MSG. People will swear it gives them all manner of ailments
I bought a big pack of msg from the Asian supermarket and use it instead of normal salt for many things. My partner and I call it wonder salt.
(Of course, msg like normal salt or anything should be used in moderation lol)
I bought a big pack of msg from the Asian supermarket and use it instead of normal salt for many things. My partner and I call it wonder salt.
I hear the voices of my ancestors cry in confusion.
But seriously speaking, I’ve never encountered MSG being used in place of salt. We use it here to give food more of that nondescript meaty taste (aka umami).
Personally, if I need both salty and umami tastes I’d reach for soy or fish sauce first (depending on what’s being cooked). I’d only add MSG and/or salt if I really have to—usually to make minute adjustments.
I’m sorry for offending your ancestors. I hope they can find it in their hearts to forgive me lol
Tbh, I’m not very good at cooking and I rarely add salt to my food. If I want saltiness, I usually get it through ingredients like soy sauce, for example. I guess I don’t mean that I use the msg instead of salt, but I do use in foods where you might add salt, and I just happen to not since I added something else that serves a similar purpose. Does that make sense? But then, like I said, I’m not good at cooking and I just try to make things and experiment a bunch (a lot of experiments have failed horribly)
Also - maybe it also makes a difference that I eat vegan/vegetarian and I don’t always know how to fill in the “meaty” gap that I feel like can be missing.
The purpose of salt in cooking is as a flavour enhancer. It brings out the other flavours that already exist in the food. Salt is not a flavour. It’s why a lot of recipes call for salt to taste, as how much you add can vary a bit. Next time you cook something that tastes a bit dull, try adding a small amount of salt and note what it does to the flavours as you add more. If it tastes “salty” you probably added too much.
Source - I was a chef/cook for 9 years
That makes sense, thank you! I will try experimenting with salt later :)
They seem to be a lot more confused than angry, lol!
But yeah, thanks for the explanation about your use case. This, and your comment about using MSG on tomato-ey stuff has clarified things for me. The reason I brought up soy and fish sauces earlier is because they too, have MSG, and depending on the flavor profile I’m after, I might elect to use one or the other. That usually takes care of MSG in a lot of cases.
I just happen to not since I added something else that serves a similar purpose
… Taken that way, we both do a similar thing.
I eat vegan/vegetarian and I don’t always know how to fill in the “meaty” gap that I feel like can be missing.
Ah, that explains a lot, thanks! And I don’t really have experience in vegetarian/vegan cooking so I am afraid I can’t help with that. There are meat substitutes, of course, but the one I had experience with relied on gluten to achieve a meat-like texture. I’ve heard, too, that mushrooms can used to give that earthy taste that can be enhanced with MSG. Tofu as well. But please take these with a pinch of… MSG, lol!
I really appreciate the explanation! I’ve learned a lot from you and the others, and I have some ideas for things I want to try for the next time (which is probably very soon, since it’s almost lunch time lol)
I actually bought some mushroom sauce a couple of days ago, and I’m looking forward to giving that a go. I only recently discovered this amazing Asian supermarket near where I live (in Germany) and it has been so fun learning to use things I didn’t know I had such easy access to before!
My ancestors are happy to have reeled one in. HAHAHAHAHAHA!!
But yeah! Have fun exploring the various (weird) flavors that you can find in Asian supermarkets. Some of them might be a bit too weird for your tastebuds, but I think that’s part of the fun. You might also want to explore Buddhist vegetarian cooking as well, if you haven’t already, since there are a lot of techniques there might be useful for you.
I heard a lot about how msg can make stuff taste great, so I bought some a while back and I try it every now and then, but I can’t really tell the difference. If I use too much I do notice that it makes the taste worse. I don’t know if I’m doing it wrong.
Yeah, using too much is going to make your food taste gross, just like adding too much salt would too. I also think it might not be suitable for every dish, so I think there’s some experimentation required. For me, I like to add it to things that have a lot of tomato in them (like a sauce) or when I feel like there’s something “missing”. I find it rounds out the taste.
Maybe while you’re cooking, taste your food before and then immediately after adding some msg, taste it again. It won’t be like a huge, in your face difference - it’s pretty subtle imo. Then again everyone’s tastes and taste buds are different and it might just actually not be for you!
Yeah it just adds umami. Some dishes don’t want umami added. Whiskey really doesn’t from personal experience. Alcohol and curiosity are a dangerous combination
Wait, you added it to whiskey?? That sounds disgusting but also I love that you tried it lmfao
It was not quite disgusting but very not good. Adhd probably played a role in this decision lol
Mmm yes, I can relate. I have also eaten weird shit because my brain had weird ideas.
