Easy Homemade Ketchup – no sugar added, low-carb, keto
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If you’d like to make your own homemade ketchup but it sounds like too much work, you are going to love this recipe. This Easy Homemade Ketchup Recipe tastes great, takes only five minutes to whip up, and not heating up the kitchen at all!
With this no-cook ketchup recipe, you can ditch the HCFS, loads of sugar, and suspicious “natural flavors” of the store-bought ketchup brands without spending a load of time!
Yes, today I’m sharing a Homemade Ketchup Recipe with you, and it’s so simple, you aren’t going to believe your eyes.
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Making Favorite Foods Healthier
Since we’ve been on a candida diet, I’ve worked hard and remade some of our favorite foods into sugar-free alternatives.
We’ve ended up with some great recipes like my Homemade Chocolate Chips, Dairy-Free Ice Cream, Homemade Jello, Gummy Candy, and Homemade Marshmallows, plus Homemade Unrefined Powdered Sugar and more.
This Homemade Ketchup Recipe, however, has been one of the better additions to our repertoire of processed food re-dos.
Partially because we love ketchup so much, but also because it is just so simple.
Why You Need this Recipe
If you’ve ever checked out homemade ketchup recipes on the internet, you know what I mean by them taking too. much. time.
The majority of ketchup recipes have you blending tomatoes or tomato paste with a bunch of spices and simmering for a looooong time. And then sometimes you have to put the spices in a little spice bag and simmer that way.
If I can avoid things like “little spice bags” tied up with string and lots of simmering and still get a good product, I’m all for it.
That’s just the life of a busy whole foodie mama, you know?
I need simple recipes like this.
Why Make Homemade Ketchup
The main reason to make your own Homemade Ketchup is to have control over the ingredients. And you’ll save money too since organic, healthier, or low-carb varieties can super pricey.
Even organic varieties of store bought ketchup have loads of sugar in them. Since we’re all on a low-to-no-sugar diet, that doesn’t work for us.
Not to mention the added “natural flavors”. That can be a catch-all for everything from basic spices like parsley extract, but it can also be code for “MSG-type” substances.
I’d rather just make my own.
With this super simple ketchup recipe, you literally toss all the ingredients together and a minute or two you have homemade sugar-free ketchup ready, almost as quick as you can say either “ketchup” or “catsup.”
By the way, did you know that both words are derived from the Chinese word “ke-tsiap” which is a “fish sauce? Look at that–a recipe and a linguistic lesson in one post :).
On with the easy homemade ketchup recipe.
I was on my perpetual hunt for a good easy homemade ketchup recipe when I finally found one that worked pretty well, but it needed a few changes. Now, it’s perfect.
Serving Ideas
Of course you can put this easy no cook ketchup on everything you’d normally eat with ketchup–burgers, fries, hot dogs.
However, my kids are so happy that we have ketchup around much more frequently now, and my youngest seriously dips EVERYTHING in it. And you can too. For awhile he was taking to dipping his carrot sticks in it and today he was dipping crackers in it too!
These Easy Baked Chicken Nuggets would be great dipped in this too.
Other Processed Food Alternatives:
Following are some other fabulous processed food alternatives that I think you will find helpful for healthifying your home.
Powdered Sugar Substitute
Homemade Chocolate Chips – possibly the best chocolate chips you will ever have
Homemade Marshmallows
Our Favorite Salad Dressing – Five Ways
Sugar-free Maple Baked Beans – ready in under an hour!
Recipe Notes
- Sweetener: Any sweetener (healthier or low-carb or otherwise) can be substituted for the low-carb sweetener and/or stevia. Read How to Substitute Sweeteners for tips/ratios. Vegetable glycerine is another great option. If you’d prefer to use only one sweetener for both, that’s fine too.
Yacon syrup or a dash of stevia extract can work too–or even monk extract.
Use 1/2 – 3/4 the amount of honey or maple syrup. - Measuring Tips: The measurements for some of the ingredients are small (like 1/64 teaspoon / 1 drop, 3/16 teaspoon). You can either eyeball it (the recipe will likely be just fine as long as you don’t really overdo it) or you can buy these handy measuring spoons. I use them for measuring stevia all the time.
Special Diet Options
- Paleo: Use 1/2 – 3/4 the amount of honey or maple syrup for paleo.
- THM: This recipe is a “fuel pull” for those on the Trim Healthy Mama plan.
- This recipe as is, is keto / low-carb.
How to Store
You should store this delicious, and oh-so-easy-to-make ketchup in your fridge in an air-tight container.
It should last a week, but perhaps up to 3 weeks, but I personally wouldn’t push it that far and I doubt it will be around that long anyhow.
If you really want to make a lot more of it, or store it for longer, you can store it in the freezer for 6 months–making sure there’s very little air in the container will help it to store there without freezer burn. If you can make the container truly air tight you can likely freeze it for longer than that.
