Ripe tomatoes, which are rich in umami components

Umami /uːˈmɑːmi/ is a savory taste^[1][2][3] which is one of the five basic tastes, together with sweet, sour, bitter, and salty. Umami is a loanword from the Japanese umami (うま味^?) meaning "pleasant savory taste".^[4] This particular writing was chosen by Professor Kikunae Ikeda from umai (うまい) "delicious" and mi (味) "taste". The kanji 旨味 are used for a more general meaning to describe a food as delicious.

The human tongue has receptors for L-glutamate, which is the source of umami flavor. As such, scientists consider umami to be distinct from saltiness.^[5]

Background[link]

Scientists debated whether umami was indeed a basic taste ever since Kikunae Ikeda proposed its existence in 1908.^[6] Finally in 1985, at the first Umami International Symposium in Hawaii, the term umami was officially recognized as the scientific term to describe the taste of glutamates and nucleotides.^[7] Now it is widely accepted as the fifth basic taste. Umami represents the taste of the amino acid L-glutamate and 5’-ribonucleotides such as guanosine monophosphate (GMP) and inosine monophosphate (IMP).^[8] Although it can be described as a pleasant "brothy" or "meaty" taste with a long lasting, mouthwatering and coating sensation over the tongue, umami has no translation. Umami is umami in all major languages, including English, Spanish and French. The sensation of umami is due to the detection of the carboxylate anion of glutamate in specialized receptor cells present on the human and other animal tongues.^[9][10] Its fundamental effect is the ability to balance taste and round the total flavor of a dish. Umami clearly enhances the palatability of a wide variety of foods (for review Beauchamp, 2009).^[11] Glutamate in acid form (glutamic acid) imparts little umami taste; whereas the salts of glutamic acid, known as glutamates, can easily ionize and give the characteristic umami taste. GMP and IMP amplify the taste intensity of glutamate.^[10][12]

Discovery of umami taste[link]

Kikunae Ikeda

Glutamate has a long history in cooking.^[13] Fermented fish sauces (garum), rich in glutamate, were already used in ancient Rome.^[14] In the late 1800s, chef Auguste Escoffier, who opened one of the most glamorous, expensive, and revolutionary restaurants in Paris, created meals that combined umami with salty, sour, sweet and bitter tastes.^[15] He did not know the chemical source for this unique quality, however.

Umami was not properly identified until 1908 by Kikunae Ikeda,^[16] a professor of the Tokyo Imperial University. He found that glutamate was responsible for the palatability of the broth from kombu seaweed. He noticed that the taste of kombu dashi was distinct from sweet, sour, bitter and salty and named it umami.

Professor Shintaro Kodama, a disciple of Ikeda, discovered in 1913 that dried bonito flakes contained another umami substance.^[17] This was the ribonucleotide IMP. In 1957, Akira Kuninaka realized that the ribonucleotide GMP present in shiitake mushrooms also conferred the umami taste.^[18] One of Kuninaka's most important discoveries was the synergistic effect between ribonucleotides and glutamate. When foods rich in glutamate are combined with ingredients that have ribonucleotides, the resulting taste intensity is higher than the sum of both ingredients.

This synergy of umami provides an explanation for various classical food pairings, starting with why Japanese make dashi with kombu seaweed and dried bonito flakes, and continuing with various other dishes: Chinese add Chinese leek and cabbage with chicken soup, as in the similar Scottish dish of cock-a-leekie soup, and Italians combine Parmesan cheese on tomato sauce with mushrooms. The umami taste sensation of those ingredients mixed together surpasses the taste of each one alone.

Properties of umami taste[link]

Umami has a mild but lasting aftertaste difficult to describe. It induces salivation and a sensation of furriness on the tongue, stimulating the throat, the roof and the back of the mouth (for review Yamaguchi, 1998).^[19][20] By itself, umami is not palatable, but it makes a great variety of foods pleasant especially in the presence of a matching aroma.^[21] But like other basic tastes, with the exception of sucrose, umami is pleasant only within a relatively narrow concentration range.^[19] The optimum umami taste depends also on the amount of salt, and at the same time, low-salt foods can maintain a satisfactory taste with the appropriate amount of umami.^[22] In fact, Roinien et al. showed that ratings on pleasantness, taste intensity and ideal saltiness of low-salt soups were greater when the soup contained umami, whereas low-salt soups without umami were less pleasant.^[23] Some population groups, such as the elderly, may benefit from umami taste because their taste and smell sensitivity is impaired by age and multiple medications. The loss of taste and smell can contribute to poor nutrition, increasing their risk of disease.^[24]

Foods rich in umami[link]

Many foods that may be consumed daily are rich in umami. Naturally occurring glutamate can be found in meats and vegetables, whereas inosinate comes primarily from meats and guanylate from vegetables. Thus, umami taste is common to foods that contain high levels of L-glutamate, IMP and GMP, most notably in fish, shellfish, cured meats, vegetables (e.g., mushrooms, ripe tomatoes, Chinese cabbage, spinach, celery, etc.) or green tea, and fermented and aged products (e.g., cheeses, shrimp pastes, soy sauce, etc.).^[25]

Humans' first encounter with umami is often breast milk.^[26] It contains roughly the same amount of umami as broths.

