Historians trace the ancestry of the zesty mixture as far back as the Roman Empire. Ancient cooks created a sauce from the entrails of dried fish they called “garum,” a highly prized addition to the dinner table. The more familiar word “ketchup” however, probably had its origins in the 1690s, from what the Chinese called “kôe-chiap” or “kê-tsiap.” Created from the brine of pickled fish or shellfish, it was the Orient’s answer to a flavor enhancing food additive.

After the East India Company opened trade with the Far East during the sixteenth century, the port markets of Singapore became a favorite place for sailors. There, exotic dishes accompanied by a tasty hot sauce dubbed “kechap” were hyped by Malaysian vendors. The dressing became an immediate favorite and promptly exported when the seafarers returned home (the Dutch renamed it Ketjap). Before too long, frazzled housewives began experimenting with the recipe, attempting to recreate the tantalizing concoction that their well-traveled husbands were raving about.

It came as no surprise that Mrs. Harrison’s Housekeeper’s Pocketbook and Mrs. Glasse’s Cookery Book began featuring recipes during the 1700s to aid the creative cook in her kitchen adventures. But, since the exotic ingredients used in the Indonesian mixture were not available in England, home cooks cleverly substituted a variety of other staples. Ketchups made of mushrooms became the first choice, followed by purees based on tomatoes, walnuts, anchovies, and even oysters.

Despite the variations, the notion of ketchup as a food enhancer began to grow in popularity. Sailors returning to America eventually brought the sauce with them across the Atlantic, adding the tomatoes they gathered during expeditions to Mexico or the West Indies. Their families loved the taste, and soon, tomato seeds were planted so that they might have their own personal supply of the prime ingredient.

Suddenly, women realized that the task of mixing up large batches of the condiment was added to their wifely duties. It was a laborious job, requiring an entire day of stirring just to ensure that the pulp didn’t stick to the bottom of the pot. Around this time, a man by the name of Henry J. Heinz saw his opportunity in this work and wasted no time adding ketchup to the line of condiments he was producing for sale. In 1876, he began to manufacture and bottle America’s first commercially processed tomato ketchup.

Since then, ketchup has risen to its place of prominence as the supreme comfort food condiment for the masses. The distinctive multi-faceted bottle has established itself as an icon of the fast food table top, taking its rightful place alongside salt and pepper shakers and the napkin dispensers For the frenzied aficionados who thump, shake, and pour the piquant sauce upon every conceivable foodstuff known to man, there is nothing that compares!

Move over, mayonnaise, mustard, and secret sauce—tomato ketchup reigns unchallenged as the primo flavor enhancer for junk food—coast to coast. Call it ketchup, catsup, or catchup—nobody really cares. Just be sure that there is a full bottle on the table, an ample supply in the squeeze pump, and at least a half dozen of those little plastic packets in the bag!

Related Ketchup Links and Resources:

• See the World’s Largest Catsup Bottle
• History of the Heinz Company
• Ketchup In a Bottle Levitation Trick
• How Ketchup is Made Funny Video

The Quarter-pounder with cheese

Sure, history books tell of the Tartar’s fondness for raw meat and how sailors from Germany loved to order Hamburg Style Steak upon their arrival in the New World. The real question is: Who created America’s first all-beef patty, ancestral prototype of today’s Quarter Pounder, Big Mac, and Whopper?

Pinpointing the origination of the hamburger to one particular person has proven more difficult to substantiate than the introduction of buttered toast. From localities across the nation, a roster of colorful characters have all staked their claim to the honor, forever obscuring the faint lines of fast-food lineage.

Popular food folklore—peppered with a light sprinkling of facts—often gives the top billing to “Hamburger” Charlie Nagreen, an inventive resident of Seymour, Wisconsin. Seems it all started somewhere around 1885, when fifteen-year-old Charlie began peddling his chopped beef to the throng of hungry visitors attending the Outgamie County Fair.

Worried about soiling their hands with grease, a few genteel patrons asked if Nagreen could supply a more sanitary way of toting the snack meat. Responding with a sizzling stroke of genius, he slapped one of his cooked patties between two slices of bread—and presto! The first truly portable combination of ground beef and bread became a reality.

