Is there people actually making tomato sauce with ketchup!?
I've seen several recipes for tomato based sauces that use ketchup as an ingredient if that's what you mean. But it's used a flavoring ingredient, not as the bulk of the sauce.
Only one vital difference. Ketchup's tomato density is much greater that tomato sauce. In other words it's just a matter of intensity of flavor, thickness and consistency, all of which follow when the sauce is concentrated though it depends what flavor you want for either. No other magical characteristic required.
Vinegar and sugar are the two other vital components of tomato ketchup, with vinegar probably being the more characteristic of the two. (Tomatoes are naturally somewhat sweet, so you are always going to have some sweetness in your tomato sauce as a flavor component.)
Both are either used not at all in tomato sauce or used in much, much lower doses. (I actually have sometimes used very low doses of balsamic vinegar in my tomato sauces but it’s an atypical ingredient. Sometimes adding carrots, honey or just a bit of sugar is recommended if your tomatoes are particularly sour and lacking in sweetness but that’s more as a workaround to hide not so tasty tomatoes. I have also done that in the past but we are talking about adding a pinch of sugar or a drop of honey, not having sugar as the third entry on your ingredients list.)
Obviously, the texture of ketchup is also very smooth while tomato sauce can have many different textures, from completely smooth like ketchup to with substantial vegetable chunks. Depending on how long you cook the sauce those chunks will also be more or less soft. Also, tomato sauce can and probably often is much less thick than tomato ketchup and tomato sauce often has quite a bit of added fat (typically butter or olive oil or both).
Ketchup is also typically served cold and tomato sauce hot but that’s more like the default. Both can go either way.
So, yeah, I would say there are a lot of substantial differences between tomato ketchup and tomato sauce beyond just how concentrated the tomatoes are.
But maybe we are talking past each other and what you call “tomato sauce” is actually something else entirely.
Ketchup is a sauce with tomatoes in, but it generally includes vinegar, salt and quite a lot of sugar; tends to have a consistent, lump-free texture; it's applied to greasy food like fries and hamburgers; and only about one tablespoon would be used per meal.
On the other hand, a pasta sauce would generally retain chunks of tomato, use less (or even no) vinegar, salt or sugar per unit volume; and it would be applied to non-greasy pasta in much larger volumes :)
Historically, ketchup was a class of condiments that all had a lot of umami like fish sauces and oyster sauces. Over time, different ketchups were invented, one of which was tomato ketchup. Its popularity grew, and the other ketchups were forgotten, so these days ketchup is synonymous with tomato ketchup.
> Ketchup is a sauce with tomatoes in, but it generally includes vinegar, salt and quite a lot of sugar; tends to have a consistent, lump-free texture; it's applied to greasy food like fries and hamburgers; and only about one tablespoon would be used per meal.
What you've described is just called tomato sauce in my part of the world (Pacific Islands, Australia, New Zealand). So what we call tomato sauce, you call ketchup.
We do tomato paste and tomato puree. Typically use the paste for a pizza base, and if you're making your own pasta sauce, tomato puree with a dollop of paste to up the tomatoeness.
For the confused people in the audience: There is a product, in Australia, much like ketchup, marketed as “tomato sauce”. Yes, people make pasta sauce with it. Yes, pasta sauce made from scratch is better. It’s not so dissimilar from ketchup, just a little less vinegary.
I'm British, and I refer to ketchup as ketchup. This may be regional; I'm southern-English. I'd probably by default assume that if you said 'tomato sauce' you meant a generic tomato-based sauce, not the specific condiment Heinz &c make.
I’m British, from the South East, and it was tomato sauce in my family when I was a kid, but now it is ketchup. There was a transition at some point fairly recently. English evolves easily.
I think you've nailed it. I'm was Essex/Kent born and raised, with East End of London heritage. It was always "tomato sauce", was very rare to hear it referred to as "ketchup".
Yeah I don't think I've ever heard of that in Australia.
I know about ketchup and 'tomato sauce' as being essentially the same condiment, used on a hot dog or what have you.
I've never heard of someone using actual ketchup/tomato sauce condiment as a pasta sauce. Literal spaghetti and sauce (that we all ate as kids, don't deny it) from a can would taste better.
Apparently it's a thing here in Thailand, but given how most Thai places in western countries treat Thai food, Im not sure I have much place to tell them they're doing it wrong.
Tomato jam would be better description, though that’s also a whole other condiment which is apparently pretty popular in South Africa. We don’t typically serve our pasta with ketchup[1].
I've seen several recipes for tomato based sauces that use ketchup as an ingredient if that's what you mean. But it's used a flavoring ingredient, not as the bulk of the sauce.