ketchup recipe

bhankiii

One of those things that every kitchen needs is ketchup. If you read the labels you'll see that almost every brand has high fructose corn syrup in it. There are a couple labeled as "organic" or "no high fructose corn syrup", that just have plain sugar in them. There's even one that substitutes something like Splenda.

Or you can just make your own. I've made ketchup before using a very basic recipe, tomato paste + vinegar + onion powder + garlic powder, but today I thought I'd try a recipe from my "Jam It, Pickle It, Cure It" cookbook. And I slightly adapted it to remove the sugar and reduce the salt.

Ingredients:

1 28oz can of tomatoes (I like Cento)
1 small yellow onion (I like 4166's)
5 cloves garlic (optional)
1/2 cup Bragg's organic apple cider vinegar
2 TBS unflavored oil, like canola
1 bay leaf
1 cinnamon stick
5 whole cloves
5 whole cardamom pods, crushed
10 peppercorns, ground
1 star anise
1 tsp Hungarian paprika
you can also add toasted cumin seed if you want

Method:

Put the tomatoes, onion and garlic in a processor or blender, puree until smooth. Heat the oil in a big tall non-reactive (enamel or stainless) pot. It needs to be a tall pot because this is going to splatter. Add the spices, except paprika, and cook for a minute or two until fragrant.

Add the puree and vinegar, cook for 20 minutes to reduce the liquid - this is where the splattering happens. Add the paprika and cook another minute or two. Let cool.

When cool, stick your fingers in and feel around for the whole spices and remove them. (You can avoid this by tying up the spices in some cheesecloth, but I'm a hands on guy. If you plan to can this hot, this is what you'll need to do.)

This makes about 20 ounces. It's not completely salt-free since the canned tomatoes have salt in them. By my math you end up with about 70mg per tablespoon of ketchup. You can certainly add more if you want. You could also add a little fresh lime juice at the end. If you're more adventurous than me, you can start with fresh tomatoes, peeled and stewed, instead of canned. I like Cento because they're cooked with basil and don't have any additives other than "naturally derived citric acid".

It's good.

treetop57

Cinnamon, cloves, and cardamom. Interesting spices. Glad it turned out!

bhankiii

Those are pretty standard spices for ketchup. I tried it out last night on a bison burger and it was surprisingly good.