Healthy Sauces, Dressings and Toppings

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Updated on July 1, 2013

A personal arsenal of go-to Primal meals that can be cooked with little thought, time, or effort is an easy way to keep healthy eating on track. Dinner can be as basic as seasoning a steak with salt and pepper and sautéing veggies in butter. The next day that same leftover steak can show up in a bowl of greens with a little olive oil and lemon and voila! It’s a salad.

But here’s the catch – basic is a slippery slope that leads straight to boredom. Luckily, the solution is simple: Give your basic go-to meals a Primal makeover.

As you’ve been hearing lately, my newest cookbook, Primal Blueprint Healthy Sauces, Dressings & Toppings, is a guide to transforming even the simplest meal into something sensational. Your go-to meals will never be boring again with the help of over 120 recipes that make it easy to add extra flavor and nutrients with a sauce, dressing, seasoning, or topping.

But don’t wait for the book to arrive at your door – start transforming those meals now. The following recipes – Spicy Red Pepper Coconut Sauce, Pesto Vinaigrette and Oregano Mint Marinade – are bonus recipes not included in the cookbook. They prove that with a little guidance and inspiration you can make whatever you’re cooking tonight both taste better and be better for you.

Spicy Red Pepper Coconut Sauce

Spicy Red Pepper Coconut Sauce adds nutrients by blending healthy fat (coconut milk and butter) with a brightly colored, antioxidant-rich vegetable (red bell pepper). The bold flavor is an added bonus and will spice up any type of meat or seafood.

This sauce is so good you shouldn’t hesitate to pour it over an expensive grass-fed, organic steak. If that’s not in your budget, then go ahead and buy a less than ideal cut, trim the fat to get rid of unwanted omega-6s, and then add healthy fat back in with this sauce.

Servings: One cup

Time in the Kitchen: 10 minutes

Ingredients:

2 garlic cloves
1 jalapeno, seeded and chopped (or half a jalapeno, for a less spicy sauce)
4 scallions, chopped
1 tablespoon butter, melted (15 ml)
1/4 teaspoon salt (1 ml)
1 roasted red pepper
1/4 cup coconut milk (60 ml)
2 teaspoons lemon juice (10 ml)

Instructions:

Blend the garlic, jalapeno, scallions, butter, salt, and red pepper in a blender until well combined. Pour in the coconut milk and lemon juice and blend until smooth.

Serve warm or at room temperature.

Pesto Vinaigrette

There’s nothing wrong with basic vinaigrettes made from balsamic vinegar and olive oil, or olive oil and lemon. But let’s be honest. When was the last time a simple dressing like that really rocked your world?

And let’s back up a minute…there could actually be something wrong with that vinaigrette if the olive oil has been diluted or replaced entirely with soybean or canola oil. It’s almost impossible to find bottled salad dressings that aren’t made with unhealthy oils and other unwanted ingredients.

A Big Ass Salad is one of the healthiest meals around but if you pour a store-bought dressing on top of your greens, the health benefits might go right out the window. Keep your salads flavorful, interesting, and healthy by using a homemade dressing.

Fresh basil, garlic, olive oil and a drizzle of nut oil mimic the flavors of pesto in this innovative vinaigrette that will add healthy fat and memorable flavor to any salad.

Servings: One cup

Time in the Kitchen: 10 minutes

Ingredients:

2 cups loosely packed, roughly chopped fresh basil leaves (500 ml)
2 garlic cloves
1/4 teaspoon salt (1 ml)
3 tablespoons lemon juice (45 ml)
2 tablespoons macadamia or walnut oil (30 ml)
3/4 cup olive oil (175 ml)
Optional add-in: 1/3 cup grated Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese (75 ml)

Instructions:

Combine basil, garlic, salt, lemon juice, and nut oil in a food processor until finely chopped.

Scrape down the sides, then with the blade running slowly drizzle in the olive oil. After all the oil is added, process for another twenty seconds to finish.

Oregano Mint Marinade

What you’ll notice first when you whip up this marinade is how great it smells. Fresh oregano and mint, raw garlic, and drizzle of coconut oil will fill your kitchen with eye-opening aromatics.

There’s also lot going on behind the scenes in this marinade that your body will thank you for later. Marinades made with fresh herbs like oregano and mint (also rosemary, thyme, and parsley) can lower heterocyclic amines (HCAs) – known carcinogens – by up to 87%. Using coconut oil, which doesn’t easily oxidize, adds an extra layer of defense against high-heat cooking.

Steak, chicken, pork, lamb…it doesn’t matter what you’re cooking. Rub it down with this marinade first and let it rest at room temperature for just 30 minutes. The vibrant flavor of the oregano and mint will come through loud and clear.

Servings: Enough marinade for one pound of meat

Time in the Kitchen: 10 minutes, plus 30 minutes to marinate

Ingredients:

Juice of two limes
3 tablespoons liquid (melted) coconut oil (45 ml)
2 garlic cloves, finely chopped
1/2 cup loosely packed fresh oregano leaves, roughly chopped (120 ml)
1/4 cup loosely packed fresh mint leaves, roughly chopped (60 ml)
1/4 teaspoon salt (1 ml)

Instructions:

Mix all ingredients together (or instead of chopping by hand, blend the ingredients into a paste in the blender). Pour or rub the marinade into the meat. Let the meat marinate at room temperature for thirty minutes before cooking.

Grilled your meat to perfection and enjoy.

Healthy Sauces, Dressings & Toppings is Now Available!

Primal Blueprint Healthy Sauces, Dressings & Toppings is now available!

This new cookbook is all about turning ho-hum meals into Primal masterpieces with delicious and nutritious sauces, dressings, marinades, condiments, and other toppings. It includes over 120 easy-to-prepare recipes inspired by traditional and contemporary cuisine from around the world. From the staples (ketchup, mustard, hot sauce, mayonnaise) to the innovative (Blueberry Chutney, Coconut Cilantro Pesto, Avocado Lime Dressing), every recipe will enhance the nutritional value of your meal, using only Primal-approved ingredients. That means no gluten, grains, legumes, added sugar, or unhealthy oils. The recipes we developed for this cookbook have already changed the way I prepare my Primal meals. I can’t wait for it to do the same for you.

If you’re a long-time Mark’s Daily Apple reader, you know that I always do something special for devoted readers when I release a new book. To mark this occasion I’ve put together a very special bonus offer with a total value of over 1 million dollars to people that buy one or more copies (it will make the perfect holiday gift!) of the book by December 12. You can read all the details here.