6 ms·

> Half of the world’s aspartame is made by Ajinomoto of Tokyo—the same company that first brought us MSG back in 1909. There is nothing wrong with MSG either

by cael450 5mo ago

cestith 5mo ago
Indeed. It turns out that “MSG headaches” are just high sodium level headaches, either through dehydration, unbalanced electrolytes, elevated blood pressure or whatever else higher than normal sodium levels cause headaches. The same headache could be caused by salt. MSG actually makes recipes require less of other flavor ingredients, including salt. It’s also often found in dishes that still contain relatively massive amounts of salt. So a little MSG to get your taste buds extra sensitive to other flavors is a net good. Just don’t eat too much sodium altogether, balance your electrolytes, and stay hydrated.
- kccqzy 5mo ago
  This effect is very obvious on me. I consistently get headaches when my sodium intake is too high. I don’t even use MSG in my own cooking but occasionally I add too much salt.
  - tracker1 5mo ago
    Might consider a mix of electrolytes instead of just salt. I usually keep a container mixed with "snake juice" ratios for electrolytes and use that to season with instead of salt alone. I'll also sometimes put a pinch in my water, not nearly snake juice amounts, when I get a bit off and start getting leg cramps.
- cubefox 5mo ago
  > So a little MSG to get your taste buds extra sensitive to other flavors is a net good. Salt and MSG are sometimes said to strengthen existing flavors, but I'm pretty sure they mainly just contribute their own unique taste: salty and umami. (There could of course theoretically be some interactions with other taste receptors, similar to how sweet things make things taste much less bitter, e.g. cocoa, but that is a relatively specific effect and not one that acts as a general flavor enhancer.)
  - kdheiwns 5mo ago
    If you lick plain MSG, it tastes bitter. Add it to something very sweet and it just tastes bizarre. Sprinkle it on fried chicken and it tastes like you just dumped chicken gravy on it and pumped up the taste. It really does mainly amplify flavors. And while MSG tastes very wrong in sweets, sweets generally always taste better with a bit of salt. Salt is its own flavor and a flavor amplifier.
    - SAI_Peregrinus 5mo ago
      Plain MSG absolutely does not taste bitter. I just tried some (again) to confirm, it's not salty & not bitter. Just a strong flavor of its own.
      - BobaFloutist 5mo ago
        Yeah it just tastes like straight up "savory." Almost tastes like fat more than anything.
        Kirby64 5mo ago
        > Almost tastes like fat more than anything. Probably because a lot of fat sources have high levels of glutamates in them. You're not tasting the fat, per-say, but the other stuff that isn't fat. It's why beef tallow is so much tastier than neutral oil. Same level of fat.
      - cubefox 5mo ago
        Yeah, I also just tried it, it doesn't taste bitter at all. It tastes like clear soup broth, which usually contains a lot of MSG.
- bennettnate5 5mo ago
  I have a family member who has discovered through gradual process of elimination that she gets migraines from MSG, aspartame and yeast extract. "just sodium headaches" doesn't really apply to her case; simply chewing a piece of gum that has aspartame, or eating a piece of meat cooked with MSG in her salad is enough to trigger them. I agree in the general sense with your comment and the article that there's no widespread danger to public health from these additives, but it doesn't mean there aren't still individuals whose health gets messed up (including legitimate headache or migraine symptoms) by these additives.
  - ch4s3 5mo ago
    > discovered through gradual process of elimination that she gets migraines from MSG This is definitely not true. There is no biological pathway that can do this. MSG is nearly identical to the glutamic acid in other foods. If it were true they'd be unable to tolerate parmesan cheese, soy sauce, aged meats, tomatoes, mushrooms, and seaweed.
