Cook’s Science believes that ketchup is one of the world’s perfect foods. It’s salty, sweet, sour, bitter, and umami all at once. You can eat it on almost anything. Malcolm Gladwell once wrote a fantastic article on the subject. Its one flaw? It can be tricky to get out of the bottle, especially if the bottle is glass. Why? Like with much of life, it all comes down to physics. We asked illustrator Lucas Adams to take a look at the history of the ketchup bottle, and the science contained within. (Want to learn more about ketchup? Come to Cook’s Science Live: The Burger Tour, hitting up Austin, Chicago, Seattle, and Boston this month!)
