Tough to do if you've never tried your preferred brand. What do you like about it?

I mix ketchup and prepared horseradish with some lemon to make my own sauce.

My husband uses catsup.

Del Monte and Heinz are both good. I used to make my own (catsup, horseradish, lemon juice and Worchestershire) but the bottled ones are fine.

I don't think I've ever bought cocktail sauce, I do what olychick does - and add a dash of Worcestershire too.

Ketchup, horseradish, tobasco sauce, wedge of lemon on the side. Many decades ago, when I was waitressing in New Orleans, we used to serve oysters with a little cup that had these ingredients, unmixed. If it was an unpleasant customer, we'd load it up with a lot of extra tobasco sauce because you couldn't see it in the ketchup.

Another ketchup & horseradish blender here, may have to try adding a dash of Worcestershire in my next batch. To be honest the only seafood I eat using my homemade cocktail sauce is steamed shrimp.

...eta > Oysters, fried and raw both also require my cocktail sauce

Lobster > hot butter

Crab > nothing

Scallopes > nothing

All Fish > nothing, unless it "fishy" then use Tartar sauce

Just put some breaded shrimp in the air fryer for lunch and mixed up some sauce.

I'm not terribly choosy about my cocktail sauce. We have shrimp and crab often but infrequently with the sauce. It needs the tomato base, some horseradish, lemon and I will usually just mix up a little of my own - if 'getting fancy' for guests I'll add a touch of anchovy paste, onion salt, bit of the grated lemon peel). If using bottled, Stonewall Kitchens is good, with similar ingredients to Cross and Blackwell (there are many - many more than I include in my own quick mix!).

Same as Lone Jack...I have always made my own, very similar to how he does it.

My husband was a commercial fisherman.....we ate a lot of shrimp and oysters, and I have always made my own tartar sauce too.

The stuff seems to be available online, but someone else elsewhere asked about it and someone came up with a copycat. It's been tasted by folks that know the brand and it seems to be OK to them.

http://turin.nss.udel.edu/recipe/cocktail-sauce-recipe-2

• 1 cup ketchup
• 1 ½ tbsp prepared horseradish
• 1 ½ tbsp Worcestershire sauce
• ½ tsp onion powder
• ¼ tsp garlic powder
• ½ tsp paprika
• ¼ tsp celery seed, ground
• ¼ tsp mustard seed, ground
• 1 ½ tsp salt
• 1 ½ tbsp sugar

I have no idea if it will work for the OP or not. I too am a make my own and keep it simple person.

We make our own with ketchup, etc.

I always had homemade for my husband. My preference is remoulade for boiled shrimp. After he tried it the first time he was a convert. No more cocktail sauce.

Last time I made cocktail sauce I used this. Easy to adjust as desired.

1/2 cup ketchup

1/2 cup chili sauce (I used Heinz)

3 T. prepared horseradish

2 tsp. freshly squeezed lemon juice

1/2 tsp. Worcestershire sauce

1/4 tsp. hot sauce

Mine is like chloebud's, except that I generally use lime juice instead of lemon, but I will use lemon juice if that is all I have. I also make my own chili sauce using Ancho and Guajillo or Pasilla chilies - plus garlic and oregano. I had both lemon and lime trees in L.A. and now I only have access to a lemon tree (the neighbors', which grows over my wall). However, when I move, I will have access to a neighbor's lime tree, which grows over the wall there.

I often substitute chili sauce for the ketchup, if I do not want it to be sweet, and I never stock ketchup, except for the tiny packets from take-outs, which I rarely get.

I make a sauce that my mother made. I mix together cream, ketchup, worcestershire sauce, dash of horseradish, all to taste. Sometimes I like it stronger on the worcestershire, sometimes I prefer more ketchup.

I also make my own. Similar to the way everyone else makes it, although i usually add a few shakes of Tabasco. i’m usually pretty heavy on the horseradish and W’shire too.

And if I’m in a restaurant my ’secret sauce’ is to mix in little tarter sauce with the cocktail sauce which makes it more like a remoulade and is my favorite.

You've had a lot of good, on topic answers, so I hope you won't mind a bit of a discursion: I don't much care for classic cocktail sauce, but I've recently fallen in love with cocktel campechana. It's more of a cold soup kind of thing, but chock full of seafood and vegetables (tomatoes, onions, etc., pretty much what you might find in a salsa fresca) plus avocado (fruit) chunks. Tomato-y base, usually with clam juice and a bit of heat, but not enough to disturb the seafood. Usually shrimp, scallops and octopus, but it could have anything you like. To me, a big step up from boiled shrimp. :) SO good!

My Mum used to add a little ketchup to mayo, worcester...

The ingredient list...

Most of the popular brands have similar. If you don't fancy making your own from scratch, purchase a similar brand and have worcesterchire, tube tomato paste, and bottled horseradish on hand to adjust how you like it.

That said, like others, we don't use ketchup....loaded with sugars. We prefer a creole remoulade made with lots of lemon/and zest, yogurt/or mayo, a few inches of tomato paste in the tube, horseradish, worchestershire, garlic, smoked paprica, chipotle powder...

If you host friends and family, make both. 99% of friends and both our families prefer a remoulade over a ketchup based sauce.

If I use any dip, it is my remoulade. Which is catsup, mayo, and cajun spice.

I can't think of anything we eat it with in Britain except the old prawn cocktail from the 70s LOL https://www.recipetineats.com/prawn-cocktail/#wprm-recipe-container-23041

For those of you who don’t care for ketchup, I started making this ketchup-less remoulade when my sister brought me a large package of sweet paprika from her trip to Hungary. It is from Simply Recipes

Do Americans put ketchup in sauce remoulade?

Not yes, not no. Some do, some don't. I don't, but also have a dozen ways to serve various seafood.

Varies up and down the coastal states...Cajun, Creole, NewOrleans, Carolinas and Eastern shore. Varies family to family. NewEngland is often a white sauce with lots of lemon, capers, chopped cornichons. Not spiced like the southern states.