The Ketchup Taste Test

This evening I realised that I have a very broad selection of ketchup brands in my refrigerator, and I got this novel idea: I would perform a taste test of these ketchups! What better delivery vehicle for this marvelous condiment is there but the humble hot dog? I opened a package of this marvelous invention of the 1936 World Expo in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, extracted three links from it, and placed them into steaming water. Also of note is the fact that these links don't use any natural or synthetic casings, so no deceptive "crunch" would be there to influence the overall taste of the ketchups.

As the hot dogs simmered in the pot of hot water, I withdrew three squeezable containers of ketchup: W Ketchup, Generic Supermarket Ketchup, and Heinz Ketchup. I removed the bottles from the icebox one by one, shaking them and placing them upside-down as to allow for the ketchup to accumulate into the neck of the bottle and thus avoid the accumulation of any unwanted ketchup-water, which might make its way to the nozzle when liberally applying the ketchup to the hot dogs. Nobody likes a soggy bun when applying ketchup to hamburgers, hot dogs, or even hash browns.

Next, I withdrew from the refrigerator a small bottle of French's Yellow Mustard, which I also shook to prevent any possible occurrence of soggy bun. However, I did not balance the mustard bottle on its tip, it would be unrealistic to do this in haste as the tip of the mustard bottle doesn't provide a nice flat surface which would allow the bottle to stay upright if slightly disturbed. I also removed and placed on the counter one bottle of dill relish, which would also be applied to the three hot dogs in steaming water once the hot dogs themselves were withdrawn from the steaming water and placed into hot dog buns.

I then removed a package of hot dog buns from the refrigerator on the kitchen counter and much to my dismay, I had a number of hot dog buns which did not match up in total to the number of hot dogs both at the time in a pot of steaming water, cooking prior to my consumption of them, and the remainder which I had returned to their proper area of storage in the meat drawer of my refrigerator. I will always be perplexed by this phenomenon. Is it an intended result of a sinister meeting between the hot dog baker's guild and the hot dog pressing guild? We will never know unless we belong to either of those organisations, if in fact they exist at all. Or perhaps it is a mere coincidence or resultant of tradition. I shall not surmise anything from mere numbers.

Finally, I withdrew a clean plate from my kitchen cupboard and placed it on the kitchen counter. I then removed the plastic twist tie from the bag of hot dog buns and withdrew three hot dog buns individually, slightly seperating the bun in half where the industrial baking machines had split them down the middle, as to create a resting spot for the hot dog links after they had finished becoming sufficiently warm for proper consumption of the hot dog links and were removed from the steaming water that cooked the hot dogs themselves.

After probably ten minutes of having the hot dogs cook in the steaming hot water in the pot which I heated on my stove, I removed the hot dogs one after the other with a pair of metal tongs, as to avoid burning my fingers with the steaming hot water, and I placed each hot dog in a corresponding hot dog bun which I had earlier removed from a plastic bag and seperated slightly, as to facilitate the placement of this now-cooked hot dog food item. After I removed all three of the now-warm hot dogs, I removed the pot of hot water from the heat and poured it down the drain of my kitchen sink slowly, as to avoid the hazard of splash-back that one encounters when pouring an excess of water into a sink, which inherently has a limited capacity and concave surface.

I twisted the nozzle for the French's Yellow Mustard open and placed three small pea-sized amounts of mustard onto each of the three hot dogs, one at each end of the hot dog and one at the center of the hot dog. Next, I removed a spoon from my utensil drawer, unscrewed the cap on the dill relish, and withdrew approximately one-half of a teaspoon of relish for each hot dog and distributed it as evenly as possible across each of the three hot dogs.

Now came the moment of truth. I arranged the three hot dogs so that they sat side by side laterally and supported eachother as to prevent any of the three from rolling over and disrupting the serenity of the two in-place condiments. On the farthest left hot dog I conservatively applied the Heinz ketchup in a nice line, on each side of the hot dog link. On the middle hot dog, I slathered a moderate portion of the Generic supermarket ketchup. Last, but not least, I liberally applied lots and lots of W Ketchup to the hot dog on the right side of the plate.

Contrasting the ketchups

Sight: Now, I will not dismiss lighting effects and possible colour contrasts with the other two condiments, but it would appear that the Heinz ketchup was slightly lighter than the other two ketchups. The Generic brand supermarket ketchup was a shade darker. Last but not least, W ketchup was the darkest in shade. We can only guess what secret ingredient made this particular brand of ketchup slightly darker than the others. Is molasses the secret ingredient? One can only speculate, unless you're willing to accost the owner of W Ketchup's trade secret ketchup recipe. Barring this violent improbability, we will never know.
Touch: All three of these ketchups feel identical. They're all very finely puréed and are completely indistinguishable from one another on the basis of touch alone.
Smell: I must say, that they're all very similar. The Generic ketchup smells most of vinegar, while W Ketchup smells slightly sweeter than the others. Are these observations simply the result of the intermingling odours of relish and mustard? I cannot even begin to guess.
Aural: While you cannot hear ketchup without other external factors, I must admit to being curious about which of these squeezable bottles of ketchup results in the most satisfying "burr-rrap" sound when nearly empty, similar to the sound of flapping butt-cheeks of a person who has farted.