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  1. ketchup love

Definitions

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

  1. n. A condiment consisting of a thick, smooth-textured, spicy sauce usually made from tomatoes.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

  1. n. See catchup.

Wiktionary

  1. n. uncountable A tomato-vinegar based sauce.
  2. n. countable Such a sauce more generally (not necessarily based on tomatoes), or a specific brand or kind of such sauce – see usage notes below.

GNU Webster's 1913

  1. n. A pureed table sauce made predominantly from tomatoes, flavored with onions, sugar, salt and spices; called also tomato ketchup. The term is also applied to pureed sauces containing mushrooms, walnuts, etc., being called in such cases mushroom ketchup, walnut ketchup, etc.

WordNet 3.0

  1. n. thick spicy sauce made from tomatoes

Etymologies

  1. 1711, following earlier catchup (1690), of disputed origin. Originally referred to a sauce from South/Southeast/East Asia – 1690: East Indies (region generally); 1711: Tonkin (northern Vietnam) and China. (Wiktionary)
  2. Probably Malay kicap, fish sauce, possibly from Chinese (Cantonese) kē-chap, equivalent to Chinese (Mandarin) qié, eggplant + Chinese (Mandarin) zhī, sap, gravy. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)

Examples

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Lists

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Comments

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  • ruzuzu See ketchup couverture. Jan 27, 2010

  • chained_bear Rolig, I think catsup is a very common spelling; I'm not sure either is really preferred except by individuals. My understanding (which comes almost exclusively from Kurlansky's book, below, p. 189-191 acc. to Amazon) is that the word was originally something like "ke-tsiap" (going off vague memory here), and that pronunciation probably was more like catsup than ketchup.

    The "original" ke-tsiap (or however it was spelled, this being well before standardization) was a salt-preserved condiment sauce made from fermented inedible fish parts (e.g. heads, guts) and sounded to me a lot more similar to Worcestershire sauce than to what we know today as ketchup. But anyway... what we call catsup or ketchup can be made from a wide variety of foodstuffs--I've seen banana ketchup quite frequently, actually--but the most common seems to be the tomato.

    I don't know anyone who pronounces it cat-sup, though. Oct 6, 2008

  • rolig As a child I learned the spelling "catsup" for this condiment, I think from the writing on our catsup bottle. Of course, I felt a certain awe for this word that could be spelled one way and pronounced entirely differently. Oct 6, 2008

  • reesetee THANK you. :-) Oct 4, 2008

  • chained_bear *makes restitution*

    *beats chest in penance* Oct 3, 2008

  • reesetee C_b, you carelessly left "little tomatoey globules" unbracketed. Shame. Oct 3, 2008

  • chained_bear p.s. this word has a pretty awesome etymology. And I highly recommend the couple of chapters in Mark Kurlansky's Salt for more history than you ever dreamed ketchup had in its little tomatoey globules. Oct 3, 2008

  • chained_bear What? WeirdNet says it's a sauce... Oct 3, 2008

  • reesetee *snort* Oct 3, 2008

  • chained_bear A type of fruit-butter, much like applesauce. According to discussion on criss-cross applesauce. Oct 3, 2008

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‘ketchup’ has been looked up 2043 times, loved by 1 person, added to 18 lists, commented on 10 times, and has a Scrabble score of 18.