Ketchup Leather: This Is Behind The Food Trend

Ketchup leather: explaining the food trend

Like so many other things, the latest food trend, ketchup leather, comes from the USA, from Los Angeles to be precise.

• Ketchup leather is nothing more than dehydrated, i.e. dried, ketchup. Ernesto Uchimura, the chef at Plan Check Restaurant in Los Angeles, came up with the idea.
• The restaurant is known for its gourmet burgers. Uchimura was looking for a way to keep the burger buns from getting soggy with the ketchup.
• That gave him the idea of ketchup leather. To do this, he simply dried the ketchup and then cut it into slices of the same size.
• The ketchup processed in this way is then placed between the bun and the burger patty.
• The ketchup slice only becomes liquid again when the patty is warm, so it doesn’t soften the roll from the start.

How to make ketchup leather

You can make normal ketchup or curry ketchup yourself. However, you can also use any commercially available ketchup to prepare ketchup leather.

1. Spread the ketchup on a baking sheet lined with a baking mat. The ketchup should be about 2mm thick.
2. If you don’t have a silicone baking mat at hand, you can use baking paper. However, parchment paper can wrinkle as the ketchup dries. This will make the end result less smooth.
3. Put the tray with the ketchup in the oven and set it to 60 degrees.
4. The ketchup now has to dry in the oven for three to four hours. You can easily check whether the ketchup leather is ready. Run your finger over it until it no longer feels sticky or wet.
5. Let the ketchup leather cool down and then cut it into 10 x 10 cm pieces. The perfect base for the patty is ready.
6. By the way: You can store ketchup leather for several weeks. It is best to place a piece of baking paper between the individual slices and pack the ketchup leather airtight.