    - BobaFloutist 5mo ago
      Migraines are complicated enough that I'd buy a psychosomatic trigger, maybe?
      - cestith 5mo ago
        Migraines can possibly be triggered by cause and effect chains several intermediate causes long. It could help explain for example why certain things are triggers for certain migraine patients and not others.
    - cestith 5mo ago
      Glutamate is considered a migraine trigger, though. Many people do avoid or limit those foods for that reason. Thankfully it doesn’t appear to be a trigger for me, because I love all those things. There is some controversy about dietary glutamate being directly responsible for migraine. It’s common in the brain already. It’s only allowed selectively through the blood-brain barrier. However it could trigger other types of headache, and those can trigger migraines. Also, apparently more of it is formed in the brain when there are high levels of lysine and ornithine in the body. Many of the foods with high levels of glutamate also have high levels of those aminos. High levels or low levels of sodium in the body can also be a migraine trigger. MSG is lower in sodium than table salt, but it is additional sodium. Many of the issues blamed on it though are after eating foods that contain MSG and a high amount of salt as well. That’s also true of many of the glutamate-containing foods for that matter (gravies, miso, soy sauce, aged meats). Doctors recommend eliminating one single ingredient at a time to find your triggers. However, I’m sure many people don’t control for salt when eliminating MSG or natural food glutamate.
- ranger_danger 5mo ago
  I drank sodas with aspartame just fine for many decades. Then one day they suddenly started giving me migraines any time I had one, so I had to quit cold turkey. No other amount of caffeine, regular sodas, salty foods, MSG-laden meals etc. seem to trigger it though, and I have no idea why.
  - kbelder 5mo ago
    It triggers a headache for me as well. Happens whether I'm previously aware of its presence in the product or not. I'm fine accepting that it's a generally safe chemical that has been thoroughly studied and I just have a quirk, but I also don't want my quirk to be dismissed because studies don't validate it. The headaches are replicable and severe enough that it's turned me off of all artificial sweeteners, although I doubt they all have the same effect. I don't want to risk it.
- aitchnyu 5mo ago
  Doesnt all sodium chemicals like salt and baking soda increase taste perception?
ChrisRR 5mo ago
There's not "nothing" wrong with MSG. But msg is fine in moderation, just like salt, fat and sugar are all fine in moderation too
- tptacek 5mo ago
  If there's anything wrong with MSG that isn't simply due to sodium intake, I think it's unknown to science (at least in the sense that there's no theory about it with any wide uptake). MSG is also intensively studied and has a very similar mechanistic story to aspartame.
  - cyberax 5mo ago
    One thing that is "wrong" with MSG is that a lot of restaurants overuse it as a condiment. So you're paying money for a good food experience, but you're getting the taste equivalent of instant ramen noodles. I actually _like_ instant ramen noodles and MSG, and I use MSG when cooking. But it feels like cheating when fancy restaurants also use it.
    - TFNA 5mo ago