I remember when I was looking up diet videos years ago everyone was VEHEMETLY advocating against MSG and how bad it was for you, especially for diabetics. I’m still not entirely sure what to believe, but I know MSG isn’t as bad as everyone thought it was.
It’s basically just salt. Salt can be bad for you if you eat too much of it. Don’t over salt your food and you’re fine.
That was the conclusion i came to, it’s just another seasoning like paprika or salt. The opposition to it is what keeps me skeptical, if it’s just a seasoning why are people so randomly against it? I think it’s because it’s used in lots of fast food.
It’s rooted in racism. Chinese American food was cheap and delicious, steadily growing in popularity. Non-Chinese restaurant owners viewed us as a threat. So the racists among them used dubious studies, which have since been discredited, to try to spread this myth that Chinese food was unhealthy because it contained MSG.
Of course it was all a fabrication. People would claim to feel bloated/sick even after eating Chinese food containing no MSG, probably because it tastes so damn good and people are bad at eating in moderation. Likewise, people could eat non-Chinese food containing MSG and somehow there are minimal complaints.
My family’s restaurant was put through the ringer over this in the 80’s-90’s and almost went out of business, but thankfully the science prevailed in the end.
MSG isn’t “bad” at all, it’s just another ingredient really. The campaign against it was entirely bullshit that was driven by racism against Asian people because it’s a common ingredient in Chinese food.
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It’s almost like a cheat code to make almost anything taste better!
But I also I don’t understand people who think that it literally is cheating and shouldn’t be used because of that. If msg is cheating, salt is also cheating.
For me, msg has become almost as important “tool” in the kitchen as salt.
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The holy trinity 🤤.
My understanding of “cheating” when it comes to cooking is that you’re becoming reliant on something that might be/become difficult to get ahold of. Pure salt is ubiquitous in western cuisine, so most would feel comfortable relying on it. That’s not the case with MSG.
Well if people won’t use it because it’s “cheating”. Then it’ll never make it to bw ubiquitious next to salt, like it imo deserves to be.
I also love msg, but 2.4kg would probably last a decade in my pantry. I use it sparingly. How much do you use?
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There’s glutamate, although not MSG, in breast milk. Also sugar in the form of lactose. That’s because that’s what gets babies to keep sucking.
MSG is naturally in certain foods too, like tomatos and seaweed.
Msg started from analyzing seaweed, thanks Japan
I remember reading something from Chef John being against MSG (he was commenting within one of his YouTube videos). But not for health reasons. He just felt the flavor punch it gave lead to addictive overeating.
I’m like bitch, that delicious food you showcase does the same thing, you don’t hear me bitching about it.
I love the taste of msg, unfortunately over the past few years it seems to have become a trigger for my migraines. I miss eating noodles with msg.
Had a gnarly migraine yesterday after having msg. Hope its not msg causing it, so tasty 😩
I sometimes eat it knowingly and then question all my life decisions once the migraine sets in 🤣
That’s actually a misconception within a misconception.
It’s not that MSG allergies don’t exist, it is that they are often downplayed for the same reason that Celiac’s disease is downplayed. When a few people fake or overexaggerate their symptoms, credibility is taken from the rest of us who actually suffer from it. Now people are always quick to invalidate those who are symptomatic.
Yes, it’s true that some of the rumors around MSG are racially motivated, and that some people who claim to be affected are lying. But that doesn’t mean that MSG related symptoms aren’t real for the rest of us. Speaking as someone who is from Hong Kong, grew up with MSG, and absolutely loves the taste of it, but developed health conditions that were comorbid with MSG intolerance.
As a chronic pain and migraine sufferer, large quantities of MSG is a common trigger for migraines (or headaches when I’m lucky). I’ve been blind tested before with someone else’s help using the same quantities of salt vs MSG in a cellulose capsule. Each time, I would happen to be fine after taking the salt capsule with a glass of water. But after taking the MSG capsule with a glass of water, I would have have a headache or a painfully tense sensation around my head. This was done multiple times across separate days to rule out confounding factors.
It’s likely true that for the vast majority of people MSG doesn’t trigger a reaction. However, a few of us have an intolerance and we are frequently dismissed and medically gaslit. Please believe us. I’m so tired of people telling me that what I’m experiencing isn’t real. I wish it didn’t have to be real so I could go back to eating whatever I want and not worry about migraines.
I was confused at first how anyone thought that Madison Square Garden was dangerous, could it be all that ice-hockey they play there. Then I read the other comments and now I realize it’s the basketball.
Socialism.
Careful, friend. Once you start giving a shit about people who don’t have much money it’s a slippery slope
Yeah…good trolling there.
