This easy homemade tartar sauce recipe is so much better than anything you can buy at the store. It’s extra creamy, packed with flavor, and you can make it in 5 minutes.
I’ve always been disappointed with bland, store-bought tartar sauce, which is why we created this recipe. It has a tangy, fresh flavor that is perfect for all your favorite seafood dishes.
A big bowl of this homemade tartar sauce is a must-have whenever we’re making poached salmon, homemade fish sticks, or my favorite crab cakes. Once you try it, you’ll never go back to the jarred stuff again.
Key Ingredients
- Mayonnaise: This forms the creamy base of the sauce. You can use your favorite store-bought brand or, for the best result, try making your own mayonnaise. While I prefer full-fat mayo for its richness, you can substitute it with light mayo or plain yogurt for a lower-calorie option.
- Pickles: Chopped pickles add essential crunch and flavor. We love using homemade pickles or the refrigerated kind, but bread and butter or sweet pickles also work if you prefer a sweeter sauce.
- Lemon Juice: Freshly squeezed lemon juice is so important. It adds a zesty, fresh flavor and thins the sauce to the perfect consistency.
- Capers: Roughly chopped capers add texture and a briny flavor that truly makes this sauce incredible. They are one of the reasons our homemade sauce tastes so much better than what’s sold at the store.
- Dill: Both fresh and dried dill work well here and are a must for that classic tartar sauce flavor. If you don’t have dill, fresh parsley is a great alternative. For another sauce with dill, try this dill sauce for salmon (although, it’s lovely with most seafood dishes).
- Dijon Mustard: A little Dijon mustard adds extra tang and flavor. Trust me, don’t skip this one!
- Worcestershire Sauce: A small dash of Worcestershire sauce might seem unusual, but it brings all the flavors together beautifully. We use this same trick for many of our dressings and sauces, including our homemade ranch dressing.
Find the full recipe with measurements below.
How to Make the Best Homemade Tartar Sauce
If you can chop and stir a few ingredients together, you can make this tartar sauce. I’ve always been disappointed with store-bought versions, so after borrowing a few tips from our favorite seafood restaurants, we devised a recipe of our own. I’ve never looked back.
Tip 1: Chop everything nice and small. Take a moment to chop your pickles, capers, and fresh dill finely. This guarantees that every dip or drizzle of sauce delivers a full impact of flavor.
Tip 2: Let it sit before serving. After making this recipe so many times, we’ve noticed that this sauce gets even better with a bit of time in the fridge. So, if you have the time, after stirring your sauce ingredients together, slide it into the fridge and leave it for at least 15 minutes. This gives all the flavors time to mingle. Trust me, this small step makes a big difference in the final flavor!
What to Serve with Tartar Sauce
We are a big tartar sauce family, and we enjoy this sauce with so much more than just seafood. That said, we love this sauce next to classic seafood recipes like homemade fish sticks, garlic caper baked salmon, shrimp cocktail, and these Maryland-style crab cakes.
Beyond seafood, this sauce is also incredible with popcorn chicken, baked French fries, sweet potato fries, and our rosemary potato wedges. For more homemade sauces, see our homemade ketchup or this creamy honey mustard sauce. And, if you are a seafood lover like me, you might want to save this classic mignonette for the next time you have oysters!
Best Homemade Tartar Sauce
- PREP
- TOTAL
I love this tartar sauce recipe so much! I’ve always been disappointed with store-bought tartar sauce, so I was so excited when we figured out a way to make it at home. When I have it in my fridge, I love using homemade mayonnaise for this recipe. For an egg-free option, substitute the mayonnaise for vegan mayo.
Watch Us Make the Recipe
You Will Need
½ cup (113g) mayonnaise, try homemade mayonnaise
1 small dill pickle, chopped very small (3 tablespoons)
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice, plus more to taste
1 tablespoon capers, chopped, optional, but recommended
1 tablespoon chopped fresh dill or 1 teaspoon dried dill
½ teaspoon Dijon mustard
½ to 1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
Salt and fresh ground black pepper
Directions
1Make the sauce: In a small bowl, stir together the mayonnaise, pickles, lemon juice, capers, dill, mustard, and Worcestershire sauce until the mixture is well blended and creamy. Season with a pinch of salt and pepper, then taste and adjust the seasonings as needed.
2Refrigerate for 15 minutes (optional): For the best flavor, cover the bowl and refrigerate for 15 minutes before serving. This time in the fridge allows all the flavors to mingle and makes a big difference in the final taste.
Adam and Joanne's Tips
- Storing: Homemade tartar sauce lasts for about a week when stored in an airtight container in the fridge. The fresh flavor from the lemon starts to fade after that, so we recommend enjoying it within the week. Our family loves it, so we often make a double batch to have it on hand!
- The nutrition facts provided below are estimates.
