MSG: The Most Savory of Poisons

Something weird has been happening to me. After eating a tofu dish with a certain chicken seasoning, I experience a rapid onset of fuzziness in my head along with an inability to focus and concentrate lasting for about fifteen minutes. Then immediately after, a surge of hunger takes over my body. Anything sugary I crave — bananas, fruit juice — the impeding feeling to consume carbohydrates is overwhelming. But at the end of the day, I always remember the tofu dish as being quite tasty. And so the next night or two I make the same dish again. In fact, week after week I consistently find that this certain chicken seasoning is superior in flavor and texture to any other spice or seasoning available to me on my large spice and sauce shelf.

After experiencing this bizarre reaction for two months I narrowed down the cause of the reaction to this seasoning. I took a look at it’s ingredient list. It contains MSG, otherwise known as monosodium glutamate. Interestingly, none of the other spices I use contain it, none of which cause the same reaction either. I determined MSG is the culprit of my adverse reaction to this seasoned tofu.

I remember all the health talk years back surrounding the food additive MSG, but it all seemed to have ceased since I haven’t heard anything about MSG in quite some time now. I figured the health buzz was incorrect. But then I remembered my mother telling me when I was ten to stay away from MSG. Does my mother know something about MSG that I do not? Finally, I decided to do some research on MSG myself. What I learned disgusted me. I promptly threw that tasty seasoning into the trash.

What if I gave you a choice, a choice to eat the most savory food you could imagine, but you would experience fifteen minutes of cellular death in your brain making you unable to concentrate. Would you eat it? What if I gave you a choice to eat most delicious and filling chicken you have ever had, but afterwords you will experience a sore neck, back and arms along with diarrhea. Want a taste? What if I promised you the most tasty chips possible with the only trade off is that thirty minutes later will crave more. What if I promised healthy, prepackaged lunches for your children, but the trade off would be long term emotional instability, mood swings and hyperactivity in your children. Is this tasty, delectable food worth these trade offs? Well, I wouldn’t eat it knowing that. But sadly I have been eating it, unknowingly, and so have each of you.

Do you experience any of the following conditions?

headaches
nausea
depression
mood change
hyperactivity
rapid heartbeat
cramps
bloating
irritable bowel
diarrhea
dizziness
soreness, burning or numbness in neck, back or shoulders
chronic fatigue
sleepiness
blurred vision
eye pressure
tingling face
runny nose
difficulty breathing
dry mouth
difficulty concentrating
poor memory
weight problems
chest pain
sweating

A 1995 FDA-commissioned report acknowledged these symptoms as a result of a reaction to MSG, giving it a label “MSG Symptom Complex.” (“FDA and Monosodium Glutamate (MSG) http://www.cfsan.fda.gov/~lrd/msg.html ) I will describe to you why this happens.

MSG, monosodium or sodium glutamate, is a flavor enhancer commonly added in many foods. In fact, so many foods contain MSG that in a typical large chain food market it is hard to find packaged foods and seasonings that do not contain MSG. Overall, the majority of all MSG is found in canned soups, beef and chicken stock, potato chips, snack foods, frozen dinners, fast foods, instant foods, flavorings, spices, and sauces. That is just about all of the American food available, isn’t it? But that is not where MSG ends. The FDA only requires MSG to be labeled as “Monosodium Glutamte” when MSG is added to food. Therefore, MSG can be found in the labels ingredient list. However, MSG is sometimes left out in spices, sauces and flavorings simply in error because the manufacturer is unaware of it’s presence in it’s source materials. Pay attention to ingredients that merely state “spices” or “natural flavorings” because that can hide MSG. But other forms of MSG, simply called free glutamate can be present in many other food additives like vegetable proteins, yeast, soy extracts and protein isolate. Also, anything in the ingredient list saying “hydrolyzed” contains free glutamate. In fact, it is far easier to list which foods do not contain MSG: raw fruits, vegetables, seeds, nuts, meats and organic produced food items with no additives.

Monosodium glutamate is an excitotoxin, just like aspartame (Nutrasweet). Excitotoxicity is the term describing nerve cells becoming damaged or dying off by glutamate and similar substances. These toxins open up nerve cell calcium channels allowing an influx of calcium into the cell creating over-simulation. This activity results in cellular death. Therefore, a diet containing daily doses of MSG creates a potential for long-term neurodegenerative effects, with special alarm for greater potential harm to infants and children. Here are titles and source information of three studies proving this correlation:
1. Meldrum B. (1993). “Amino acids as dietary excitotoxins: a contribution to understanding neurodegenerative disorders”. Brain research. Brain research reviews 18 (3): 293–314.
2. Nemeroff, C. (1980). “Monosodium Glutamate-Induced Neurotoxicity: Review of the Literature and Call for Further Research”. Nutrition & Behavior edited by Sanford A. Miller (U.S. Food & Drug Administration): 177–211.
3. Olney JW, Ho OL (1970). “Brain damage in infant mice following oral intake of glutamate, aspartate or cysteine”. Nature 227 (5258): 609–611.

(side note, aspartate is the amimo acid aspartame (Nutrasweet) is broken down into.)

In another side note, I learned glutamate plays a major role in our memory retrieval. It is not clear if monosodum glutamate interferes in that activity, but I’ll err on the side of caution.

A large insulin response is caused by ingesting MSG. Glutamate receptors exist in the pancreas. MSG is rapidly absorbed by the gut, then tricks the pancreas into flooding the blood stream with insulin causing a corresponding drop in blood sugar levels. This activity increases hunger. Glutamic acid in American diets may be relevant to diabetes. Here is a link to a Canadian research study showing a correlation between ingesting free glutamic acid and higher insulin levels. http://ajpendo.physiology.org/cgi/content/full/278/1/E83

The final issue with MSG deals with obesity. In lab rats, monosodium glutamate decreased the rats thyroid ability to suppress appetite, causing the rats to consume more food. Here is the link to the research proving the relationship between MSG and obesity in rats. The study is titled: Obesity, voracity, and short stature: the impact of glutamate on the regulation of appetite. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16132059

Even the industry sponsored website http://www.msgfacts.com/facts/msgfact12.html state adding MSG to food triggers elderly people to eat more! But what about you? You’re not elderly! Why do you need to eat more food than you need?!

No wonder why more and more Americans are become overweight and obese. We just can’t stop at one MSG-laced snack, chip, or taco. What about the increasing numbers of passive neurological disorders pervading our American society? The hyperactive children, the emotionally unstable adults, the persistent depression in the elderly? Are food additives like monosodium glutamate really safe for long term consumption? All i see around me is our quality of life dropping due to physiological and psychological problems while our access to processed and pre-packaged food increases. I can’t speak for all of you, but starting tonight my future will be MSG free. A life free of food additives is a healthier life, and that I can speak for all of us. Stop poisoning yourself with MSG now.