SANTA FE – Though they tied the knot just last September, Carmit Levin and Jacob Seidenberg Korn playfully bickered recently about the details of how they had created their new product – ketchup infused with green chile from Hatch – as if they were a seasoned couple.
Asked what triggered the idea to combine green chile and ketchup, the couple agreed on one memory from three years ago this August: Green chile tumbling in a roaster in the Whole Foods Market parking lot near their first apartment in Santa Fe.
Seidenberg Korn has never liked peppers much. “I can’t stand jalapeños,” he said. Yet the two said they quickly became hooked on those green chiles from Hatch.
“We could smell it all day long,” Levin said.
This led to their creation – Hatchup Katchup. It’s been on the market since December, a spicy New Mexico alternative to Heinz and Hunt’s, giants of the U.S. ketchup trade.
This year’s green chile harvest will mark the third anniversary of the couple’s discovery of New Mexico’s favorite vegetable. And three years ago, they couldn’t have imagined how important that harvest would become in their lives.
The couple moved to Santa Fe in spring 2012. Levin had returned to the United States from a five-year stay in Italy, she said, and Seidenberg Korn had been living in Las Vegas. She accepted his marriage proposal – but only on the condition that they wouldn’t live in Las Vegas.
So, on a road trip back to the East Coast, where they had grown up and met in high school, they stopped in Santa Fe and decided to call it home.
Once they were settled here, their shared passion for food turned into a desire to create a product of their own.
Levin, born in Israel, said food is at the center of her family’s traditions. Seidenberg Korn’s passion for grilling is so relentless he does it in the dead of winter. The two knew they wanted to incorporate green chile into a product.
Hatchup Katchup’s two key ingredients, green chiles and tomatoes, are particularly relevant to New Mexico’s history. Green chile’s journey from Aztec settlements to New Mexico by the Spanish is well-documented. Perhaps less well-known is that the Spanish also “introduced the tomato into Europe, Southeast Asia, and what is today the United States” after Central Americans domesticated them, according to Andrew F. Smith’s book, Pure Ketchup: A History of America’s National Condiment.
Levin and Seidenberg Korn, both 35, are now preparing to open a Santa Fe commercial kitchen in August to ramp up production of Hatchup Katchup. They’re eager to set up shop closer to home.
Seidenberg Korn, a trained paramedic, and Levin, a jeweler, have been driving to a community kitchen at the Taos County Economic Development Corp. on the weekends to make batches of Hatchup Katchup. They’ve solicited ideas on different recipes, they said, pushing themselves into early morning delirium in the kitchen.
Finding the right balance between green chile and tomato proved tricky. Green chile’s hotness might dilute the flavor of a tomato. Different levels of vinegar, which helps preserve ketchup, means changing the acidity and altering the flavor.
“We were using Pomì!” Levin said, referring to Italian tomato purée. “That’s how inexperienced we were about sourcing ingredients.”
They wanted to create an organic, vegan product, but they discovered the difficulty and costs of achieving that goal. For instance, Seidenberg Korn said, some sugars on the market aren’t vegan because bones are used in the processing.
But after a year of regulatory reviews by agencies such as the New Mexico Environment Department, they began selling their creation. They settled on vine-ripened tomato purée from California, cane sugar and gray sea salt collected with wooden rakes in France. And, of course, Hatch-grown green chiles.
Hatchup Katchup is now featured in a few specialty markets across the nation, such as the Southern Season in Richmond, Virginia. Bloomberg Business, in an June 29 article titled “Eight Condiments to Take Your Cookout to the Next Level,” wrote that New Mexico’s “chilis” lend “this tomato sauce some brightness and serious heat (especially if you go with #4, the highest on the scale).”
For New Mexicans with heat tolerance, though, it will take about five spoonfuls of the “#4” to induce hiccups.
“A lot of your chile-heads are like, ‘It’s not hot enough,’” Seidenberg Korn said.
The couple are gearing up to offer the product at the 20th annual Hatch Chile Fest, put on by the Austin, Texas-based Central Market, in the Lone Star state that features Hatch’s green chiles.
Once they open a kitchen in Santa Fe, the two plan on pitching their product to more local stores. It’s been on the shelves at the Santa Fe School of Cooking since April. Kaune’s Neighborhood Market also sells it, along with Los Poblanos Community Farm in Albuquerque.
Stephen Humphry, manager of the Farm Shop at Los Poblanos, said customers visit the shop specifically for Hatchup Katchup. A 10-ounce bottle sells for $10.
He said there also is a red-chile mustard that’s made in New Mexico, but the shop won’t feature it unless it represents “the best of what a mustard will be.” The same goes with his search for a gourmet ketchup.
“I think there’s something that’s familiar about (Hatchup Katchup) – the consistency. It’s not too runny like a cocktail sauce. And it’s not too heavy like a tomato paste,” Humphry said. “And every (gourmet) ketchup I’ve tasted, they tend to fall into too thin or too thick. And to hit the nail right on the head is very difficult.”
Cheryl Sommer, the owner of Kaune’s Neighborhood Market, said after she taste-tested it on sloppy joes at home, the store began carrying Hatchup Katchup.
She’s seeing more and more condiments come in spicier flavors – like sriracha barbecue sauce.
“I think that spice is definitely on the rise,” she said. “And I suspect that Hatch will continue to appear in more and more products. Hatch chile will, especially locally.”
Hatch, the chile capital of New Mexico, will heighten its profile with the help of entrepreneurs from its capital city.
