No. 187 - Umami

I like to think that I'm a pretty healthy person. I probably mentioned this before but my philosophy on pretty much everything in life is: Everything in moderation, nothing in excess. I am not a health nut by any means, although I try to eat well and avoid putting unnatural substances into my body, like flu shots and over-the-counter drugs. I believe that the human body has a natural ability to heal itself and remain healthy provided you put good things into it.

In order to stay educated on living a healthy lifestyle, I subscribe to e-mail alerts from a website called Naturalnews.com. Today they sent me an article titled Beware of Umami - "Taste No. 5" - It's Just Another Name For MSG.

The article starts off as follows:

The controversial food additive MSG may soon be making its way into consumers' diets in a new form, marketed as the so-called fifth taste, or umami.

Western scientists long believed that the tongue contained only four types of taste receptors -- sweet, salty, sour and bitter -- with the sense of smell supplying the remainder of a food's taste. In 2000, however, researchers at the University of Miami discovered that the tongue also has receptors for the chemical glutamate, and that those receptors fire only in the presence of one of the other four tastes.

Back in Post No. 64 my daughter asked me to learn something new about taste buds. I wrote: "Taste buds help you detect the different kinds of tastes: salty, sour, bitter, sweet and savory."

I was not aware that the fifth taste - savory - was also called umami (pronounced oo-MA-mee). Umami means deliciousness in Japanese, but translates best as 'savouriness' and provides the 'meaty' flavor in meat. It describes flavor which is common to products like cheese, meat, mushrooms, oysters and red wine.

I also learned that every food culture has its own natural umami-rich ingredients, such as seaweed in Japan or Parmesan cheese in Italy. Worcestershire sauce and soy sauce are high in umami and so is human breast milk.