Gluten-Free Asian Dipping Sauce

Hi! I’m back with a gluten-free Asian dipping sauce recipe for June’s 12 Months of Dim Sum recipe. I know I said I’d make a dish each month but I thought it was important to make sure that there will be an emphasis on at least one dipping sauce. For my family, dipping sauces from sweet and spicy chili oil to plain ol’ light soy sauce complete our dim sum meals. It would be a real shame to make quite a bit of dim sum but not really have a fall-back recipe for a simple dipping sauce! This gluten-free Asian dipping sauce also happens to be versatile.

In some of my 12 Months of Dim Sum recipes like my vegan potstickers with ginger scallion tofu, I simply share a dipping sauce of light soy sauce, white vinegar and chili oil with a ratio of 3:2:1.

Today’s gluten-free Asian dipping sauce recipe is a special one as I’ve recently been trying to reduce my gluten intake for health reasons. I hope this recipe helps out other Filipinos as it’s a known fact that diabetes is a prevalent problem among our ethnic group. Diabetes runs in my Filipino family and a big part of why I struggle with my health is that I do tend to eat a good amount of refined carbs from white rice to wheat noodles to flour tortillas. I have no intention of giving up those foods either but I do think having alternative options are good.

Also, having multiple loved ones with real intolerances to gluten due to celiac or some other underlying cause is inspiring me to want to be more inclusive in my recipes.

If you are interested in this gluten-free Asian dipping sauce recipe but have no gluten-intolerance and/or no gluten-free tamari on hand, feel free to substitute with light soy sauce. The taste isn’t too different but it’s still just as good.

So here we are. I would use this gluten-free Asian dipping sauce for my jiaozi and siomai. If I ever put up a gyoza recipe, I’d use it for that too especially since I use gluten-free tamari. But I’d also drizzle it on my mushroom congee if I wanted to enhance the natural umami flavor of the mushrooms…not that this sauce wouldn’t have its own tasty flavor!

It’s a simple recipe: three parts gluten-free tamari (check the bottle to make sure it’s gluten-free), two parts distilled white vinegar and one part Chinese chili oil. It’s okay to use store-bought chili oil with or without the pepper flake sediment but I like to use homemade chili oil if I have the extra time.

All we do is carefully mix it together and it’s instantly ready. Of course letting it sit makes it better as the flavors marry but this is also easy to put together in a pinch as a tasty accompaniment to your Asian dish.

12 Months of Dim Sum Recipes:

January 2021: Vegan Siomai

February 2021: Instant Pot Congee

March 2021: Vegan Potstickers with Ginger Scallion Tofu

April 2021: Crispy Golden Fried Tofu

May 2021: Toasted Cumin Scallion Pancakes

June 2021: Gluten-Free Asian Dipping Sauce

July 2021: Sweet Red Bean Paste and Perfectly Golden Sesame Balls

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