Breaking Bloody (Part III: Umami Tsunami)

Colonel Pabst: Craft Worcestershire Sauce

Just because Lea & Perrins is the ubiquitous condiment that you’ll find in every major grocery store doesn’t mean it’s the only game in town when it comes to umami sauces. I jumped on a call with Kate Quartaro about the story and ingredients behind her Col. Pabst Worcestershire Sauce, which also has some really cool ties to American drinking culture.

According to Kate, her mother sourced the recipe for Colonel Pabst Worcestershire Sauce from the kitchen of her grandfather, Gustave Pabst. It was only made occasionally, since it was a complex recipe, but it demonstrates a family tradition of cooking with beer. Gustave’s father (Captain Frederick Pabst) was the founder of the Pabst brewery, which explains the family’s connection to fermented malt products.

As the oldest son, Gustave became president of Pabst Brewing Co. in Milwaukee upon the death of his father and maintained that position until Prohibition. He married into another brewing family from St. Louis, and the couple subsequently spent time in England, where it is assumed that they derived their recipe for Worcestershire sauce.

Worcestershire sauce was originally made with malt vinegar (as opposed to the current recipe ingredient, distilled white vinegar), and the Pabst family decided to substitute some of that malt vinegar for the pre-vinegar ferment: beer. According to Kate, this produces a fuller-bodied, richer flavor experience when compared to Worcestershire sauces that only contain malt vinegar. (And to be clear, during the manufacturing process, the alcohol in the beer is boiled out.)

Anchovies: The Umami Of The Sea

So, let’s just say you’re the kind of person who’s cool with fermentation, and let’s say you’re also the kind of person who’s cool with little fishies donating their delicious flavors and aromas to your Bloody Mary. Here’s Katie Parla, host of the Gola Podcast, to teach us about the ins and outs of anchovies in general, and also the legendary sauces and condiments that are derived from them.

What Are Anchovies?

According to Katie, an anchovy is a little oily fish in a category of species that are all or mostly related and that have similar morphological and flavor characteristics. There are, however, small differences that may influence their size and/or color.

There are a number of different types of anchovies, including the European Anchovy (harvested from the Tyrrhenian Sea) and the Cantabrian Anchovy (more high-end and harvested from the Iberian Peninsula). The latter tend to be served on toast with butter to accentuate their delicate flavor.

Garum & Colatura di Alici

What I was really interested to speak with Katie about is her knowledge of Italian fish sauces, which have a longstanding historical tradition, dating back at least as far as the Phoenicians.

Garum is a liquid obtained by fermenting the viscera, blood, and organs of anchovies. It would have been kept in sealed containers subjected to heat (and often sunlight). It would have been incredibly concentrated in flavor and used to accentuate the flavors of some foods or to impart greater flavor to other (read: blander) foods. As the Roman empire declined, so did garum, reducing it from an international commodity to a local product until even local production petered out during the late Roman period. Then, there was a centuries-long gap in large-scale fish sauce production until more modern variants arrived on the scene.

Colatura di Alici is in the same “universe” as garum, but it is made by layering evicerated anchovies (rather than using the offal) in a container with salt, such that the liquid fallout (a mixture of protein, fat, water, and other compounds) fall through the layers and collects at the bottom of the vessel. A hole is drilled in the bottom of the vessel to collect the liquid. This is the “modern day” version of garum because it is fish-based but does not contain the nastier bits of the fish.

According to the archives, he served in a diplomatic capacity in many European cities, including Madrid, Paris, Venice, Florence, and Lisbon. But there’s just no evidence that he set foot in Bengal, and that seems to me to be the linchpin of Lea & Perrins’ entire origin story.

So I reached out to the Badsey Society, who connected me with Martin Davis, the keeper of the Sandys family archives. He declined to record with me on the podcast but was kind enough to confirm that Marcus Sandys was indeed the gourmet of the family and that he left behind a recipe book upon his death.

But still, no evidence of Marcus Hill, the 3rd Lord Sandys traveling to Bengal, which means that he wouldn’t have likely sampled in person the fish sauces prevalent in Asia at the time. This begs the question: could there be another explanation for the anchovies that do most of the umami heavy lifting in Worcestershire Sauce?

1. Umami is best enjoyed with friends – and I don’t mean human friends. I mean flavor friends. The reason why Worcestershire sauce is so compelling and complex is because it utilizes acids (in the form of different vinegars), spices, salt, and textural elements to create a tapestry of flavor notes that delight the senses. So don’t just dump some MSG in your Bloody Mary and hope for the best. Carefully consider what you’d like your source of umami to be, and then execute. A little intention can go a long way.

2. Don’t assume that your vegan, vegetarian, or otherwise ethically concerned friends are going to appreciate fish in their Bloody Mary. Is this move popular the world over? Yes. Otherwise we wouldn’t have the Caesar cocktail, which is a Bloody Mary with the addition of clam juice. But it’s just not for everybody. That’s why we’ve linked to Brinda Ayer’s incredibly thorough article on Worcestershire sauce substitutes, many of which are vegan friendly. Think about mushrooms, think about soy. These things can check your umami box, but also make your friends feel warm and fuzzy that you took their dietary choices into consideration.

3. If you’re thinking about going minimal or eliminating Worcestershire sauce in your Bloody Mary, PLEASE make sure you add salt. This is an ingredient that helps to cure the fermented ingredients in most of these sauces, and so eliminating them from your Bloody Mary is going to mean it will taste under-salted. As a secret trick, a lot of bartenders keep a very simple saline solution on-hand to ramp up the flavor in their cocktails, and the Bloody Mary should be no different. If you wouldn’t under-salt your food, please don’t undersalt your brunchtime hangover cure.

4. And finally, embrace fermentation on all levels. If there’s one thing I need to think more about following this episode, it’s what precisely happens when the microorganisms in our environment are allowed to break down animal protein and vegetable staches and cellulose. Something magical is clearly happening at the chemical level, and our ancestors have found ways to harness it through millennia of trial and error experiments. We benefit from their informal research, but I think there’s an opportunity for all of us to try and understand this process more fully. There are differences between fermentation that creates alcohol and fermentation that creates vinegar. Different microorganisms and compounds are at play in both cases. If you want to know what I’ll be thinking about in the wake of this episode it is with these little things that munch on our food and drink before we do, so if you need me, that’s where I’ll be.