Homemade teriyaki sauce takes less than 5 minutes to prepare, and this recipe makes a truly authentic Japanese teriyaki widely used in Japanese cuisine.
It's often used for grilling meats but can be used as a condiment or dipping sauce for dumplings, rice paper rolls, or baked chicken breast.
One of my favourite ways to use it is to make this bacon wrapped pork tenderloin glazed with teriyaki.
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What is teriyaki?
The word teriyaki refers to the cooking method of glazing food several times while grilling or broiling. "yaki" means to grill or broil and, "teri", means to shine. An effect is achieved through the caramelization of the sugars in the sauce.
Teriyaki sauce is a mixture of soy sauce, mirin, ginger, and sugar. It gets thickened into a viscous sauce, which is then used to glaze meat, fish, or vegetables, while they are cooking on the grill or under the broiler.
The combination of sweet and salty is something we find in most Asian dishes, especially in Japanese and Chinese Cuisine.
Why make your own?
There is a huge advantage when you make your own teriyaki sauce. You get to control the sweetness, saltiness, ginger, quality of ingredients, and also consistency.
Importance of soy sauce and mirin
Soy sauce or "shoyu" in Japanese, forms the base of this sauce. True soy sauce is naturally fermented for many months in a huge wooden container called a "kioki".
Koji rice is blended with water, soybeans, roasted wheat berries, and salt. This mash is then fermented for a long period of time, up to 2 years. The koji has powerful enzymes that break down proteins into amino acids over time.
Resulting in an umami-rich sauce that forms the basis for many Japanese sauces.
Mirin is a sweet fermented rice wine. Also produced by fermentation over a much shorter but still lengthy time frame. About 2 months.
Both soy sauce and mirin are essential for making authentic teriyaki sauce.
Ingredients
- Soy sauce - Use a naturally brewed good quality dark soy sauce. It will have a deeper richer flavor. Kikkoman is a good brand.
- Sugar - Brown sugar is best, but you can also use regular white sugar or make a honey teriyaki sauce by substituting the sugar with honey.
- Mirin - Mirin is best, but if you can't find it, use a semisweet white wine.
- Ginger - I used naturally dried ginger that I made and ground myself. If you can't find good-quality dried or powdered ginger, then use fresh ginger instead. Garlic is not required.
- Thickener - I used cornstarch, but you can use any other thickener, like potato or tapioca starch instead.
- Msg(optional) - I like to use an extra bit of msg depending on what I will use it for or how intense my soy sauce is. I make my own soy sauce and it takes a long time to mature, so sometimes it needs a little extra msg.
Instructions
- Weigh out your ingredients and put everything apart from the cornstarch and water in the pan. If you are thickening it with xanthan, then simply add the xanthan gum and blend it up till thickened.
- Otherwise, make a slurry by mixing the cornstarch and water.
- Bring the rest of the ingredients to a simmer while whisking.
- Add the slurry while you keep whisking until the sauce thickens.
- You should now have a wonderfully sweet, salty, and gingery sauce. Store in an airtight container in the fridge until you are ready to use it.
If you use fresh ginger, then make sure to chop the ginger up as fine as humanly possible. Or, blend the sauce in a blender until smooth.
Small bits of unblended ginger will burn when grilling, so make sure it's as smooth as possible.
Serving suggestions
Teriyaki is best for grilling and broiling, but can be used in other ways.
- Stir fry - You can use it as a finishing sauce when making any type of stir fry. Just make sure to let it down with a bit of water. Otherwise, it might be too gloopy, thick, and concentrated. Try this duck stir-fry and use a splash of teriyaki.
- Meat - Glaze meats like pork belly on the fire, pork tenderloin wrapped in bacon, or chicken in any shape or form. Glaze this oven-roasted chicken breast for spectacular results. If you want to cook amazing steak from cheap cuts like bavette steak, then this is one of the sauces you want in your repertoire. Alternative meat cuts have an intense flavor and do well when glazed with a sweet-salty, umami-rich sauce.
- Vegetables - Substitute the sweet miso in this Japanese baked eggplant dish for teriyaki instead. You can also get amazing flavor when roasting broccoli or bok choy and then deglazing the pan last minute with this sauce.
- Fish - Finish baked salmon, yellowtail, or seared tuna in the oven by glazing or brushing it onto whole grilled fish.
- With raw food - Similar to using soy sauce for sushi. You can use it as a dipping sauce for sashimi, seared raw meat, or as a healthy vegan snack with crudités.
