Help! DIY sauce and condiment recipes using only fresh ingredients (allergy issues)
Everyone in the family has allergies or food issues, although not all the same ones, and it makes finding sauces and condiments we can use, commercially, difficult if not impossible. Heck, I'm just happy I have a salt we can use! (literally, one of the family allergens is to a bleaching agent used to make most salt white. o.0)
If anyone has any great DIY sauces or condiments that they make that they'd like to share the recipe for, that use fresh ingredients, I would be forever grateful!! Especially soy sauce...if someone has a way to make homemade soy sauce, without the use of OTHER sauces, I would love you forever!
I am not sure if anyone even has recipes like this, honestly. :-( Sauce recipes that don't use OTHER sauces, or processed food, to make them, have been hard to find, as I mentioned. But it seems that most of the flavor for these sauces tends to be from all the ingredients, we can't use, you know?
Like if it's a veggie, fruit, unprocessed meat, eggs, or fresh herb, we can use it. I could probably find a way to cope with something with plain, raw nuts, some seeds, or beans, in a pinch (have to track down expensive allergen free varieties, basically). A couple of us can tolerate vinegar. But...that's really about it. No pre-made sauces, no condiments, problems with most grains, no dried spices (WE can dry, but other spices have contamination issues), no flavored nuts.
Anything anyone could offer would be hugely appreciated!
If anyone has any great DIY sauces or condiments that they make that they'd like to share the recipe for, that use fresh ingredients, I would be forever grateful!! Especially soy sauce...if someone has a way to make homemade soy sauce, without the use of OTHER sauces, I would love you forever!
I am not sure if anyone even has recipes like this, honestly. :-( Sauce recipes that don't use OTHER sauces, or processed food, to make them, have been hard to find, as I mentioned. But it seems that most of the flavor for these sauces tends to be from all the ingredients, we can't use, you know?
Like if it's a veggie, fruit, unprocessed meat, eggs, or fresh herb, we can use it. I could probably find a way to cope with something with plain, raw nuts, some seeds, or beans, in a pinch (have to track down expensive allergen free varieties, basically). A couple of us can tolerate vinegar. But...that's really about it. No pre-made sauces, no condiments, problems with most grains, no dried spices (WE can dry, but other spices have contamination issues), no flavored nuts.
Anything anyone could offer would be hugely appreciated!
0
Replies
-
Yup, what do you mean by fresh ingredients? And what sauces/condiments are you specifically looking for?
Soy sauce is basically soybeans, koji (mold), water and salt. I've made it before. It's not that hard but there's a lot of waiting involved as it goes through fermentation. It takes about a year. It wasn't worth the hassle but I have access to a lot of variety (type and quality) of soy sauce. I don't have the recipe anymore, but this link url="https://thethingswellmake.com/how-to-make-soy-sauce-homemade-shoyu/"]click[/url looks similar.
I've made home-made ketchup before, but it uses tomato paste as the base. I just googled and there are recipes out there using fresh tomatoes.0 -
Are butter, sour cream, and yogurt "fresh" ingredients by your definition, or do you need recipes starting with cream and milk to make those?
Is commercially bottled olive oil "fresh," you could make your own mayo and mayo-based condiments starting with oil and eggs? What about commercially bottled vinegar?
0 -
Define "fresh" ingredients.
Pretty much what I mentioned as what we can use: vegetables, fruits, uncured meats, eggs, fresh herbs. I guess I'd add on fresh mushrooms, and anything we can get as fresh roots, like ginger and turmeric root and galangal. In addition to fresh ingredients, could do raw, plain nuts or dried beans or seeds, sometimes (I have to track down sources, but they exist for a lot of these). vinegar can be used for some of us, too. Honey can be used for some of us.
Oh! I did forget to mention that there IS an oil we can use, although we have olive trees so heck, if that oil failed we could make our own oil, too, at this point.
Right now, recipes for a lot of our foods that we can all have are pretty labor intensive. I mean, I have had to make apple cider vinegar from scratch for one of us to get vinegar, and it took a couple months for that sucker. I tracked down fully green, unripe mangos and ground small dried peelings of it to make a kind of amchoor powder for Indian-style dishes. I juice apples and boil down the juice to make it into a sweetener for one of us. I've literally considered trying to grow a tree to just get cinnamon from and a caper bush for capers.
So...that's the level of labor I'm potentially expecting, you know? But it's hard to find recipes that have a lot of labor, but with, I dunno, ingredients more like what our great grandparents might have used. And it ends up with foods that we can eat, certainly, they just....taste crappy.
Just hoping some folks might have some ideas or recipes that I could use as a starting point so the family can have better tasting food.
0 -
Have you tried liquid aminos instead of soy sauce? It is still soybean-based, but isn't fermented and doesn't contain gluten if that's where the allergen issues are.0
-
Yup, what do you mean by fresh ingredients? And what sauces/condiments are you specifically looking for?
