20 Sauces To Boost The Flavors Of Almost Every Meal

On the culinary timeline, there is before sauce and after sauce. Just imagine what barbecue was like before its sauce was invented. The first experience of a condiment made to perfectly complement charred barbacoa must've been truly awe-inspiring for the taste buds. Fast forward to today, and the idea of eating barbecue without sauce is culinary blasphemy. Beyond BBQ, sauce is the flavorful savior for nearly every dish imaginable.

Classic combos like lemon-butter sauce on fish or Worcestershire sauce on steak will always satisfy, but the best sauces are not only tasty, they're versatile. There's nothing better than drizzling your favorite sauce over an unlikely recipe and discovering a new delicious pairing. Whether topping, spreading, or smothering, with the right sauce, there's no limit to the flavorful possibilities.

If you love sauce as much as we do, you've probably got a starting lineup of go-to flavors. But, if you're a conservative saucer, you're missing out on a whole world of savory and sweet satisfaction. Here is a list of versatile sauces that can be used for almost every meal.

If France is known for anything, it's food. The country's contributions to the culinary arts are pretty much unmatched. One classic creamy sauce from French cuisine is béarnaise, which is an offspring of hollandaise, one of the mother sauces essential to French cuisine. Béarnaise is made with butter and egg yolk, giving it a delectable consistency that's perfect for grilled meats, vegetables, and more. Taste-wise, it's herbaceous, tangy, and buttery — in other words, it's so good that you'll undoubtedly want to use it on everything. For a truly mind-altering taste-perience, you can also add tomato paste to béarnaise. Called Choron sauce or Béarnaise tomatée, it's sweeter than the OG but still as delicious and versatile.

You'd be hard-pressed to find a savory recipe that Worcestershire sauce can't elevate. Steak lovers are intimately aware of how game-changing a splash of Worcestershire can be, and steak is just one of countless foods that it pairs well with. Widely available at grocery stores, Worcestershire sauce is made using a unique blend of anchovies, molasses, tamarind, and spices. Along with topping meats, seafood, and veggies, it can be used as a marinade and even in cocktails. And those uses only scratch the surface of its delicious dynamic range. You can use Worcestershire sauce to elevate soups, burgers, morning scrambles, salad dressings, and more. Vegans needn't feel left out either, because an anchovy-less Worcestershire sauce can be made quickly and easily. 

From soy sauce to teriyaki, Japan's cuisine features a wide array of delectable recipe toppers. While it's lesser-known, mentsuyu is the versatile sauce used across many Japanese dishes. Also known as tsuyu, this umami-rich blend combines soy sauce, sugar, mirin, and kombu and katsuobushi (dried kelp and bonito flakes). If you're unfamiliar with Japanese cuisine, kombu and katsuobushi are the main ingredients in dashi, which is a family of stock bases commonly used to flavor recipes. Tsuyu is remarkably easy to make considering how delicious it is. Super customizable, ingredients are commonly swapped or added. You can use it in soups, in hot and cold noodle dishes, and more. Whatever you plan on cooking up, add a few drops of mentsuyu to the mix. 

Rich and complex, oyster sauce is a Chinese condiment that's similar to hoisin sauce, but isn't as sweet and has a thinner consistency. Like some of the most irresistible culinary creations, oyster sauce was an accidental invention. According to oyster-sauce producer Lee Kum Kee, the condiment was first discovered when a forgotten pot of boiling oyster soup was reduced to a thick gravy. When it comes to flavor, it's a sweet and salty mix of soy and fish sauce. Commonly used in many Asian cuisines, its umami punch actually works great for all sorts of dishes, like stir-fry meals, hot and cold noodle dishes, meat proteins, and also as a savory dip. And, as the name implies, it's an especially tasty seafood condiment.