There are some distinctions among stocks from different countries. Japanese dashi gives a very pure umami taste sensation because it is not based on mammal or poultry meats. In dashi, L-glutamate comes from sea kombu (Laminaria japonica) and inosinate from dried bonito flakes (katsuobushi) or small dried sardines (niboshi). In contrast, Western or Chinese broths have a more complex taste because of a wider mixture of amino acids from bones, meats and vegetables.

Taste receptors[link]

All taste buds on the tongue and other regions of the mouth can detect umami taste independently of their location. The tongue map in which different tastes are distributed in different regions of the tongue is a common misconception. Biochemical studies have identified the taste receptors responsible for the sense of umami, a modified form of mGluR4, mGluR1 and taste receptor type 1 (T1R1 + T1R3), and all have been found in taste buds from any region of tongue.^[27][28][29] The New York Academy of Sciences corroborated the acceptance of these receptors stating that "Recent molecular biological studies have now identified strong candidates for umami receptors, including the heterodimer T1R1/T1R3, and truncated type 1 and 4 metabotropic glutamate receptors missing most of the N-terminal extracellular domain (taste-mGluR4 and truncated-mGluR1) and brain-mGluR4."^[9] Receptors mGluR1 and mGluR4 are specific to glutamate whereas T1R1 + T1R3 are responsible for the synergism already described by Akira Kuninaka in 1957. However, the specific role of each type of receptor in taste bud cells remains unclear. They are G protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs) with similar signaling molecules that include G proteins beta-gamma, PLCb2 and PI3-mediated release of calcium (Ca²⁺) from intracellular stores.^[30] Ca²⁺ activates the selective cation channel transient receptor potential melastatin 5 (TrpM5) that leads to membrane depolarization and the consequent release of ATP and secretion of neurotransmitters including serotonin.^{[31][32][33][34]} Cells responding to umami taste stimuli do not possess typical synapses, but ATP conveys taste signals to gustatory nerves and in turn to the brain that interprets and identifies the taste quality.^[35][36]

Notes[link]

References[link]

External links[link]

• Umami Information Centre (NPO)
• International Glutamate Information Service
• Italian umami research
• Discovery of Umami
• Discovery of Umami Receptors
• Society for Research on Umami Taste
• "Who's umami? Human taste now comes in five flavours", CBC News, June 1, 2007
• "Sweet, Sour, Salty, Bitter… and Umami" NPR, November 1, 2007
• A New Taste Sensation, by Katy McLaughlin, Wall Street Journal, 12/8/07.
• Mouthfuls : huitlacoche is another beispiel, 24/7/08.
• The Science of taste at Kitchen Geekery. An informative article about the science behind taste - including umami. Written from a culinary science perspective.

Anders "Anden" ("The Duck") Matthesen (born July 6, 1975) is a Danish stand-up comedian, actor and rapper. He is known for creating a wide array of memorable characters and stereotypes which he uses as alter-egos in performances.

After failing as a rapper, Matthesen started his stand-up career at the Danish Stand-Up Championship in 1993, where he finished in second place. After making a name on this scene, as well as through his comedy radio stories, he also contributed to several other projects. For example, a television "Julekalender", Jul på Vesterbro, featured fourteen characters of his invention, all of them played by himself. These included the drunken, prostitute-addicted sailor Stewart Stardust, and his junkie son, Danny. The story revolves around Stewart's hot dog stand, which a band of terrorists attempts to use to detonate a nuclear device during a UN meeting in Copenhagen.

Anders Matthesen has also released several CDs with his radio material, in addition to the animated movie Terkel in Trouble, based on one of these. He has also shown himself as a capable actor in a few plays including one about the life of the Danish travel tycoon Simon Spies. In 2006 he revisited rapping on his album Soevnloes, to great success, selling enough records to earn a "Guldplade".^[1]

Recently Anders Matthesen has gone back to his stand-up roots, touring Denmark with shows like Bytte, bytte købmand (in collaboration with stand-up comedian Thomas Hartmann) from 2009 and the new one man show "ANDERS" which will premier September 5, 2012.

Discography[link]

• 2000 Hva' snakker du om? - Den ka' byttes Vol. 1
• 2001 Hva' snakker du om? - Arne fortæller... Terkel i knibe
• 2003 Jul på Vesterbro
• 2005 Snedronningen (Co-produced three tracks)
• 2006 Soevnloes
• 2010 Villa Peakstate

Filmography[link]

Stand-up[link]

• 2001 Hva' snakker du om?
• 2001 Talegaver til børn 2001 (vært sammen med Mick Øgendahl)
• 2002 Talegaver til børn 2002
• 2002 9 års jubilæum
• 2002 Den ægte vare
• 2004 Tal for dig selv
• 2006 Anden paa coke?
• 2008 Anders Matthesen ...vender tilbage
• 2009 Bytte, bytte købmand
• 2012 ANDERS

Movies[link]

• 2004 Terkel i knibe
• 2006 Rene hjerter
• 2009 Sorte kugler

TV productions[link]

• 1998 Andarki
• 1998 Andensortering
• 1999 Casper og Mandrilaftalen
• 2001 Langt fra Las Vegas
• 2002 Perforama
• 2004 Jul på Vesterbro
• 2008 Comedy Kuren

Musicals[link]

• 2004 Simon - Spies, skæg og ballade

References[link]

External links[link]

• Anden.dk, the official Danish homepage
• Big danish fanclub
• IMDb's profile

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