HP Sauce facts for kids
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| Type | Brown sauce |
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| Place of origin | United Kingdom |
| Invented | 1870s |
| Main ingredients | Tomatoes and tamarind extract |
| Other information | Owned by H. J. Heinz Company, previously:
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HP Sauce is a brown sauce, originally produced in the United Kingdom and now produced by the H. J. Heinz Company in the Netherlands. It was named after London's Houses of Parliament. After making its first appearance on British dinner tables in the late 19th century, HP Sauce went on to become an icon of British culture. It was the best-selling brand of brown sauce in the UK in 2005, with 73.8% of the retail market.
HP Sauce has a tomato base, blended with malt vinegar and spirit vinegar, sugars (molasses, glucose-fructose syrup, sugar), dates, cornflour, rye flour, salt, spices and tamarind. It is used as a condiment with hot and cold savoury food, and as an ingredient in soups and stews.
The picture on the front of the bottle is a selection of London landmarks including Elizabeth Tower, the Palace of Westminster, and Westminster Bridge.
Contents
History
The original recipe was invented and developed by David Hoe of Bottesford, who had been making sauces since 1854 to compliment locally made pork pies. This business later evolved into David Hoe & Sons, and Hoe Brothers, sauce manufacturers. Hoe's sauces were patronised by the Prince of Wales. The recipe was sold to Frederick Gibson Garton, a grocer from Nottingham, who registered the name H.P. Sauce in 1895, after reportedly hearing that a restaurant in the Houses of Parliament had begun serving it. In 1903, Garton sold the recipe to Edwin Samson Moore, founder of the Midlands Vinegar Company, for the sum of £150 and the settlement of some unpaid bills.
For many years the bottle labels have carried a picture of the Houses of Parliament.
In the United Kingdom, HP Sauce became informally known as "Wilson's gravy" in the 1960s and 1970s, after the wife of Prime Minister Harold Wilson gave an interview to The Sunday Times, in which she said: "If Harold has a fault, it is that he will drown everything with HP Sauce."
Heinz takeover
The brand was passed from the Midlands Vinegar Company to Smedley HP Foods Limited, acquired by a division of Imperial Tobacco, then sold to the French Groupe Danone SA in 1988 for £199 million.
In June 2005, Heinz purchased the parent company, HP Foods, from Danone. In October of that year the United Kingdom Office of Fair Trading referred the takeover to the Competition Commission, which approved the £440 million acquisition in April 2006.
In May 2006, Heinz announced plans to switch production of HP Sauce from Aston in Birmingham to its European sauces facility in Elst, Netherlands, only weeks after HP launched a campaign to "Save the Proper British Cafe". The announcement prompted a call to boycott Heinz products. The move, resulting in the loss of approximately 125 jobs at the Aston factory, was criticised by politicians and union officials, especially as the parent company still wanted to use the image of the House of Commons on its bottles. In the same month, local Labour MP Khalid Mahmood brandished a bottle of HP Sauce during Prime Minister's Questions in the House of Commons as part of a protest against the Heinz move. He also made reference to the sauce's popularity with the former Labour Prime Minister Harold Wilson. These plans were confirmed on 23 August 2006 and the factory at Aston ceased production on 16 March 2007. A week later a "wake" was held at the location of the factory.
The factory was demolished in the summer of 2007.
The six-acre Aston site was purchased by developer Chancerygate in 2007 at £800,000 per acre; they subsequently sold it for half that price and it now houses a distribution warehouse for East End Foods.
Varieties
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HP Sauce is available in a range of formats and sizes, including the iconic 9 oz/255 g glass bottle, plastic squeeze bottle, and TopDown bottle.
Also the ingredients vary markedly. In 2007 for example the varieties from Mexico and Canada were lighter and less concentrated.
- HP Fruity is a milder version of the Original brown sauce, using a blend of fruits including oranges and mango to give a milder, tangier taste. This variety has been renamed "HP Chicken & Rib" in Canada and the US (though it can be found in some stores with the original name).
- HP Bold is a spicier variant in Canada.
- HP BBQ Sauce is a range of barbecue sauces, and is the UK's best selling barbecue sauce product.
- Since 2011 the original HP sauce has been manufactured with a new reduced-sodium recipe, with 0.8 g per 100 g. The traditional recipe was 1.2 g sodium per 100 g. This was a direct result of Government policy with regard to salt levels in food.
See also
In Spanish: Salsa HP para niños
