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Ketchup
Appears in
Published 2004
The word “ketchup” conjures up an image of the thick, sweet, tomato-based condiment that American teenagers deploy indiscriminately on most of their foods. Although almost every restaurant and café in the United States provides easily accessible bottles of tomato ketchup—often standing on each table next to the salt and pepper shakers—Americans did not invent ketchup, which was originally not thick, or sweet, or made from tomatoes.
The concoction takes its name from the Mandarin word kē-tsiap, which refers to a fermented sauce made from soybeans. British explorers, colonists, and traders came into contact with the sauce in Southeast Asia, and upon their return to Europe they attempted to duplicate it. As soybeans were not grown in Europe, British cooks used such substitutes as anchovies, mushrooms, walnuts, and oysters. British colonists brought ketchup to North America, and Americans continued experimenting, using a variety of additional ingredients, including beans and apples.