Monday to Friday I generally focus on very serious issues when I blog. On the weekends because it is a time of relaxation for all, I like to have a little fun and do lighter fare. Every Sunday I write a post entitled Sunday Shame where we publicly admit to little faux pas for fun. This week I decided to cross post the Sunday Shame item I wrote for Womanist Musings, with the thought that Feministe readers might also like to share in the fun.
Along with a desperate addiction to Timmys, many Canadians have an extreme love of ketchup. It is not uncommon to see someone eating fries and gravy with you guessed it, ketchup. For many the table is not set until ketchup is sitting front and center.
Last week when I went to a donut shop (nope, not Timmys), I ordered a Jamaican Beef patty. They heated it on a plate and brought it to me with a knife and fork and you guessed it, ketchup. Okay, that is taking the love of Canadian gravy aka ketchup one step to far. Is it any wonder that Barenaked Ladies sang in If I Had A Million Dollars, that they would buy Dijon Ketchup?
Americans seem to use mustard in the way that we use ketchup. I’m starting to think that we have just learned to forgo the seasoning rack for the love of condiments. Why bother with sage, thyme, oregano, or basil, when we have ketchup and mustard? Do North Americans even have taste buds for anything that does not involve a condiment?
It is so bad, that when I was a kid, I would put ketchup on my spaghetti. I didn’t even know another tomato based sauce existed for pasta. Imagine my surprise when my unhusband turned his nose, when I reached for the ketchup at our first spaghetti dinner. Don’t get all sympathetic for him now that I have publicly admitted this…the man puts ketchup on french toast. Yes, you read that right, he puts ketchup on french toast. Can I get a group groan over that one? This of course runs a close second on the gross out meter to bologna and HP Sauce sandwiches. Yep, he loves those to. So, my ketchup and spaghetti isn’t looking so bad now is it?
Okay, I am sure you know what comes next….the Womanist Musings confessional. It is time for you to come out of the closet and admit the condiment that you overuse, as well as what kinds of food that you put it on. You know damn well, that no matter how much you love your condiments, some foods do not need ketchup, mayo, mustard etc., Fess the hell up everyone.
Not guilty. Don’t overuse condiments. Despite what former President Reagan said, ketchup is NOT a vegetable. LOL
Soy sauce…. there is very little that I don’t think gets better with soy sauce.
My condiment-based confession is… I don’t really like condiments. Gravy, yes. Sauces, yes. Ketchup, hell no. Any ketchup, mustard, mayo or similar stuff on my food makes me want to gag. I’ve always been a little bit picky about my food (I was a complete pain for my mother as a child) but this is just weird.
I think the reaction is extreme because I worked in KFC as a teenager. Three hot summers and several lazy colleagues meant that I regularly went into work and had to clean rancid mayonnaise and crusty ketchup off the kitchen utensils.
Still, that means more condiments left for everyone else, right?
Does garlic count? I’m a garlic abuser, that’s for sure…very few savory food don’t get better with 4-5 cloves of garlic!
I also have been known to abuse vinegar and lemon juice on things that *probably* don’t need to be so sour ;-)
Well, when I make bbq glazes (for grilling) I use mustard to help kick it along when I’m out of brown sugar/honey. I also use the ham glaze packet for help when I’m lazy. Condiments to make food taste better after it’s done, though? ‘Fraid I don’t do much of that. I sometimes eat mustard on ham sammiches, though. Now, – pepper -, oh, pepper, my love…..and garlic, I’m a big fan of garlic.
I grew up in the U.S. midwest, and yes, ketchup was put on just about everything. I think of it as a White People’s Salsa.
I was a picky eater as a kid, so I never was one to put ketchup on fried eggs or anything like that. No, when I grew up and moved away to a big city I developed more “international” tastes, like Nutella. I confess I will eat it straight from the container w/ a spoon.
I use garlic salt on a lot of things.
Oh, and mayo. Good God, I put mayo on everything.
Spicy mayo. When I went to a local fish & chips chain and realized you could get spicy mayo on the side, instead of tartar sauce…well…things got kind of hazy, and the next thing I knew, I was sitting in the park, covered in grease, with no more fries and an empty spicy mayo container.
mmmm chippy’s.
