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Comment by asiachick | Hacker News Reader

Speaking of people being afraid of MSG, As far as I'm concerned that's racist. The only reason people are afraid of seaweed extract (MSG) is because some racists person made up "Chinese Food Syndrome". People repeating the lie are affectively passing on something based on racist propaganda. It's also the reason much of the asian food in the bay area doesn't taste nearly as delicious as the real deal in asia. Because the racist person who made up Chinese Food Syndrome lie is still spreading their hatred.

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> The only reason people are afraid of seaweed extract (MSG) is because some racists person made up "Chinese Food Syndrome".

Not exactly. I agree the term is racist, and that racist sentiment may way spur disinformation on MSG. But the fear actually began in 1968, during the beginnings of the modern 'health food' movement, with a letter written in the New England Journal of Medicine by a man named Robert Ho Man Kwok describing his supposed symptoms from eating MSG. The body of follow up research showing no such effects is much less interesting to people than the scary story that started it all.

Well, most Chinese restaurants usually dump MSG into their cooking. Back before Panda Express stopped claiming they used it, they would dump more than one teaspoons of it for a single entree on the fly.

MSG should be used as sparingly as possible (a pinch or less) and there are many kinds for specific ingredients, such as the original one made by Ajinomoto and more specialized ones for meats or vegetables only.

The safe dose of MSG is significantly higher than the safe dose of table salt so I wouldn't worry about eating too much.

This isn't really about the safe dosage of MSG for human consumption but the prolonged effects from folks whom are sensitive (or have developed a tolerance) to such exposure without even realizing it. I have had non-Asian friends whom have developed an allergy from it when it doesn't overly affect me at all but raises an interesting correlation not causation argument when applied in a broader food and cooking consumption context.

According to this article [0], "Robert Ho Man Kwok" was a fake name. The letter was supposedly a hoax but the journal wanted to publish it even though the author contacted them later and told them it was a hoax.

[0] https://news.colgate.edu/magazine/2019/02/06/the-strange-cas...

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