What Ajinomoto says about MSG Nov 26, 2008
MSG functions as a seasoning in foods, due to its umami or savory taste characteristics. Umami is recognized as the fifth basic taste alongside salty, sweet, sour and bitter ... We can obtain optimum umami by adding 0. (Jakarta Post, Indonesia -- Editorial)
The Claim: Tongue Is Mapped Into Four Areas of Taste Nov 11, 2008
What is known is that there are at least five basic tastes: sweet, sour, salty, bitter and the most recently discovered, umami. This last flavor, which means savory in Japanese, can be detected in miso, soy sauce and other Asian foods, particularly those that contain monosodium glutamate. (Atlanta Journal-Constitution -- Health)
Wines from around the world to help you stretch your dollar Nov 1, 2008
2007 Josef Leitz Rudesheimer Drachenstein Dragonstone Rheingau Riesling ($18) Johannes Leitz's workhorse Riesling from an excellent Rheingau parcel, packaged with a screwcap and consumer-friendly name, is in fantastic form, with a deep umami note and intensely high acid. Lean, citrus-driven, tangy and spot-on. (San Francisco Chronicle -- Sports)
Sweet, salty, sour, bitter ... calcium? Oct 28, 2008
Since then, scientists have acknowledged a fifth taste, umami, a brothy soy sauce flavor emphasized in Eastern cuisine ... For instance, sweet and umami tastes signal that a food is nutritious, loaded with sugars or proteins we need to survive. (Boston Globe)
Mixing It Up: Enjoy a healthy vegetable salad Aug 31, 2008
The phrase most often used during the week was that a recipe was packed with umami, the fifth taste, or a more literal Japanese translation of deliciousness. I have been reading Connie s book and have applied the cooking principles and ingredient selection to our meals at home. (La Crosse Tribune, WI)
Like the Taste of Chalk? You're in Luck--Humans May Be Able to Taste Calcium Aug 23, 2008
(, which contain approximately 50 to 100 taste cells, comprise receptors for at least five specific tastes salty, sour, bitter, sweet and umami, or savory. . (Scientific American)
Magnifying Taste: New Chemicals Trick the Brain into Eating Less Aug 6, 2008
The Elusive Umami: Although it was discovered a century ago, umami still struggles for acceptance as the fifth basic taste the tongue recognizes ... Humans sense five taste qualities: sweet, salty, bitter, sour and savory (also called umami, which roughly translates from Japanese into delicious flavor ). (Scientific American)
The Inside Scoop: Gastropub planned for Marina; Ponzu gets a new chef Jul 24, 2008
The trio is part of the Vintage 415 team that also owns Mamacita and Umami. Inspired by the public houses of England, Valentine says they'll turn the restaurant into an American gastropub, with a casual menu served in a setting of button-tufted brown leather banquettes, rustic wood floors and antique lamps. (San Francisco Chronicle)
Make Mushrooms Your Pick of the Season Jul 19, 2008
In addition, mushrooms have umami. Also known as the "fifth taste," umami foods are described as hearty or savory. (Canton Daily Ledger, IL)
Tong Chee Hwee's menu: Hakkasan Jul 19, 2008
An exception to that rule, however, is sherry, which is delicious with a classic fish soup - then again, manzanilla and fino are good with shellfish full stop - and will also work well with Tong Chee Hwee's lobster and spinach concoction, particularly because both have a slight umami flavour that is reflected in the enoki mushrooms ... What is great about both of these sakes is that, like the sherry, they have more of the umami that's also threaded through the food. (Guardian Unlimited)
Your Health: Mushrooms offer more than good taste Jul 13, 2008