Half my favorite foods are in that category in large part because they are something I can put sour cream on. mmmmm sour cream.
but, I too will put ketchup on almost anything. I also am pretty addicted to salt, I seriously lucked out in having low-end-of-normal blood pressure by nature.
Hot sauce!
I have, at last count, about ten different kinds of hot sauce. I put it on pizza, burgers, steak, pasta….mmmmmm hot sauce.
BBQ sauce! In fact, I didn’t go vegetarian for 6 months because I convinced myself that I had to go to all the bbq joints in town first. Irrational, I know. Now that I’m vegan, I don’t eat bbq sauce that much. Which is sad. Think I’ll eat some fries and tofu with BBQ today. Yummm.
I’ve got a bunch of weird neuroses about – well, about everything, but they tend to be bad with food, so I find condiments kinda unpleasant even to think about. I sometimes put a bit of ketchup on my fries, and I’ll put soy sauce on a stir fry, but other than that, I’m not really down with goop that you put on your food.
SALSA!!! SALSA!!! AND MORE SALSA!!!
I absolutely hate ketchup and have never put it in/on anything. As a child I recall an aunt putting it on her ice cream — ewwwww. I don’t have a particular fondness for mayo either.
I do like mustard, but in appropriate places like reubens and german potato salad. I guess lime pickle would be my go-to condiment, it seems so well suited to so many dishes.
I have a partner who mis/over/uses mayo and ketchup and wasabi (if that is possible).
Er. Which part of Canada do you live in? Because when I lived in Calgary, the Canadians thought USians used ketchup too much, and gravy was the condiment of choice for fries, followed by vinegar. (Shoutout to Peter’s Drive-in in Calgary, who will give you your fries in a brown paper bag so you can shake the vinegar over them.)
And I mean, Canada is the country wot invented poutine: fries, cheese curds, and gravy.
When I had to return to the States, I was forlorn because have you tried asking for gravy with your fries here? No, they give you KETCHUP! But in Canada, gravy could be had for the asking.
My condiment experience seems to differ vastly from yours. Maybe it is a regional thing?
Apparently, President Obama has had his own condiment issues.
@victoria
I am pretty certain this is how Nutella is meant to be eaten. :)
No condiments, but I have a tendency to put cinnamon on everything–everything sweet, definitely, and sometimes savoury meat dishes. I also eat a LOT of apricot jam…pancakes, sandwiches, turnovers, crepes… And I’m always trying to find ways to include my favourite dairy, yoghurt, in my meals…
I overuse hot sauce. Nothing is exempt from hot sauce, imo. Hot wings get drenched in more hot sauce. I even use it on my french fries. Apparently, my mother ate hot wings en masse when I was in the womb, so…yeah, I was sorta born with an overaffection for hot sauce.
I go through condiment phases. In college, it was soy sauce. Lately, it’s been hot sauce. (Yoink some hot sauce packets from taco bell next time you go in, and try it on cottage cheese. It’s awesome. Also, even though I’m trans, the fact that I think so makes me think I might be pregnant.)
@PixelFish
Yes I am a lover of fries and gravy as well, though I do add malt vinegar and ketchup to it. Fries for me is an adventure and a mess. I am from southern Ontario and Ketchup is a big deal out here.
My favorite condiment–at least for sandwiches–is Durkee’s Famous Dressing, a sort of mustard-mayonnaise hybrid. However, whenever I cross the river to Canada, I try to bring back a couple of bags of those wonderful ketchup potato chips.
Mustard. MUSTARD!
There are a bazillion kinds of mustard that are delicious on everything. My current obsession are the whole-grain mustards with the grains suspended in some kind of vinegar mixture. It goes on steak, chicken, pork, veggies, starches, and is delicious in salad dressing.
Another sour cream lover here — I went through a long phase where I put it on pretty much everything (or, if something couldn’t be eaten with sour cream, I just removed that from my diet).
Unfortunately I am dairy-free now so I’ve gone back to my other love — honey mustard.
