So we continue to defrost a venison roast a few days before Christmas, or buy a big chuck roast and plunge it into a big Dutch oven kettle filled with the vinegar, ketchup and brown sugar-based marinade for its annual overnight soak. The roast is cooked stovetop in this liquid after browning, and it is the base of a thick, delicious gravy that tops the roast and mounds of fluffy mashed potatoes. It's not Christmas without it.
Regarding "Ketchup on tamales? Yes, please. | Opinion," (Dec. 18): Craig Hlavaty just brought back something I had totally forgotten! My mom is full-blooded Czech, too, and I was raised in San Antonio, Freeport and Lufkin. Whenever we were lucky enough to get tamales (often from the "hot tamale man" in Lufkin), we always ate them with ketchup. I don't know that we ever even had salsa in the house. In my later, more worldly days, I somehow got, errantly, on the track of salsa, but never again. Back to my ketchup roots!