I've talked to many otherwise perfectly rational folks who get worked up about avoiding MSG when it comes to Asian food — but still go out and buy liquid aminos or eat foods that are caked in it.
The article rather understates the use of glutamate in the body.<p>> <i>it is an essential building block of protein found in muscle tissue, the brain, and other organs.</i><p>It's not only found in <i>every</i> organ, it's present in 99.6% of all human proteins, out of 20328 only 72 do not use glutamate, and of those 29 are keratin proteins.
MSG is fine, but I stubbornly cling to the notion that high quality ingredients should yield umami taste without adding MSG. To me it's similar to using ripe red bell peppers that are sweet, without needing to "fake" it with cane sugar. It's easy to turn dishes into caricatures by taking basic tastes to extremes. I'm no miso soup expert, but shouldn't it naturally have MSG from the seaweed, fermented miso paste, tuna, and tofu?<p>Still, perhaps it's a bit silly because I don't blink when adding salt.
The article mentioned that glutamate is currently produced by fermentation with molasses as the main feedstock. I found a fascinating open access article about the history of glutamate production here:<p><a href="https://academic.oup.com/ajcn/article/90/3/728S/4597145" rel="nofollow">https://academic.oup.com/ajcn/article/90/3/728S/4597145</a><p>The author is an employee of Ajinomoto Co, Inc., the same company that the author of the New Yorker article visited.<p>Abstract:<p><i>In 1907 Kikunae Ikeda, a professor at the Tokyo Imperial University, began his research to identify the umami component in kelp. Within a year, he had succeeded in isolating, purifying, and identifying the principal component of umami and quickly obtained a production patent. In 1909 Saburosuke Suzuki, an entrepreneur, and Ikeda began the industrial production of monosodium L-glutamate (MSG). The first industrial production process was an extraction method in which vegetable proteins were treated with hydrochloric acid to disrupt peptide bonds. L-Glutamic acid hydrochloride was then isolated from this material and purified as MSG. Initial production of MSG was limited because of the technical drawbacks of this method. Better methods did not emerge until the 1950s. One of these was direct chemical synthesis, which was used from 1962 to 1973. In this procedure, acrylonitrile was the starting material, and optical resolution of DL-glutamic acid was achieved by preferential crystallization. In 1956 a direct fermentation method to produce glutamate was introduced. The advantages of the fermentation method (eg, reduction of production costs and environmental load) were large enough to cause all glutamate manufacturers to shift to fermentation. Today, total world production of MSG by fermentation is estimated to be 2 million tons/y (2 billion kg/y).</i>
Melissa O'Brien at UBC has directly observed the effects of MSG on the blood flow in the dura in rat brains:<p><a href="https://open.library.ubc.ca/cIRcle/collections/ubctheses/24/items/1.0224000" rel="nofollow">https://open.library.ubc.ca/cIRcle/collections/ubctheses/24/...</a> [2016]<p>She basically takes it for granted that MSG causes headaches and is looking at the mechanisms.<p><i>A recent study found that a single oral dose of 150mg/kg taken consecutively for five days resulted in headache and muscle tenderness when given to healthy young men
(Shimada et al. 2013). Older work concluded that MSG consumption did not induce symptoms of pain or sensitivity but many of these studies have been scrutinized for their poor methodology (Tarasoff and Kelly 1993). Without definitive proof that MSG is harmful, it has been cleared in the United States and Canada as safe for human consumption and can be added to foods without regulation from Health Canada.</i><p>Lots more in this paper; very good work.
Here's a thought. People who have persistent "diet related" health problems who also tried every single known dietary avoidance strategy (often with little success) could also get tested for H.pylori.
TIL glutamate is one of four amino acids that also functions as a neurotransmitter. Obviously, this does not refute any of the science disproving "MSG sensitivity" but I still find it interesting. Further, I wonder if there are people out there that claim sensitivity to aspartate or serine given that they too are both neurotransmitters and amino acids.<p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neurotransmitter" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neurotransmitter</a>
> <i>They are willing to bring MSG into their homes as a component in other foods—more than happy to accept it as a flavoring powerhouse in Doritos, instant ramen, canned soup, and bouillon cubes, or at least happy to accept its euphemisms, like “hydrolized soy protein” and “autolyzed yeast.”</i><p>Those are strawman avoiders of MSG, not everyone. I avoid stuff which lists MSG under these names. As well as disodium inosinate or disodium guanylate.<p>I can tolerate some MSG, but if there is too much, I get headache/nausea. That is, it's not like I can't have a few chips at a party.