The Best Way To Get Ketchup Out Of The Bottle

Ketchup lovers, rejoice: Your day has arrived.

In a groundbreaking new study, University of Melbourne physicist Dr. Anthony Stickland has finally outlined the very best way to get America's favorite french fry dip out of that glass bottle, Munchies reports. Stickland's method is rooted in the idea that the crimson goop's viscous composition makes it inherently resistant to common pouring methods.

"If you tilt a bottle of water, the water flows out because it is a liquid," the scientific mastermind tells the University's online magazine, Pursuit. "But tomato sauce prefers to be in the bottle because it is technically a solid, not a liquid."

Stickland's endeavor was motivated by his interest in rheology, or the study of "soft solids" like paint, sewage and, of course, ketchup. These pesky substances don't follow Sir Isaac Newton's findings that liquids should flow at a speed proportional to applied force and, as such, have long frustrated anyone attempting to extract them from tight, rigid spaces. Like you, smacking the bottle over and over again, desperately trying to douse your naked fries in that sticky red sauce.

However, follow the good doctor's three simple steps, and your palm-bruising days will be over for good.

① Give the bottle a hearty shake to evenly distribute the material throughout the container.

② Flip the thing upside down and give it one last good shake, this time using a vertical motion like you're whipping up a cocktail. The bottle's neck should be completely full of ketchup. Keep it capped and return it to its upright and locked position.

③ Pop off the lid, tip it down at a 45-degree angle and watch as your dish of choice becomes perfectly engulfed in sugary, toddler-approved dressing. And if the stubborn sludge still refuses to budge, hit the bottle a few times, increasing your force with each slow blow.

"The amount of force depends on how much is left in the bottle," Stickland notes. "A full bottle will have the weight of the sauce pushing down whenever the bottle is tilted, whereas a nearly empty bottle will need some help."

There you have it, folks—problem solved. Unless you, ahem, hate ketchup altogether.