Mayo, ketchup, mustard – they all have their place. Sometimes they can be found in amiable unison, lubricating the innards of a nice juicy burger in fairly equal measures, but the uptake of these condiments shows considerable variation around the globe.
Personally, I’m not overly keen on mayonnaise – give me sour cream instead any day – but it is a popular condiment in Germany, where liberal lashings of it are added to potato salad, for example. Germany is also infamous for ‘Pommes mit Mayo’ (Chips/fries with mayonnaise). It’s at least as popular, if not more so, than the ketchup alternative. You can get Pommes mit Mayo from any burger van, unstylishly served in either a paper cone or a cardboard tray.
As for who eats the most mayonnaise, if anyone had asked me before checking*, I’d have plonked for the Japanese being the highest per capita consumers. I’ve seen them deploy this condiment, seemingly without any scruples, on most types of food, and especially on those that are not traditionally Japanese.
But I was wrong. Japan is 20th down the list! It’s the Russians who are the true kings of mayo, clogging up their arteries with 5.1 kg of the stuff in 2013 per capita. Japan managed a comparatively humble 1.5kg, the UK just a smidgen more with 1.6kg, while Germany is quite a long way down with just 1.0 kg, less than half of Dutch consumption levels.
Across the Atlantic, 1.9kg are set to slide down Canadian and US consumers’ gullets this year. Australians and New Zealanders won’t even hit the 1kg mark.
So, led by Russia, the top ten of mayo loving nations is dominated by Eastern European nations in the following order: Lithuania, Ukraine, Belarus, Belgium, Estonia, Latvia, Chile, Netherlands, Poland.
In case anyone’s wondering, the world’s leading mayo brand is Hellmann’s (by Unilever), followed by Kraft.
In the Ketchup stakes, Canada leads with 3.1kg per head, followed by Finland (3kg), Sweden (2.7kg), the UK (2.4kg), Norway (2.3kg), Austria and the US (both 2.2kg). Russians aren’t nearly as fond of ketchup as they are of mayonnaise, squirting just 1.4kg onto their bangers. And yes, of course Heinz is the world’s leading brand, who else?! Second in line, though, is Kagome, a Japanese brand, which I hadn’t expected. Must be big in the Asia Pacific region.
As for mustard, Slovakia sports the most enthusiastic uptake with 1.6kg per capita in 2013. The Czech Republic is in second place (1.2kg), and France ranks third (1.0 kg). At least Germany features in the top ten. We do love our mustard, and we have tons of different regional varieties. A very sweet type of mustard (as sweet as chutney), for example, is served with several traditional meat products and sausages, including the famous Weisswurst.
Are you more of a mayo, a mustard or a ketchup person? Are there any weird food combos featuring any of these in your country or region? I’d so love to hear about that!
[*For data source, click here]
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I’m I allowed to like all three? Or is that just greedy?
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I’ll let you off!
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Reading your entry reminds me of a very dear friend of mine who proclaims himself “The Sauce Monster”. 🙂
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Oh, I do have more data on brown sauce, chili sauce, fish sauce (popular in Asia) etc… maybe next time 🙂
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Yummy! Looking forward to it! Btw, fish sauce is called “patis” here, and some Filipinos like to serve a specific type of brown sauce with roast pig.
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I’d love to try the pork!
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I would have expected Belgium to be top for Mayo considering chips with mayonnaise is their national dish! Personally, I prefer mayo as a sandwich item… ham % mayonnaise, tuna mayonnaise. Yum! I will tolerate ketchup on burgers but HATE it on chips. And I don’t like any kind of mustard.
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I think the Dutch also do that mayo with chips thing…
I don’t really like it in sarnies 😦
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Tuna on its own is kind of dry though…
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Am not a big fan of tuna, for that reason… though I’ve got some frozen tuna steaks in the freezer, they come marinated in pesto sauce – nice!
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I just loooooove all your foodie articles. First of all, I am absolutely not surprised by the Russians’ love affair with mayo. All other salad dressings – even anything as basic as olive oil and vinegar – were virtually unknown to Russians until very recently. Even ketchup was a novelty we first tried in the 1990s! Mayo and mayo-based sauces are put on and in everything – from veggie salads to steaks. I love mayo! Also, spicy mayo is my favorite fries condiment.
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Spicy mayo…. that I could probably get into. I loooooove spicy 🙂 But real spicy. Spanish/German spicy is not spicy. I’m talking Indian/Malaysian spicy.
