Homemade Teriyaki Sauce with Honey

Here's a homemade sauce that's so good that you'll never buy it again because it's so easy to make!

Jump to:

• ❤️ Why you'll love it
• 🧾 Ingredients
• 🔪 Instructions
• 🥫 Storage
• 📖 Variations
• 💭 Things to know
• 👩‍🍳 FAQs
• 📚 Related recipes
• 🍽️ Serve with...
• 🥄 Restless Chipotle recommends
• 📞 The last word
• Homemade Honey Teriyaki Sauce
• 💬 Comments

❤️ Why you'll love it

• Homemade teriyaki sauce easy to make with simple ingredients you've probably already got on hand.
• It tastes way better than the commercial kind.
• You'll never worry about having to run to the store mid-recipe again.

This sauce is an important ingredient in so many delicious dishes! It's a delicious marinade for meat or poultry (think teriyaki chicken), excellent as a stir fry sauce, and a delicious dipping sauce for potstickers!

Let me warn you, though. Once you try this homemade teriyaki sauce recipe you'll never go back to the store bought kind.

It's the perfect combination of savory-salty-sweet flavor!

🧾 Ingredients

🔪 Instructions

1. Add the soy sauce, 1 cup of water, brown sugar, honey, ginger, garlic, and onion to a small saucepan. Bring to a boil and simmer for 2 - 3 minutes.
2. Dissolve cornstarch in a small bowl with the ¼ cup cold water, whisking to make a cornstarch slurry.
3. Stir it into the simmering soy sauce mixture.
4. Cook until thickened. Let come to room temperature and pour into a storage container and refrigerate.

🥫 Storage

Put in an airtight container (a pint sized glass Mason jar works great). Store up to a week in the refrigerator.

I wouldn't suggest freezing it because it has a tendency to get watery and separate because of the cornstarch.

📖 Variations

• Use pineapple juice or orange juice for part of the water to give it even more flavor.
• I like to use both brown sugar and honey to sweeten this easy sauce but you can use all brown sugar or all honey if you wish.
• Add some crushed red peppers for a little heat.
• For an extra thick teriyaki sauce add a bit more cornstarch.
• Sometimes I add just a teaspoon of sesame oil, or drizzle of smoked sesame oil or chile sesame oil for even more flavor.
• This versatile sauce is great with pork chops, too.

💭 Things to know

Expert Tip: Don't let it boil or overheat it. Simmer for about 2 -3 minutes. If you cook too long the mixture will break and get very thin and watery again.

• If you need a gluten-free option be sure to look for a gluten free soy sauce.
• If you'd like a sweeter sauce you can add a bit more sugar or honey. Vary the amount of honey to your own tastes.
• White sugar gives the homemade sauce a bit more of a delicate flavor than the brown sugar.
• I prefer ground ginger to fresh ginger. If you want to use fresh you'll need about a teaspoon and a half of freshly grated ginger.
• You can substitute about ½ teaspoon of garlic powder for the fresh garlic.
• Adjust the saltiness to your own tastes by using low sodium soy sauce to lower it or regular soy sauce for a saltier teriyaki sauce.
• Marinate chicken in your homemade teriyaki sauce and then grill chicken. Brush on a little more teriyaki during grilling to create a shiny glaze.

👩‍🍳 FAQs

📚 Related recipes

You can make all kinds of pantry basics right at home! They save time and money plus they are usually much more flavorful!

This Red Robin Copycat Campfire Sauce is another homemade condiment to add to your recipe file! It's so good with french fries or burgers.

🍽️ Serve with...

Brush this simple honey teriyaki sauce on burgers, roasts, or chicken. It's also good on grilled pineapple!

I use this in my favorite slow cooker pineapple teriyaki chicken recipe.

🥄 Restless Chipotle recommends

The following are affiliate links. We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites.

• soy sauce
• brown sugar
• honey
• ginger
• onion
• garlic
• cornstarch
• saucepan
• whisk

📞 The last word

I learned my lesson during Covid 2020.

I, like Scarlett O'Hara, raised a tired fist to the sky and exclaimed, "I'll never be without bread, sauce of any kind, or toilet paper again!"

Now, I haven't yet learned to make toilet paper but as far as homemade versions of the commercial products I buy?

Y'all, it's not that deep.

This homemade teriyaki sauce is absolutely delicious in any recipe that you'd use the commercial kind in. It's also one of the easiest homemade sauces to make!

You'll just need a few pantry staples.

It's less expensive, has more flavor, and if you go to the grocery stores and the teriyaki shelves are bare?

You'll smile to yourself and head home, confident in your abilities to recreate an even better version.

Add this simple sauce to any recipe that calls for teriyaki sauce. You'll love it!

If you click on the number of servings in the recipe card you can adjust the measurements up or down for the exact number of servings you need. Don't forget that you can click on "add to collection" to save it to your own, private recipe box!

If you love this recipe please give it 5 stars! ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

First published August 24, 2021. Last updated January 25, 2023 for editorial corrections.