I used to choose restaurants based on who had the best honey mustard. (I don’t like regular yellow mustard, so if the mustard/vinegar part outdoes the honey part, I ain’t interested.) KFC and Dairy Queen both have great honey mustards; at Macca’s, I use regular honey on my chicken nuggets because their honey mustard is nasty. (No, I wasn’t meaning to imply that KFC, DQ, McD’s, etc, are “real” restaurants. :P)
I love ketchup, too. Sometimes the food is just the vehicle FOR the ketchup.
French fries with Mayo…and some more mayo. I loves me some mayo!
There are a lot of foods that are basically vehicles for condiments in my mind. Sushi’s great and all, but it’s really just a way to get wasabi and soy sauce into my mouth. My sandwiches center around huge globs of dijon mustard (the spicier the better), with the cheese and veggies only incidental. My family douses grits in Tabasco sauce. I put Tabasco on lasagna and, um, everything. I’ll also make the most simple meals way harder than they need to be so I can load them up with garlic.
I blame it on being a smoker and having no taste buds.
PESTO.
I’m not personally guilty of this one, but my friends used to have “ranch offs” in high school. They’d order big meals and lots and lots of ranch dressing, and compete to see who could use the most ranch on their food. I saw chicken fingers drenched in ranch, french fries drenched in ranch, salads drenched in ranch, even a couple of weird items like English Muffins drenched in ranch…
Revised estimate: fifteen hot sauces. I forgot a few.
(and Jaleesa – I forgot about fries! I put it on that, too.)
until recently, even the smell of ketchup made me gag, but when i started to make friends, i found myself getting drunk more often… and i discovered there’s nothing better than drunk times eating ketchupy fries with friends.
Hot sauce. I eat spaghetti with just butter and hot sauce on it if my stomach’s feeling a bit off.
Also mayo. The go-to quick lunch here is two eggs, boiled slightly under completely hard, lettuce, slices of tomato, all on bread, both pieces of which have been spread with mayo.
I used to eat mustard by the spoonful, and my mother’s refrigerator pickles by the half-jar, with cheese. For a while I was putting candied jalapeno slices on everything. They’re really good with peanut butter.
Also, I suppose, pepper. My dad carries around a tiny pepper grinder rather than do without his freshly-ground pepper. I do not go quite that far, but I do think that a proper plate of eggs and home fries should look as if it’s had a sudden light volcanic eruption over it.
None of the places I’ve lived in Canada (*waves at Pete’s lovers*) do that thing with the ketchup. I wonder if it’s an Ontario thing.
When I was in the UK, I got addicted to mayo with fries.
Gotta say I don’t get the whole mayo with fries thing. My stomach turns just thinking just thinking of it.
I grew up in New Brunswick and live now in Ontario, and I’ve definately been in the habit of everything being better with ketchup. Especially eggs, and Kraft Dinner. Some people put ketchup on poutine though, and i don’t get that.
I also have to put salad dressing on my broccoli before I’ll touch it, and like to eat fries with mayo or with ketchup and mustard together. Sour cream is also fantastic on anything I can pair it with. But honestly, NOTHING beats mayo with fries!
My name is Natalia, and I am addicted to hot sauce.
My husband also puts ketchup on his French toast. He grew up in western Illinois, but his mother is from Australia, and she didn’t know what else you were supposed to put on it (I guess she thought bread and eggs would go with a savory condiment and didn’t even consider that the dish is akin to pancakes). It’s not my bag, but as long as there’s no powdered sugar on the French toast, and the bread itself isn’t anything sweet, I’m not sure why some people are so turned off by it.
I’ve never been much of a condiment fan myself — I’ve never cared for ketchup on anything, I only have dressing on my salad if someone else has already put it on, and mustard has to be really interesting for me to have it on anything. (I’m from Chicago, and since I’d only eat a hot dog plain on the bun, I guess I’ve never had a Chicago hot dog.) Barbecue sauce and hot sauce are awesome, though, and I will cop to enjoying mayo on fries on several occasions.
Mustard. Cranberry mustard. Honey mustard. Southwestern mustard. Horseradish mustard. Plain yellow, not so much.
The thing that goes everywhere it shouldn’t is salsa. On my eggs. on my pizza. In the chili when I make it. into the taco-mac.