The Mushroom Lady wrote on Jul 11, 2008 6:46 AM:" Not only do shiitake mushrooms have wonderful health benefits, they are also a source of Umami, enhancing the flavours of all the other foods they are served with. ". Neil Redding wrote on Jul 12, 2008 9:28 AM:" Great to see more coverage of the shiitake's benefits - I'm a big fan of them, and eat them multiple times a week, usually sauteed in olive oil and garlic salt. They go well with so many things - pasta, brown rice, all sorts of... (Green Valley News & Sun, AZ)
Taking A Cue From Breath Fresheners, Researcher Develops New Method For Taste Testing Jun 16, 2008
Greg Smutzer, director of the Laboratory of Gustatory Psychophysics in the Biology Department of Temple's College of Science and Technology has created taste strips similar to breath-freshening strips, but these edible strips contain one of the five basic tastes that are detected by humans -- sweet, sour, salty, bitter and monosodium glutamate, which is also known as umami taste ... Added into the solution is a small amount of a taste stimulus that will give each strip the desired taste: sodium... (Science Daily)
Chef tastes victory after cancer fight Jun 14, 2008
"You see how the salty, sweet, bitter, sour and umami [the 'savoury' flavour] go together," he said. "You've isolated them.". (Globe and Mail)
The din of dining Jun 5, 2008
Umami, San Francisco. The Bay Area's noisiest (Noise Rating: BOMB). (San Francisco Chronicle)
Who needs recipes? May 14, 2008
Flavours are countless, but there are only five tastes: salt, sweet, acid, bitter and umami ... And then there is umami - the full-on pleasure taste ... Dedicated umami receptors on our tongues hunt for and recognise proteins, which we need to build muscle. (Guardian Unlimited)
'Trendiest' S.F. Eateries May 8, 2008
I'd also have to throw in 1300, right next to Yoshi's, probably Suppenkuche, and maybe Umami in the Marina. The trends. (San Francisco Chronicle -- Crime)
patrick Riley May 2, 2008
Umami has been recognized as a fifth taste. Umami turns the bad to a good taste ... Umami is most recognized in beef taste. (Great Falls Prairie Star, MT)
The Roving Feast: Meatballs evoke memories of Grandma Mar 27, 2008
Following her cue, I mix a little soy sauce in the meat itself, then shake some in the pan as the patties brown, adding a hearty, umami hit. I have no doubt the soy sauce was her own idea, a twist of flavor she discovered when she reached the multicultural land of California. (San Francisco Chronicle)
Yamahai warriors Feb 23, 2008
"It really does make it more likely that you'll end up with sake with a more robust character, a richer, broader flavor, more umami and yet a cleaner finish.". While sake made using the modern sokujo style sometimes comes out with a cloying sweetness or a lingering aftertaste, Nasu says, yamahai's clean finish can be a draw. (San Francisco Chronicle)
Celery Makes 'Grandma's Penicillin' Tastier In Cold & Flu Season Jan 24, 2008
In particular, celery's extract enhanced the sweetness and umami (meaty or savory) taste of the broth, even though the extract had virtually no flavor of its own. From the extract, researchers identified three compounds responsible for celery's flavor-enhancement. (Science Daily)
American Chemical Society's Weekly PressPac -- Jan. 16, 2008 Jan 22, 2008
Wishing your Valentine good heart health on February 14 and throughout 2008" Then consider the food some people love to hate, and hand over a gift bag of broccoli along with that heart-shaped box of chocolates. Researchers in Connecticut are reporting impressive new evidence that eating broccoli may protect against heart disease. Their study is scheduled for the Jan. 23 issue of ACS Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry, a bi-weekly publication. Researchers have known for years that... (EurekAlert!)
