Easy Romesco Sauce
Easy Romesco Sauce – a rich, smoky, and utterly moreish Spanish classic that’s ridiculously easy to make! Traditionally from Catalonia, this bold red sauce is packed with roasted red peppers, nuts, garlic, olive oil, and a touch of sherry vinegar for the perfect balance of smoky, tangy, and nutty flavours.
This is such a great sauce and so easy to make! It’s tangy, sweet, smoky, savoury, and punchy – perfect for a dinner party when you want to wow your guests. Kids love it too, I’ve noticed! For example, served with these chicken parmesan meatballs – absolute yum!
I love how versatile Romesco sauce is – you can drizzle it over grilled vegetables, serve it as a dip, spread it on sandwiches, or even toss it with pasta for a quick and flavourful meal. This version is super simple, made with pantry-friendly ingredients but still delivers that authentic, deep, and slightly smoky taste.
If you have a bit of time, you can roast your own paprikas (peppers) for an extra layer of flavour, but jarred roasted peppers work just as well and make this recipe even quicker. I used roasted red peppers, toasted almonds for richness, and a hint of smoked paprika to bring out the deep, warm notes. Garlic and sherry vinegar add a punchy contrast, while a good-quality olive oil ties everything together into a velvety, spoonable sauce. Some recipes use bread to thicken it, but I prefer to keep it naturally creamy with just nuts. A quick blitz in the blender, and that’s it – Easy Romesco Sauce ready in minutes!
Serve it as a dip with crusty bread, alongside grilled fish or meat, or spoon it over roasted cauliflower and asparagus for a plant-based delight. However you use it, this sauce is guaranteed to be a staple in your kitchen!
Why You’ll Love This Recipe:
✔️ Quick & Easy – Made in just minutes with simple ingredients.
✔️ Smoky & Tangy – A perfect balance of bold Spanish flavours.
✔️ Super Versatile – Use it as a dip, spread, or sauce.
✔️ Naturally Vegan & Gluten-Free – A delicious option for all diets.
✔️ Meal Prep Friendly – Keeps well in the fridge for up to a week.
Once you try this Easy Romesco Sauce (inspired by Rick Stein), you’ll be finding excuses to drizzle it over everything – it’s that good!
Easy Romesco Sauce
(1 votes, average: 5.00 out of 5)
Loading...Elevate your dishes with Easy Romesco Sauce! Discover this quick recipe packed with roasted red peppers and garlic.
Ingredients
- Option 1: 2 Fresh red peppers
- Option 2: 1 jar of roasted red peppers, drained
- Rest of the ingredients
- ½ cup raw almonds - unsalted (see notes)
- 1 medium sized tomato
- 1 small white onion, or half a bigger onion, ± 2 tbsp
- 2 cloves garlic, peeled
- 1 tbsp sherry vinegar or red wine vinegar
- 1 tsp smoked paprika
- ½ tsp sea salt, to taste
- ¼ tsp cayenne pepper or pinch of chili flakes or both (to taste)
- ½ cup extra-virgin olive oil
Instructions
Option 1: Fresh red peppers
I like to roast my peppers on the gast stove, I lay them directly on the hub and let the flames burn, blacken and roast the peppers on all sides, turning in between using tongs. Don't worry it doesn't really get messy!
Once blackened add the peppers to a sealable plastic food container and let it steam for 15 minutes, this will help the skin come off easier.
Remove from the container and scrape the blackened skin of the peppers, remove the seeds and stem and roughly chop.
Continue with the rest of the recipe in the next steps.
Option 2: Jarred peppers
Drain the peppers and roughly chop.
Continue with the rest of the recipe in the next steps.
Making the sauce
Add all the ingredients, except the olive oil, into a blender (either with the jarred peppers or your own roasted ones) and give it a few pulses.
Once the ingredients are mostly blended, start drizzling in the olive oil while running the blender.
Continue to blend until you get your desired consistency, I like mine a little chunky, but feel free to blend until smoother.
Taste and season to your liking.
Serve straight away, but it will keep for up to a week in an airtight container in the fridge.
Notes
You can substitute the almonds with pine nuts, walnuts or cashew nuts, works great too!
