How MSG Got A Bad Rap: Flawed Science And Xenophobia

LazyLion

LazyLion

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As a college student in New York City, I marveled that the city let me eat poached eggs with halloumi cheese and Moroccan spiced pita for breakfast, a spicy-sweet minced meat salad from northern Thailand for lunch, and Singaporean nasi lemak for dinner. My requisites were pretty straightforward: delicious, cheap and served in bulk. But if I was eating Chinese, I added one more: no MSG.

Like many people, I thought MSG — monosodium glutamate, a chemical compound used to enhance the flavor of food — was bad for me, and I was sure I felt terrible every time I ate it. After all, I was sluggish and had headaches and achy limbs whenever I ate a big meal in Chinatown. Now I know that the recurring headaches that plague me have little to do with what I eat. But at the time, avoiding those three letters brought me comfort and let me think I’d be eating some sort of sacredly pure meal made with food, not chemicals. Oh, how young and foolish I was.

That MSG isn’t the poison we’ve made it out to be has been well-established. News stories are written regularly about the lack of evidence tying MSG to negative health effects. (Read here and here, for example. Or here, here, here, here and here.) Still, Yelp reviews of Chinese restaurants tell tales of racing hearts, sleepless nights and tingling limbs from dishes “laden with MSG.” Even when the science is clear, it takes a lot to overwrite a stigma, especially when that stigma is about more than just food....
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Read More...
https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/how-msg-got-a-bad-rap-flawed-science-and-xenophobia/
 
walt disney world has policy of no MSGs across all their properties , so they are rather serious about this.
 
Robertsons makes a product called Zeal, any comments on this flavor enhancer?
 
Possibly msg doesn't affect everyone and only a smaller group of people. I used to have bad migraines for years which were put down as an allergy to certain chocolate snacks and a few cheese varieties. After reading about it and avoiding the foods with ingredient labelled MSG, instantly the migraines were gone.
 
When it comes to the food industry, 'lack of evidence tying MSG to negative health effects' is as comforting as a blanket made from concrete.
 
Spizz said:
When it comes to the food industry, 'lack of evidence tying MSG to negative health effects' is as comforting as a blanket made from concrete.
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I'm sure there's plenty of reputable peer-reviewed work indicating the lack of negative effects from MSG.
 
I enjoy hearing all the people who claim that MSG makes them feel terrible but they happily eat plenty of mushrooms. Shows just how often these dietry issues (Gluten intolerance is another one I find amusing) are purely psychological.
 
Kilgore_Trout_Redux said:
I enjoy hearing all the people who claim that MSG makes them feel terrible but they happily eat plenty of mushrooms. Shows just how often these dietry issues (Gluten intolerance is another one I find amusing) are purely psychological.
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There are genuine cases of actual Gluten intolerance (coeliac's disease). Everyone else is just following the latest fad *cough* LCHF *cough*
 
Kilgore_Trout_Redux said:
I enjoy hearing all the people who claim that MSG makes them feel terrible but they happily eat plenty of mushrooms. Shows just how often these dietry issues (Gluten intolerance is another one I find amusing) are purely psychological.
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This.

I read an article who said that true gluten intolerance is actually very rare, yet so many people claim to react badly to it.

Its the latest fad to not eat things, whether they are "artificial" like MSG (despite glutamate ions being found in nearly anything savoury) or "unhealthy" like gluten.
 
I was interested hear that Woolies have removed MSG from all of their products because consumers have told them they would prefer not to eat foods containing it.

Then, I read on the back of a packet of Woolies chips that it contains yeast extract. Guess what yeast extract is rich in - glutamate ions!

Its why Marmite has that savoury taste.
 
don't Chinese consume large amounts of MSG? And they're not really unhealthy? Or was that an urban legend based on the fact its in Soy sauce?
 
neoprema said:
don't Chinese consume large amounts of MSG? And they're not really unhealthy? Or was that an urban legend based on the fact its in Soy sauce?
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Read the article.

If you feed someone MSG but don't tell them it is MSG, they won't even notice.

Soy sauce naturally contains glutamate ions due to the fermentation, which is why it has a savoury taste.
 
Ancalagon said:
Read the article.

If you feed someone MSG but don't tell them it is MSG, they won't even notice.

Soy sauce naturally contains glutamate ions due to the fermentation, which is why it has a savoury taste.
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Nocebo effect, it's the same as the WiFi people
 
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