Dipping sauces are the ultimate camouflage for bland or mediocre food or the perfect complement to quality share plates and snacks.
Some of us may only like one or two (there’s always a family member that only puts ketchup on things) types of different sauces, while some of us like to explore all manner of different flavors.
The list below examines my favorite dipping sauces, and why they are so much fun to incorporate into different snacks and meals. Add the new ones to your list, and give them a try when you have the chance. I think you’ll be surpsried at how great they can taste.
1. Hot Sauce
I know that choosing a good hot sauce is often a deeply personal, highly emotional choice, so rather than just give you one option to go with, there’s 15 you can try here in my ode to the best hot sauces!
2. Homemade French Fry Dipping Sauce
I must dip my fries in something. A plain fry, while essentially good, becomes something else entirely with the right sauce. Who needs ketchup when you can make this highly dippable hoamemade Homemade French Fry Sauce instead?
3. Char Siu Sauce
You know that yummy sweet red sauce that goes on to your BBQ pork and duck at the Chinese restaurant? The sauce is called char siu and it’s equally amazing as a dipping sauce (that you might want to pour on) for dumplings, pork buns, spring rolls, and dim sum.
Char siu is sweet and thick, equally at home for dunking or glazing all those wonderful meat and vegetables flavors, and surprisingly delicious with chicken nuggets too!
4. Ketchup
I understand some people find ketchup boring and unimaginative, yet it’s one of the most versatile condiments. Ketchup transforms some foods from good to great – such as the Aussie meat pie – while masking the blandness of others altogether. Ketchup is also essential in my house. It’s a dipping sauce that often keeps my kids from a meltdown when they get hangry. Whenever we go away for a night or more as a family, there’s always a bottle of tomato ketchup along for the ride.
5. Soy Sauce
I’m a big soy sauce guy, but not to the same degree my wife enjoys it (Katie puts it on Thai food, to my bewilderment).
Either by itself or alongside a few added spices, soy sauce adds that salty/umami (savory) goodness that ensures a snack or meal gets the added spark it may need to taste that little bit more amazing.
6. Homemade Chik-Fil-A Sauce
As much as I like to go out to eat, I also like to recreate some of my restaurant or fast-food favorites at home. If I can make Chik-Fil-A Sauce at home, then it’s going to make my own chicken taste even better! This simple and delicious Homemade Chik-Fil-A sauce means you can have that Chik-Fil-A flavor whenever you want.
7. BBQ Sauce
While not quite as widespread (or is that ‘wide-dipped’) as ketchup, there’s a bit more pizzazz in the different incarnations of BBQ sauce. For dipping, I prefer it rich and tangy, but if I had to choose the version I like the best for every situation, then it must be thickly sweet, lightly smoky hickory BBQ sauce.
8. Mustard
I have about ten different mustard brands in my kitchen and they all get a workout for various foods and snacks, as it’s versatile for use on a whole range of flavors. Mustard even works well with sushi, a happy accident that I found when I’d run out of soy sauce and wasabi packs in my office stash.
Yellow mustard goes on hot dogs only, but the others – wholegrain, Dijon, and hot English especially – all work brilliantly for different dipping sauces and dressings.
9. Aioli
I always thought aioli was just a fancy way to say mayo, but apparently, they’re made differently (garlic and olive oil for aioli; egg yolk and canola for mayo) despite tasting creamily close on the tongue.
As a garlic and olive oil fan, that explains why I tend to favor aioli, which is a useful dipping sauce for everything from fresh seafood to fries and fried chicken. I’ve found that balancing out Aoili’s creaminess with another flavor or level of hotness, makes it taste better in bigger amounts, otherwise, it’s dainty dipping for me.
10. Sour Cream
Some may mutter that sour cream is not a sauce! You’d be absolutely right (it’s a dairy product), but it’s going on the list anyway.
Why?
Because wedges are why. If your delightfully crisp and filling potato wedges don’t come with sour cream, then they aren’t going to be any good. Sour cream is also great with Mexican Food, Doritos, Takis, and Asian potato chips with the giant shrimp on the packet.
11. Sweet Chilli Sauce
There are two types of sweet chilli sauce. Authentic Thai chilli sauce, and the rest.
Authentic Thai chilli sauce is deliciously thick and sweet, until the chilli hits and you cough in confusion, because your brain is tricked into thinking it’s not supposed to be that hot. Thai sweet chilli is a legitimate hot sauce cloaked in a sweet, cheerful disguise.
Western sweet chilli sauce is cruisy by comparison as it’s most often warm and well balanced on the tongue. Some brands have started ratcheting up the heat or diversifying the flavor somewhat, but simple is best!
12. Ranch Dressing
I didn’t understand the American obsession with ranch dressing until I realized how versatile the flavors are. I may have thought it was just a mayonnaise clone, but I was very clearly wrong. Creamy and flavorsome, Ranch works equally well at tamping down the heat of hot wings or laded fries, while also adding a delicious component to salad dishes and seafood.
13. Brown Sauce (HP Sauce)
These days there’s plenty of different brown sauce varieties, but the original HP Sauce still tops the lot.
You’d be hard-pressed to find an English household that doesn’t keep a bottle in the pantry. Brown sauce is like mash up of tomato and barbecue sauce – rich sweetness with a tangy taste – but with a little hint of Worcestershire sauce thrown in for good measure. Just like ketchup and barbecue sauce, brown sauce works well with most things, although personally, I love it as a complement to bacon and eggs.
Conclusion
While I’m certain you’ve tried most of these dipping sauces before, there’s at least one or two that you may not have used in the past. Give them a go with your snacks or share plates and see if they become a fixture in your pantry.