I agree, it sounds like a home-make soy(less) sauce.

I think they attempted to make an Asian sauce right.. But the looks of this recipe seems to be an attempt to make ketchup and ketchup came from southeast Asia - probably from ketsup manis (Indonesian) which includes soy in it.

When I went to onelook.com and looked at the definition for soy in the older dictionaries, it was used pretty much the same as we do now. Agree that it sounds like a basic ketchup recipe.

1936?

1936 Sylvan Goldman &
Fred Young invented the first shopping cart.

1936 The 5th Avenue candy bar was
introduced.

1936 Louis Ballast of Denver, Colorado was given a trademark
for the name 'cheeseburger' in 1936. He never enforced it though.

1936 The Cobb salad was
invented by Robert Cobb at his Brown Derby Restaurant in Hollywood, California.

1936 The first American
blue cheese plant was founded by Felix Frederickson in 1936 in Faribault, Minnesota.

1936 The Oscar Mayer
Wienermobile is invented. It is a giant hot dog on wheels. Invented by Carl
Mayer, nephew of Oscar Mayer, it was built by General Body Company at Chicago, Illinois. There are now a fleet
of six. www.oscar-mayer.com

1936 Harland Sanders (KFC)
is made an honorary Kentucky Colonel by governor Ruby Laffoon in recognition of
his contributions to the state's cuisine.

1936 Cola flavored Jell-O
was introduced. It didn't sell and was dropped after about one year.

dcarch

It was also the depth of the Depression, and candy bars, Cobb salads and blue cheese weren't on the menu for a great many people. Ketchup may have been more common, I don't know. But soy sauce would probably been almost unknown as a condiment outside of ethnic neighborhoods. So the ketchup recipe seems more logical in that context.

If you scroll through the recipes at the link, there are 5 recipes for Tomato Ketchup (out of those 115 "Ways to prepare it"). So, ketchup was indeed quite common at that time. In the context of the article, I agree with Albert and think that 'soy' means sauce.

Would that be George Washington Carver? One of my heroes; he developed multitudes of recipes/inventions - a very fertile mind!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Washington_Carver

Def. looks like what we would call a catsup or ketchup - which was originally copied from an Asian sauce - perhaps a regional moniker?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ketchup

Found this in my dictionary - emphasis added:

"Records of the Dutch East India Company list soy sauce as a commodity in 1737, when seventy-five large barrels were shipped from Dejima, Japan, to Batavia (present-day Jakarta) on the island of Java. Thirty-five barrels from that shipment were then shipped to the Netherlands.[7] In the 18th century, diplomat and scholar Isaac Titsingh published accounts of brewing soy sauce. Although earlier descriptions of soy sauce had been disseminated in the West, his was among the earliest to focus specifically on the brewing of the Japanese version.[8] By the mid-19th century, Japanese soy sauce gradually disappeared from the European market, and the condiment became synonymous with the Chinese product.[9] Europeans were unable to make soy sauce because they did not understand the function of Aspergillus oryzae, the fungus used in its brewing.[9] Soy sauce made from ingredients such as Portobello mushrooms were disseminated in European cookbooks during the late 18th century. A Swedish recipe for "Soija" was published in the 1770 edition of Cajsa Warg's Hjelpreda i Hushållningen för Unga Fruentimber and was flavored with allspice and mace.[10]"

FWIW, Dickens has a number of references to catsup, usually walnut.

Ketchup may have been more common, I don't know.

Yes, there are many references to ketchup sandwiches as part of Depression cuisine.

ETA My parents, who were of the Depression generation, always preferred chili sauce to ketchup. We often made chili sauce at home, but never ketchup. I'm pretty sure they never ate a ketchup sandwich (I doubt that many people really did), but my dad was fond of butter and brown sugar on white bread sandwiches.

well the original kechups didn't contain tomatoes at all.. take a look at this history of kechup's origins and also the origin of tomato ketchup. ketchup

By the way, Worcestershire sauce has a Indian - British history behind it.

