HP Sauce is a condiment; a popular brown sauce formerly produced in Aston, Birmingham, England, by HP Foods but now produced by H.J. Heinz in Elst, the Netherlands.

Proper British!

It has a malt vinegar base blended with fruit and spices and is usually eaten as an adjunct to hot or cold savoury food, or used as an ingredient in soups or stews. It is the most well known brand of brown sauce in the United Kingdom as well as the best selling, with 71% of the UK market

The original recipe for HP Sauce was invented and developed by Frederick Gibson Garton, a grocer from Nottingham. He registered the name H.P. Sauce in 1896.

Garton called the sauce HP because he had heard that a restaurant in the Houses of Parliament had begun serving it. For many years the bottle labels have carried a picture of the Palace of Westminster.

Garton sold the recipe and HP brand for the sum of £150 and the settlement of some unpaid bills to Edwin Samson Moore. Moore, the founder of the Midlands Vinegar Company (the forerunner of HP Foods) subsequently launched HP Sauce in 1903.