In article >,
blake murphy > wrote:

> On Wed, 10 Feb 2010 13:48:38 -0800, Ranee at Arabian Knits wrote:
>
> > In article >,
> > Doug Freyburger > wrote:
> >
> >> Sweet is also both a taste and an
> >> item.
> >
> > Not quite. Table salt is NaCl. Sweet has quite a range from
> > strawberries to ice cream to table sugar and more. You couldn't put
> > together a tube of sweet any more than you could put together a tube of
> > sour.
> >
> > Regards,
> > Ranee @ Arabian Knits
>
> some would say citric acid (a.k.a. sour salt) would be a stand-in for your
> hypothetical sour paste.

Pretty much any acid is sour. Vinegar is pretty common. Some people
keep a bottle of vinegar on the table to add some "sour" to taste, just
like many people keep a bowl of sugar on the table to add to coffee,
tea, cereal or whatever. Many people keep a bottle of ketchup on the
table, too. That has a lot of sugar and some vinegar, so it is a sweet
and sour condiment. I'm confused about this Umami paste. A scientist
in Japan already isolated a primary Umami flavor, know as monosodium
glutamate, or MSG. This process of extraction was patented in 1909:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monosodium_glutamate

It was introduced into the US under the brand name of Accent in 1947.

Just as there are more than one source for acid and sugar, there is more
than one source for glutamic acid:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umami

"Glutamate has a long history in cooking.[5]It is naturally found in
East and Southeast Asian foods, such as soy sauce and fish sauce, and in
Italian foods like parmesan cheese, anchovies and ripe tomatoes. It is
also prevalent in seafood, such as lobster, crabs, and shrimp."

--
Dan Abel
Petaluma, California USA