Considering that this use of ''soy'' might have been a misprint or a dialectical usage I went to Dave Wilton's Wordorigins.org Discussion Forums | Powered By ExpressionEngine - and solicited an opinion there. Dave responds:

''Tomato soy was evidently a thing back then. There are numerous
hits for it in Google Books, mostly from cookbooks. The earliest I
found was from 1869, The American Housewife and Kitchen Directory. The latest in Google Books is from 1942. ...

''Since, from what I can see, none of these recipes contain any actual
soy, my guess as to the name is that it is from a reanalysis of soy to mean “sauce.”

''Here’s a usage of soy, as opposed to tomato soy, to mean sauce. From The Tropical Agriculturist: Journal of the Ceylon Agricultural Society, 53.1, July 1919, 4. The recipe appears to be a reprint from the Jamaica Agricultural Society, 23.1:

''Some years ago a friend from Canada gave us a recipe
which we have always found to be excellent for making green tomatos
[sic] into soy [....] This will be found to be a condiment or sauce
which can be used either with meat or fish, and we think it should find a
ready sale in restaurants and eating houses where, of course, it could
be eaten freshly made. Half an ounce of cayenne pepper may be added to
advantage for those who like hot soy.

Here's another etymological reference to the use of the word soy for sauce...and ketchup. ;) http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=soy

1670s, saio "soybean-based Asian fish sauce," from Dutch soya, from Japanese soyu, variant of shoyu "soy," from Chinese shi-yu, from shi "fermented soy beans" + yu "oil." Etymology reflects Dutch presence in Japan before English and American merchants began to trade there.

it is neither tomato sauce or catsup

since they are recipe #9 tomato sauce and catsup is recipe #13

the rural cook book 1907 p 174 lists tomato soy and green tomato soy it also list tomato mustard. what tomato soy is none guesses as to what it really is i am not sure if it is a type condiment or sauce. the use of tomato soy may be lost to history

the earliest reference i found to tomato soy is

The New England Farmer - Volume 1 - Page 451 1867

after looking at recipe in

The American Housewife and Kitchen Directory: Containing the Most ... p 29

Wordorigins.org Discussion Forums | "Soy" in a recipe book, 1936. - HISTORY OF SOY SAUCE
(160 CE TO 2012)
William Shurtleff, Akido Aoyagi
Randolph Mary. 1838. The Virginia housewife: or, Methodical cook. Baltimore, Maryland: Plaskitt. & Cugle.
Note 1. “This is considered by some to be the first truly American cookbook and by all to be the first regional American cookbook . “ Mary Randolph lived 1762-1828 (MSU introduction).
Note 2. This is the earliest document seen ... that contains the term “Tomato soy” or a recipe titled “Tomato soy.” Address: Virginia.
But what is “Tomato soy”? (p. 163). Surprisingly, it contains no soy (sauce), and the word “soy” is not even mentioned in the body of the recipe, only in the title.
The Tomato in America
Early history, culture, and cookery
Andrew F. Smith
The second edition of Mary Randolph’s The Virginia House-wife, published in 1825, featured “Tomata Soy,” which was a misnomer, since it was not based on soybeans. It was, however, very popular. Other cookbook writers, such as Eliza Leslie, subsequently published similar recipes for tomato soy.
*Bold emphasis mine

Perhaps I started this on the wrong forum. Recipes would have been a better place. No?

No, this is the right place. Recipe Exchange is pretty dead. This is really interesting.... thank you.

Yes, we're enjoying it. There are more foodies than wordies here, but still...

there is recipe for tomato soy according to "

Tomatoes: a Savor the South® cookbook - Page 9

“

Tomato Soy” (which seems to be a hot sauce)

isn't that interesting. Is it possible that it was simply meant as 'sauce' but was pronounced 'soy' back in past centuries . That later someone wrote it down as it sounded? Just a maybe but why not? Language is always evolving. Mater in Sanskrit (Indian) eventually evolved into mother for example.