I think someone ruffied my ramen.

Me + Mari + Naveen went to lunch as Menkui Tei - a Japanese place near Cooper Union.  I had the ramen and got super sick afterwards - not sick in the stomach, but sick in the head.  I was lightheaded and couldn’t see straight.   Sitting at my desk after lunch, it was like I had the spins from a crazy college night of drinking.

I went home early and took a nap.  When I got up about an hour later I couldn’t walk straight I was so lightheaded.

It eventually got better, though the sick-in-the-head kept coming back at weird times.  I went out to dinner w/ Nick & Nora and as we ate I started getting crazy again.  They both said it was prob from a large amount of MSG (in the ramen broth?) and the returning craziness  was my body continuing to break it down.

I feel 100x better today, but here’s what I found via wikipedia on Glutamic acid, a component of MSG:

Research into health effects

In April 1968, Robert Ho Man Kwok wrote a letter to the New England Journal of Medicine, coining the term “Chinese restaurant syndrome”:

I have experienced a strange syndrome whenever I have eaten out in a Chinese restaurant, especially one that served northern Chinese food. The syndrome, which usually begins 15 to 20 minutes after I have eaten the first dish, lasts for about two hours, without hangover effect. The most prominent symptoms are numbness at the back of the neck, gradually radiating to both arms and the back, general weakness and palpitations…^[5]

In 1969 the Chinese restaurant syndrome was attributed to the flavor enhancer glutamate largely due to the widely-cited article “Monosodium L-glutamate: its pharmacology and role in the Chinese Restaurant Syndrome” published in the journal Science.^[6] The syndrome is often abbreviated as CRS and also became known under the names Chinese food syndrome and monosodium glutamate symptom complex.

Symptoms attributed to the Chinese restaurant syndrome are rather common and unspecific and have included burning sensations, numbness, tingling, feelings of warmth, facial pressure or tightness, chest pain, headache, nausea, rapid heartbeat, bronchospasm in people with asthma, drowsiness, and weakness.^[7]

While many people believe that monosodium glutamate (MSG) is the cause of these symptoms, an association has never been demonstrated under rigorously controlled conditions, even in studies with people who were convinced that they were sensitive to the compound.^{[8][9][10][11]} Adequately controlling for experimental bias includes a placebo-controlled double-blinded experimental design and the application in capsules because of the strong and unique after-taste of glutamates.^[8]

In the 2004 version of his book, On Food and Cooking, noted food scientist Harold McGee states, “[after many studies], toxicologists have concluded that MSG is a harmless ingredient for most people, even in large amounts.”

Of course, I ping Mari and Naveen with this story and Naveen says…

ps. i told you not to finish the broth without noodles! :)

Ha, f’er!