Anyone who reads this blog regularly knows I’m not a fan of flavors or spices more exotic than ketchup or salt. Christopher Columbus of the food world, I’m not. Despite my comestible limitations, a staple of my recipe colleciton, Shepherd’s Pie, calls for a seemingly innocuous ingredient called Worcestershire sauce.
For over a year, I’ve used Worcestershire sauce, butter, and flour to make a roux to thicken the pie’s gravy. A few months ago, I checked the ingredient panel to see what gave the sauce its distinctive flavor, but in my haste didn’t notice anything too strange.
While in Florida, I decided to make SP for my family. My sister and I dashed out to Albertsons (the grocery store) to purchase the ingredients for dinner. Bossy first-born that I am, I told her to grab a bottle of Worcestershire sauce; she stopped dead in her tracks.
She whipped around to face me, blonde locks flying, and fixed me with an intense stare. She then asked if I knew what was in Worcestershire sauce. I raised an eyebrow and shook my head no, afraid to hear where this was headed.
Without a word, she snatched a bottle off the shelf and handed it to me for inspection.
And then my world came crashing down and I crumpled to a heap on the tiled floor of the condiment aisle.
Weep with me, won’t you?
LMAO!!!!! That is HILARIOUS! I never never noticed that.
Wow.
cwg says: yeah…me neither. sadly, i’m not laughing. when it comes to food, i believe in FULL DISCLOSURE. that anchoive shite should be written in BOLD on the front of the bottle. clowns. i hate lea and perrins.
I had no clue, but it is still yummy.
(I can never pronounce it correctly.)
cwg says: for the record, accord to L&P’s website:
Worcestershire can be properly pronounced a few ways: “wust-ter-shire, “woos-ter-sheer”, or “woos-ter-sher” sauce. But the easiest way to say Worcestershire Sauce is Lea & Perrins®!
Goodness, hope you don’t like Ceaser dressing.
cwg says: surely you jest. I wouldn’t touch that with a Haz-mat suit.
I’m embarrassed to reveal this but I’ve known that particular fact since I was in my teens. That isn’t the embarrassing part, though. The embarrassing part is how I came to know it. Games Magazine had a mega-Scavenger Hunt for its readers, asking them to find all sorts of weird items. In addition to things like a vintage postcard with an X on it (can’t remember what the object was) and a television listing in which the same actor or actress appeared at the same time on two different stations (significantly less common in the pre-zillion channel cable era), one of the objects was a common grocery item that boasted both anchovies and tamarind among its ingredients. Took me a while to figure it out, but I’ve never forgotten it.
p.s. I love Worcestershire sauce, but scoff at A-1. Not a ketchup fan.
Oh, no. I should never have read your post today. The day I found out that anchovies were in ceasar dressing was one of the worst days of my life. I have not eaten a ceasar salad since. I really hope this doesn’t affect me drinking bloody mary’s on sundays!
Worchestershire, and A-1 have their roots in an ancient Roman sauce, of which I have a recipe, via medieval interpretation. Necessity is the mother of invention and back in the days before reliable food preservation strongly flavored sauces were relied upon to mask any off flavors. I am sure you knew that. And since for today at least we do have reliable food preservation there is no need to eat what you don’t like.
I save the worchestershire for my Bloody Mary’s.
And A-1 has raisins it. It used to have anchovies but now it has MSG to provide that umame flavor. I’d rather have the anchovies personally.
Ketchup is hard to beat anyday.
knew that but choose to ignore that fact. but i have to admit wanting to try an anchovie only because “wurs-tuh-shire” tastes so good so anchovies should as well. right?
Crap!!!! This is enough to possibly remove it from my regularly used spice list…
THANKS!
cwg says: well, if i suffer, you should all suffer. that’s my motto. hahaha.
LOL, but you enjoyed it prior to knowing what was in it! That’s why I don’t read ingredients….ignorance is bliss!!!!
Sometimes you’re better off not knowing.
curl, they do make worchestershire without anchovies. You can find it at whole foods, among others. Sometimes it says vegetarian, sometimes vegan, low sodium or natural. It’s what I use. Still very tasty.
cwg says: bless you, my child.
Kamran told me this soon after we started dating, back when I still had a baby’s palate (instead of the toddler’s I do now) and was more easily freaked out.
I think it’s better to know than not to.
I thought it was just salt and, you know, flavour from the worsterschire….plant?
I think this is a perfect example of bliss in ignorance.
Reminds me of the time a group of us were eating pizza, and the bf goes, ‘This pepperoni pizza tastes a little fishy, but it’s SO good!’ He was informed that was because there were anchovies on it. I thought he was going to yark. Awesome.
WHAT! I had no idea. That is absolutely crazy and quite disgusting….
Anchovies, eh? Hmmm….I’m going to try and forget I saw that.
LOL that’s hilarious!