The government providing a baseline existence for it’s people is like super fucking dangerous.
Dangerous to the profit margin of a lot of companies, maybe.
There are already programs. Run by a government that obviously can’t help. We don’t need to share our wealth, if we were provided wealth through real jobs. With a paycheck to buy whatever it is you need and be able to save. Less taxes, less inflation. It’s the government chopping your wealth at your knees too “feed” other people will only make it harder to become financially well set for your chosen life style.
LGBTQ people and drag queens.
First the gay agenda, now the trans agenda, when will the agendas end?!?
I’m telling ya, it’s all a part of Big Agenda…
Can we go back to the simple, front picture changing, neato math/science fact having, paper agenda instead? I’ll even have my mom sign in daily it we can agree to this.
Resist Big Agenda! Spontaneity only!
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Well dressed people that can often dance (in high heels) and sing and are comfortable in their bodies. What the hell
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Speak for yourself, sis. I’m a dangerous homosexual. 💅🔪
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This is a great quote. I may have to borrow it.
“Christian”
Nah, quotes not necessary.
True Scotsman Fallacy detected.
In South Korea most fans have timers so they’re not left on overnight, because people think it’ll kill you if you do leave it on.
This belief wasn’t helped by medical examiners putting “death by fan” on the death certificates of suicide victims to help the dead save face and spare the families the embarrassment of a “cowardly death” for a few decades.What is death by fan supposed to mean? Like how would you die from a fan?
Ask John Lennon.
Lol, Jesus Christ
!LeMMySilvur
Oh shit… This was funny. Thank you.
Many people believe that death by fan sucks but really, it blows.
I think they believe it will blow all the air out of the room
Chop up all the oxygen and make it unusable?
If the hydrogen and oxygen get redistributed in the wrong way, the room will fill with water and you drown.
Understandable.
That’s basically what they think, yes. That it interrupts the flow of the air, as if capillary action was needed to pull air into your lungs. I’m not sure how the myth started but at one point they were selling fans with special guards or something to protect against the imaginary risk.
Of course, I might be wrong - I read about this on the internet.
Fan Death.
I used to work in a real sweatbox of a factory so we had huge fans running all day. It was deceptive because you’d normally be drenched in sweat but the fans prevented it. So you’d drink a gallon of water and take maybe one brown ass dehydrated piss. I could see something like that being blamed on a fan. Just heat exhaustion or dehydration
So do they think that CPAP machines are just suicide devices?
For my country (Germany): Catching a draft. Basically people believe that a light breeze from an open window will make you ill.
We have a similar one here in the US. People think if you go outside when it’s too cold, you’ll get sick.
It’s not completely baseless. You can’t get sick from the cold itself, but lower core body temp does weaken your immune system until you warm up, making it easier for you to get sick if you do get exposed to something.
The cold, dry air during the winter can also dry out the mucus membranes in the sinuses which can make it easier for pathogens to enter the body. Again, doesn’t make you sick directly but does interfere with your body’s defense mechanisms.
In the US, I hear this more when your hair is wet: “Don’t go outside, it’s cold and your hair’s wet, you’ll get sick!”
Not only colds, but you also get stiff necks! According to my mother, it’s almost instantly. Leaving two windows open makes here neck stiffer than a priest in a kindergarten, but only inside. Standing in the wind outside is perfectly fine.
Also Russia and probably most eastern European countries. One of my kids will catch a cold and the first thing my mother or grandmother will ask is if they were somewhere drafty.
It’s even in the name! A “cold”, huh!
I’ve heard that cited in stories, usually older. A baby dies and they blame someone leaving the door open too long and letting in a draft.
God, on one hand, catching a draft makes you die and then on the other STOSSLÜFTEN!!
Tja ein STOSS ist halt kein ZUG!
Schon, wenn meine Mutter lüftet. Alle Fenster im Haus (auch im Winter) und das ist nicht mehr ein Zug, aber ein ganzer Hauptbahnhof lol
Sei froh! Wenn sie die Fenster nur kippen würde wärt ihr wahrscheinlich schon tot oder zumindest schwer krank. Soweit ich weiß ist so ein kleiner Zug, den man kaum spürt, am gefährlichsten. Weil dann fühlt sich der Körper sicher und Killerviren haben leichtes Spiel!
The hero we need, but don’t deserve 😔
- meine Mutter, wahrscheinlich
Similar in France, also airco giving you all kinds of symptoms
I didn’t know it’s a thing in Germany too. 😊 Drafts are also blamed for pretty much any unexpected ailment, from rheumatism to toothache. And off course cold, flu and so on.