Soy sauce is basically soybeans, koji (mold), water and salt. I've made it before. It's not that hard but there's a lot of waiting involved as it goes through fermentation. It takes about a year. It wasn't worth the hassle but I have access to a lot of variety (type and quality) of soy sauce. I don't have the recipe anymore, but this link url="https://thethingswellmake.com/how-to-make-soy-sauce-homemade-shoyu/"]click[/url looks similar.
I've made home-made ketchup before, but it uses tomato paste as the base. I just googled and there are recipes out there using fresh tomatoes.
Ooh, thank you for the soy sauce link! That will be very helpful!
Fresh ingredients - pretty much anything that is not preserved, dried, or gone through processing more than chopping it up. Maybe taking off a shell, for some nuts. But we can do veggies, fruits, uncured meats, fresh herbs, eggs, and fungus like mushrooms or roots like turmeric or galangal. Sometimes we can do raw nuts, or dried beans, or seeds - the reason I don't use these much is because we have to find safe sources that aren't contaminated with our allergens, and it's very expensive (like, the one source I know of for safe nuts starts at about $13 a pound for the cheapest nut they have). Some of us can use a vinegar, some can use honey - but not all, so I try to find recipes that don't use those, if I can.
The biggest issue is that in the family, there are allergies and reactions to some really common agents used in drying, as anti-fungals or preservatives, anti-bacterials, and so on. Then we have allergies to some ingredients that are so common they typically contaminate huge swaths of processed foods. So most dried things or processed things end up being unsafe for at least one person in the family. In the past, I literally made about 3 different meals for each meal time, but making 9 meals a day gets a bit old, both in time AND money, know what I mean?
But NOT doing that, which is what I've been trying recently, ends up with, well, really boring food, once we are eliminating all the allergens for all the family. :-( So I'm really trying to find safe ways to add flavor.
So, for sauces or condiments - quite literally ANY of them. Traditional American ones like ketchup or mustard, or traditional ones for any other country in the world. I literally don't care, as long as it's not bland and adds flavor. :-)
0 -
So you can make mayo (it's a lot less labor intensive than the things you describe -- at its most basic, it's just drizzling oil into beaten egg yolk while whisking (or preferably in a blender or food processor), although it may taste better with the addition of small amounts of lemon juice, salt, and finely ground mustard seed (if you grow mustard greens and let them go to seed and then let the seeds dry, that doesn't sound too labor intensive compared to other stuff you do).
It sounds like you don't do dairy at all?0 -
Khmer lime and pepper sauce. Only ingredients are lime juice, lots of freshly ground black pepper, salt and sugar. Delicious on steak and fish.
https://maknao.wordpress.com/2010/06/28/cambodian black pepper dip/
Toum is a lebanese garlic sauce containing vegetable oil, garlic, lemon and water.
https://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2018/01/toum.html
Alioli is garlic mayo containing egg yolks, olive oil, garlic and lemon
http://spanishsabores.com/2018/02/17/easy-spanish-alioli-recipe-homemade-garlic-mayonnaise/
You can also google homemade ketchup. If prepared vinegar is an issue use lemon juice instead.2 -
Google recipes for chimchurri, pesto (or pistou if parmesan cheeese is an issue), romesco sauces. For romesco roast your own peppers instead getting peeled peppers from jars.1
-
You could probably experiment with chimichurri recipes and come up with a couple different varieties that could be used to flavor meats and veggies.
We make all our own sauces and spice blends (although we can use dried spices and that sort of thing) because DH is allergic to onion powder, which is in everything. Typically I just find a recipe that sounds good and leave out what he can't have. I also can't eat soy but like a lot of the recipes that call for soy sauce, so I've used soy-free soy sauce recipes before, and again just substitute or leave out items we can't have.
So, in your case, you could find a chimichurri recipe and just leave out vinegar or whatever it might call for that you can't use. Sauces are usually flavorful enough that you won't notice when one thing is missing.0 -
lynn_glenmont wrote: »Are butter, sour cream, and yogurt "fresh" ingredients by your definition, or do you need recipes starting with cream and milk to make those?
Is commercially bottled olive oil "fresh," you could make your own mayo and mayo-based condiments starting with oil and eggs? What about commercially bottled vinegar?
...
So you can make mayo (it's a lot less labor intensive than the things you describe -- at its most basic, it's just drizzling oil into beaten egg yolk while whisking (or preferably in a blender or food processor), although it may taste better with the addition of small amounts of lemon juice, salt, and finely ground mustard seed (if you grow mustard greens and let them go to seed and then let the seeds dry, that doesn't sound too labor intensive compared to other stuff you do).
It sounds like you don't do dairy at all?
Oh, sorry I missed your previous reply! :-)
Mayo, yes, I think I have all the ingredients we can do (I have mustard greens I do grow just for the seeds, LOL, so that would work. Do the same for coriander. ^_^). I was trying to remember why I have not done mayo before - does one have to use raw eggs, or is it cooked? We could probably track down some safe raw eggs, for the folks in the house that can use them. Thanks!
Dairy - we don't do much. Half the family can't eat dairy, while only one member of the family has issues with eggs. But I DO have some family that can do dairy - they can do plain yogurt or milk or butter (those two are less sensitive, so I can even buy it sometimes, woo hoo), so if you have any dairy ideas, I'd be happy to check them out!