      > So you're paying money for a good food experience, but you're getting the taste equivalent of instant ramen noodles. Restaurants, even nicer ones, cut corners. This especially flared up in the news a couple of years ago when a posh UK restaurant served a cheese plate at a decently high price, where the label was still on the cheese and revealed it had come from an ordinary supermarket’s house brand. I’ve seen this personally, too. I ate sushi today at a sushi place where the menu said “crab sticks” were an ingredient of some rolls, but these were surely the imitation crab meat called surimi. Or another Asian place in my area is known for offering “duck” on the menu, but what you get is mock duck[0] wrapped around the meat, to make people think it’s the duck skin, but the meat itself is chicken. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mock_duck https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mock_duck
- SketchySeaBeast 5mo ago
  Sure, but it feels like a silly distinction. The famous example is water, which fits those same criteria. Would we that that there's not "nothing" wrong with water?
jamal-kumar 5mo ago
Crazy how most of the negative hype around that, total nonsense people have believed for decades now, started from some doctor making a joke paper in the New England Journal of Medicine because one of his other doctor friends was saying that orthopaedic surgeons were too stupid to get something published in there and bet like 10$ that to my recollection didn't even get paid (although this says 2024 I swear I remember reading about this 5-10 years ago): But the story doesn’t end there. In 2024, a major twist emerged when a retired orthopedic surgeon and Colgate University trustee named Dr. Howard Steel contacted Colgate University professor Jennifer LeMesurier to make a shocking claim: He was the author of the letter. Goaded by a friend who had bet him $10 that he wasn’t smart enough to have an article published in The New England Journal of Medicine, Dr. Steel said he had invented the sensationalistic “strange syndrome” and the persona of Dr. Robert Ho Man Kwok to win the wager, LeMesurier recounted in a 2025 episode of This American Life. [1] [1] https://www.self.com/story/what-is-msg-and-is-it-bad-for-you https://www.self.com/story/what-is-msg-and-is-it-bad-for-you
- aesthesia 5mo ago
  The same This American Life episode raised serious doubts about Dr. Steel's claims, which is mentioned in the article you link: > When reporters tried to corroborate Dr. Steel’s claims, however, holes started appearing, according to the This American Life episode. Chief among them: There actually was a real Dr. Robert Ho Man Kwok, and his biographical details seemed to match those provided in the letter, like his professional title, the name of his research institute, and the date of his move to the US. > While both Dr. Steel and Dr. Ho Man Kwok had died by the time the digging began in earnest, their surviving family members were able to shed some light on the situation. Dr. Ho Man Kwok’s children and former colleagues were adamant that Dr. Ho Man Kwok had in fact written the letter. Meanwhile, Dr. Steel’s daughter said her father was a lifelong prankster who loved pulling one over on people. With this testimony in mind, the reporters came to the conclusion that Dr. Ho Man Kwok was most likely the true author and Dr. Steel had taken credit for years as an elaborate practical joke.
  - jamal-kumar 5mo ago
    Oh damn I just linked the first article I could find without fully reading it, my bad. That's crazy haha wow
jiaosdjf 5mo ago
The argument for MSG is that it's "naturally occurring in food anyway" and that it is a substitute for worse things - which sounds like the same argument for aspartame. The bottom line is you don't know for sure and it's developed under commercial incentives. It's probably ok carries just as much weight as you probably don't need it.
bena 5mo ago
But they were involved in price fixing lysine. And that was wrong.
FuriouslyAdrift 5mo ago
Ajinomoto is also the worlds largest (95% market share) supplier of build up film necessary for integrated circuit packaging. https://www.ajinomoto.com/innovation/our_innovation/buildupfilm https://www.ajinomoto.com/innovation/our_innovation/buildupf...
- ThePowerOfFuet 5mo ago
  Wild. I had no idea.