That’s totally cultural, in the US it’s dehydration
I don’t know about that, I always get a pink eye and my sinuses start to hurt if I stay in draft for a longer period of time.
Yeah, but then they go and open all the windows to “change the air” no matter the weather.
I used to work with a bunch of Germans in the US. I came in to the office one time at about 4:30am in February. One of the guys had all the windows open when the outdoor temperature was something like -20F.
Like Moritz, I think that avoiding the draft is more important than changing the air at that point. 🙄
I also had an old manufacturing guy tell me that drinking cold water in the summer would kill you because of the shock to your system.
Oh, that kind of draft
Similar to “fan death” in Korea, where they think running a fan in your bedroom while you sleep can kill you.
Same in Czechia.
Living near a nuclear plant.
Little do they know, that they get more than 50x more radiation effect from the natural surroundings and the rocks in earth than from the nuclear plant 🤭 And our body is really capable of dealing with that since the beginning of our evolution (DNA repairs and co).
https://pages.vassar.edu/ltt/files/2011/04/Screen-shot-2011-04-21-at-1.18.09-AM1.png
here is a chart showing radiation intensities for various sources of radiation
Living near a coal plant, on the other hand, is really, REALLY bad for you.
Woah, this one is actually surprising to me. Even though I am in favour of nuclear power, I do have some fear of living in close proximity of such plants, especially seeing how even the clothing used in the facility is mixed into the barrels of radioactive wastes.
Would you rather the clothing get washed at your local cleaners? Or washed on-site and the water drained into the city sewers?
Seems like a sensible precaution
Yeah, you are correct. It is just that it never occurred to me how careful they take their operations to be. That is why I assumed they would even disallow residential buildings to be built close to them.
Not all the clothing anyone wears in a plant. Clothing special for contamination areas. They also do scans at thresholds and anything you carry with you that gets contaminated is confiscated. Nuclear plants genuinely have a level of safety in the us that is pretty hard to comprehend, it’s all done out of an abundance of caution more than a genuine need for it. Not quite security theater, just a very high degree of security.
I remember reading about a guy who worked at a nuclear plant that was tripping their radiation detectors on his way into work but not on his way out at the end of his shift. Turned out he had a radon problem in his home that needed to be addressed.
generally, if in doubt, do the math
it’s not the background radiation that worries people, it’s the risk of a Fukushima-type incident.
Ehhhh, those are the ancient light water designs. Fuck light water, even though it’s actually pretty safe. Advanced sodium reactors are where it’s at. One loop is molten salt and nuclear fuel. The salt makes it less dense so it can’t melt down like a traditional reactor. A second loop of salt is what steals heat from the fuel, which loops around to a water boiler further away. In essence, it’s airgapped. While corrosion can be an issue, the lack of water in the salt loops helps a ton.
Solar towers with molten salt generators also work in the same way. The salts are molten and continue pumping out power for 12 hours after the sun has set, which makes them an excellent source of power for cities :)
I’d live next to a nuclear plant any day of the week! Especially if the homes are less expensive because of it :D
While the modern technology is relatively safe, it’s not a technical issue with the reactor design. It’s a trust issue with the humans, particularly for-profit companies, that operate it.
And even then, despite the catastrophe it was, it only had 1 death attributed to it.
TIL. That’s a good point. 20k deaths due to the earthquake but only 1 due to the power plant itself.
While true when everything works, people don’t want to live near a nuclear power plant because sometimes there are accidents. They are rare, but severe when they happen. Also because nobody wants to live in sight of one, it affects how easy it is to sell land and property.
The probability of such accidents are waaaay to overestimated by the general population. Take a look at this: https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/death-rates-from-energy-production-per-twh
it shows the deaths per kWh for various sources of energy. Nuclear power is really as safe as wind and solar. Nuclear power is sooooo safe honestly. But coal? We have global climate change, dirty air, smog, … and radioactive materials in the atmosphere due to the coal 😅 Fun fact: Way more radioactive materials are spewed into the atmosphere due to burning coal than is actually by nuclear power plants.
The human emotions are waaaay too inaccurate in this situation here
Not disagreeing. We need more nuclear. Just saying people are scared of a major event than the constant low grade radiation.
I love that chart and I’ve posted it in several discussions about the safety of nuclear. A lot of people have weirdly volatile reactions to it though. It’s really hard for them to believe that nuclear is on par with renewables.
