The Best Nightshade Free Marinara Sauce (AIP, Instant Pot)
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This sauce is a nightshade-free marinara sauce that’s made without tomatoes! It’s AIP compliant, as well as Whole30, Paleo, and sugar-free.
If you were to ask me what my favorite food was when I was a kid, I probably would’ve said pizza and pasta. I mean, can you blame me? Who doesn’t love pizza? I grew up in New York in a Jewish/Italian American family, and my dad always used to joke that spaghetti sauce ran through the veins, and thus, mine.
That’s why my heart completely dropped when I first came to terms with my nightshade intolerance at 20 years old. No ketchup? No Caprese salad? No pizza?!
I went about nine months being nightshade free before I was eventually able to discover the glory of red sauce without tomatoes. Wait, what? How?! It’s a veggie-rich sauce made to taste like tomato sauce, but without the tomatoes. SCORE. Over the years, I’ve perfected my own version. It’s just the right flavor and consistency, and it’s made quickly and easily in the Instant Pot. You’re serious about 20 minutes away from having nightshade-free tomato sauce right now.
The Best Nightshade Free Marinara Sauce
The Ingredients You’ll Need For the Nightshade Free Marinara Sauce
Carrots
Carrots are the main veggie in this dish. They have a pretty neutral flavor and their color adds some of the red tint to the sauce.
Beets
This is the main veggie in the sauce that gives it its red color. I know some people don’t love beets, but really
Onion and garlic
These add a ton of flavor to the sauce. Technically, you can leave out the garlic, but you’ll miss a lot of the flavor.
Celery
Another crucial vegetable in this sauce.
Basil, parsley, and oregano
Lemon juice
Lemon juice adds that acidity that tomatoes naturally have without being overly vinegary. I just don’t love the taste of apple cider vinegar in this sauce, but you can use that as well.
The Appliances
The Instant Pot
If you don’t have an Instant Pot yet, I highly recommend it. It’s a safer pressure cooker that also has a slow cooker function, steam function, satuee function, and more. It’s saved me hours in the kitchen and can cook pretty much anything. I’ve included instructions to make this without an instant pot. However, it will more than double the cooking time, so seriously… this thing is life changing.
Vitamix
The Vitamix is one of my favorite kitchen appliances. It just blends so well, and the damper insert is perfect for making chunky sauces like this nice and smooth. You can use other high speed blenders as well!
Some things to consider…
I would not make any swaps rather than what may be noted in the section above.
All of the ingredients listed should be used as is to get a great product.
Your flavor will often vary depending on the veggies you have at the time.
Something that I’ve learned from cooking with real food ingredients (especially vegetables) is that you don’t get that identical product like you would with processed food. The flavor of every carrot is going to be a little bit different, some beets are stronger than others, and sometimes your basil is a bit milder… that’s okay! I’m used to my sauce always tasting just a tad different depending on the ingredients, the season, etc. so if it doesn’t taste identical each time, that doesn’t mean you did anything wrong!
What to pair this sauce with…
Compliant pasta
If you’re AIP, pair this sauce with spaghetti squash or zoodles! If you’re not AIP and can tolerate something like rice pasta or chickpea pasta (which are pictured in the picture above) go for it!
The following AIP recipes…
AIP Nightshade Free Marinara Sauce
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Ingredients
- 1 tbsp olive oil, sub avocado oil
- 2 cloves garlic, minced
- 1 white onion, diced
- 2 ½ cup carrots, chopped
- 1 ¼ cups celery, about 4 stalks, chopped
- 1 ¼ cup beet, chopped
- 1 tbsp fresh basil
- 1 tsp oregano
- 2 tsp parsley
- 1 tsp sea salt
- 1 cup water
- 2 tbsp lemon juice
Instructions
- Add the olive oil to the base of the instant pot and set to saute.
- Saute the onions and garlic for 2 minutes, before adding in the carrots, beets and celery. Saute for 5 minutes, stirring frequently. Press cancel to turn off the saute function.
- Pour in the water and lemon juice and add the seasonings. Stir to combine.
- Lock the lid onto the instant pot and flip the the pressure release valve to closed. Press "manual" (it will default to high pressure" and use the "+" button to set the time to 14 minutes. Allow the instant pot to come to pressure and the sauce to cook.
- Once the sauce has finished, carefully release the pressure valve. Once depressurized, remove the lid and allow for the sauce to cool before blending it in a Vitamix or high speed blender until smooth.
- Season further to taste and enjoy!
Notes
- To adapt for the stove, use a large, deep sauce pot to saute the garlic and onion on low heat in olive oil until softened. Add the remainder of the veggies and saute for a few minutes. Add about 1-1.5 cups of water to the pot (just enough to cover the veggies) along with the herbs and bring to a simmer for about 30 minutes or until the veggies are completely softened. Allow to cool. Pour off some of the water if a thicker sauce is desired. Combine all of the of the veggies and seasonings with the lemon juice in a blender and blend until smooth.
- The pasta in the background of the pictures is GF chickpea pasta, and is not AIP or paleo. See suggestions above for more options for what to pair this sauce with.
- All nutrition information is an estimation and will vary.
This is the best Nomato type sauce I’ve made to date! I added 10 kalamata olives as well (was mentioned in other reviews). I felt that the sauce was perhaps too thick and added a little water (I shouldn’t have!) The recipe is great and my husband really enjoyed it (he’s the no tomato person in our household). Thanks for sharing your recipe!
