The Great Ketchup Debate

When you're the oldest child, as I am, there's a tendency to feel as though you've gotten a bad break when it comes to parental regulations.

The ridiculously early curfew hours and harsh punishments that are set in stone when you're in the midst of navigating puberty seem to just kind of disappear when your younger siblings hit the same awkward period. It's as if your folks were using your upbringing as a way to send a message to the younger kids. This isn't just baseless speculation on my part, either: there's legitimate science about this phenomenon.

In my family's household, a good example of this sliding scale of strictness came at the dinner table.

Whereas I was forced to finish all of the vegetables that sat next to whatever meal my parents made that evening, my youngest sister was actually given the option of having entirely different dinners made for her. So, while the rest of us were eating steak and potatoes and green beans (which, in retrospect, does sound mighty good to these adult taste buds), she was handed over plates of chicken fingers and fries. And before eating them, she'd drown them with one of two things: Ranch dressing, or entire bottles of ketchup.

Today, we discuss the latter.

Now, kids love ketchup because the huge amount of sweetness it adds. But grown-ups are fond of it, too. But one Florida chef is taking a parental-like stand when it comes to the ubiquitous sauce.

At the Mad Fresh Bistro in Fort Myers, Florida, chef Xavier Duclos introduced a rule that forbids the use of ketchup for anyone over 10 years old. His explanation:

He has a point. Ketchup does mask and overwhelm any level of subtlety that a dish contains. But do other chefs believe ketchup ruins their carefully-crafted creations? To find out, I asked a few.

Jay Porter, from San Diego's The Linkery and Oakland's The Half Orange and soon-to-be-opened Salsipuedes:

Personally, I find it a bit of a publicity gimmick, but obviously it works; you certainly wouldn't be writing about this Florida restaurant's food otherwise. Generally speaking, we restaurants are all in the hospitality business and that means helping people have a great time and accommodating whatever of their requests we reasonably can. If a guest genuinely likes to put ketchup on their sausage sandwich, or for that matter mayonnaise in their IPA, it's all fine with me.

Bryan Stevens, Sous Chef at Mohawk Bend:

Ketchup is an American staple. It's familiar and we associate it with comfort foods like fries and hamburgers. It adds a great bit of acid to a dish. However, if ketchup is used to mask flavors then I agree with Chef Duclos' point.

Joyce Goldstein, author of "Inside the California Food Revolution" and chef/owner of San Francisco's Square One:

If people have the habit of adding ketchup to a plate of food, he is not going to break them of it. And it makes him look narrow minded and needlessly controlling. If they want to put ketchup with fries or a burger or lamb chops or cooked cauliflower or grilled fish or fried chicken, or whatever, that's OK. It is going in their mouths. (Not the chef's.) I personally shudder when someone orders a steak well done but I do not forbid it. (In fact ketchup might help!) I would not want to eat it myself but I do not think ordering it is an insult. Different tastes. In fact, we used to make our own ketchup at Square One even though we were a Mediterranean restaurant and ketchup was not traditionally part of the Mediterranean larder. But if someone wanted it for potatoes in place of romesco sauce or whatever sauce we had on the plate we gave them some of our own.

Adam Levoe, Executive Chef at the Pub at Golden Road Brewing and Chloe's:

Ketchup is an amazing condiment born out of American innovation and necessity. Drowning a meal in it is up to the consumer, but you can't ban a classic.

So, where does that leave us?

It seems the side of the debate that one falls on has to do with how they view the role of the chef. Are they an artist, their plates acting as canvases on which to deliver complex and dramatic works to their audience? Or are they entertainers, whose job it is to cater to the desires of their consumers whatever they may be? The answer, as all answers generally do, is probably found somewhere in between.

But as my own experience growing up under the regime of overzealous parents can attest to, if a chef's goal is to get people not to use ketchup, telling people they can't have it is going to do the opposite of quashing their desire.