> Half of the world’s aspartame is made by Ajinomoto of Tokyo—the same company that first brought us MSG back in 1909. There is nothing wrong with MSG either

by cael450 5mo ago

> Half of the world’s aspartame is made by Ajinomoto of Tokyo—the same company that first brought us MSG back in 1909. There is nothing wrong with MSG either

cestith 5mo ago

Indeed. It turns out that “MSG headaches” are just high sodium level headaches, either through dehydration, unbalanced electrolytes, elevated blood pressure or whatever else higher than normal sodium levels cause headaches. The same headache could be caused by salt. MSG actually makes recipes require less of other flavor ingredients, including salt. It’s also often found in dishes that still contain relatively massive amounts of salt. So a little MSG to get your taste buds extra sensitive to other flavors is a net good. Just don’t eat too much sodium altogether, balance your electrolytes, and stay hydrated.

kccqzy 5mo ago
This effect is very obvious on me. I consistently get headaches when my sodium intake is too high. I don’t even use MSG in my own cooking but occasionally I add too much salt.
- tracker1 5mo ago
  Might consider a mix of electrolytes instead of just salt. I usually keep a container mixed with "snake juice" ratios for electrolytes and use that to season with instead of salt alone. I'll also sometimes put a pinch in my water, not nearly snake juice amounts, when I get a bit off and start getting leg cramps.
cubefox 5mo ago
> So a little MSG to get your taste buds extra sensitive to other flavors is a net good. Salt and MSG are sometimes said to strengthen existing flavors, but I'm pretty sure they mainly just contribute their own unique taste: salty and umami. (There could of course theoretically be some interactions with other taste receptors, similar to how sweet things make things taste much less bitter, e.g. cocoa, but that is a relatively specific effect and not one that acts as a general flavor enhancer.)
- kdheiwns 5mo ago
  If you lick plain MSG, it tastes bitter. Add it to something very sweet and it just tastes bizarre. Sprinkle it on fried chicken and it tastes like you just dumped chicken gravy on it and pumped up the taste. It really does mainly amplify flavors. And while MSG tastes very wrong in sweets, sweets generally always taste better with a bit of salt. Salt is its own flavor and a flavor amplifier.
  - SAI_Peregrinus 5mo ago
    Plain MSG absolutely does not taste bitter. I just tried some (again) to confirm, it's not salty & not bitter. Just a strong flavor of its own.
    - BobaFloutist 5mo ago
      Yeah it just tastes like straight up "savory." Almost tastes like fat more than anything.
      - Kirby64 5mo ago
        > Almost tastes like fat more than anything. Probably because a lot of fat sources have high levels of glutamates in them. You're not tasting the fat, per-say, but the other stuff that isn't fat. It's why beef tallow is so much tastier than neutral oil. Same level of fat.
    - cubefox 5mo ago
      Yeah, I also just tried it, it doesn't taste bitter at all. It tastes like clear soup broth, which usually contains a lot of MSG.
bennettnate5 5mo ago
I have a family member who has discovered through gradual process of elimination that she gets migraines from MSG, aspartame and yeast extract. "just sodium headaches" doesn't really apply to her case; simply chewing a piece of gum that has aspartame, or eating a piece of meat cooked with MSG in her salad is enough to trigger them. I agree in the general sense with your comment and the article that there's no widespread danger to public health from these additives, but it doesn't mean there aren't still individuals whose health gets messed up (including legitimate headache or migraine symptoms) by these additives.
- ch4s3 5mo ago
  > discovered through gradual process of elimination that she gets migraines from MSG This is definitely not true. There is no biological pathway that can do this. MSG is nearly identical to the glutamic acid in other foods. If it were true they'd be unable to tolerate parmesan cheese, soy sauce, aged meats, tomatoes, mushrooms, and seaweed.
  - BobaFloutist 5mo ago
    Migraines are complicated enough that I'd buy a psychosomatic trigger, maybe?
    - cestith 5mo ago
      Migraines can possibly be triggered by cause and effect chains several intermediate causes long. It could help explain for example why certain things are triggers for certain migraine patients and not others.
  - cestith 5mo ago
    Glutamate is considered a migraine trigger, though. Many people do avoid or limit those foods for that reason. Thankfully it doesn’t appear to be a trigger for me, because I love all those things. There is some controversy about dietary glutamate being directly responsible for migraine. It’s common in the brain already. It’s only allowed selectively through the blood-brain barrier. However it could trigger other types of headache, and those can trigger migraines. Also, apparently more of it is formed in the brain when there are high levels of lysine and ornithine in the body. Many of the foods with high levels of glutamate also have high levels of those aminos. High levels or low levels of sodium in the body can also be a migraine trigger. MSG is lower in sodium than table salt, but it is additional sodium. Many of the issues blamed on it though are after eating foods that contain MSG and a high amount of salt as well. That’s also true of many of the glutamate-containing foods for that matter (gravies, miso, soy sauce, aged meats). Doctors recommend eliminating one single ingredient at a time to find your triggers. However, I’m sure many people don’t control for salt when eliminating MSG or natural food glutamate.
ranger_danger 5mo ago
I drank sodas with aspartame just fine for many decades. Then one day they suddenly started giving me migraines any time I had one, so I had to quit cold turkey. No other amount of caffeine, regular sodas, salty foods, MSG-laden meals etc. seem to trigger it though, and I have no idea why.
- kbelder 5mo ago
  It triggers a headache for me as well. Happens whether I'm previously aware of its presence in the product or not. I'm fine accepting that it's a generally safe chemical that has been thoroughly studied and I just have a quirk, but I also don't want my quirk to be dismissed because studies don't validate it. The headaches are replicable and severe enough that it's turned me off of all artificial sweeteners, although I doubt they all have the same effect. I don't want to risk it.
aitchnyu 5mo ago
Doesnt all sodium chemicals like salt and baking soda increase taste perception?

