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Flavor Enhancer
or Dangerous Drug?

MSG,(monosodium glutamate),is it a flavor enhancer or a danger "drug"? MSG has the unenviable title of being the most extensively researched food additive on today's market. Hundreds of controlled studies have been carried out on its safety over the past thirty years.

What Is MSG?

Ask around a group of people- everybody has heard of it but almost no one knows what it actually is. Common responses are it is a tenderizer, a preservative, or it "just makes food look more attractive". All of these are incorrect. Quite simply, MSG is nothing more than a flavor enhancer.

As a flavor enhancer, MSG does not change the flavor of food in any way. What it does do, when combined with the saliva in your mouth, it stimulates the tongue's taste buds so you think the food product has excellent flavor. At the same time, if there is some kind of unpleasant flavor, you can actually expect a reduction of the bad taste in your mouth.

How Is MSG Made

Many people are surprised to find out that as an additive, it is not a dangerous combination of man-made chemicals. Actually, MSG is a product from the fermentation process just like beer, vinegar, yogurt and soy sauce. A pure and natural source of molasses is combined with either tapioca starch or a cereal starch, fermented and then dried to a powdered form. The result is MSG.

Is MSG Safe Or Not

Many doctor's, researchers and of course the manufacturing community feel MSG has received its bad reputation because of bad press reports. Over consumption of foods with MSG, too high of concentrations in the product being ingested, or the attitude "if a little helps, a lot will make it better" have all led to the consistent impression that MSG needs to be avoided.

Many doctors feel MSG is an important plus for people in their aging years. With our society's consistent attempts to lower blood pressure and reduce weight, MSG as a flavor enhancer can be used as an important trade-off for regular table salt.

For an easy and quick to fix spice alternative which does not rely on MSG and also reduces your intake of salt at the same time, try this recipe:
Take 3 sprigs of fresh rosemary (from the regular grocery store) and strip the leaves off the stem. Place these in a blender and process until fine.
Now mix one part rosemary to three parts Morton's Salt Substitute and one part of a good quality sea salt. You can effectively reduce your salt intake, raise your potassium intake and get the great flavor that rosemary will add to almost any self-prepared dish you make.

Hidden Sources Of MSG

Don't let the advertising label, No Added MSG, trick you into feeling safe. Added MSG to a product during manufacturing can and does get controlled and labeled. But you must realize many common food sources do have glutamate(MSG) naturally-occurring in them. If you eat any of them, you are getting the "benefits" of MSG. Some of these include:

Any product sold or labeled as all natural
Avocado
All meats
Poultry
Fish
Cheese
Milk/milk products
Tomatoes
Mushrooms
Many vegetables
Many types of Seafood- especially Shrimp

Final Results From Extensive Testing

Although there is many reports of instances where people have shown reactions to food containing this flavor enhancer, often it has been shown that the MSG itself was not the contributing factor. Rather, it has usually been shown to be over-consumption and over-use of MSG was the final result.

As with any food allergy or intolerance, somewhere there is always going to be some people that are sensitive to every substance, so if you do show unusual symptoms, keep a log and chart all the times you notice these symptoms and what type of food(s) you had during those sessions. By doing a little detective work, it is often possible to determine if you may be one of those people who are sensitive to MSG.

Many in the medical community though feel MSG's bad reputation far exceeds its usefulness to mankind.

Return to "Home - Allergy and Diabetic Health" from "Flavor Enhancer".

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*Disclaimer*
This site is not intended to replace the advice and supervision of your professional medical treatment plan. Although all of the information is true and accurate to the best of our knowledge, we still recommend you carefully check all food labels before consuming any food product. We can not assume any legal responsibility for any illness obtained while following the advice contained on this site.

SBI!