BTW, you will probably remember that virtually every Spanish bar/small eatery serves something called ‘Russian salad’ – a potato salad with tuna, egg, gherkins and, of course, mayo 🙂
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In this case it’s mild-spicy, but a number of NYC restaurants offer their own ‘variation on a theme.’ It’s really good. that said, I also love ketchup and mustard, especially sweet mustard.
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Oh, and I have NEVER seen that ‘Russian Salad’ in Spain, though that sounds like something Russians would totally make and eat.
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I’m never sure about that… usually when a country labels something “X-country’s” something (be it a food or a disease), it usually has very little to do with the country in question, lol.
That’s why I was counting on your expert verdict!!! Shouldn’t have gotten my hopes up….
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At least this sounds Russian. Recently a friend asked me to verify the recipe for a proper Moscow Mule cocktail, as I am the current Moscow resident. Except nothing remotely similar has even been heard of here.
The salad most traditionally dubbed ‘Russian’ abroad is what we call ‘Olivier’. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olivier_salad
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That looks just like it!!! I forgot to mention peas 🙂
Phew, mystery solved! You’ve come good.
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Who knew??
I’m more of a mayo person than ketchup or mustard – though to be honest, I don’t even use mayo that much.
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In reality, I’m the same as you. I don’t even have any of these in my fridge, which says it all 😉
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As kids we would mix mayonnaise and ketchup, plunder the (at the time) expensive frozen prawns and eat them without our parents noticing. In Spain, we’re trying to avoid mayo and ketchup but mustard – what with all the lovely lomo etc – is proving harder.
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You avoid it in Spain…why??
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Having spent some time in Dijon: mustard all the way!
The Mongolians are inordinately fond of mayo, which I blame squarely on the Russians (who introduced it). Problematic for those of us who can’t stand the stuff!
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Dijon – I can only imagine!
I don’t know all that much about it, but I think I’d be struggling with Mongolian cuisine…
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God damn, the Russians love mayo. I enjoy it, but not when it overpowers everything! I’m more of a ketchup person and to be honest, I’m surprised America isn’t higher up on the ketchup list!
Informative as always 🙂
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Ah yes, you do live in the land of mayo, I suspect you can barely escape it, even if you tried!
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It seems to be especially exacerbated by my vegetarianism — no meat?! We’ll fill you with mayo instead!
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Lucky you….
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Probably bc Americans have so many other options to choose from. Especially the non-mayo, non-ketchup based dressings. OMG I miss those!
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I know!! God, I yearn for zesty Italian dressing some times. Why have such marvelous things not caught on elsewhere?!
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I have taken to blending 2/3rds EVOO, 1/3rd balsamic with salt, freshly ground black pepper and dried basil leaves. It’s the only thing I regularly make in my kitchen (aside from cocktails).
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Totally blanked on EVOO for a second. Got it — too much mediocre wine tonight for me. I usually do the same unless I splurge and spend an outrageous amount of money on dressings in Stokmann. Their selection is pretty good.
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Hurrah! Latvian makes another top ten list! 🙂
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I’m always so delighted to find Latvia achieving some notable consumption level of something 😉
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You should do one on dill 😉
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I haven’t got any data on dill… but I do love it!!!! German cucumber salads usually have dill in them.
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EVERYTHING in Latvia has dill in it!
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Not…. cake?!? Surely!
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I wouldn’t be overly surprised, but no, I don’t think they’ve gone that far…yet 😉
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Phew!
Maybe that’s… why they don’t smile! Fear of revealing that sprig of dill that’s inevitably stuck in their teeth!
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One of my students cried when she first got here – she’s Ukrainian and the woman in the supermarket was so rude to her, she just broke down 😉
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OK…. we can’t really blame that on the dill, as much as we may want to…
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No, I don’t think so either. You like it and you seem perfectly pleasant. Apart from the fact that you’d choose cake over me and the lovely Black Sheep 😉 No, I haven’t forgotten!
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I AM perfectly pleasant. Until someone sticks their fork into my cake uninvited….
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Trembling all the way over here! 🙂
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You’re Irish, they’re a naturally well-boundaried people in my experience. No sticking their forks where they aren’t wanted.
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OMG DILL! YESSS! Maybe something on herbs and spices? Seriously, I love dill.
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Late to the party, but my favorite is mayo. Katsup for fries, and mustard in limited appearances unless it is on a hot dog (then NO Katsup or mayo!).
BTW, I found you on TBM via a comment you made. 😉 One click leads to another and here I am. What a fun place you have here!
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Never too late for one of my parties!
I see we are very particular in our condiments preferences 😉
Aw, TBM… are you missing her terribly, too???
