Yum Yum Sauce

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The famous Japanese steakhouse sauce that’s phenomenal for dipping, drizzling and enjoying with your grilled meats, seafood, vegetables, rice, noodles and more!  This homemade Yum Yum Sauce recipe is super quick and easy to make and tastes at least a hundred times better than store-bought, and without any junk ingredients!

One of our favorite places to go for date night is our local Japanese steakhouse for a hibachi grill dinner.  Todd usually gets his standard, sushi, while I enjoy sampling the grilled chicken, vegetables, rice and noodles….all drizzled with the deservedly popular sweet and slightly tangy Japanese steakhouse sauce known affectionately as “Yum Yum Sauce.”  Here’s my homemade yum yum sauce that captures the flavor you know and love! And as with most condiments, you can buy this sauce in the store but let me tell you, NOTHING beats the flavor of homemade! Making your own gives you full control over what goes in it (and what stays out), enables you to customize the flavors, it’s cheaper, and tastes SO much better!

What is Yum Yum Sauce?

While this sauce is referred to as a Japanese steakhouse sauce, you won’t find it in restaurants in Japan because it is an American invention.  But it is a key component to the Japanese restaurant experience in the United States and Canada.  It’s uncertain who was the first chef to invent it but chef Terry Ho is credited with being the first to bottle and mass produce it.  He had been serving it at his Casual Japanese restaurant and it become so popular that he jumped on the opportunity to bottle it and make it commercially available.

This Japanese-American is also known as white sauce, shrimp sauce, hibachi sauce and yummy sauce.  But whichever name you know it by the consensus is that it is indeed YUMMY!  No Japanese steakhouse meal is complete without it – whether drizzled on grilled chicken, fried rice and noodles, vegetables and as a dipping sauce for shrimp, potstickers and sushi, it’s simply delicious!

Yum Yum Sauce Ingredients

My sweet and tangy yum yum sauce is made with the following ingredients:

• Mayonnaise – this is the base ingredient that provides the foundational creamy flavor.
• Rice vinegar – adds a nice bit of tang.
• Sugar – balances the acidity from the vinegar and mayonnaise.
• Butter – adds flavor and a smooth texture.
• Paprika – adds a touch of zestiness and color.
• Ketchup – adds a touch of fruity sweetness and color.
• Garlic and Onion powder – enhances the flavor and adds a dose of umami.
• Mirin – adds a sweet and tangy complexity.

Most of these ingredients are standard but every Japanese chef uses different own ratios and some include their own special touches, so feel free to experiment.  We recently had the BEST hibachi sauce ever at our local Japanese steakhouse.  I asked the chef and he revealed his secret addition: Mirin.  It adds flavor and complexity and I’m including it in my recipe.  Mirin is Japanese sweet rice wine used for cooking.  It’s similar to sake but is sweeter and has a lower alcohol content.  If you don’t have access to mirin you can substitute a dry sherry or white wine mixed with 1 teaspoon of sugar.  If you don’t have those either, simply omit it.  It will still taste yummy!

Variations

• Smoky Sauce:  Add a generous pinch of smoked paprika.
• Spicy Sauce:  Add a pinch of cayenne pepper or a dash of your favorite hot sauce.
• Sweet and Spicy Sauce:  If you want to add a little heat while bumping up the sweetness even further, add some Sweet Chili Sauce (another one of my favorite homemade sauces).
• Redder Sauce:  Yum yum sauce is typically a very pale pink in color.  In fact, it’s sometimes called “white sauce.”  But if you’ve got your heart set on a darker red color, simply add a little more ketchup and/or paprika.

Yum Yum Sauce Recipe

Let’s get started!

Place all of the ingredients in a small bowl, stir to thoroughly combine, cover and chill for at least 2 hours before using.  For best flavor results let it chill overnight to give the flavors more time to meld.  Store in an airtight jar in the fridge and it will keep for up to a week.

That’s it!  It’s ready to serve and I’m confident you’ll agree that it rivals your favorite hibachi restaurant yum yum sauce!

How to Use Yum Yum Sauce 

This sauce is extremely versatile and the flavors pair will a wide variety of foods.  It’s similar to what’s known in the U.S. as “Fry Sauce” (mayonnaise and ketchup) but with additional ingredients that give it a far more interesting flavor.  You could consider it fry sauce on flavor steroids!  Here are a few ways to use yum yum sauce:

• As a dipping sauce for shrimp, crab cakes, and fish cakes
• Drizzled over fried rice and noodles
• With grilled chicken, meat and seafood
• With fried green tomatoes
• Slathered on hamburgers and hot dogs
• With oven baked French fries, sweet potato fries, baked potato wedges or baked potatoes
• As a dipping sauce for potstickers and wontons
• As a vegetable dip
• With sushi and rice balls
• In macaroni salad or classic potato salad
• As a salad dressing (just add a tablespoon or two of milk to thin it out)

Can This Be Made in Advance?

Absolutely, in fact it’s recommended for the best flavor.  At minimum it should be made 2 hours in advance but a day in advance is better.  It will keep for up to a week in the fridge.

For more delicious homemade Asian sauces be sure to try my:

• Teriyaki Sauce
• Sweet and Sour Sauce
• Eel Sauce
• Black Bean Sauce
• Plum Sauce 
• Kecap Manis
• Sweet Chili Sauce
• Ponzu Sauce
• Char Siu Sauce
• Ginger Sauce

Originally published on The Daring Gourmet June 19, 2020