Roasted Bell Pepper Sauce

This roasted bell pepper sauce is a great alternative to marinara on pasta, but don’t stop there. Mix it with hummus, spread it on a sandwich, or dip a toasted baguette in it.

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I’m a big fan of bell peppers, especially red, orange, or yellow ones. But bell pepper sauce is kind of a new thing for me. One day while I was having lunch out, I ordered a flatbread sandwich. The menu listed red pepper sauce as one of the ingredients, along with grilled squash and cheese. It sounded good, so I took a chance. After one bite, I realized that I had to work bell pepper sauce into my life. You can buy ready-made roasted bell peppers, but in this recipe, I’ll show you how to roast your own bell peppers to use in the bell pepper sauce.

Ingredients

To make this recipe, you’ll need bell peppers, garlic, nut milk, olive oil, nutritional yeast, and salt and pepper. This picture shows a red bell pepper, but you can use orange or yellow ones too. A note about nut milk  – I make my own cashew milk and use that in this recipe, but store-bought cashew milk, almond milk, soy milk, or whatever kind of nut/grain milk you use regularly will work. I haven’t tried them all, but if you like the flavor of one over another, go with that.

I didn’t list the secret sauce – red curry paste. This is optional, but it really spices things up.

Making Roasted Bell Pepper Sauce

Start by cutting the bell peppers in two and removing the seeds, stem, and pulpy parts on the inside. Rub extra virgin olive oil inside and out. Coat each clove of garlic with olive oil too. Put the bell peppers with the garlic nestled inside on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper.

Put the peppers and garlic in a 400-degree oven for about 25 minutes. Check them after 20 minutes. Blackened edges are okay, and the bottoms might be black in places too.

Let them cool, and then gently remove the skin. It will peel off easily after they’ve been roasted and cooled.

Tip: Peel the bell pepper halves over a bowl or over the food processor bowl, so you don’t lose any juice.

Put the peeled bell pepper halves in your food processor along with the other ingredients.

Pulse the ingredients until they are smooth and creamy. Fold in any wayward ingredients along the edges and pulse again if necessary.

Serving Roasted Bell Pepper Sauce

Now that you have this yummy, healthy, gluten-free, vegan roasted bell pepper sauce, what do you do with it?

It works well as an alternative to marinara on pasta. Below, I warmed up the sauce and put it on top of some rigatoni pasta and vegetarian “meat” balls. I sprinkled some fresh parsley for added flavor.

Bell pepper sauce adds so much flavor to plain hummus as shown below. Of course, the different colors of bell peppers will result in different sauce colors. The sauce shown in the picture below was made with orange bell peppers.

Here are some other ideas. If you make this and think of a way to use that is not listed, please let me know in the comments.

• Dunk toasted baguette pieces in it.
• Spread it on flatbread, ciabatta rolls, or any kind of bread, and add other ingredients to make a tasty sandwich.
• Mix it half and half with your favorite marinara sauce and pour it over noodles, ravioli, or tortellini.
• Use it as a dipping sauce for bread-sticks or olive parmesan rolls.

Make-ahead Ideas

I was at my local big-box store recently and bought a package of six bell peppers  – two red, two orange, and two yellow. One afternoon I roasted them all. Then I put the peppers and garlic in a food storage bag, sorted them by color, and put them in the freezer. It worked out great. You can try this or make the sauce and freeze that. Either way, you’ll have the makings of a quick dinner on hand.

I roasted the orange and yellow bell peppers the same way I roasted the red ones.

After they were finished roasting, I removed the skins and put them in silicone food storage bags. You can also make the sauce and freeze it too.

Later, I pulled the orange bell peppers out of the freezer and made sauce. It was so good on spaghetti. I topped it off with a little parmesan and fresh basil. That meal took just a few minutes.

I hope you’re psyched to roast your own bell peppers and make bell pepper sauce. If you like bell peppers, you might like vegetarian stuffed bell peppers.