Tartar sauce substitutes

The genuine article assembled from pantry parts, which is what commercial tartar sauce is anyway.

Best for

fried fish and fish and chips, fish cakes and fishcakes, crab cakes, fried shrimp, fish sandwiches, chip dipping

Not a substitute so much as the recipe, and it beats most jars because the pickle stays crunchy instead of going soft in storage. Mince the pickle and onion finely rather than chopping them coarse, since the texture is half the pleasure. Use dill pickle for the sharp American-diner version and sweet pickle relish for a sweeter one. Let it sit 15 minutes before serving so the onion loses its raw bite.

The ten-second version, covering the two things tartar sauce is really for: cool fat and bright acid against hot fried food.

Best for

fried fish in a hurry, chips and fries, fish fingers, sandwiches

This gets you roughly eighty percent of the way for almost no work, because the fat-plus-acid contrast is the actual mechanism by which tartar sauce makes fried fish taste good. What you lose is the crunch and the pickled savouriness, so the sauce reads smoother and blander and it stops being interesting after a few bites. Salt it, since lemon juice alone can make mayonnaise taste thin.

The mayonnaise-based condiment served across Scandinavia with fried fish, hot dogs and open sandwiches, thickened with finely chopped pickled vegetables.

Best for

fried plaice and fish fillets, fishcakes, smorrebrod, hot dogs, fried shrimp

The natural partner for exactly the same dishes, and in Denmark it is what actually arrives with your fried fish. The difference from tartar sauce is that it is distinctly sweeter, carries mustard and often a pinch of turmeric or curry powder, which gives it a pale yellow colour and a mild spiced warmth. On fried fish that sweetness is a feature. Cajun-style remoulade is a different animal again, tomato-tinted and spicy, and it will dominate delicate white fish.

The same recipe built on cultured dairy, for a lighter sauce or when there is no mayonnaise in the house.

Best for

lighter fried fish, grilled or baked fish, fish tacos, salmon

Tangier and much leaner, which sounds appealing and has one real drawback: mayonnaise is about eighty percent oil, and that fat is what coats the tongue and cools down hot fried food. A yogurt version tastes sharp and slightly watery by comparison. Fix it by whisking in a tablespoon of olive oil and cutting the lemon juice back to half a teaspoon, since the yogurt is already acidic. Sour cream fares better than yogurt because it is fattier.

Greek yogurt with grated cucumber, garlic, dill and lemon, which happens to hit the same cool, acidic, herby, crunchy notes.

Best for

fried fish, fish cakes, grilled fish, calamari, fish wraps

Works considerably better on fried fish than people expect, because grated cucumber does the same job as chopped pickle and dill is already a classic fish herb. The dish now tastes Greek rather than Nordic or British, and the garlic is noticeable in a way tartar sauce's onion is not. Squeeze the cucumber out hard first, or the sauce will pool water on the plate under the fish.

Mayonnaise with crushed raw garlic beaten through it, the Mediterranean answer to fried seafood.

Best for

fried fish and calamari, chips, prawns, fish sandwiches

Richer and more assertive than tartar sauce, with garlic filling the flavour gap where the pickle should be. It is completely smooth, so the textural interest is gone, and it needs an extra squeeze of lemon because a plain aioli is less acidic than tartar sauce and can taste heavy against fried batter. Excellent with squid and prawns, slightly overpowering with delicate white fish like plaice or sole.

Ketchup with horseradish, lemon and a dash of Worcestershire, which is a real alternative rather than a match.

Best for

fried shrimp, fried fish, crab cakes, oysters

Do not expect this to pass as tartar sauce, because it is sweet, tomato-red and pungent with horseradish where tartar sauce is creamy and pickly. What it shares is the important part: sweetness and sharp acidity cutting through fried batter. It contains no fat, so it refreshes rather than coating, and the plate ends up brighter and less rich. If you make it yourself, start at ¼ cup ketchup to 1 teaspoon prepared horseradish and go up from there.