So glad that you liked it!!
I am blown away! My house smells like i am making marinara. This sauce is delicious. You just saved me from a life time of crying over my loss of tomatoes. I actually got tears in my eyes when i tasted it. From the bottom of this Italian girls heart, thank you for sharing this recipe!
Would this work with beet powder instead of rroasted beer? Maybe 1 tsp. Per beet ??
I would stick with the whole beets for the texture of the sauce as well 🙂
I agree whole beets for texture and specially roasted brings out the flavor you need as sauce.
This was really awesome! I was very surprised actually! Nice colour and flavour 🙂
Yay! Thank you so much, Shonna!!
I was nervous making this because it was my first time trying to make a nomato sauce, but the recipe is really foolproof! It makes a delicious sauce that really does taste exactly like tomato sauce. I used a whole large beet, so the color was a little more purple than pictured, and the beet flavor was a little stronger than the carrot. Definitely don’t skimp on the seasonings, garlic or lemon juice! I added the juice of a whole lemon and way more Italian seasoning and fresh basil than I thought I would, but taste testing the puree helped me make sure it would taste the way I wanted it. I used it in a GF baked ziti and you couldn’t tell the difference with real tomato sauce (other than the beets staining my pasta purple)!
Thank you for the recipe. I shared it with my sister who decided to roast her veggies before making them into the sauce. Lucky me, she gifted me a pint. For breakfast the other day, I sauteed chopped onions and zucchini. When they were softened, I stirred in about 1/4 cup of the nomato sauce, along with a shake of Middle Eastern 7 spice blend. I slid the mixture around and made room to cook eggs in the bare areas. It was so good, I don’t plan on using my nomato sauce for pasta – just eggs! Roasting the veggies really ramped up the flavor.
I haven’t made this yet but love the idea as I also miss tomato sauce. My question is this: are the vegetables cooked before you put them in the instant pot? Seems like the pressure would cook them but can’t find it in the comments.
The ingredients are all raw going into the instant pot 🙂
I was skeptical, because I actually despise celery and carrots and am not a fan of beets. (In addition to gluten and tomato allergies, I’m hugely picky lol), but I trusted all the comments and gave it a go. Mine turned out a lot chunkier than yours, because we used an immersion blender to blend it instead, and I actually really like the texture. It’s the same texture as a jarred tomato sauce. The taste is amazing, too. It’s a little carrot-y, but not enough to be like ‘oh wow that’s carrots,’ if that makes sense. If told what’s off about it, people then say ‘oh yeah, carrots are the base, that makes sense,’ but otherwise they just assume its tomato sauce with maybe some bland cheese in it, based on the color and smell.
We did two batches, and for the second batch we doubled it and increased the beet ratio against the carrots and it turned out slightly redder and slightly less carroty. We also added a full tablespoon of minced garlic to that one, rather than the two teaspoons, mostly because I love garlic. Delicious. I am very excited to have spaghetti again.
We did go ahead and try canning it. We canned it in pints and added a tablespoon of lemon juice to each jar before pressuring it just to get the acid up. My dad was concerned with it not having tomato there wasn’t enough acid. Every jar sealed, but all the sauce turned green. (Apparently this is a thing carrots do when the PH changes). I haven’t opened a can yet to eat, but I’ll report back if it turns out bad. I don’t anticipate it being a problem, however. According to my research green carrots are fine to eat and don’t taste different.
So glad you enjoyed!!
I thoroughly enjoyed making this recipe. The texture and taste is just like tomato sauce, and went well with roasted veggies and fried ground turkey on top of gluten-free pasta. What a marvel! Thanks for sharing!
This was the first AIP and Nomato recipe I tried and it deserves an Award!!! I’ve made 4 batches over the last 4 weeks! That’s how good it is! Before finding out about Nomato sauce, I wasn’t very happy with the tomato-based sauces I made – something seemed to be missing. So I’m very happy to have this! It’s yummy as-is or with cooked ground meat added afterwards. Even my roommate who was hesitant to try it at first now says I’m not making enough of it! We’re addicted!
I swear I feel better, too. Thank you so much for sharing it!
In addition to the many foods I am sensitive to, my husband gave up tomatoes 2 years ago and we have all missed tomato sauce. Made this tonight and it was really delicious. A little sweeter than tomato sauce but still, it had a tomato-like flavor. Unfortunately, I paired it with ground turkey which I don’t really like to begin with – won’t do that again! I used only about 1/2 of and will use the other 1/2 for gluten free pizza! Thanks so much for this creative and flavorful recipe. Oh, and I had no parsley so I subbed about 1/2 tsp dried tarragon and it seemed to work well.
Did you use canned beets? I bought fresh beets for this recipe. Do you think it’ll still work?
Yes, I use fresh, raw beets for the recipe!
I’m a believer ! I’ve held off on “nomato” sauces , thinking there’s no way it would match up. Well I stand corrected. Sooo good. Thanks for sharing !
Thank you so much!!
LOVE this recipe!! So easy to make and can be used in so many meals! Thank you!
This turned out great, and I am making plans to keep a stash of it in my freezer! I first tried nomato sauce by buying a jar of it, but it was just OK – something I could eat but not something I really enjoyed eating. Then I decided to try this recipe, and it is delicious! I was nervous about whether I would like it because of the beets, but if my sauce is ready before my noodles, I have to tell myself not to eat the sauce yet.