Good Ketchup Recipe

[seedcorn]

My mom tried to make Ketchup. Whatever you make will not taste like commercial. People now know and like the commercial taste.

People think tomatoes in stores taste like tomatoes....wrong, they taste like a tomato vine smells. Same with margarine over butter by younger generations.

 

[Prairie Rose]

WOW, @Prairie Rose !!!
I KNEW it was a good idea to post this. Your recipes are similar to the ones that I researched.
I gotta ask...have you made ketchup, and is there one or all of these recipes that you recommend or do I get to be the Guinea Pig in this experiment?

I have made ketchup, but none of those recipes. The one I made was from the Blue Ball Canning book that everywhere sells. I found the spices to be too overwhelming, and to get the right texture I almost scorched the tomatoes. That said, it made an excellent barbecue sauce, and my father gleefully ate it all winter long. Just tasted nothing like ketchup! It did give me lots of ideas about trying again, just without the spice bags. And in the crockpot after pureeing, like applesauce into apple butter.

There's one last basket of tomatoes I can go out and pick, I might have to experiment a little....

 

[ducks4you]

PLEASE experiment and give me a report. Like I said, I saw a video where this guy uses his cherry tomatoes and we ALWAYS have lots of them, no loss if the recipe doesn't work.

I am thinking that many of the spices in most of the recipes are too much for ketchup. A little bit of GoogleFoo--
Heinz tomato ketchup's ingredients are: tomato concentrate from red ripe tomatoes, distilled vinegar, high fructose corn syrup, corn syrup, salt, spice, onion powder, and natural flavoring.
I think my recipe ingredients should be as follows:
Tomatoes, trying cherry tomatoes first
distilled vinegar
light brown sugar
salt, not much at my house
spice—still thinking about what spices, according to various recipes, but I think that they should be trace
onion, NOT onion powder
garlic, NOT garlic powder
natural flavoring—I think that falls into the “spices” catagory, BUT, I like using:
celery seed NOT celery salt, too much salt!
Mustard seed, bc who KNOWS how old the ground mustard is
1 single clove/batch is sufficient
I Don't think a cinnamon stick is going to add anything to this recipe.

When I use Ketchup/Catsup--don't care what you call it--I taste the tang of vinegar, but I DON'T taste hot pepper, like I do when I make salsa, OR cloves OR allspice OR cinnamon, so they should be a trace amount, or not at all. I also think that if I work at this, I should come up with a recipe that really brings out the tomatoes. As I have read, AND Colonial Williamsburg has experimented with, growing 18th century tomatoes, the first tomatoes in American gardens were specifically grown for sauces. They were mis-shapened dwarves that looked like very small heirlooms.
When we make stuffed peppers we use a quart of my canned tomatoes for filling up about 7 peppers. You can REALLY taste the tomatoes the onions, the meat and the cheese and without the tomatoes that taste like REAL tomatoes, it doesn't taste the same.
ALSO, I think that I will really need to watch while the sauce reduces, just like when I make a cherry pie filling bc the cornstarch has to thicken but not burn. UNfortunately, my crock pot is old. It only knows really hot and pretty hot, which is fine for prepping tomatoes/grapes/other fruit to keep it hot before putting in the jars for canning, but it often burns my food. Maybe, Christmas?!? Maybe not. I have asked for the largest chest freezer on the market to replace the really nice 3yo upright freezer that our local power company destroyed in a power surge.
I am hoping that my ketchup is Heavy on tomato taste.
Guess, we'll see.
Certainly this is a good topic for discussion.
We may ALL work on this recipe together!

 

[ducks4you]

Here is an 18th century recipe inside an article, supposedly modernized for our use. The list of ingredients is interesting.
Tomato ketchup, Makes about 2 1/2 cups.
Ingredients:

In the 18th and 19th centuries, most households made their own ketchup. The reason was simple: Commercial bottled ketchup didn't become available until after the Civil War.

2 35-ounce cans peeled tomatoes
3 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 large onion, diced (about 1 cup)
1 clove garlic, minced
1/2 to 3/4 cup brown sugar
1/2 to 3/4 cup tarragon vinegar
2 tablespoons chili powder
1 teaspoon Tabasco sauce
1 tablespoon prepared mustard
1 scant teaspoon sea salt
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1/2 teaspoon celery seeds
1/2 teaspoon ground coriander seed
1/4 teaspoon ground allspice
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
https://www.baltimoresun.com/news/bs-xpm-1991-08-25-1991237166-story.html

 

[Prairie Rose]

sounds good, ducks. I think I would add a little paprika, too. every recipe i have ever seen has at least a little, and it just adds a nice savory flavor to my taste buds when i use it in cooking

 

[ducks4you]

I could try that, thanks!

 

[flowerbug]

what i see in a lot of recipes above is things like cloves and other spices which add sharper notes. to me those are all variants on what we've always called chili sauces. chili sauces may not have any actual chilis in them though, but what they were for was canning so that when you made chili you could just open up a jar and add the meat, and your fresh roasted ground up chili powder and beans and you'd be all set. we often also used it as steak sauce and some batches tasted a lot like Heinz 57 steak sauce. other batches were more mild. either way they were always edible.

in recent years Mom has gotten away from liking a lot of spices so almost everything we make is basic so that it can be added to if i want to but so she will also be able to use it for what she wants.

so we do plain tomatoes and dill pickles now mostly and i do strawberry freezer jam if i get enough strawberries.

 

[ducks4you]

A Spicy Take On An Old Standby: This Ketchup's Ripe For Return

When life gives you tomatoes, make ketchup. With those fruits of the vine in season, All Things Considered reaches into the archives for a tomato ketchup recipe.

www.wutc.org

Taste Of Grandma's Kitchen: We Hack An Old Ketchup Recipe

Jim Ledvinka grew up outside of Chicago watching his grandmother make ketchup from scratch once a year. As a kid, he hated the stuff. As a man — and now a grandfather — he became desperate to re-create it. That's where All Things Considered's Found Recipes project comes in.

www.kunc.org

Ketchup: The All-American Condiment That Comes From Asia

The story of how ketchup became a staple in American kitchens tells us much about the history of international trade, taking us from Fujian province to western Europe and ultimately across the Atlantic.

www.npr.org

 

[ducks4you]

Also, THIS:

Ketchup

Ketchup Fujianese immigrants rescued from the grounded freighter Golden Venture. AP Photo: used by permission Immigration h...

languageoffood.blogspot.com

 

[ducks4you]

ANYWAY, THESE are going to end up being Some kind of Ketchup/Catsup in the next month. ( I know I already posted this on another thread, but the photo bears repeating, if you no other reason than, Look how MANY tomatoes get wasted after a freeze.) I intend to add one ingredient at a time to taste and see what I like. I am a bit intimidated by some of ingredients that have been used in the condiment, which is why I copied the ingredient label from a purchased commercial bottle.