MSG in Sea Vegetables?

image from http://www.donotenter.com

When I first started looking for sea vegetables at grocery & health food stores, I was concerned because some of the kinds/brands I found (particularly the nori which is processed) said they contained mono sodium glutamate (MSG). MSG can cause some pretty bad symptoms in certain people. The most prominent symptoms are numbness at the back of the neck, gradually radiating to both arms and the back, general weakness and palpitations... all in all, not so good.

After poking around, I found that sea vegetables are the original food source that monosodium glutamate (MSG) was mass-produced from in the early 1900’s. Sea vegetables in their natural form, contain the amino acid glutamic acid. When this acid is broken down by cooking, it becomes glutamate. Stabilizing that with sodium (salt) creates mono sodium glutamate. MSG is now manufactured by a process using fermented molasses, wheat or corn.

But getting back to the important discussion here about sea vegetables and MSG, I found out that eating plants that naturally contain glutamic acid does NOT cause the adverse reactions that manufactured MSG causes. Here's a more detailed explanation of why:

Any small amounts of free glutamic acid that might be found in unprocessed, unadulterated, and/or unfermented, food will be L-glutamic acid, only, and will not typically cause adverse reactions in MSG-sensitive people. This should not be confused with the glutamic acid that occurs in or on food as a consequence of manufacture, which typically causes adverse reactions in MSG-sensitive people providing that they ingest amounts that exceed their tolerances for MSG.

BUT: products contained MSG only need to be labeled so if they contain manufactured MSG... so read the labels. If the package on your nori (or other sea vegetables) says it has MSG in it, don't buy it. (unless it specifically says its naturally occurring). They could have added it in the processing.

There's a really interesting article here about Professor Ikeda and how he created and patented MSG in 1909. Also an interesting article about how Asian cultures don't believe MSG is harmful here.