There’s no condiment I’m really addicted to. But something I have been putting on EVERYTHING is honey+peanutbutter (it comes in one jar). Trans fats have never been so delicious
Hot sauce, particularly any kind that is “smoked” — the Tobasco chipolte flavor is a current favorite. I’m also quite fond of the Crystal brand of hot sauce. But I also adore garlic, and pickles, mustard, sourkrout (anything soaked in vinegar, basically). Although, oddly enough, I never got the vinegar-on-fries thing. It always looked a bit soggy to me.
Now this place in Austin has sweet-potato fries served with chipotle mayo (made the RIGHT way). ooooh. hungry now.
A1 Steak Sauce. This condiment can be enjoyed on everything from mashed potatoes to potato chips to Brunswick stew.
‘nother kid from southern Ontario here and I can’t say that I noticed an *extreme* interest in ketchup, but it is a household staple, for sure. I can’t imagine a home without it. Maybe if I travelled more, I’d notice a difference! I grew up with ketchup on my mac and cheese (another Canadian food staple — apparently we’re the mac and cheese capital of the world, but I’m not sure that it’s not just me skewing the numbers) and my scrambled eggs, but grew out of it eventually… Now I abuse a particularly amazing brand of salsa and I have yet to find something *not* improved by its addition. Mmm.
Mayo grosses me out in all its forms and applications, but I know a lot of people who love it. Yech!
Ketchup is good on chili and especially blackeyed peas. Mmm. I refuse to be ashamed!
Jufran! Which is kind of like ketchup, but with bananas. That or mae ploy sweet chili sauce end up on a few too many things in this household.
I don’t really have a condiment that I put on food too much, but I really do abuse Vegemite during the cooking process. Seriously, a bit of it in soups, stirfry, with Avocado on toast for breakfast, whatever.
I’ll admit that I used to eat mustard sandwiches. Bread MUSTARD, MUSTARD, MUSTARD, bread. I feel a little grossed out thinking about it now, but I really do love mustard. I also really love French dressing on pizza, but I blame Mississippi for that one (instead of my own idiosyncrasies).
I think ketchup and french toast crosses a line though. I’d probably have to excuse myself just to keep from thinking of those two things meeting. The horror!
Hello other hot sauce fans!
I heartily recommend Blair’s. I have their After Death right now and it’s incredible – I can only take a bit at a time though. Some day I need to try Ultra Death (four levels up – they have a scale).
This past weekend I bought hot sauce with Hillary Clinton on the bottle. :)
Cock sauce. Which is the double header of food, because you can use it as a condiment and as an ingredient in a surprising variety of foods. It’s the secret to my fantabulous veggie fajitas. Cock sauce and Shiner beer, with some other stuff like cumin tossed over a variety of seasonable veggies, served with a side of black beans on flour tortillas. I honestly can’t think of anything more Austin that that.
Mayo, however, is the grossest thing ever invented. It’s like eating snot.
I’m also a salsa nut. I buy the green salsa in the cans that are like $.69 a pop in the Mexican import section of the grocery store, and just eat that on everything. Veggie burgers, mac and cheese, I’ve even experimented with salsa verde on bagels. (It works if you put hummus on the bagel.)
I don’t overuse any condiments, but I do like ketchup (tomato sauce for those of us in Aus). Since I don’t put it on very many foods at all, there are foods I eat just so that I can put sauce on them – sausage rolls, party pies and mini frankfurts are the main offenders. If ketchup didn’t exist, I would never eat those foods…. :)
Oh, actually, some people would consider my use of sweet chili sauce excessive. I couldn’t possibly comment.
I don’t use a lot of condiments because I don’t like salty food, and most condiments are salty. (Vegemite is excepted because it’s awesome, and also only used in small quantities.) I make up for this, however, by abusing the garlic. The recipe says 3 cloves? That means 3 HEADS! Woo!
Mango chutney. On toast with peanut butter for breakfast. In egg salad for lunch, and of course in and on curries. I have even served latkes with mango chutney. Ditto with chow-chow, which I put on everything when I’m not in the mood for chutney.
