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.
I don’t know what I did wrong but mine is orange and just tasted like carrots and celery….
Did you use the number of beets that is called for?
Never believed it could be this good. I added 1cup chicken broth, I used a crock pot for 2hours and added 3 Tbl. for needed acid balance.
Made this, I absolutely loved it. I made enough and froze some
I have used it to make pizzas and gluten free pastas. I have passed it on to several friends.
So happy that you loved it! Thank you so much for passing it along. 🙂
Really good flavor and texture! It was a bit too beet colored for my liking- I added about a cup of beets and it came out really purply red. Next time I’ll try adding about half a cup of beets to get a more orange-red color like tomato sauce.
Hello!
I’m super excited to make this recipe as I really miss marinara sauce so much. I’m craving lasagna and am hoping to use this sauce for that. How many ounces does this recipe yield?
Thank you!
Melanie
About 48 fluid ounces!
Hello. How long can this sauce be stored? Does it freeze well?
It freezes well! I love to have some in my freezer to pull out for different recipes!
Have you fermented this so it can last longer in the frig, and have the added benefit of probiotics?
I’ve never tried that and I’m not sure if it would work. I always just freeze it!
Hi and thank you,
I have hope for this recipe. I gave up nightshades about four years ago. Just bought a gut supplement that I read over and thought was nightshade free, but got sick, my daughter just got married so I thought I came down with a bug. Then, the aha moment. I looked up the ingredients I wasn’t familiar with. Yup a nightshade.
I am diabetic, allergic to tree nuts, tannins and then nightshades. (at this moment I am having a very short pity party) Finding this and making it this evening, sigh, well, I am greatly hoping, because I love marinara sauce, one of my favorite foods that I still make from scratch for my part italian husband.
Anyway, just needed a moment to vent and say thank you.
I really hope you love it, Laura!!
I’m currently paleo, nightshade free and low fodmap, so I didn’t include the garlic or onion… BUT this is the best no tomato marinara sauce there is. I highly recommend!!! Thank you so so much for this. It’s definitely a staple item in my fridge/freezer from now on.
Thank you for this recipe! My teen daughter, who has a night shade allergy, was overjoyed to have pasta and nomato sauce the other night. It had been several years. She made fresh mozzarella sticks with nomato marinara last night. Tomatoes were her favorite food. This allergy has proven difficult.
This sauce freezes well; however, it does not can well. It can be canned safely, but it turns the rich red marinara into an unappealing green mush. The taste is still pleasant, but found the garlic or a spice became bitter.
There is potato flour in many ingredients, such as shredded cheese, pizza crust, gummies etc. Paprika is in almost every processed food for color; mozzarella sticks, salad dressings, sausage, vitamins, crackers etc. She cannot risk going out to eat. Food starch, spices and natural flavors are disguises for night shade ingredients.
I’m allergic to celery. Is there anything to sub for that or could I adjust the recipe to leave that out?
You can try to leave it out and maybe add some extra onion!
Delicious! I only used a cup of this to make the sloppy joe recipe so I’ll be freezing the rest to have on hand!
Due to an unknown condition causing acid reflux, tomatoes and bell peppers are temporarily out of the picture. So, craving a nice bean chili, I made a batch of this. And – it tastes like tomato sauce! It’s so trippy how close it is! I left out the Italian seasonings so that I can season it later (half for chili, half for I don’t know yet, it made 50 ounces!). Looking forward to having some unboring food again!
This is an amazing recipe. Seriously! I was eating out of a bowl like a soup. Lol! Then I ate it on zoodles. I’m so happy to have this ! I can’t thank you enough
Thank you so much, Paula!!
Great basic recipe. Personally, I find carrots a bit too sweet in the final product even with lemon juice added. I replaced about half to 3/4 of the carrots with pumpkin. The less sweet variety the better. In the fall when the jack o lantern style pumpkin are cheap. buy them , quarter them, roast them in the oven and the skin fall off easily when cooked. I put them in a food processor and freeze them in silicone muffin cup. Once frozen, pop them out in ziplock freezer bags. Now you have single serve ! I use this for my nomato sauce with carrots and beets. I also added cooked cranberries (for tartness) and a bit of balsamic vinegar / or red wine vinegar in the final product. I got the idea of cranberries from a popular commercial jarred expensive nomato sauce using tart cherries which are not available in my region.I suspect i will use butternut squash once the pumpkin is no longer available.