When you purchase through links on our site , we may earn an affiliate commission . Here ’s how it works .
For more than half a hundred , the savory flavor enhancer monosodium glutamate ( MSG ) has gotten a tough rap , with people blaming it for a configuration of symptoms , including headache , indigestion , feel flushed and acid reflux . And Chinese restaurants have faced the brunt of this curse .
But is MSG really spoiled for you , or is there more to the tale ?
The seasoning monosodium glutamate, better known as MSG, is used to flavor some instant noodle snacks.
allot to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration , MSG is consideredsafe and always has been , according to a1995 guard studythe FDA commissioned . MSG is the sodium salinity of the amino acid glutamic acid ( and , despite its name , there is no gluten in it ) . The 1995 sketch reported some example of mild and short - terminus symptom , like vexation , flushing or sleepiness , when soul who are sensitive to MSG consume a large amount — 3 gm or more — without food for thought . " However , a typical serving of a solid food with added MSG contains less than 0.5 grams of MSG . consume more than 3 grams of MSG without food at one clock time is unlikely , " according to theFDA .
If the case on MSG was close down decades ago , why are mass still avoiding it ? The long - hold concern around this umami - promote fixings is root in an old letter , a series of bad studies and medium craze of the sixties and beyond .
In 1968 , a Maryland doctor named Robert Ho Man Kwok wrote aletterto the New England Journal of Medicine describing his symptoms — apathy , weakness and heart racing — after eating Northern Chinese intellectual nourishment . He call the sensation " Chinese Restaurant Syndrome " and suggested three potential culprit : saltiness , fudge wine-colored or MSG .
The seasoning monosodium glutamate, better known as MSG, is used to flavor some instant noodle snacks.
Related : Why does mint make your mouth feel cool ?
MSG was keep apart and patented by a Japanese chemist named Kikunae Ikeda in the early 1900s . It became a commonplace additive in East Asian cookingthrough Japanese imperialism . By around 1926 , MSG was make its way to the U.S. by two channels : Formosan restaurants and force out foods , like those from Campbell ’s Soup Company . By the time of Kwok ’s letter of the alphabet , MSG was anearly omnipresent food additivefound in all sorts of processed , packaged and restaurant - prepared foods , and was even a family spice .
A host of doctors and scientist responded to Kwok ’s letter describing their own edition of Chinese Restaurant Syndrome , but there was little convergence in symptom . It ’s even been paint a picture that the entire telephone exchange was bogus , mean to be a jokeby Dr. Howard Steel , an orthopedic sawbones who wagered he could get publish in the honored New England Journal of Medicine . But the medium still latch on at the time , publishing headline like " Chinese Restaurant Syndrome Puzzles Doctors " and stigmatizing Formosan cuisine .
At first , no particular ingredient was singled out — after all , " Kwok " had suggested three likely causes of his alleged maladies . But between 1968 and 1969 , a series of poorly executed report attempted to establish Taiwanese Restaurant Syndrome as a medical status drive by MSG .
" When you look at the trials , it ’s pretty uttermost , " saidDr . Fred Cohen , a headache specializer and assistant prof of medicine and clinical neurology at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York , who recently publisheda review of the evidence against MSG .
Meanwhile , the former trials that became the foundation for MSG ’s opprobrium were wildly bias . In unblinded studies , researchers gave wonton soup to volunteerswho had already had a tough reaction to food at a Chinese restaurant to see if there was a negative response . Unsurprisingly , they found what they were await for .
afterwards studies tested MSG ’s health result in mice and linked the additive to learning ability lesions and corpulency — but in these cases the MSG wasinjectedunder the skin , rather than ingested as it would be in humans and yield inexorbitant doses .
Related : Why do our flavor preferences alter over time ?
As researchers continue to issue defective and misleading studies and the mass medium blow up their findings , public percept was cement . mass consider MSG as a poison and Taiwanese eatery as the source .
Chinese restaurants start out hanging " No MSG " signs in their windows . Food producer lend the same language to their packaging . In 2024 , Yelp reviews are still litter with talk of MSG - induced symptoms , even though the phenomenon has been widely expose .
" degraded nutrient and bite are usually high in MSG , but do not carry the same extent of complaint , " addedKantha Shelke , master scientist at Corvus Blue LLC , a intellectual nourishment science and nutrition research and regulatory intimacy house based in Chicago . Meanwhile , food for thought like Lycopersicon esculentum , mushroom , and Parmesan cheese naturally stop MSG but there ’s no talk of " Italian Restaurant Syndrome , " she told Live Science .
— Why do people like savory food ?
— Why does chocolate wrick bloodless ( and is it secure to use up ) ?
— Why do soft drinks go categoric ?
Shelke said there ’s also the power of proffer to consider . The stigma around MSG and Taiwanese food encapsulates the " nocebo " effect : the phenomenon in which negative anticipation or beliefs about a means lead to unpleasant symptoms , even in the absence of any physiological cause . In other password , people can manifest real reactions , such as headache , feeling flush or sickness , because they ’ve been tell to expect one .
In his review , Cohen ’s team found that while MSG could be a potential gun trigger for headaches , many field used MSG doses much higher than normal consumption . Clinical visitation report " conflict outcome " and MSG ’s character in causing migraine is unclear , the researchers write in the recap .
There are a variety of ingredients , like alcohol , dairy , or eggs , that are loosely considered secure , but still trigger headaches in a few , Cohen told Live Science . While MSG can be a headache initiation , " a lot of multitude remember it is when it ’s not , " he tell .
This article is for informational use only and is not mean to extend aesculapian advice .