And Texas Pete, made here in North Carolina, totally kicks Tabasco, though it’s not quite as hot. For hot I like plain sambal oelek, wasabi, or horseradis, depending.
I am a serious condiment (ab)user, but I could quit any time.
Renee, I think that mayo in the UK and mayo in Canada tastes different. At least the stuff that I put on my chips doesn’t taste like miracle whip. Cuz that would be *gross*.
However, Kraft Dinner needs ketchup.
Ketchup only goes on hamburgers, hot dogs, and some kinds of fries.
Mustard only goes on hamburgers, hot dogs, and ham sandwiches. Sometimes chicken nuggets.
Barbecue sauce goes on meat sandwiches, especially smoky meat sandwiches, and sometimes chicken nuggets.
Mayo goes on NOTHING.
Honey mustard goes on chicken strips, chicken sandwiches, and fries.
Honestly, the only condiment I find myself using quite a lot these days is butter. And I really only eat it on plain toast or bread. In my mind there are very specific places that certain condiments go and don’t go, and they shouldn’t go on the “wrong” place. When I see mayo on a barbecue burger, I go “ewwww.” If I saw ketchup on something I didn’t think ketchup should go on (almost everything that’s been stated here) I might gag just a little (literally, not figuratively).
My mom always said that sandwiches “need” mayo or else “they’re too dry.” Well, then people should stop using dry meat. Because mayo is gross, fatty, gross, and gross. And I’m so sick of having to have it taken off of everything. I like to appreciate the flavors of a food, not drown them out in fatty, oily, salty dressings and spreads. I get SO tired of being told, “OMG, you’re American? Why do you eat ranch dressing on EVERYTHING??” I had never even tasted ranch dressing until a year or two ago. :/
Hang on… what’s wrong with ketchup on french toast? Where I work
french toast makes an occasional appearance on the breakfast menu,
and I’ve only ever seen people eat it with some combination of salt,
pepper, ketckup, brown sauce or baked beans. Or with nothing.
Unless you’re saying it should be eaten with nothing, which I admit
is quite a nice way to eat it, what on earth would you put on it? I usually
go for salt&pepper, or brown sauce.
Condiments overused, in this order:
1. Ranch dressing. Good with everything. Baked potatoes, pizza, chicken fingers, salad. Also good with
2. Cock sauce. Goddamn, sriracha is the bomb. I put it in *everything.* The day I found out you could get it in packets with carryout pho is the day I began loving America again.
3. mustard/mayo combo: fries, burgers. Yum.
4. Cholula/Cajun Chef — hot sauce for soups and eggses.
For the record: I have never liked ketchup. Too sweet.
when i was younger, and again when i was pregnant, i used to drink vinegar straight from the bottle. it was always malt vinegar when i was a kid, because that was all my british parents bought. i still love vinegar, and make my salad dressings way more vinegar-y than oil-y. i probably have ten or so kinds of vinegar in my pantry. and i drink the dressing left in the bottom of my salad bowl if no-one is looking — as long as it’s vinegar-based. i don’t do creamy salad dressing.
renee — i live in bc, and my friends in high school all did the ketchup-vinegar-fries-and-gravy thing. it grossed me out.
oh, and bacon and eggs must be accompanied by hp sauce. you mix the sauce with the egg yolk (only over-easy eggs form me!) and then dip the bacon in it. if you have leftover, you mop it up with your toast.
One more for the mayo with chips fries brigade here – is it a European thing? Because I know it’s extremely typical in Germany – Pommes rot-weiß, anyone? – and I’ve run into it as well in the UK (along with things that should never go on fries like vinegar, gah) but I can’t remember ever hearing about it in the US or from US people.
I don’t think I overuse any condiment, although I am quite fond of mayo in general and a specific mayo-yoghurty salad cream in particular (from Aldi! It’s the only salad cream I know that doesn’t have a nasty vinegar aftertaste and trust me, I’ve looked). Although I don’t actually put it on salad as that’s what homemade dressings are for, but bread with that and a slice of mature gouda cheese? Mmmmmmmm culinary heaven – now try finding mature gouda in shops. *sigh* I hate mustard, have no particular urge to try brown sauce, and only use ketchup for my fries if mayo isn’t available.
