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Traditional Sweet and Sour Sauce has a lot of sugar. But, it is undoubtedly one of the most delicious Chinese take-out sauce options. So, I challenged myself to recreate the flavors using keto-friendly and low-carb substitutes. This Keto Sweet and Sour Sauce recipe is the result of several rounds of trial and error! Serve it on shrimp or another protein for the perfect homemade take-out meal.
Why I Made a Keto-Friendly, Low-carb Option
I am a huge fan of Chinese take-out. In fact, I love it so much that I wrote an entire blog post about keto Chinese Food recipes.
However, most of my favorite Chinese take-out dishes contain a lot of brown sugar. To make cutting carbs easier, I needed to learn to make my own version.
After lots of searching, I could not find any recipes that I liked. So, I started experimenting until I developed a sticky, sweet, and tart version that my family and I enjoyed.
Ingredients for the Sauce
This recipe includes many keto pantry staples. Specifically, you have:
- Keto Brown Sugar
- Choczero Honest Syrup, Caramel
- Sriracha
- Apple Cider Vinegar
- Soy sauce or Coconut Aminos
- No Sugar Added Ketchup
- Xanthan Gum
How to Make Low-Carb Sweet and Sour Sauce
This sauce is super easy to make in four steps:
- Add all of the ingredients except for the Xanthan gum into a saucepan.
- Whisk the ingredients and heat the pan to medium heat.
- Cook the sauce for 5 minutes, stirring occasionally.
- Whisk in the Xanthan gum and continue to cook for about 5 minutes more. The sauce will thicken and be similar to a syrup.
Cooking Tips, Substitutions & Variations
After making this dish a few times, here are my top cooking tips:
- ACV: I am using apple cider vinegar. You can use unseasoned rice vinegar instead if that is what you have on-hand.
- Mild Heat: I like the mild heat that Sriracha offers, but you can start with one tablespoon if you’d like. I will say though that the sauce seems spicier before it gets added to the vegetables and protein.
- Xanthan gum helps the sauce become sticky, so be sure to include it in this recipe. A little goes a long way, and it will allow this Keto Sweet and Sour sauce to have the right texture when compared to the original.
- Keto Brown Sugar: Be sure to use a brown sugar substitute instead of keto white sugar. I have tried it with both, and find that brown sugar adds complexity and richness that keto white sugar lacks.
- Soy-Free Option: You can substitute coconut aminos for soy sauce. The end result tastes the same to me.
What to Enjoy This Sauce With
You can make a meal with this as I did in Keto Sweet and Sour Shrimp by adding vegetables and pairing this with my keto cauliflower fried rice.
You can also enjoy this as a dipping sauce or topping with:
- Air Fryer Salmon
- Oven-Fried Chicken Wings
- Pan-Seared Halibut
- Bacon-Wrapped Cola BBQ Chicken Kebabs – just use this instead of the BBQ sauce!
- 4 Spice Chicken Breast
- Easy Grilled Chicken Kabobs
Keto Sweet and Sour Sauce
Use DRDAVINAHS at checkout to save on some equipment & ingredients!
Recommended Equipment
Ingredients
- ⅓ cup Keto Brown Sugar Replacement
- ¼ cup Honest Syrup, Caramel - use DRDAVINAHS for 10% off!
- 3 tbsp Sriracha Sauce, you can start with 1 tablespoon and add more to taste
- 3 tbsp Apple Cider Vinegar
- 1 tbsp Soy Sauce, reduced-sodium or coconut aminos
- 2 tbsp No Sugar Added Ketchup
- ¼ tsp Xanthan Gum
Instructions
- Add all of the ingredients except for the Xanthan gum into a saucepan.
- Whisk the sauce ingredients with a rubber whisk and heat the pan to medium heat
- Cook for 5 minutes. Stirring occasionally.
- Whisk in the Xanthan gum slowly (that helps prevent it from clumping) and continue to cook for about 5 minutes more. The sauce will thicken and be similar to a syrup.
Nutrition Details
The nutrition facts come from entering the recipe ingredients into Spoonacular API, a database of food ingredients. They may vary for any recipe based on the exact product used. The keto sweeteners I use have 0g net carbs & are not included because sugar alcohols do not impact most people. This is provided as a courtesy, but you can do your own calculations if you wish!
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