I made this tonite and used dill pickle relish chopped. Also added about a tsp of honey to counter act the tartness of the capers, lemon juice and dill pickles. It turned out fantastic
Really great taste and easy to mix up for a simple tartar sauce! Wish the option to save as pin or share as email actually worked.
Made this in a few minutes and much much better than store bought Tartare Sauce, everyone loved it, don’t think will buy the premade version from now on as is so quick and easy and so much better.
Had everything I needed, even the capers. I loved my chip shop’s sauce but their fish and chips with this sauce puts me at a crawl to the bed. You should be ashamed at how good this is!
Can I use pepperoncini peppers instead of dill pickle
Absolutely. We have tried that before and it is delicious if you love pepperoncini’s.
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Had to go out and buy more fish because I didn’t want to waste any of this sauce! Better than many store bought brands. Definitely a keeper.
I made a huge bowl of this for our Church’s Fish Fry. We used pickle relish instead and left out the capers. Everyone was raving about how good it was!
I did the tartar sauce. Delicious. Thank you for sharing
You are so welcome! Glad you loved it 🙂
I can’t do seafood, but this is awesome with deep-fried mushrooms or onion rings.
I rarely leave comments about recipes, but wow, this is delicious! Far superior than anything store-bought, and so easy. Anyone who cooks fairly frequently will have all the ingredients around. Thanks for posting.
We love this! So easy to make and store bought is no comparison!!
thats my favourite ceechyna song!!
Simply amazing, this is a keeper. I made this to serve with fish finger sandwiches and it was such a great addition. Totally recommend!
goes good more using as a refresher as u cant get good i used english mustard insted gave it a tad of a bite but tastes great
How long does it last in fridge please? If it’s not eaten already of course!
It should last for about a week when stored in an airtight container in the fridge. If it lasts that long 🙂
This Recipe worked! We had it with fish and chips ( although did use store-bought mayo). Made with my own naturally fermented gherkins and it hit the spot.
Just had this with wild salmon and WOW! Only variation here was adding a few drops of lemon oil. It’s a Total Keeper! Thank you!!!
Delicious. That’s all I need to say. Absolutely delicious.
This was delicious!! Made it exactly except used dill pickle relish. We used it for deep fried shrimp (yum). I will use this sauce for any seafood! Thank you.
Have made this good tartar sauce a few times, 1st time made as directions called for; 2nd and after added some finely chopped white Onion, let it sit to blend in fridge until dinner. Great tartar sauce.
I love this sauce after it sits, too. Love your addition of onion.
Made this up this morning. Oh my! It’s amazing and it hasn’t had a chance to meld yet. No need for salt or pepper or more lemon. It was perfect as is. Will taste again before we use it to make sure, though. Thanks for the recipe!
Made crab cakes for the first time and used this sauce. My son is obsessed with the sauce! Will definitely make again!
First time seeing your website and tried the Tartar Sauce. Wow, what a great recipe.
Delicious. We were pan frying pickerel and I discovered we were out of our usual brand of store bought tartar sauce. So glad we were! I started with a more basic tartar sauce recipe I found online but I was looking for some zip, so I found this one and adapted the other (essentially the same ingredients as this minus the capers, worchestershire sauce and dijon). What a difference! I will always make this from now on – bye bye store bought – and for any fussy family members, and I now know that eliminating the capers, worchestershire sauce and dijon makes a lovely mild version.
Growing up in Houston, the best tarter sauce was made using capers so I was spoiled from day 1! This is a great recipe ! I do add finely chopped onion to mine. Try it if you like onion ! Thanks so much for publishing this!
Super easy and delicious, it was kind of spur of the moment thing, you know where you make fish and want tartar sauce and realize well you don’t have any. I had all the ingredients on hand except capers. I made it exactly as it said. DELICIOUS is all I can keep saying.
Wow!! Even my picky-eater son said, Thats good!. We love it! Didn’t have capers, to use and still loved it!!
It was good, however the pickles were quite a distraction for us. IMHO…otherwise, good!
Maybe pickles are more of a personal preference. Next time, try leaving them out and let us know what you think. Thanks for coming back!
BEST EVER! Super fast and easy, even someone who does not like making stuff can make this. It comes out exactly like a restaurant. Far superior to any other recipe. I think the capers and the mustard are what make all the difference. Bookmarked and will be used from here on out!
This tartar sauce recipe is the best thing ever! I’ve never made by scratch before and now I won’t have it any other way. The only thing I added was two crushed cloves of garlic and now it’s perfect! Thank you for sharing the recipe
Quick and simple recipe that is oh so yummy!
I am generally not a fan of tartar sauce but made this for my lady to go with our fried cod fingers. I tasted this after making it and was surprised to learn that I do like tartar sauce…….at least this one. Excellent!
I’m not one to leave a lot of reviews but I have to say that this is by far, the absolute best tartar sauce! Coming from someone as picky as I am…it really is saying a lot.
Try adding some chopped Kalamata olives. Delicious!
I have been making this sauce for years. It’s perfect every time and so quick to make.