…I may have something of an unhealthy fondness for pesto, though. I recently tried putting it in risotto, so the beginnings of “oh, I’m sure it’ll go with this!” are there.
No one thing (I guess mustard comes closest if you count the number of kinds I keep, mayo or sour cream for most used), but everything gets some sort of condiment. Mustard or soy, or ketchup or mayo, sour cream or salsa, it almost doesn’t matter – I love them, and use them frequently, and often in combination.
Another southern Ontarian here, and I think the ketchup thing is a bit of a mixed bag around here. Most people I know who originate culturally from European roots (like myself) are not SO into ketchup. I definitely have a bottle most times, but it really is only for veggie burgers and sometimes mac and cheese. Most of the folks I know who have more americanized cultures are the ketchup fanatics (eating it on pancakes, french toast, french fries and the like).
Myself, I love my poutine, but as far as condiments go mayo goes for fries (I realize it seems gross to some people… me too, but it tastes so good I can’t help myself) and I second Bonn that butter makes a lot of things taste better than good, and I found myself recently eating whipped butter by itself after convincing myself it’s not unlike eating whipped cream on its own.
On a random feminist thought tangent, I love to read of all the fantastic, decadant and guilt free food love expressed here. In my day to day life, the men I encounter are often shocked that there could possibly be a woman who openly admits that she loves to eat (even unhealthy fatty things sometimes! gasp!) without shame or excuses. They seem to buy this whole tv trope where women should be rightfully ashamed of gratuitous or even normal eating in front of them, for fear of lookikng like a “pig”. We are supposed to starve ourselves in front of them, acknowledging that we really should be on a diet, and then complain of the crippling hunger to our girlfriends over a tragically predictable chick flick, then binge on chocolate cake and hate ourselves (while they happily chow down platterfulls of hot wings, and make fun of “fat chicks”)
I think I eat less ketchup since I lived to Europe for six months. But I still need it for eggs, grilled cheese sandwhiches, veggie dogs and fries at least. Canadians must like ketchup since we have ketchup chips.
I like different types of vinegar for fries. I had a prof who said he went to the southern states and asked for vinegar for his fries and they thought he was crazy because you clean with vinegar.
I like miracle whip, not other mayo, for pasta salad and tomato sandwhiches and wraps.
sour cream.
sour cream.
sour cream.
1) Sour cream makes eeeeverything better (imagine that said with a thick Eastern-European accent).
2) Garlic, chopped up small and mashed up with some olive oil, goes on potatoes and meat by the delicious fragrant SPOONFUL.
3) Ketchup: Meh. On fries, inside a burger, and sparingly on mac and cheese, if you must. In French toast? Yuck.
4) Mayo: Ewwwwwww. As far as I’m concerned, it’s an abomination of desolation.
Isn’t it funny, not only how idiosyncratic people’s condiment preferences are, but how strongly entrenched, dogmatic, and passionate? I might change the political party I vote for (er, I’m Canadian, so we have more than one lefty option). But condiments? Nevah!
I don’t use many condiments at all.
Ketchup on fries or veggie burgers.
Mustard on fries, veggie burgers, tuna sandwiches and other sandwiches back when I ate more meat.
Mayo only a tiny bit in tuna salad.
Thats about it.
Someone asked what those who are grossed out by ketchup on french toast would put on it: same sweet stuff as on pancakes: syrup, butter, berries, fruit sauce, jam, whipped cream…
I love ketchup and almost all other condiments! In moderation, however, as nothing ruins a good sandwich like sogginess from huge globs of mayo, ketchup, etc.
Sometimes I just eat bread with ketchup, it’s great for dipping, yum.
mayo is my passion. Especially when I make it myself with a little bit of crushed garlic. I could eat it with everything, and I especially like it with boiled or fried eggs (then again, my fried eggs sometimes come with suger AND salt). And, because I am a dutchie, with fries and potatoes. And, if I mix it with mustard and honey, it’s really good on cheese sandwiches (old cheese, though, of the dutch variety – gouda indeed, or old amsterdam, or whatever).