Freezing this in ice cube trays is a great idea so you can take them out once frozen and store in an airtight freezer bag. Just take out whatever you want, whenever you want!
Easy Homemade Ketchup – sugar free and low-carb options
Equipment
- 1 stainless small measuring spoons useful for measuring small amounts of ingredients down to one drop
Ingredients
- 7 ounces tomato paste (approximately 3/4 cup)
- 2 tablespoons apple cider vinegar
- 1 tablespoon low carb sweetener (or to taste – use 1/2 tablespoon honey for paleo)
- 1 drop stevia (1/64 teaspoon – 1/2 scoop; or to taste; see stevia usage info here)
- 3/4 teaspoon salt
- 3/4 teaspoon granulated garlic (if using powder, use 3/8 teaspoon)
- 3/4 teaspoon granulated onion (if using powder, use 3/8 teaspoon)
- 3/16 teaspoon allspice
- 1/2 tablespoon molasses (optional. I typically use blackstrap)
- 1/16 teaspoon cayenne pepper (optional)
- 2/3 cup water
Instructions
- Place all ingredients in a bowl.
- Stir to blend completely.
- Store in the refrigerator for up to 2 weeks.
Notes
- Storage Notes: Note that this ketchup should last a week, but perhaps up to 3 weeks in the fridge, but I personally wouldn’t push it that far. Two weeks is more likely how long it will keep for. For long storage of up to 6 months, store in the freezer in an air-tight container.
- Sweetener: Any sweetener (healthier or low-carb or otherwise) can be substituted for the low-carb sweetener and/or stevia. Read How to Substitute Sweeteners for tips/ratios. Vegetable glycerine is another great option. If you’d prefer to use only one sweetener for both, that’s fine too.
Yacon syrup or a dash of stevia extract can work too–or even monk extract.
Use 1/2 – 3/4 the amount of honey or maple syrup. - Measuring Tips: The measurements for some of the ingredients are small (like 1/64 teaspoon / 1 drop, 3/16 teaspoon). You can either eyeball it (the recipe will likely be just fine as long as you don’t really overdo it) or you can buy these handy measuring spoons. I use them for measuring stevia all the time.
Nutrition
Nutritional information is provided as a courtesy and is merely an approximation. Optional ingredients are not included and when there is an alternative, the primary ingredient is typically used. We cannot guarantee the accuracy of the nutritional information given for any recipe on this site. Erythritol carbs are not included in carb counts since they have been shown not to impact blood sugar. Net carbs are the total carbs minus fiber.
Drop a comment below and let me know what you think about this ketchup!
I have to ask in all seriousness, how are you measuring out 3/8 tsp.? 3/16 tsp.? 1/16th tsp.? Or how are you eyeballing it? The smallest I’ve ever seen is 1/4th. And can it be frozen, like in ice cube trays and used as needed since I would not use this whole recipe in 2 weeks? Thank you
Hi Brooklyn – sorry for the delay in responding. I just added some new info to the post for you, both in the recipe card and in the Recipe Notes section. Hope that helps!
Oh as for freezing, I answered that in the storage section as well for you – great questions and hope it works for you. We just had it this week–and the leftovers are disappearing fast :).
You say 24 servings, but how much is 1 serving? it would be better to have a cup amount. Thanks!
Hi Carol! I am sorry that we don’t have that information on the blog. I just checked some not so popular as well as very popular sites, and none of them did either. I could consider that for the future, but I’m buried as it is, so I can’t make any promises and I will have to see if my recipe system supports it. If they don’t, I won’t provide it since it’s the best one out there. Sorry!
Hi again – just looking quickly at the options, it doesn’t appear that that option is there. The inputs for the nutrition information are in grams I believe, so that is the only option. Sorry again, but it seems that it just is what it is.
My husband is on the Duran diet so I used only Splenda as a sweetener, I used 2 packs. This is a great recipe! It is almost identical to Heinz No Added Sugar which is about $5, except the Heinz brand has more salt. I might decrease the Splenda next time. I used a funnel to put the ketchup in a squeeze bottle.
Thank you! I will look for other recipes here!
Hi there. Welcome! I am so glad you liked it! We do as well! I think you meant, Dukan Diet, correct? I hope you find other good things…working on getting a lot more posted hopefully soon. Most are good – there are a few that need reworking so feel free to reach out before trying something if you like. By the way, however, Splenda has some sugars in it in the form of dextrins, so you might want to look into other sweeteners. I hope to do a post on that topic as well – feel free to let me know the parameters of what you are trying to eat / avoid and perhaps I can help.
Thanks for the kind words, and take care!
Yes Dukan! Spell check “ corrected” me twice
Hahaha. Those pesky spell checkers. They wreck my confidence in the future with all this AI stuff coming.