Umami Is a Taste

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Our current understanding of umami as a taste was part of a larger campaign to change the conversation about m s g. A lot of what we know about sensory science has its root in the modern industrial food system. Our names, our language do, in a way, forge our reality. Whether we call it umami or not has real effects in the world. The popularity of japanese quisine exploded at the same time that food science and molecular astronomy took hold of the culinary imagination.

For thousands of years, there have been four basic tastes recognized across cultures. But thanks to Kumiko Ninomiya (aka the Umami Mama), scientists finally accepted a fifth. As part of its Making Sense series, Vox’s Unexplainable podcast explores whether there could be even more.

This episode was reported and produced by Meradith Hoddinott and edited by Katherine Wells, Noam Hassenfeld, Brian Resnick with help from Mandy Nyugen and Byrd Pinkerton. Music by Noam. Cristian Ayala handled the mixing and sound design. Research and fact checking by Richard Sima. Tori Dominguez is our audio fellow.

Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained

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