Heinz, Miller, ketchup and wretched light beer.

Read the first full paragraph below like this:

Amerian low-calorie "light" lager is one of those beers that science, technology and mass production have truly mastered. We as a society no longer need to make our own light beer in the same way that we no longer need to hand-crank our cars. We figured out a better way. Or, rather, Miller, Bud and Coors figured it out.

I'm serene in the knowledge that as times change, my fundamental hatred of light beer remains intact.

But there's more to ketchup than this homage to Heinz, as was verified by the time-wasting wonders of Wikipedia. The actual word "ketchup" can be traced to a local dialect of the Chinese language in reference to a condiment, and so perhaps it isn't so unusual after all for barbecued spareribs from the Chinese carry-outs using ketchup in the sauce.

Meanwhile, ketchup in England used to be made from mushrooms, not tomatoes. This makes sense, because Europeans didn't have tomatoes until they were brought back by New World explorers. In turn, this means that your favorite Italian spaghetti sauce recipes were not available to ancient Romans.

Neither was light beer. Lucky Romans.

Stop Making Your Ketchup In-House. It's Terrible, by Farley Elliott (Eater forums)

You know it's true.

Ketchup is one of those foodstuffs that science, technology and mass production have truly mastered. We as a society no longer need to make our own ketchup in the same way that we no longer need to hand-crank our cars. We figured out a better way. Or, rather, Heinz figured it out.