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Yes actually! (Answer applies to both the preferences and TBM) 😀
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Two more TBM-less weeks… how are we going to cope… I need to find some other place to deposit random inane commentage… am looking at your butterfly right now…be warned.
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Hahaha, I look forward to it. 😉
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Brown sauce for me! Fish, chips, brown sauce and mushy peas! But I like, ketchup, mayo and mustard too! Hot English mustard with steak. Mayo with moules frites. Ketchup with a burger. Oh dear, did you guess I like food?
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Food is the best thing in the world!
Mushy peas… I never could get used to those, not even in 20 years! 😉
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That mayo pizza looks horrible! It scares me. After living in Italy for 5.5 years I’ve learned to love food without the condiments. The only thing I allow myself is French mustard and I use it sparingly. Great post!
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I find mayo really overpowering and cloying.
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Haha. I actually saw the picture and went YUM!
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You should petition Domino’s to launch it in Moscow 🙂
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I’m surprised Australia doesn’t rank higher in mayo consumption! My sister has mayo on everything. I think I saw her have it on ice-cream once. And my father has mayo on his chips (what?! doesn’t he know you’re meant to have gravy on your chips?), which I used to think was an English thing, until he said he learnt to do that in Belgium. Which was equally surprising, since I didn’t know he ever spent any considerable time in Belgium…
I suppose Australia would be higher on the tomato sauce (not ketchup, never ketchup) rankings. I think we’re meant to be proud of having barbeques, and tomato sauce gets smothered on everything at a barbeque (mostly to cover up the burnt toothpaste flavour of the meat, I think). That said, how would they get the statistics? At least 50% of the people I know buy tomatoes wholesale and make their own tomato sauce…
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Burnt toothpaste??? How do you know what THAT tastes like?! the mind boggles…
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Oh, let me tell you how much Russians love mayo. They put it on everything. It would surprise you the uses they find for it. Interestingly enough they are very health conscious, go figure. Sometimes you just have to throw caution to the wind.
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Health conscious? Average Russian male life expectancy is 64. It may not all be down to mayo, I grant you that… BUT…!
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We’re totally health-conscious. We’ve got those teas to fix the negative effects of mayo and vodka.
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YES! The teas!!!! Get to it, woman 😉
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The biggest problem in Russia today is alcoholism. I believe it’s the major reason for more male deaths in Russia than any other reason. But there is a growing trend of health consciousness here. When I first came to Russia my favorite drink was Coke. Here they consider it poison, Even people on the streets will give you dirty looks when they see it in you hand. Russia is changing, thank God.
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Did you switch to vodka & Coke??? 😉
Yes, the drinking culture… it is the biggest issue. The traditional diet, as such, is really quite healthy, what with stuff like buckwheat, fish, cabbage, beets, etc. But you’d know all about that, I’m sure.
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Da,da,da.
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Ah now you’d need to be investigating the Dutch. One reason why I moved to NL was a portion of fries that I had once. They were served to me in East England ‘Dutch’ style. With mayonnaise (special friet sauce technically) ketchup and raw onion. Then when I got here I discovered ‘patatje oorloog’. The direct translation is ‘chips war’. It comes with mayo, those same chopped onions and peanut sauce! Delicious!
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I’ve very much enjoyed your enthusiasm 🙂
Chips – not my thing.
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: ) it was a pivotal moment. After they explained that it was Dutch, I said, “I’ll have to go and live there then!”
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I totally approve of moving countries to be with the best food 🙂
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: )
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…that’s why I’m fantasising about moving to Portugal in a few years down the line. And NEVER leave.
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That does sound appetising!
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Meat, fish, vegetables, cheese, soups, desserts – they do everything fantastically well 🙂
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Don’t leave it too long!
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Portugal isn’t going anywhere, it’ll still be there… waiting for me 🙂
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: )
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Best chips and mayo in the world: Eat them at a real “fritkot” which you can find in almost every self-respecting town in Flanders-Belgium. The fries there are usually deep-fried in ox fat. (“French fries” or chips were also invented in Belgium during WWI by the way. Not in France as many people may think.)
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I learnt that French fries were “invented” in Belgium from reading Asterix 😉
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We as Pakistanis are fond of ketchup and mayo but not mustard in general. However, all three are usually liked by younger people especially children, if one is eating fast food. The reason being that our food is very spicy and these additions really spoil the original taste of the dish.
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Oh, I love spicy food! Sadly, here in Spain they can’t deal with that at all, and where I live, there are no Pakistani/Indian restaurants 😦
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