Five states to the South, the burger-loving denizens of Athens, Texas, have posted a plaque promoting their own history. For them, the original father of the blessed burger has been and always will be legendary lunch counter owner, operator, cook, and chief bottle washer Uncle “Fletch” Davis.

By the latter part of the 1890s, old Dave gained a notable reputation locally for his fried patties of steer. He decorated his first hand-held version with a healthy dose of hot mustard, crowned it with a slice of Bermuda onion, and nestled the stackup between dual slabs of home-made bread. Voila, pardner—the hamburger was born!

The state of Ohio throws its own entry onto the griddle with the exploits of Akronite Frank Menches. Seems that in 1892, he tapped into the mother load of grease at the Summit County Fair with his own creation. When a pork delivery failed to materialize one busy morning, the Menches brothers were left lacking the main ingredient for their famous sausage sandwiches. Snorting their noses at the adversity, they substituted ground beef. With zeal, circular hunks were flavored, formed, and fired. In the spirit of saving the day in the last minute (all too prevalent in food folklore), Frank Menches began slapping patties between the two halves of buns and proceeded to canonize himself as the “inventor” of the hamburger.

Even more colorful is the “just in the nick of time” story handed down to descendants of Louis Lassen, once famed burgermeister of Louis’ Lunch in New Haven, Connecticut. According to Ken Lassen, current owner and grandson of the founder, an unidentified man came waltzing in at the turn of the century and requested a “quick sandwich.” Ever ready to please, his grandfather mashed a handful of sliced meat trimmings into a single patty, cooked it in a vertical broiler, and slipped it in between—you guessed it—two slices of bread!

Is there really one birthplace of the hamburger? No one will ever know for certain. In all probability, the hamburger sandwich invented itself—created simultaneously by a melting pot of individuals who happened to tune into the universal consciousness of human inventiveness, imagination, and hunger.

Kirby’s idea was simple: patrons were to drive up in their automobiles and make their food requests from behind the wheel. A young lad would take the customers’ orders directly through the window of the car and then deliver the food and beverages right back out to the curb. The novelty of this new format was that hurried diners could consume their meals while still sitting in the front seat.

Of course, the Roaring Twenties were ripe for such a brazen idea. Adventurous folk perched atop flagpoles, danced the Charleston at around the clock dance marathons, and consumed bathtub gin at speakeasies. During Prohibition, freedom of travel emerged as the new thrill, fueled by automobile ownership that soared from six million to twenty-seven million motorcars by decade’s end.

When Kirby and Jackson’s Texas “Pig Stand opened along the busy Dallas-Fort Worth Highway (West Davis Street) in the Fall of 1921, hoards of Texas motorists tipped their ten-gallon hats to “America’s Motor Lunch. Here was the ultimate dine-in-your-car convenience—starring Kirby and Jackson’s newest hand-held creation, the “Pig Sandwich. Prepared with tender slices of roast pork loin, pickle relish, and barbecue sauce, it quickly gained a loyal following among harried commuters and carefree joy riders. A frosty bottle of Dr Pepper (another Texas favorite, invented at a soda fountain in Waco) accompanied the motoring meal.

But the tasty curbside cuisine wasn’t the only attraction at America’s first drive-in restaurant. The flamboyant car servers who worked the curb—or “carhops as someone coined the phrase—were truly a sight to behold. “All the car hops were young men, probably 12 to 15 years old, recalls Richard Hailey, successor to the Pig Stand throne and acting president of Pig Stands, Inc. “The carhops were very competitive. As soon as they saw a Model T start to slow down and turn tires towards the curb, they’d race out to see who could jump up on the running board first while the car was still moving.

With its good food and derring-do curb service, the legend of the carhop grew as the reputation of the Pig Stands and its signature barbecue sandwich spread. Propelled beyond the borders of Texas by one of the first franchising arrangements in the industry, the number of restaurants multiplied quickly. Between 1921 and 1934, more than 100 Pig Stands were serving up “A Good Meal At Any Time in Texas, California, Louisiana, Mississippi, New York, Florida, Oklahoma, Arkansas, and Alabama.

As the demands of the American automobile owner changed, fast food innovation shaped the Pig Stand legacy. According to Hailey, “It was California Pig Stand No. 21 that pioneered drive through car service in 1931. Unheard of at the time, customers drove right up to the building to make their order, while the cook served the meals to occupants waiting in their car. Fast forward seventy years: Today, virtually every American fast-food chain restaurant relies on the “drive-thru window format to service busy commuters arriving in their motor vehicles.

