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There is no rival for homemade strawberry sauce. It has just 3 ingredients and this is the easiest strawberry sauce recipe. Adding a few spoons of this glossy fresh strawberry topping will make any dessert feel fancier. This is a great recipe to have in your arsenal for entertaining or to make your family’s eyes light up as you spoon it over a bowl of vanilla ice cream.
This strawberry topping is completely wonderful over pancakes, waffles, pie, cheesecake, this trifle, you name it! This is our favorite and easiest way to make strawberry sauce. The lemon juice balances the sweetness and makes the strawberry flavor more pronounced. Truth be told, it’s dangerously irresistible stuff – consider yourself warned ;).
We’re using this sauce in our next recipe post so I hope you are all kinds of excited!!
Make-Ahead Tip: You can make this strawberry topping 1 to 3 days in advance, cover and refrigerate until ready to serve.
Easy Strawberry Sauce Ingredients:
1 lb Strawberries, rinsed, hulled and thickly sliced
1/3 cup granulated sugar
1 Tbsp lemon juice (from 1/2 Lemon)
How to Make Easy Strawberry Sauce:
1. In a medium saucepan, combine sliced strawberries, 1/3 cup sugar and 1 Tbsp fresh lemon juice. Place over medium heat and bring the mixture to a boil, stirring occasionally. The strawberries will release juice without any mashing required.
2. Reduce heat and simmer 20-23 minutes or until sauce is thickened, stirring occasionally. Remove from heat and cool to room temperature. Keep in mind sauce will thicken up slightly as it cools and even more after refrigeration.
Pro Tip: Do not blend strawberries before cooking. I have tested coarsely blending strawberries in a food processor and even though they taste great, the color of the sauce was foggy and not glossy as shown in the photos above. We had best results with slicing strawberries by hand.
It really is as good as it looks – bursting with fresh strawberry flavor!
⬇Print-Friendly Strawberry Sauce Recipe:
Strawberry Sauce Recipe
Ingredients
Strawberry Sauce Ingredients:
- 1 lb Strawberries, rinsed, hulled and thickly sliced
- 1/3 cup granulated sugar
- 1 Tbsp lemon juice, from 1/2 Lemon
Instructions
How to Make Strawberry Sauce:
- In a medium saucepan, combine sliced strawberries, 1/3 cup sugar and 1 Tbsp lemon juice. Place over medium heat and bring to a boil, stirring occasionally. Strawberries will release juice without any mashing required.
- Reduce heat and simmer 20-23 min or until sauce is thickened, stirring occasionally. Remove from heat and cool to room temperature. Keep in mind sauce will thicken up slightly as it cools and even more with refrigeration.
Nutrition Per Serving
If you make this recipe, I’d love to see pics of your creations on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter! Hashtag them #natashaskitchen
I hope this becomes your new favorite strawberry topping. Let me know how you serve your strawberry sauce. Or maybe it’s just you with a spoon in your hand? Remember I called this dangerous for a reason!
Excellent recipe & insights! I prefer to not totally boil my strawberry topping but to homogenize (or incorporate the goodness of the fresh sliced strawberries w/ the granulated sugar) the two above key ingredients until you have a nice strawberry syrup but still have semi-firm crisp strawberry flesh. This topping goes on nicely to a yellow/ pound cake!
Thank your for your detailed feedback and tips! I appreciate your wonderful review.
Can you make ahead a refrigerate?
Yes, you can make this strawberry topping 1 to 3 days in advance, cover and refrigerate until ready to serve.
Tried it once and it was delicious, now I have made it over 4 times 😋 goes great with my homemade waffles.
Thanks for sharing!
Wanda
Sounds like you just found your favorite strawberry sauce! I love that you’ve already done it a lot of times and you always enjoy it. Thanks for your excellent review!
What can you use in place of mascarpone cheese?I have all ingredients except that.
Hi Sharon, you can use more cream cheese.
Can you use frozen strawberries instead of fresh?
That should work with frozen strawberries, just cook the sauce to the desired consistency. Sometimes frozen can give off more juice so it may take slightly longer to cook.
Tried it….really yummmmy…n very easy to make….thank you for this wonderful recepie
You’re welcome! I’m so glad you enjoyed that.
