A condiment is only as honest as its ingredient list. 78 Brand was built so that line of small print on the back of the bottle reads like real food, not a chemistry set. Rich tomato paste, aged vinegar, real spices, and not much else. Here is exactly what goes in, what we left out, and why the non GMO mark on our label is the kind a regulator stands behind.
The ingredients in our ketchup and mustard
78 Brand Original Ketchup starts with high brix tomato paste pressed from fully vine ripened tomatoes. Higher brix means more fruit, less water, deeper flavor. From there we add aged spirit vinegar for the bright top note, cane sugar to round it out, sea salt, onion, garlic, and a quiet blend of warm spice. Seven ingredients. That is the entire build.
Our mustards follow the same rule. Whole and ground non GMO mustard seed, the same aged vinegar, water, salt, turmeric for color, and the heat or honey that defines the SKU. Nothing is sourced because it is cheap. Every line item earns its place on the spoon.
Every batch is produced to the highest food production standards recognized in the United States and the European Union, so the bottle that lands on a shelf in Chicago and the one that lands in Berlin read the same on the back.
What we deliberately left out
High fructose corn syrup. The default sweetener in most of the ketchup aisle. Cheaper than cane sugar, easier to ship, harder to defend. Read why we will not use it.
Modified corn and tapioca starches. Fillers that thicken a thin sauce. We do not need them because our tomato paste already carries the body. Real fruit, real pour.
Artificial colors and dyes. No Red 40, no caramel color, nothing tuned to look brighter than the food actually is. The red in the bottle is the red of the tomato.
Natural flavors carried in GMO oils. Two of the dirtiest words on a clean label, because natural flavor is a black box. We spell out every spice instead.
Non GMO, verified by a regulator and not a paid badge
There is a difference between a private logo a brand pays to place on a package and a non GMO standard that a government food authority defines and audits. 78 Brand is held to the latter. Our ingredients are traced from the farm gate to the fill line, and a regulator, not a marketing service, signs off on the result.
That matters because nearly every shortcut in the condiment aisle starts with a GMO crop. Corn, soy, sugar beet, canola. Pull those four crops out of the supply chain and you have to rebuild the recipe from scratch. Here is a plain English explainer on GMO.
A non GMO claim is only as strong as the body verifying it. Ours is verified by a regulator, not a logo we rented.
Sourcing, from tomato to bottle
Tomatoes are grown to spec, picked at peak ripeness, and crushed within hours so the brix and the color stay where they should. The paste is held cold, blended with vinegar and spice in small runs, hot filled, and cooled fast. The same care applies to our mustard seed, which is sourced from non GMO growers and milled close to the kitchen so the oils stay alive in the jar.
We do not buy on the spot market. We buy from named growers and named mills, the kind that pick up the phone when we call.
Honest answers to the questions we get the most
Is 78 Brand kosher? Yes.
Halal friendly? Yes.
Vegan and plant based? Yes, every SKU.
Gluten ingredients? None. We use no wheat, barley, or rye.
Where can I buy it? Direct from shop.78brand.com or from a growing list of independent grocers and restaurants.