I really wanted to title this recipe
“No sugar barbecue sauce from fresh tomatoes in the instant pot for people with ADHD”
but my WordPress said that was too long for a title. Not sure when I started following those rules, but anyways. Yes, ADHD, no to the squirrels.
I am horrible at following recipes. I am more of a tinkerer and my ADHD with this stuff shows. I have a reputation at work for my “concoctions” and have just now started writing stuff down. I tend to just throw stuff in a pan (or a bowl) and cook it. I am notorious for throwing stuff in a Ziplock bag – vegetables, beans, and whatever random spices I grab from the cabinet, and then just microwaving it all and hoping for the best when I get to work.
Most turn out fine. Some fantastic and I’m mad that I didn’t write it down.
So with that this recipe came from me googling other people’s recipes and looking at the spices they used. I’m like …. Uh, no, I don’t that, but I like that, and I don’t have this, but this should work just as well. And then a little of I’m just going to add this anyway and see how it turns out.
I was pleasantly surprised this turned out pretty good and I plan to make it again. My little Andrew, my pain in the rear eater, who likes nothing, even said it tasted good.
I did not want to add sugar in this recipe, so I used ½ roma tomatoes and ½ cherry tomatoes to give it the sweetness I wanted. However, next batch I am going to try only using a ¼ cherry tomatoes because it’s pretty sweet.

My mom said it was good, but says it tastes like sriracha sauce. So, with that I make these recipes for myself. If others like them fantastic, and if you don’t I’m good with that too. I like it and I will make it again.
With that here’s the super duper easy recipe that even a moron could make (and trust me I’m kind of stupid in the kitchen if there’s too many steps. I just wind up skipping them. So, there isn’t too many steps in this one. Perfect right?
Zero Added Sugar Instant Pot Barbecue Sauce

Ingredients
- 2.5 lbs fresh tomatoes
- 1 tsp onion powder
- 1 tsp garlic powder
- 1 tsp salt
- 1 tbsp worcestershire sauce
- 1 tsp paprika
- 1 tsp cayenne pepper
- 1 /4 cup red wine vinegar
- ½ cup water
Instructions
- Cut up your roma tomatoes and you can leave your cherry tomatoes alone. I didn’t cut them. I might try not cutting any of them next time. (I’ll update if I do and let you know if you can skip that step because trust me, I’m all about the easy.)
- I soaked them in water and a ¼ cup vinegar because that’s what I saw another recipe say to do. Don’t know if it’s necessary. I may skip that next time too (of course I’ll update this).
- Then I drained them and threw them in the instant pot with the spices and ingredients above. I added the ½ cup water because I’m scared of my instant pot. Instant pot is still sort of new to me and I’ve burnt a couple things from not having enough water. Not sure the extra water was necessary, but it didn’t hurt anything so I’m leaving it in.
- I put it on pressure cook for 10 minutes and did a quick release.
- Once done cooking I drained some of the excess fluid off. I just used a cup and pulled some of it off so I didn’t have to cook down so much. Maybe like a ½ cup. I think you’ll have to eyeball if you have a lot of extra liquid.
- Then I threw all of it in the blender. I did not peel any skins or anything. I just put it in the blender.
- Once done blending, I set the instant pot to sauté to cook it down and thicken it. I used a mesh strainer because every single recipe said that was essential. So, I didn’t skip that step. I put all the blended tomatoes threw the strainer and there was some residual tomatoes left in there. I just ate the crushed stuff that didn’t strain. It was so good!
- The last step was cooking it down until it was thick enough to call it barbeque sauce. It took somewhere between 10 and 20 minutes. (I got interrupted so I had to turn it off and turn it back on so I don’t have an exact time for you, but going to assume if you got this far you know how to use your eyeballs).
- That’s it! For me, this made one 16 ounce squeeze bottle of bbq sauce.
If you liked this you might like my Plant Based Ranch Dressing Recipe.