Natasha, you can’t keep it in the fridge for a single day !!! It disappears immediately 🙂 Regards from Poland. Teresa
Haha I know what you mean, Terry.
can this sauce be frozen?
Hi Amanda, I haven’t tested that but here is what one of our readers wrote citing it freezes well, “I freeze mine and it turns out great. I use for our nightly ice cream” I hope that helps.
I’m making strawberry short shot shooters with strawberry jello, angel food bits, berries, glaze and cool whip for SOUPER bowl lunch at school. no alcohol but serving in tiny red solo cups….
That sounds awesome! Thank you so much for sharing that with us!
Hey I️ tried the doing the sauce & it’s not thickening how I️ want it to , what should I️ add to it ?
Hi Deaj, you could simmer a few minutes longer to get it to thicken a little more.
Hi Natasha!! I was wondering, would I be able use this as a filling in a cake?
Hi Tatiana, I imagine that should work. I’d love to know how you like the recipe trying this.
My husband wanted strawberry sauce and chocolate cake tonight. Told him I would make a himemade sauce. I used your recipe and everyone loved it! So easy to make. Will be making this again that is for sure.
I love it when everyone enjoys the recipe, Eleanor! Thank you for that amazing feedback.
Hey! I’ve made this sauce many times and I love it Do you think I would be able to blend it and it would taste the same ?
Hi Linda, Since strawberries release enough natural pectin on their own as they simmer I would suggest simmering an extra couple of minutes to break them down more, that will also make the sauce thicker. Also, I have this note in the recipe that may help “Do not blend strawberries before cooking. I have tested coarsely blending strawberries in a food processor and even though they taste great, the color of the sauce was foggy and not glossy as shown in the photos above. We had best results with slicing strawberries by hand” I hope that helps
what is the shelf life in the refrigerator?
Hi Abhijit, I have stored it max 4 days and it was still great but I haven’t tested it beyond that. Freezing it should work just fine.
This looks delicious,
however i think you missed putting a thickening ingredient in your recipe ingredients list. Cornstarch or arrowroot starch. why? it is tasteless and nobody will know it is in there. please let me know by emailing me.
Hi Heather, that was intentional. You are welcome to add more or could simmer a few minutes longer to get it to thicken a little and also, be sure to let it cool completely before adding it to the cake.
This is by far the best strawberry sauce I’ve tested. I make cheesecake all the time but my topping was horrible. Thank you so much for this recipe
I’m so glad you enjoyed it! Thank you for the wonderful review!
This works perfectly with blueberries to!
That’s just awesome!! Thank you for sharing that with me.
This is a simple recipe to follow. I modified it by using Splenda. I use a heaping 1/3 cup of it and it worked great. Seems to look like the picture and tastes wonderful. My husband won’t use sugar so I’m using this on a sugar free cheese cake I’m making for his birthday today.
Thank you so much for sharing that with us, Mary!
Can you use frozen strawberries?
Hi Sherrie, that should work with frozen strawberries, just cook the sauce to the desired consistency. Sometimes frozen can give off more juice so it may take slightly longer to cook.
Hi! I’ve made this sauce before and I had this idea to make an Oreo cheesecake with a strawberry sauce on top. I’m concerned that the sauce will be rather thin and drip off the cake, so do you have any recommendations on how I can thicken the sauce so it’s more of a jam-like consistency? Thanks!
Hi Jess, you could simmer a few minutes longer to get it to thicken a little and also, be sure to let it cool completely before adding it to the cake.
My husband and I live this stuff. Here in Calgary, the strawberries are always a little beat up and sad by the time they make it to the store. But it doesn’t matter when they are made into this lovely sauce! We put it on homemade pancakes.
I’m so glad you enjoyed it! Thank you so much for sharing that with me.
Hi there I just made this out of some strawberries that were slightly soft in the fridge bought 6 days ago…so made a (double batch) to be exact… and also placed whole berries in food processor and pulsed for 5 times then I used fresh lime juice instead of lemon juice as I didn’t have any lemons and it is delicious… kids are loving it on ice cream and going to make puff pastry triangles with the leftover
thank you from lovin strawberry season in Australia….
You’re welcome! I’m so happy you and the kids have enjoyed this recipe! That’s so great.