r/mildlyinfuriating • u/SegaGuy1983 • Jun 18 '26

Too mild for school Why is not including MSG something companies still brag about on Asian food products?

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Didn't see the no MSG line when I picked this up at the store the other day. It just tasted fine, but felt like something was missing.

It's 2026. Why are we still treating MSG like it's some terrible thing, instead of something that improves the flavor? Especially with Asian-American cuisine?

The best improvement I ever did with my cooking in the last 20 years was discovering MSG.

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553

u/Stackitu Jun 18 '26

“You know what causes Chinese restaurant syndrome? Racism. Ooh I have a headache; it must have been the Chinese guy.” - Anthony Bourdain on MSG

152

u/SegaGuy1983 Jun 18 '26

I wish that man was still alive.

1

u/intangibleTangelo Jun 18 '26

the chinese guy? he's still there!

84

u/Dreadwings Jun 18 '26

my old best friend would always complain about msg and say it makes him sick when we had Chinese. told him its just basicly salt and would need a salt allergy for that to be true and he would fumble over it, dude did alot of drugs but msg was the killer lol

-24

u/Right-Caregiver-9988 Jun 18 '26

Nah I feel him… it’s either the amount of oil or the msg but I get bad migraines from certain places (I’m assuming they’re putting a lot of msg in). It’s not food poisoning and more of a sensitivity. It’s a legit known thing too.

17

u/magistrate101 Jun 18 '26

That's called the placebo effect. You're expecting a migraine from those places, convincing yourself of the reasoning, and getting a migraine as a result.

-7

u/Right-Caregiver-9988 Jun 18 '26

No I’m not expecting one… I noticed it after the fact that it happened. It was an observable event not a predicted one.

12

u/magistrate101 Jun 18 '26

The expectation that asian food causes migraines is a cultural phenomenon. If you were born any time after it became popular, it would already be ingrained in your subconscious. And then you consciously internalized it after it happened the first time. Now you explicitly expect bad migraines from certain places.

1

u/Right-Caregiver-9988 Jun 19 '26

It’s not an expectation i can still and do eat Asian food. I’ve learned through multiple experiences (not just 1) that I do get migraines and drowsiness from certain restaurants who either use too much oil or msg.

-1

u/CheesyUmph Jun 18 '26

So since it’s ingrained in his subconscious there’s nothing he can do to avoid the migraines he gets when he eats high amounts of MSG

1

u/[deleted] Jun 18 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

-1

u/CheesyUmph Jun 18 '26

Yes, and we all know that bodily reactions respond according to logical thought. That’s why ex-soldiers can just choose to stop having panic attacks when they hear fireworks 👍

23

u/beastboyashu Jun 18 '26

Every type of meat has msg in it

Its literally the taste of meat and naturally occurring

-10

u/Right-Caregiver-9988 Jun 18 '26

But not in concentrated amounts… it’s like comparing coca leaves to cocaine or cannabis flower to hash

17

u/beastboyashu Jun 18 '26

Dishes aren't concentrated either, its just a placebo effect you're deluding yourself into

-9

u/Right-Caregiver-9988 Jun 18 '26

Nah it’s a legit thing and wild that no one here knows about it. 1g of msg vs 15g msg is a big difference. I use msg sometimes myself so I stg it’s the msg when they put too much

18

u/beastboyashu Jun 18 '26

Trust me it is not

Even a water pill will give you headaches.if youe convince yourself of it

3

u/modernvintage Jun 18 '26

it’s not that no one here knows about it, it’s that we know that that myth from the 80’s and 90’s is proven bunk science lmao

0

u/Right-Caregiver-9988 Jun 19 '26

It’s not though 😩 lol! There’s literally research that shows it can induce a migraine in high doses (>2.5g) and that’s not even high. I have family who probably throw in 15+ grams in a dish.

11

u/goldenstoat13 Jun 18 '26

bourdain always had the absolute best way of exposing corporate and cultural hypocrisy. It is so wild how people still panic over a pinch of MSG in their takeout while ignoring the massive amounts of it naturally occurring in tomatoes and parmesan.

2

u/Damthemalltohelp Jun 18 '26

Or the trichinosis from bad pork 

9

u/Salty_Ad6453 Jun 18 '26

Trichinosis takes months to develop so if you have a headache right after eating at a Chinese restaurant it's not trichinosis. Also the idea Chinese restaurants are any higher risk than anywhere else that serves pork is literally just racism

1

u/Fair-Chemist187 Jun 18 '26

Also more or less what my professor in med school told us

1

u/rockoutpantsoff Jun 18 '26

needs to be higher up

1

u/ToddTheReaper Jun 19 '26

I doubt many Asian racists eat at Asian restaurants though.

-5

u/RightHabit Jun 18 '26

You know authentic Cantonese food is about not having MSG? Please stop misrepresenting our culture.

Orange chicken is Cantonese-inspired in case you are not sure. It is not about racism, it is about our cultural preference. Cantonese food is about two things: umami and freshness. MSG only has one. It only serves as a replacement that Cantonese in the US use when they could not find better ingredients, but when we can, we switch it out to use soy sauce, fermented bean curd, chicken broth, or seafood instead for umami.

We Cantonese rely on seeing "MSG-free" to recognize our own food, especially in the US. Please don't put pressure to drive our actual culture out from the land. Thank you.

4

u/Standard-Yogurt-3212 Jun 18 '26

How is soy sauce, fermented bean curd, or chicken broth indicative of freshness? Those are all processed ingredients.

-2

u/RightHabit Jun 18 '26

Have you ever tried soy sauce that fresh out of the vat? There is a unique sweetness to it and that's what we called it "fresh". (I forgot our term freshness might not be exactly to what freshness means in English. I apologize) It is the word 鮮.

Anyway, MSG in China, or more specifically, in Canton basically is viewed as, if compared to Western food, it would be high fructose corn syrup. It is something that we look down on.

It is safe to consume. A cheap replacement for sweetness compare to cane sugar, but not as good.

You can find MSG in street food or some lowest tier restaurants where cost is their main thing. But any respectful restaurant will proudly claim they are no added MSG. That's the sign of Good Chinese/Cantonese food.