Ajinomoto

THE WORLD'S LARGEST MSG BRAND IS DEBUNKING THE RACIST MYTHS SURROUNDING THE UMAMI-BOOSTING INGREDIENT.

- AMELIA SCHWARTZ

IN 1968, the New England Journal of Medicine published a letter to the editor with the headline, "Chinese-Restaurant Syndrome." The letter detailed the numbness and weakness the writer would experience after eating Chinese food. It theorized that MSG (monoso- dium glutamate) was to blame. There was no evidence, then or now, that MSG is harmful, and yet the theory spread, and American perception of MSG has never fully recovered.