Hot Pot Sans MSG

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When your Chinese language skills are limited to "nei hao" and "han hao" its a good idea to take a friend along to interrogate the waitresses. Those poor waitresses had to endure my interrogation via a third party. "No salt in the hot pot water."/"Is the hot pot water from the tap?"/"No ice in the cola."/"No salt."/"Is there MSG in that?"/"Is there salt in that?" I mean I can be a real pain in the neck sometimes, but this is type of painful annoyance is absolutely vital to my health. I can't deal with another dose of MSG poisoning. It's just too taxing on my system.

Anyway, we got the hot pot and everything turned out fine. I refused the salted hot pot water (I didn't want to take any chances) and just stuck to pain 'ol water and then skipped the sauce. They showed me the garlic starter sauce before they added the oil to it and there was some unidentified white granules in it and even the waitresses weren't sure what it was. So I took a taste and decide it wasn't worth it. On a side note, the mom and son sitting next to us laughed when we got some forks from the waitress. Oh, those slippery white yams!

In China, if you order anything with "salt" you are more than likely getting MSG mixed in with your salt. Pretty much everything has MSG in it, even the strawberry toppings on your McDonald's sundae has MSG in it. I think the ice cream is fine though. I tried the McFlurry and I felt OK afterward. The french fries are another story. The manager and the fry cook insisted that they only put salt on the fries. I believed them, guess what, the "salt" was a mix of MSG and sodium. I can always tell, because the salt isn't salty enough, that and the tiny capillaries in my heels go in to spasm. It's an odd sensation, but a dead give away that something is tainted with MSG. I don't know if anyone else has this sensation after ingesting MSG, but I do.

BTW - I am extremely sensitive to MSG. My first week in China culminated in a high fever, profuse sweating, monstrously huge swollen ankles, and diarrhea. Once I figured out that MSG was the culprit, I have pretty much stuck to cooking my own food and my ankles have gone back to normal.

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Photos

Yummy! Hot Pot!
Hot pot with no salt and no MSG.