Why You May Want To Avoid Buying Heinz Worcestershire Sauce
You can pronounce it any way you like (although there is a correct way), but the fact remains: Worcestershire sauce is a wonderful, versatile condiment. Whether you're marinating your steak, adding a few dashes to a Bloody Mary, or using it as an umami booster for a stew or a gravy, this concoction, invented by a pair of English chemists named Lea & Perrins, has you covered. Lea & Perrins, of course, remains a great choice, but there are several other brands of Worcestershire sauce worth your time and money. Unfortunately for Heinz, their offering isn't one of them.
Which is rather ironic, because these days, Heinz actually owns Lea & Perrins. Maybe they figured owning the original Worcestershire sauce company meant they didn't have to try too hard with their own sauce, or maybe this really is the best they can do. But while Heinz is a ketchup stalwart, they don't seem to know their way around fermented fish sauce. (Yes, Worcestershire is fish sauce, and far from the only one.)
Heinz Worcestershire sauce is quite disappointing in terms of flavor
Unlike Lea & Perrins (as well as some of the other good Worcestershire sauces, including French's and Hannaford), Heinz's offering lacks crucial ingredients such as onion and garlic. But you know what it does have? High-fructose corn syrup — because we just don't get enough of it in our daily lives, you know? Other Worcestershire sauces may be sweetened with sugar or molasses, but in America, corn production is so heavily subsidized by the federal government that it's cheaper to use high-fructose corn syrup. This is despite the fact that high-fructose corn syrup causes a litany of health issues, including an increased risk for diabetes and fatty liver disease.
As one of the cheaper options on the market, Heinz is definitely a case of getting what you pay for. But although Lea & Perrins will cost you a few dollars more, the quality of its ingredients has made it the default Worcestershire sauce for a reason. And if you really want to support Heinz for some reason, chin up: Heinz will get paid either way.