TDG: Three White Powders

[Fat Guy]

JAZ goes deep inside the red-and-white package.

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[Jinmyo]

JAZ, umami, my mammy. Very good article.

[Marlene]

JAZ, umami, my mammy. Very good article.

I've used Ac'cent for years with salt, but I've always been afraid to say so! Great article.

[maggiethecat]

JAZ;

Thanks. I'm thinking...

[Dave the Cook]

Very interesting, Janet. I recently read the Steingarten article you mention, and got me thinking. Now you've convinced me that MSG is worth some exploration.

Thank you.

[Sandra Levine]

Very interesting article, JAZ. My "sour salt" is in the form of pebbles. Does it come in a finer, pinchable form?

[bushey]

I think both Ac'cent and "sour salt" used to be staples in certain households. The spiral bound cookbooks published by the sisterhood of our synagogue and my aunt's synagogue years and years ago have several recipes that call for one or the other.

My mom always had a bottle of Ac'cent in the cabinet and her spaghetti sauce tasted better than mine does. Her older sister, Rose, always used to use a little "sour salt" in her soup.

What goes around comes around...

[JAZ]

Very interesting article, JAZ.  My "sour salt" is in the form of pebbles.  Does it come in a finer, pinchable form?

The citric acid I have (McCormick-Shilling) is not really a powder -- it's more like little round pellets -- is that what you mean?

[Fat Guy]

Although I haven't crunched the numbers, I get the impression that Ac'cent is a ridiculously expensive (in relative terms) source of MSG. When I see MSG for sale in Chinatown, it seems to cost about a dollar a ton. You should also be able to get a big thing of citric acid for cheap. Just because the name brands are inexpensive (in absolute terms) doesn't mean you should be willing to pay 200% (or a lot more than) what they'd cost in their generic forms.

[Schielke]

I have not seen Accent here on the West coast, but I do see bottles proudly labeled MSG. Perhaps I am not looking hard enough.

Ben

[alacarte]

Thanks for the article, that was a good read. I researched MSG about a year back, and found that Cargill is the major producer of MSG in the United States. I'd love to visit their plant sometime -- could you imagine the enormous piles of MSG waiting to be fed into the tiny red-and-white cylinders?

[Jinmyo]

No Ac'cent. Aji-no-moto.

[Ruth]

When I was taking classes at the China Institute years ago our teacher, Florence Lin, used to insist on a pinch of msg in every dish. We were all horrified! Now I am tempted to try it again. As for citric acid, I too have a couple of little packages in the closet whiich I use to preserve the color of puréed parsley, basil etc. I have also combined it with sugar to coat candied citrus zest. Thank you Jaz for suggesting other uses. Great article.

[Sandra Levine]

I think both Ac'cent and "sour salt" used to be staples in certain households. 

My grandmother always used it to make her cabbage soup and stuffed cabbage -- actually anything sweet and sour if she didn't want a distinctive lemon taste.

[Fat Guy]

I think the willingness of so many of us to accept these ingredients intellectually -- to look at them objectively in terms of what they do to a dish rather than as statements of principle -- must represent something. I don't know what, exactly, but I see it as a good thing.

[JAZ]

The two things I started out using citric acid for, before I started to actually cook with it, were acidulating water for atichokes and sliced fruit, and decalcifying my coffee maker. So it's a useful little product.

[mags]

This was really interesting, Janet. Thank you very much.

Edited March 16, 2003 by mags (log)

[Pan]

I also liked the article very much, and kudos to Fat Guy for setting up this series. I'm familiar with MSG. In Malaysia, MSG is actually called "Aji-No-Moto" after the Japanese brand name, and as of 1977-75, it was used universally in Malay households. MSG never bothered me in any way, though I never thought I could tell whether it was used or not by taste. (Then again, I never was given a blind tasting to test this.) The use of citric acid is less familiar to me, though I know it's often used in Indian sweets.

[mb7o]

I believe that in Thai cooking, vinegar is also considered somewhat sweet. As opposed to salty as this 'missing ingredient' in this article. Or maybe acetic acid or some other component of the vinegar is different than citric acid.

[Fat Guy]

kudos to Fat Guy for setting up this series

The only thing I can take credit for is the series name, "The Compulsive Cook." Everything else -- all the ideas, all the writing -- is JAZ's alone. I'm really looking forward to her book.