Pro tip
If you want to make a really stable and professional version, then use a tiny amount of Xanthan gum to stabilize the sauce.
Xanthan gum is a naturally produced thickener/ stabilizer that involves the fermentation of sugars.
Teriyaki sticks better to food when xanthan gum is used. Especially with foods on skewers or foods that release a lot of water while cooking.
Xanthan gum can be found on the health food shelves in most supermarkets. Otherwise, ordering it online is a breeze.
For this recipe, a small pinch or ½g will do the job well.
Frequently asked questions
Yes, it works great as a marinade for chicken, fish, or beef. Let your meat sit in the marinade for about 6 hours, then cook as you wish.
Seal airtight and store in the fridge for up to 12 months or longer. It can also be frozen.
Useful equipment
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Recipe
Homemade Authentic Japanese Teriyaki Sauce
Ingredients
- 120 g (½ cups) soy sauce - naturally brewed if possible
- 90 g (⅖ cups) brown sugar
- 2 g (1 teaspoon) good quality ground ginger or 6g freshly chopped
- 100 g (3/7 cups) water
- 40 g (2 ⅔ tablespoon) mirin or semi-sweet white wine
- 18 g (6 teaspoon) cornstarch or ½g xanthan gum
Instructions
- Weigh out your ingredients and put everything apart from the cornstarch and water in the pan. If you are thickening it with xanthan then simply add the xanthan gum and blend it up till thickened.
- Otherwise, make a slurry by mixing the cornstarch and water.
- Bring the rest of the ingredients to a simmer while whisking.
- Add the slurry while you keep whisking until the sauce thickens.
- You should now have a wonderfully sweet, salty and gingery sauce. Store in an airtight container in the fridge until you are ready to use it.
Notes
- If you use fresh ginger then make sure to chop the ginger up as finely as humanly possible or give the sauce a blend when it's done. Small bits of unblended ginger will burn when grilling so make sure it's as smooth as possible.
- Store in the fridge airtight for many months. No need to freeze.
- Traditional teriyaki does not contain garlic in any form.
- Make sure the sauce is nice and thick so that it sticks to whatever you are glazing with it.
- Serve with vegetables, chicken, pork, beef or shrimps.
Michelle says
Fantastic recipe and very easy to follow.
Moth says
Saving the recipe, thanks.
Geneva says
This was the perfect combination for the teriyaki sauce that I was looking for. Thank you!
Charlé Visser says
You're welcome!
Kim.W says
This recipe makes a very authentic teriyaki glaze. I thickened it a bit more because I vegetables that was a bit watery.
Natt says
Hi,
In several recipes I have read I saw that cornstarch is not used everywhere . Do you know why?
And also I have a question about using a garlic. In your recipe I don't see it, but almost every recipe has it.
I don't mean to be rude, but I'm just driven by curiosity.
Thanks in advance for your answer.
Charlé says
Hi Natt, Not at all.
Teriyaki is traditionally not made with garlic but rather ginger. Some recipes and brands add both. I suppose it’s up to the consumer to pick their own version. As far as thickening goes, the most common and well known of Asian sauce thickeners is cornstarch.
Thickening is not an essential step but it does help the ingredient getting glazed on the barbecue or in the oven hold on to the glaze better and in return it forms a thin shiny caramelised crust without having to brush it a million times.
Un-tickened teriyaki would require you to almost continuously brush or glaze the ingredient you are cooking.
As for specifically cornstarch, I use it in this recipe because everyone knows what it is and can easily source it.
It can also be thickened with a wide range of other thickeners. My favourite being xanthan gum. You can find it in pastry shops, online, and in the health foods section in large supermarkets.
Hope that helps.
Natt says
Hi,
thank you! Your answer helped me so much! I usually don't use any thickeners to make teriyaki sauce and as you said - I always have to glaze everything a milion times. But you know, it is a pleasant work somehow. 🙂 And also I'm sure I will try make it with this xantan gum. I have it and until now I couldn't find a proper application for it.
Thank you again! Have a nice day!
Charlé says
You're welcome!
Jeneen says
Any idea what the shelf life for this teriyaki sauce is?
Charlé says
Nearly forever if you keep it sealed and only use sterilised utensils.
Anonymous says
Awesome, thank you!
Barbara says
I grate the ginger with a fine grater then squeeze the juice out for adding. The leftovers can be reused in ginger tea
Great recipe. Thank you