Tare Sauce

 The first thing we want to say to you about tare sauce is that once you look at the recipe you may be thinking “sweet thickened soy sauce? Isn’t this just teriyaki sauce?”  Yes, tare sauce is teriyaki sauce, but it is not the same teriyaki sauce you would find in a store.  Basic store bought teriyaki contains garlic powder, onion powder, various other spices and preservatives, and this is just basic store bought teriyaki sauce and doesn't include the dozens of flavored teriyaki sauces out there.  We will be using our tare sauce in various recipes, both by itself and with other ingredients, and we don't want or need these additional flavors to be present.

Tare Sauce
Makes about 1 cup

• 3/4 cup mirin
• 1/2 cup soy sauce (shoyu)
• 1/2 cup sake
• 1/4 cup white sugar

Combine all of the wet ingredients in a 2 cup measuring cup.  Put the sugar into a small saucepan and place on medium high heat.  Swoosh the sugar around the pan to make sure of even heating and to prevent the bottom from burning.  Once the sugar is melted and starts to caramelize remove from the heat and add the wet ingredients.  This will cause a fair amount of bubbling and the sugar will solidify, this is why a sauce pan is better than a skillet.  Return the pan to medium heat, scrape and stir in sugar to dissolve, and reduce mixture by one half.  Let cool, then use or store.

Notes: Feel free to adjust the ratios depending on your personal preference, for instance if you want it sweeter or saltier.  We used cooking sake because it is more economical and is better suited for the purpose.  If you are unable to find sake in a grocery store you can try going to a wine or liquor store.  If you are still unable to find sake you can try to substitute in a dry white wine.  If you are unable to find mirin you can try substituting a mixture of sugar; and sake, dry white wine, sherry or rice wine vinegar mixed in a 1:3 ratio.  It is also possible to purchase these ingredients online from the following links: Mirin, Soy Sauce, and Sake

We like to keep some tare sauce in the fridge and use it as a condiment like ketchup and mayonaise.  So once it cools we store ours in these squeeze bottles.  They are perfect for tare sauce because its thickness prevents it from pouring well so being able to squeeze it out is perfect, plus they don't require cleaning up utensils or anything after applying it directly to your food.

We will be using this tare sauce in various Japanese recipes that we'll share with you shortly.  But in the mean time we'd love for you to let us know your favorite thing to eat with tare sauce, whether its Japanese or not.  So leave your creative responses in the comment section below.

For further instruction we have prepared this video: