Let's start with a look at the iconic Lea & Perrin's Worcestershire Sauce. In effect, it's a fermented fish sauce. I read somewhere about a nauseating Eskimo delicacy. They would make a large hole in the ground, chuck gobbets of raw fish down there, relieve themselves all over it to get the fermentation going, and then dig it back up again after a month or so. Sounds good, eh?
The British version was first sold by Mr Jon Wheeley Lea and Mr William Henry Perrins in 1838, from a family recipe given to them by a Lady Sandys, recently returned from India. They were a pair of enterprising, and no doubt, bewhiskered chemists from Worcester and their world famous sauce is still made at the old Worcester factory, close to the Malvern Hills; although the company is now part of the French food conglomerate, Danone.
The "original and genuine" stuff is made from malt vinegar, molasses, sugar, salt, anchovies, tamarind extract, onions, garlic, flavourings and salt; although the American version uses distilled white vinegar and has a slightly less rich flavour. And it's an essential ingredient in two all-time American classics; the Bloody Mary Cocktail, and the Caesar Salad.
