Raw Food Diet - Read Labels to Avoid MSG

If you've been reading my posts about the raw food diet and green smoothies, you know that one advantage of these natural styles of eating is that you avoid chemicals like MSG, which can be toxic to the body and cause health problems down the road. For healthy living now and for healthy aging in the future, it's best to eat a natural diet and avoid chemicals as much as possible.

MSG or monosodium glutamate is a very difficult chemical to keep from your diet. MSG enhances flavors and is often associated with Chinese food. However, in some form, MSG is in almost all processed or packaged foods and is also in most restaurant foods.

How Do You Know if there is MSG in the foods you buy?

Check labels. Since the food industry knows that people are sensitive to the words monosodium glutamate or MSG, so there are other ingredients which contain MSG but aren't labeled the Battling the MSG Myth at way. Check your food labels for these ingredients. You'll probably be very shocked to find some of them even in organic packaged foods:

• Calcium Caseinate
• Hydrolyzed Vegetable Protein (HVP)
• Textured Protein
• Monopotassium glutamate
• Hydrolyzed Plant Protein (HPP)
• Yeast Extract 
• Glutamate
• Autolyzed Plant Protein
• Yeast food or nutrient 
• Glutamic Acid
• Sodium Caseinate
• Autolyzed Yeast 
• Vegetable Protein Extract
• Senomyx (wheat extract labeled as artificial flavor)

Other ingredients contain varying amounts of MSG but many packaged foods contain more than one of these so the actual amount of MSG on a food label can be considerable. Here are just a few common ingredients which contain MSG:

• Soy Sauce
• Caramel flavoring
• broth
• bouillon
• gluten
• lecithin
• whey protein
• low fat or no fat items
• milk powder
• modified food starch
• dextrose, maltodextrose

There are many more on the list as well.

How do you know if you have MSG Sensitivity or Allergy?

Do you suffer from any of these ailments?:

• Tingling numbness on face, ears, arms, legs, or feet (which I have and no doctor has been able to diagnose)
• fibromyalgia
• fluctuations in blood pressure
• tendonitis, joint pain, TMJ
• shortness of breath, tightness in chest
• difficulty breathing
• depression, mood swings
• Migraines
• neurological disorders
• sleep disorders
• tinnitis
• dry mouth
• do your children or you have ADD

And many, many more symptoms could be caused by MSG allergy. If you do suffer from any of these symptoms, it's important to get checked out by a doctor as you may have a disease unrelated to an MSG sensitivity. However, if a doctor can find no cause of your symptoms, consider the No MSG Diet. Try it for  one week and see if you feel better or your symptoms are lessened.

How can you avoid MSG?

The only way to totally avoid MSG is to eat a natural diet of fresh fruits and veggies, preferably organic. Rice, fresh chicken and turkey, eggs and other whole foods are also acceptable. Stay away from packaged foods and processed foods, including anything in a can - unless you check the label and find no MSG containing products.


Read more about the whole food diet

For more information on MSG on line, see Battling the MSG Myth