Frozen ketchup won't reel 'em in

Mrs. Paul's and Van de Kamp's Fish 'n Dips. $4.99 per 20-ounce frozen package of 30 fish bites and five Heinz Ketchup cups.

Bonnie: I found this co-branding between frozen fish makers and Heinz ketchup quite odd. Ketchup isn't the typical condiment with fried fish (malt vinegar and tartar sauce are more traditional). The directions for defrosting the frozen ketchup also appear to be off. I followed them to a tee, and the frozen ketchup didn't melt in the time it took to cook the fish. And the ketchup cups should also have been larger and come in a multiple of the three servings in the box. Oddly, they packed only five, thereby almost guaranteeing a food fight.

I like to know the country or state of origin of my food, so I'm delighted to see that the Fish 'n Dips label says these are made with whole Alaskan pollack. Test-market consumers also preferred the whole Alaskan seafood to the minced mystery fish featured in the original Van de Kamp's version of this product — which is why both Mrs. Paul's and Van de Kamp's versions of Fish 'n Dips will soon feature it.

Carolyn: I get that ketchup is kids' culinary cure-all. What I don't get is the advantage of offering ketchup inside frozen fish boxes.

Any household with a functioning freezer and oven necessary to prepare frozen fish probably also has some ketchup in the fridge, right? Right. Any time-saving gained from not having to reach into the fridge for ketchup is lost with the time it takes to get out a bowl to defrost these ketchup cups in warm water per the box instructions. (Very messy things will apparently happen if you put these in the microwave.)

Could these disposable ketchup cups have been included solely to make these fish bites seem like Chicken McNuggets (fast food now apparently setting the standard for good home cooking)?! If so, Bonnie and her ilk are right to fear for America's dining future.

As for Van de Kamp's switch from minced to whole fish: While's it's good that they lost the fiberboard fish and that Mrs. Paul's at least has the texture of something that was once alive, I doubt even Jean-Michel Cousteau could identify these bites as pollack.

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