Part Two: “It was just a joke!”
Today, I’d like to dive into the rich backstory of MSG and shed necessary light on how this savory compound acquired such an unsavory reputation. What follows is a true story – of how a series of pranks between doctors, an unscientific and sensational mass media, and longstanding American prejudice against foreign cultures, converged to cause MSG’s long and public denigration.
It all started in 1968, with a fateful letter to the New England Journal of Medicine – at the time, one of the more reputable medical publications in the United States.
The letter began:
“For several years since I have been in this country, I have experienced a strange syndrome whenever I have eaten out in a Chinese restaurant… including numbness in the back of the neck, gradually radiating to both arms and the back, general weakness, and palpitation.”
The writer went on to speculate the cause of his ailments. “Others have suggested,” he continued, “that it may be caused by the monosodium glutamate used to a great extent for seasoning in Chinese restaurants.” The letter ended with an appeal to other doctors to conduct more research, and was signed:
Robert Ho Man Kwok, MD
Senior Research Investigator
National Biomedical Research Foundation at Silver Spring, Maryland
Decades later, it was discovered that the letter was nothing more than a prank.
It was the result of a bet, struck between two young orthopedic surgeons – Bill Hanson, and Howard Steel – to see who could get the more ridiculous “comic syndrome” printed in a legitimate medical publication. Even the pseudonym “Ho Man Kwok” was a prank – wordplay on the English insult “human crock (…of shit).”
Howard was being intentionally obtuse in his letter. Knowing in advance that it’s a joke, we can plainly see that he’s taken that universal feeling of overstimulation and malaise that comes after large quantities of spicy food and liquor, and dressed it up with scientific jargon.
And yet – nobody caught it. NEJM printed the article, and Steel won the bet.
Ever the good sport, he called to retract the story, giddily telling the journal that he’d made it all up as a prank. But they didn’t believe him. In fact, not only did they hang up the phone – they continued to publish more letters on the subject. Their readers – all serious medical professionals – seemed fascinated. It would have been embarrassing – been bad for business – to retract the story. Real doctors read the prank letter, took it as fact, saw potential for their own publications, and began cherry-picking anecdotal evidence to write similar letters, supporting similar conclusions. Soon, every gastroenterologist in America was talking about this “Chinese-Restaurant Syndrome.” By the time the 70’s began, consumer news media had the story, and was off to the proverbial races.
Meanwhile, Chinese restaurants across America suffered through the confusion. Why was the restaurant empty? Where had all the regulars gone? And why were Americans suddenly turning up their noses? Since the late 1800’s the Chinese had spent ages, fortunes, adapting their cuisine for Western palates. Dishes like General Tso’s, Mongolian Beef, and Chop Suey, were all created in America, not China. And they all relied on MSG as a key ingredient.
Sure, they tried make food without it. But it wasn’t the same. You know it’s not the same. Even Cup Noodles used to taste different, twenty years ago. Restaurants and manufacturers began to treat MSG as if it were radioactive. And the customers bemoaning their local spot’s “decline in quality” were invariably the same customers who, only months prior, shrieked at them to pull their most essential ingredient.
Who could endure such a betrayal?
Sad, but true. The letter may have been bogus, but the damage was already done. It drew us towards an unfair conclusion. One we were already primed to believe, under the guise of science. One that feels like second nature, today.
“Blame China.”