Pungent, piquant, and potent, Lebanese toum is the garlic sauce you should know. It only includes five ingredients — lemon juice, olive oil, water, salt, and garlic — but when they're combined correctly, toum becomes a truly crave-worthy condiment. If you've never experienced this tangy and savory sauce, it carries a strong garlicky kick that will ward away a vampire. Toum is definitely for garlic lovers, make no mistake about it. In Lebanese cuisine, it's commonly served with pita bread, grilled chicken, shawarma, lamb skewers, kebabs, and more. Around the world, its role has been expanded to pair with all sorts of delicious recipes, ranging from burgers and pasta to roasted vegetables and soup bases. Lebanese toum is an all-around flavor provider.

Ginger is one of the most common herbs used in Chinese cooking. It's a versatile ingredient that is used in its fresh form or dried. Ginger can be infused into marinades and salad dressings, and of course, into sauces. If you enjoy flavors with a peppery flair, we recommend trying ginger scallion sauce. Light and zesty, it has the perfect balance of oil, richness, and tanginess that makes it go great with pretty much anything. The ingredients are simple: ginger root, scallions, and a neutral oil with a high smoke point for a base. With its simple ingredients, it can be stored in the fridge for weeks. Along with adding it to China's wide selection of dishes, try ginger scallion sauce on grilled pork and chicken, drizzle it atop salads, and use it as flavoring for broths.

The upside of having so many mouthwatering sauces to choose between is also a downside, because there are so many mouthwatering sauces to choose between. One lesser-known flavor bender is named after the phrase you're likely to use after trying it — yum yum sauce. A Japanese steakhouse staple, yum yum sauce is made for meats. It's a mayo-based condiment that's blended with tomato paste, rice vinegar, paprika, garlic powder, sugar, and butter. Flavor-wise, it's light, sweet, tangy, and tastes similar to creamy sweet relish. As you can imagine, yum yum sauce is an extremely versatile condiment that can elevate seafood, a burger and fries, and a whole assortment of vegetable dishes. In fact, we've got the perfect recipe to get you started: yum yum chicken sliders. 

The American South is home to many culinary wonders. From unique barbecue styles to crave-worthy Creole classics, you could spend a lifetime in the South and still not experience everything the region offers. The South is no slouch when it comes to regional sauces either, as one of its tastiest condiments hails from Mississippi. Comeback sauce was clearly made for one reason: to make you come back for more. It's an orange-colored sauce made with a mayo and ketchup base, which can be customized with Worcestershire, garlic, onion, and mustard, while chili sauce or hot sauce can also be added for heat. Tangy with a spicy kick, comeback sauce was originally made for salads, but now it's easily one of the nation's best sauces for sandwiches, dips, and chicken.

Another lip-smackingly delicious sauce from the American South is Alabama white sauce. It's a creamy and tangy culinary excursion you're going to want to take the whole family on. Alabama white sauce has a laundry list of ingredients, including mayonnaise, apple cider vinegar, brown sugar, lemon juice, Worcestershire sauce, Old Bay seasoning, stone ground mustard, horseradish, and red pepper flakes for spice, along with salt and pepper. This delectable white sauce is made for delicious deployment atop your favorite sandwiches and barbecued meats, as a dip for fries, and even for blending into coleslaw. It's simply too good to remain Alabama's secret, and fortunately, this sauce can be found at grocery stores throughout the nation. If you can't locate any nearby, fret not, because making Alabama white sauce is only a five-minute affair.

One could argue that the toasted nutty taste of brown butter is one of the best flavors ever discovered. Called beurre noir (black butter) or beurre noisette (hazelnut butter) in France, it's created by cooking butter on low heat until it melts and develops a brown color with a toasted nut flavor. Like regular butter, it can be incorporated into recipes in a multitude of ways. From baking and sautéeing to topping pasta and meats, brown butter will take even the best recipe from a 10 to a 10½. But, there's another version of brown butter that's even more appetite-whetting: tomato brown butter.

Tomatoes are the missing ingredient to life-changing brown butter, adding a tangy sweetness and lightness to its full-bodied flavor. Substitute your go-to pasta sauce with tomato-infused brown butter, or drizzle it over fresh fish, or add it to grilled meats and vegetables.