0 -
Khmer lime and pepper sauce. Only ingredients are lime juice, lots of freshly ground black pepper, salt and sugar. Delicious on steak and fish.
https://maknao.wordpress.com/2010/06/28/cambodian black pepper dip/
Toum is a lebanese garlic sauce containing vegetable oil, garlic, lemon and water.
https://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2018/01/toum.html
Alioli is garlic mayo containing egg yolks, olive oil, garlic and lemon
http://spanishsabores.com/2018/02/17/easy-spanish-alioli-recipe-homemade-garlic-mayonnaise/
You can also google homemade ketchup. If prepared vinegar is an issue use lemon juice instead.
Oooh, some of these look awesome, thank you! I had not heard of Khmer and Toum. I bet I could use a couple substitutions for the khmer to be workable and the Toum would be good as-is, as well as the aioli. Thanks! :-)0 -
Google recipes for chimchurri, pesto (or pistou if parmesan cheeese is an issue), romesco sauces. For romesco roast your own peppers instead getting peeled peppers from jars.
Thank you for the new sauce names! :-) We sometimes make herb pestos with home grown pine nuts and herbs, but have not used romesco sauce at all. totally peel our own peppers, so that works great. Thank you again!
Sometimes, it's just knowing the names of what to look for that make it so difficult, but with the names like this, it will be much easier to track down things to use. Seriously, thank you. My family will be happy to have more flavor, heh.0 -
If the dairy problem is lactose intolerance, they might be able to eat most cheeses and yoghurt, as the bacteria that made the yoghurt/cheese has already digested the lactose.0
-
Also some thai red/yellow/green curry paste recipes start with only fresh ingredients. This one for example only has fish sauce as a processed ingredient that you could replace with salt.
https://www.deliciousmagazine.co.uk/recipes/thai-red-curry-paste/0 -
no1racefan1 wrote: »You could probably experiment with chimichurri recipes and come up with a couple different varieties that could be used to flavor meats and veggies.
We make all our own sauces and spice blends (although we can use dried spices and that sort of thing) because DH is allergic to onion powder, which is in everything. Typically I just find a recipe that sounds good and leave out what he can't have. I also can't eat soy but like a lot of the recipes that call for soy sauce, so I've used soy-free soy sauce recipes before, and again just substitute or leave out items we can't have.
So, in your case, you could find a chimichurri recipe and just leave out vinegar or whatever it might call for that you can't use. Sauces are usually flavorful enough that you won't notice when one thing is missing.
The chimichurri recipes sound interesting, I'm so glad you and acpgee mentioned them.
And sympathy on the onion powder - one of the family has an allium allergy and we've run into that issue, so I feel ya! It's frustrating because I try to dry my own spices, but so many times, the really fun spices (like cumin), I haven't been able to grow and can't really find a good substitute for umami.
Would you mind sharing some of your spice blends you use? If I can grow it and dry it, I might be able to replicate at least a little. :-) We live in an area where it has mild winters, so we can sometimes pull off even tropical herbs, if I jury rig a mini-greenhouse.
What soy free soy sauce recipes have you found? We have a soy free family member too, but all i can seem to find are coconut aminos, and they're allergic to coconut, too, argh.
0 -
Similar to South American chimchurri is Italian Gremolato.
https://www.feastingathome.com/gremolata-recipe/0 -
I would have a look at Whole30 recipes. All of them are made from scratch using fresh ingredients. Sunshine sauce, stirfry, tomato sauce, bbq sauce, mayo, aoli ect0
-
-
Also some thai red/yellow/green curry paste recipes start with only fresh ingredients. This one for example only has fish sauce as a processed ingredient that you could replace with salt.
https://www.deliciousmagazine.co.uk/recipes/thai-red-curry-paste/
Ooh, I might be able to do that! I was going to grow some cumin and cilantro for the seeds this year again, so this looks potentially doable, thanks!!
And Italian Gremolata I had never heard of, i'll check it out. :-)
Thank you so much for all your ideas; they have helped a lot!0 -
Love_2_Hike wrote: »I would have a look at Whole30 recipes. All of them are made from scratch using fresh ingredients. Sunshine sauce, stirfry, tomato sauce, bbq sauce, mayo, aoli ect
Oh, I hadn't even thought of that! I will totally be checking it out!0
Categories
- All Categories
- 1.4M Health, Wellness and Goals
- 391.3K Introduce Yourself
- 43.4K Getting Started
- 259.7K Health and Weight Loss
- 175.6K Food and Nutrition
- 47.3K Recipes
- 232.3K Fitness and Exercise
- 387 Sleep, Mindfulness and Overall Wellness
- 6.4K Goal: Maintaining Weight
- 8.5K Goal: Gaining Weight and Body Building
- 152.7K Motivation and Support
- 7.8K Challenges
- 1.3K Debate Club
- 96.4K Chit-Chat
- 2.5K Fun and Games
- 3.2K MyFitnessPal Information
- 22 News and Announcements
- 901 Feature Suggestions and Ideas
- 2.2K MyFitnessPal Tech Support Questions