I read somewhere that suggested that background radiation is actually (ever so) slightly lower near a nuclear plant, because all the shielding effectively casts a ‘shadow’ in the background.
as a chemist by trade: all sorts of random chemicals
also some people believe that microwaves are harmful and 5g towers will turn all your frogs gay or something like that. gee i wish they were consistent in their beliefs, if they were i’d never find them on internet
Microwaves are harmful. Unless you mean the device. Which still can be harmful if it’s broken. Edit: I see the good old Reddit behavior of downvoting facts is back.
Or dropped on someone
Only sort of, it’s not ionizing radiation so it can only burn you. Internally.
maybe if you manage to get microwave burn, these can be nasty. otherwise no
Staying in hostels when traveling overseas. The amount of people who tell me I’m crazy and going to get murdered if I stay in a hostel is ridiculous.
Hostels are great, and not any more dangerous than hotels are, you just have to look at reviews and go for the type you want. You can also rent private rooms at a lot of them. I always stay at one’s with a kitchen so I can save a bunch on food, too.
That fear is what happens when the only exposure people have to hostels in the US comes from horror movies. I didn’t know that you can rent private rooms and get a kitchen - sounds like a nice setup.
Who thinks hostels are dangerous? lol I’ve stayed at hostels all over the world including places like La Paz and had a fucking awesome time every time. I could understand a single female not wanting to stay in a mixed dorm but other than that, they’re fine.
5G, Vaccines, MSG, WiFi, Socialized Medicine, Jews.
The Tor Browser, it’s just a normal Browser with some functionality to improve privacy.
Like many tools, it can also be used for nefarious things, but that’s not its only use.
The use case for TOR is illegal activity. Some illegal activity is not immoral, like organising a protest against a dictatorship. But Tor is not a useful tool for simply browsing websites. The inconvenience isn’t worth it when a regular browser fulfills your needs better.
It’s like money laundering. It could be done recreationally, but that’s not the normal use case.
Tor isn’t explicitly developed to promote illegal activity. I’ts just another browser with some more layers, just like an Onion.
Those layers get in the way of casual browsing. Like you could use a bucket to fill a full size swimming pool, but a hose is better suitrd for the job.
It’s more than just privacy. It allows you to visit
.onionsites, which will not load in a traditional browser. As a harmless example, this is Duck Duck Go: https://duckduckgogg42xjoc72x3sjasowoarfbgcmvfimaftt6twagswzczad.onion/. Trying to click that in a normal browser doesn’t work because they don’t support the onion network. But using the Tor browser unlocks that as well as all sorts of nefarious sites that you can’t access through a “normal browser”I’ve encountered DNS poisoning (or similar?) multiple times. Wouldn’t call this completely harmless. I wouldn’t use it for online banking.
Jet fuel.
People seem to have the impression that it’s some extremely explosive stuff that has to be handled with the upmost care, but it’s just highly refined kerosene. It can be used as a replacement for Diesel fuel in many cases - in fact, U.S. military vehicles can run off either. We put it Toyota Hylux pickups up in northern Greenland because it doesn’t gel up like Diesel fuel.
It doesnt even melt steel beams, so…
In case anyone is not aware, “upmost” is a word, but it’s often substituted incorrectly for “utmost.” https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/utmost-vs-upmost-difference#:~:text=Utmost means “greatest” or “,mean “greatest.” Use utmost
is current jet fuel even hypergolic?
I suspect you’re thinking rocket fuel. Some rocket fuels are hypergolic. Jet fuel is just kerosene with a few additives to prevent icing and improve engine performance.
Yes, people expect it to be MORE volatile than gas for your car, but actually it’s heavier and harder to burn. It’s like diesel, only a bit more so.
Swimming around in a spent nuclear fuel pool: https://what-if.xkcd.com/29/
This whole Japan nuclear wastewater thing going around the news has me shaking my head.
The word nuclear in general just scares people.
Well we’ve had decades of fossil fuel company scare propaganda to make sure everyone is scared of nuclear power.
Can’t have that pesky solution come here and actually make our product obsolete!!
Most of it is fear mongering but you know bioaccumulation is a thing right? Water is a nice shield against radiation reaching you but if radioactive nucleai are in the water, it’s going to accumulate in animals that grow in that water and cause heavy metal poisoning, like Mercury.
I think there is a Tom Scott video where he does exactly this
Australia. Maybe not completely harmless, but far less dangerous than non-Australians make it out to be.
That’s what the drop bears want you to believe…
I recently read an article that said an animal that could be described as a drop bear actually might have existed some thousands (millions?) years ago.
yeah bunyips. still a few out there. aussie bigfoot.
Sounds like something an Australian would say!
Cue this song https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MrRAO_vG_K4 I’ve heard it described as the unofficial national anthem…
I thought you were going to link this instead
Video games. There’s absolutely no evidence that they make people more violent.
Nuclear power in general.