Royce Hailey, patriarch of the Pig Stands clan and father to Richard, was one of the pioneers. Inspired by the same spirit of pluck and entrepreneurship that made the Pig Stands an American success story, he started his career as a Dallas carhop at age thirteen. In 1930, he leaped up onto his first automobile running board and never looked back. When he hopped off twenty-five years later, he found himself president of the company. By the dawn of the 1960s, he led the company to sell off all of the out-of-state stands and concentrate solely on the Texas locations. In 1975, he became sole owner of the company.

But a knack for business and people skills was only part of his legend. As popular restaurant history tells the tale, the visionary Hailey “invented” the chicken-fried steak sandwich during the 1930s. Not satisfied with one culinary creation to his credit, he also helped to create the super-sized slice of grilled bread most natives of the Alamo city know and love as “Texas Toast” (according to many food historians, the Pig Stands are also credited with creating fried onion rings during the heyday of the 1920s).

Son Richard purchased all interest to the Pig Stands company in 1983 and forged ahead with the tradition of serving American comfort food to a public still in love with their automobile and the freedom it affords. “Today, diners can still get an over sized piece of Texas Toast, giant onion rings, a milkshake, and a tasty Pig Sandwich, he says. “The best part is that we still sell the same Pig Sandwich made the same way that is was made so many years ago.

Along the great American roadsides, it seems that the more things change … the more they stay the same. For fans of the “World’s First Drive-in Restaurant, there’s still nothing that compares with dining on a tasty Pig Sandwich and a bottle of Dr Pepper while seated comfortably in America’s favorite dining room: the front seat of a car.

McDonalds Golden Arches (circa 1950s)

With this simple aim in the forefront, professional architects in Southern California were approached. A few interesting concepts were drafted for the brothers’ review—but unfortunately … met with immediate rejection. Later described by Richard McDonald as “squatty looking boxes,” they exhibited a blatant lack of memorable charm or character.

Undaunted, the drawings were taken home for further contemplation. Then, while Richard McDonald pored over the plans in his office one rainy night—the arrow of inspiration found its mark. He had an idea! With limited talents as an artist and unbounded intuition about what a roadside stand should look like, he began to sketch some tentative plans.

First, the height of the building had to be lifted. Tapping into personal preferences, Richard penciled in a slanted roof—sloping gradually from the front to rear. Influenced by Colonial columns dominating his twenty-five room house, he included a few variations. Though imposing, they weren’t the elusive element he desired in a fast-food restaurant.

Next, he oriented a large semi-circle parallel to the front of the square building. It looked a little funny, so he discarded the idea and proceeded to draw two arches—positioning one of them at each side of the structure. This time, he arranged them perpendicular to where the road might be. As soon as he lifted his writing instrument from the paper at the bottom of the second arch, McDonald realized he had found the answer.

Swelled with the post-invention confidence typical of any vanguard, he presented Fontana architect Stanley Meston with the idea. Unprepared for the abstract incarnation of Coffee-shop Modern, Stan posed his question: “Dick, did you have a bad dream last night?” The garish arches assaulted his design sensibilities! He wanted no part of them—detailing their obvious impracticality to the brothers (amazingly, he would lay claim to the arch idea—decades later).

Unfazed by the response, McDonald stuck to his vision. He wanted those arches and would have them! If Meston wouldn’t work with the idea, then they would get someone else. Predictably, he eventually caught the vision and cooperated with sign maker George Dexter to amplify the golden wings with neon.

After further refinements were made, an eye-grabbing rendering was drawn up. Now, curved circles became taught parabolas—flaring gradually at their base. The upper portions of the dual yellow bands—along with the edges of the flying wedge roof, were rimmed with tubes of neon. Walls, striped with dramatic red and white tiles, jazzed the exterior.

Businessman Neil Fox and associates took the hook and became the first McDonald’s franchisee in America to construct the arched design. In May of 1953, the illuminated arches born on a scrap of paper finally came to life in Phoenix, Arizona. As they brightened the opening night with their futuristic energy, lines of customers were dazzled by the sight. To many, it was obvious that the age of drive-ins and carhop service … was over. The amazing success story of Richard McDonald’s golden arches was just beginning.