ChrisRR 5mo ago

There's not "nothing" wrong with MSG. But msg is fine in moderation, just like salt, fat and sugar are all fine in moderation too

tptacek 5mo ago
If there's anything wrong with MSG that isn't simply due to sodium intake, I think it's unknown to science (at least in the sense that there's no theory about it with any wide uptake). MSG is also intensively studied and has a very similar mechanistic story to aspartame.
- cyberax 5mo ago
  One thing that is "wrong" with MSG is that a lot of restaurants overuse it as a condiment. So you're paying money for a good food experience, but you're getting the taste equivalent of instant ramen noodles. I actually _like_ instant ramen noodles and MSG, and I use MSG when cooking. But it feels like cheating when fancy restaurants also use it.
  - TFNA 5mo ago
    > So you're paying money for a good food experience, but you're getting the taste equivalent of instant ramen noodles. Restaurants, even nicer ones, cut corners. This especially flared up in the news a couple of years ago when a posh UK restaurant served a cheese plate at a decently high price, where the label was still on the cheese and revealed it had come from an ordinary supermarket’s house brand. I’ve seen this personally, too. I ate sushi today at a sushi place where the menu said “crab sticks” were an ingredient of some rolls, but these were surely the imitation crab meat called surimi. Or another Asian place in my area is known for offering “duck” on the menu, but what you get is mock duck[0] wrapped around the meat, to make people think it’s the duck skin, but the meat itself is chicken. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mock_duck https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mock_duck
SketchySeaBeast 5mo ago
Sure, but it feels like a silly distinction. The famous example is water, which fits those same criteria. Would we that that there's not "nothing" wrong with water?

jamal-kumar 5mo ago

Crazy how most of the negative hype around that, total nonsense people have believed for decades now, started from some doctor making a joke paper in the New England Journal of Medicine because one of his other doctor friends was saying that orthopaedic surgeons were too stupid to get something published in there and bet like 10$ that to my recollection didn't even get paid (although this says 2024 I swear I remember reading about this 5-10 years ago): But the story doesn’t end there. In 2024, a major twist emerged when a retired orthopedic surgeon and Colgate University trustee named Dr. Howard Steel contacted Colgate University professor Jennifer LeMesurier to make a shocking claim: He was the author of the letter. Goaded by a friend who had bet him $10 that he wasn’t smart enough to have an article published in The New England Journal of Medicine, Dr. Steel said he had invented the sensationalistic “strange syndrome” and the persona of Dr. Robert Ho Man Kwok to win the wager, LeMesurier recounted in a 2025 episode of This American Life. [1] [1] https://www.self.com/story/what-is-msg-and-is-it-bad-for-you https://www.self.com/story/what-is-msg-and-is-it-bad-for-you

aesthesia 5mo ago
The same This American Life episode raised serious doubts about Dr. Steel's claims, which is mentioned in the article you link: > When reporters tried to corroborate Dr. Steel’s claims, however, holes started appearing, according to the This American Life episode. Chief among them: There actually was a real Dr. Robert Ho Man Kwok, and his biographical details seemed to match those provided in the letter, like his professional title, the name of his research institute, and the date of his move to the US. > While both Dr. Steel and Dr. Ho Man Kwok had died by the time the digging began in earnest, their surviving family members were able to shed some light on the situation. Dr. Ho Man Kwok’s children and former colleagues were adamant that Dr. Ho Man Kwok had in fact written the letter. Meanwhile, Dr. Steel’s daughter said her father was a lifelong prankster who loved pulling one over on people. With this testimony in mind, the reporters came to the conclusion that Dr. Ho Man Kwok was most likely the true author and Dr. Steel had taken credit for years as an elaborate practical joke.
- jamal-kumar 5mo ago
  Oh damn I just linked the first article I could find without fully reading it, my bad. That's crazy haha wow

jiaosdjf 5mo ago

The argument for MSG is that it's "naturally occurring in food anyway" and that it is a substitute for worse things - which sounds like the same argument for aspartame. The bottom line is you don't know for sure and it's developed under commercial incentives. It's probably ok carries just as much weight as you probably don't need it.

bena 5mo ago

But they were involved in price fixing lysine. And that was wrong.

FuriouslyAdrift 5mo ago

Ajinomoto is also the worlds largest (95% market share) supplier of build up film necessary for integrated circuit packaging. https://www.ajinomoto.com/innovation/our_innovation/buildupfilm https://www.ajinomoto.com/innovation/our_innovation/buildupf...

ThePowerOfFuet 5mo ago
Wild. I had no idea.