Saturday, June 28, 2008 The fifth taste By Henry L. Yu, M.D.
Half day of May 28 saw me at the Marco Polo Plaza Hotel Grand Ballroom for a lecture/seminar on umami. The lecture was sponsored by the Department of Science and Technology (DOST), Region VII, and the Food and Nutrition Research Institute (FNRI). It was a great learning that there are now five basic tastes: sweet, sour, salty, bitter and the fifth one which is called umami.
Let me just share with you some of the things I learned about umami:
l The flavor of food is determined by taste, smell, color, temperature, appearance, physiological or psychological conditions. The most important factors are the basic tastes of sweet, sour, salty, bitter, and the fifth one, umami.
l Umami is a savory taste imparted by glutamate and ribonucleotides (including inosinate and guanylate), which occur naturally in many foods including meat, fish, vegetables and dairy products.
l The taste of umami can be detected when eating tomatoes, parmesan cheese, cured ham, mushrooms, sun-dried tomatoes, meat and fish, etc.
l It was a Japanese scientist by the name of Prof. Kikunae Ikeda who recognized a common factor in the complicated flavors of asparagus, tomatoes, cheese and meat, which was quite distinctive and could not be classified under any of the well defined taste qualities of sweet, sour, salty and bitter.
l In 1909, Ikeda started investigating the main taste substance of dried seaweed (konbu) as he could detect it most clearly in soup stock prepared with konbu. Soup stock (or dashi in Japanese) has been traditionally used in Japanese cuisine for more than 100 years.
l Ikeda discovered that the taste was produced by glutamate contained in dried konbu and named it umami. After its discovery, he tried to develop a new flavoring substance based on glutamate compatible with the natural taste of foods.
Finally, he found that monosodium glutamate (MSG) was the best flavoring because it was readily soluble in water, had a strong umami taste, high stability, and absorbed no humidity.
l Two discoveries reflect traditional dietary culture in Europe and Japan. Bouillon is to the western countries as MSG is to Japan. Bouillon cubes were first commercially made by the Swiss flour manufacturer named Julius Magi in 1882.
MSG by Ikeda in 1909. The key component of both bouillon and MSG is the same.
l The discovery of umami, along with the introduction of the new seasoning (MSG) made an important contribution to the food industry.
