Bloom County 2019 by Berkeley Breathed for April 11, 2018

It took them a while to…Ketch up.

It wasn’t just turning the bottle upside down, it was inventing a special nozzle that would keep the ketchup from spilling out until you squeezed it. A man called Paul Brown developed a special valve that released the contents of the bottle when its sides are pressed. His invention was bought by various companies, including Heinz who added it to the new upside-down bottle. Back in 1995 Brown sold his company and his invention brought him $13 million.

https://www.factswt.com/did-you-know-that-the-upside-down-ketchup-bottle-earned-its-inventor-13/

I read the other day where someone has just come out with a new patented product, sliced ketchup.

Actually, with the mouth as wide as it is, you can just store it upright, and use a knife. No fancy valve necessary.

as I said yesterday, Opus was in love with the opening at the bottom.

Once upon a not very long time ago, catsup/ketchup was a homemade home-canned treat and there were multitudinous recipes for the relish.

Then it got standardized into the red vaguely tomatoey syrup slurry that it is today.

I long for those halcyon days of yore.

Perhaps it’s time to renounce the corporate standard and unearth some old recipes!

Those home-canned versions were in nice wide mouth jars that one could access with a spoon or knife.

I use honey in my morning coffee, and the upside-down bottles don’t require any extra effort. We also have a hive…

It took them even longer to think of wheels on luggage.

I just love Opus with his accidental extra ‘th’!

Oliver Wendell Jones! You’re spreading Fake News! 70000 years ago, we didn’t even use ketchup on our cave bear burgers! Must be some gooby substance in your laptop….

Tomato ketchup was invented about 1812.Chinese kê-tsiap came to Britain in 1732, but it was more like a fish sauce.Oliver Wendell Jones, it likely seems like 70,000 years because of how long we had to wait for ketchup to pour out of those narrow-necked glass bottles.

In a single use plastic bottle that is going to hang around another seventy thousand (more, actually) years.

…we’re doomed.

Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa, the term “tomato sauce” is used to describe a condiment similar to ketchup. :)

Heinz has added “Mayochup” to their varieties and is marketing it as the greatest thing since unpourable gooey substances that need pouring. And it comes in an upside-down bottle. (Don’t tell them about fry sauce.)

Being a bit of a killjoy, but Malcolm Gladwell did a column (https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2004/09/06/the-ketchup-conundrum) that I think made it into one of his subsequent books, talking about exactly why it’s all Heinz. A little depressing to a foodie, but pretty clear on the why.

I learned to live without plastic upside-down bottles long before they were invented. When the (glass narrow mouth) bottle is full, it isn’t much of a problem. Hold it on its side and tap. When it is less full, lay it on its side in the refrigerator and repeat above when you use it. Some of us are not “doomed”, but we will all die anyway.

The problem with the now-ubiquitous upside-down ketchup bottle is that it’s virtually impossible to squeeze out just the right amount. Either nothing comes out or, if I squeeze just a wee bit harder, a huge glob of ketchup explodes out and drowns my sandwich. Maybe they should sell it in tubes, like toothpaste.

The first time I saw one of those, I thought, “Genius!!”