Monsoon gets new name, renovation Dec 30, 2007
Located at 17800 Bluemound Road, the restaurant will close in early January and be renovated for Umami Moto, which loosely translated means "deliciousness" or "delicious essence." The new restaurant is expected to open in late January and will be led by restaurant developer and consultant Al Balda. Polaski, president of , took full control of the Monsoon brand in late 2007 and said he was inspired to build on the brand's success as well as offer a new take on the Asian fusion concept. (Milwaukee Business Journal, WI)
A well thought-out spot Dec 6, 2007
It's a study in umami, the savory fifth taste that occurs in ingredients like mushrooms, featured here along with chicken. It's appealing but tastes little like the tom yum you get at a Thai restaurant. (Boston Globe)
Fruit Flies Prefer Fizzy Drinks Aug 31, 2007
D., director of the NIDCD. "This research raises the question of whether people also may have the ability to taste carbon dioxide and perhaps other chemicals in food. If this were found to be true, our sense of taste could be even more complex than we realize." Currently, scientists recognize five tastes in humans: sweet, salty, bitter, sour, and umami, or savory. Before today's findings, fruit flies were known to be able to taste sweet, bitter, and salty. (Science Daily)
Flies prefer fizzy drinks UCB, Aug. 29 Aug 30, 2007
This is one of the first, if not the only taste sensation discovered in animals beyond the five that humans taste - sweet, sour, bitter, salty and umami, or savory ... While Scott has shown that fruit flies can detect sweet and bitter compounds, and now carbonation, she has discounted their ability to taste umami and said that their ability to taste sour compounds is questionable. (University of California Newswire, CA)
Researchers find new taste in fruit flies: carbonated water Aug 30, 2007
Currently, scientists recognize five tastes in humans: sweet, salty, bitter, sour, and umami, or savory. Before todays findings, fruit flies were known to be able to taste sweet, bitter, and salty. (EurekAlert!)
Sour taste make you pucker? It may be in your genes Jul 12, 2007
The findings, in conjunction with previous work on sweet, bitter, and umami (savory) taste, suggest that people differ in how they perceive the taste of foods, and that these differences are determined in part by their taste genes. So someone who inherited a high sensitivity to sour taste may find foods containing lemons or vinegar off-putting, whereas the same foods may be better accepted by a person whose genes make them less sensitive. (EurekAlert!)
Making sense of taste (Shelley Widhalm) Jun 14, 2007
Taste occurs when special sensory cells located in the tongue, throat and cheeks respond to the five basic taste qualities, that of sweet, sour, bitter, salty and savory or umami, says Barry Davis, director of the taste and smell program at the National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders, a part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in Bethesda. He holds a doctorate in neuroscience. (Washington Times, DC)
In brief: Hot licks Jun 14, 2007
That fifth sensation: umami ... In 1908, a Japanese researcher identified a complex fifth element he called "umami," a word with no English translation. (Anchorage Daily News)
Chemistry in action Mar 24, 2007
He worked with of the University of Reading to see why, and they found that the jelly has tons more glutamic acidthe source of the famous meaty, nummy umami flavor (See )--than the flesh. So, special note to my boyfriend: I now have scientific proof that de-seeding tomatoes is silly. (Nature News Service)
The Origins of MSG Mar 18, 2007
His discovery of MSG was quickly patented in Japan and the U.S. And in developing MSG, which made people want to eat more, Kikunae also added a new word to the Japanese lexicon: umami -- a terms whose roots are derived from a colloquial term meaning "tasty.". In 1909, the Suzuki Chemical Company began producing MSG under the name Ajinomoto, translated as "essence of taste." The product was a bit of a failure as cooks and restaurants preferred using soy sauce as a flavour enhancer. (Suite101.com)
Strange but True: Cats Cannot Taste Sweets Mar 9, 2007
Humans enjoy five kinds of taste buds (possibly six): sour, bitter, salty, umami (or meatiness) and sweet (as well as possibly fat). The sweet receptor is actually made up of two coupled proteins generated by two separate genes: known as Tas1r2 and Tas1r3. (Scientific American)
Asian-Fusion Flashback Feb 25, 2007
Even if they wanted to, the owners couldn't hide a spot as imposing as Umami, despite painting the exterior dark brown and downplaying a small Japanese sign that's unintelligible to 99 ... Umami has become a trendy spot for the Cow Hollow/Marina set ... Umami is to Asian food what boy bands are (or were) to the American music scene: fun, energetic but ultimately not destined to break any new ground. (San Francisco Chronicle -- Entertainment)
China's true dash of flavor Feb 22, 2007
In his laboratory, he isolated the natural glutamates in the seaweed, and to their marvelous taste he gave the name "umami," derived from the Japanese word for "delicious." His work led directly to the industrial manufacture in Japan and then worldwide of monosodium glutamate ... In recent years, however, there has been growing acceptance of the existence of a so-called fifth taste an addition to the traditional quartet of sweet, sour, salty, and bitter known through an emerging consensus by... (International Herald Tribune -- Ed/Op)
