A Soy Sauce that Can Reduce Blood Pressure?

May 26, 2010 in Cooking & Baking Hints, Diabetic Menu Item, Mediterranean, Nutrition by Joyce Bunderson

High blood pressure is one serious health problems amplified by too much salt in our diets. Soy sauce is normally one of the ways to eat too much salt, way over the health guidelines of the one-teaspoon equivalent per day. If you would like to review why I’m so excited about finding a new soy sauce that might help with this problem, you can read the March 1, 2010 blog post A Pinch of Salt Can Do the Job.

Beside its salt content, soy sauce represents one the five fundamental tastes. I’ve been thinking about these five recently. On May 19, 2010, I posted an article called, Parsley to the Bitter End, which discussed the flavor of bitter herbs and how fundamental taste qualities work together to create a certain flavor quality – a balance in flavors or fullness of flavors. In addition to the bitter taste of parsley, another of the five tastes is umami, which is the taste from Glutamate, as in monosodium glutamte (MSG), which is the chemical responsible for the umami taste. Umami is subtle, and adds “savory deliciousness” (a rough translation of the Japanese word ’umami’) when mixed in with other tastes and flavors.  It is a powerful flavor enhancer. Kikunae Ikeda of the Tokyo Imperial University first identified the taste of umami as a separate taste in 1908. It took about 70 years before umami was added to sour, sweet, salty, and bitter as an official taste.

The flavor of umami is found naturally in soy sauce, fish sauce, Parmesan cheese, anchovies, ripe tomatoes, lobster, crabs, and shrimp. I’ve decided that I must have an over abundance of umami taste buds – I love all those foods. I’ve only learned in the past few years that fish sauce and anchovies add a certain balance of flavor that doesn’t taste ‘fishy’ but makes the recipe delicious – it’s umami.

A really exciting bit of news is that scientists from Japan’s Fukuoka Soy Sauce Brewing Company have reported that they have brewed a new type of soy sauce using the friendly fungus Aspergillus oryzae that is salt-free. It initially appears that it may even be able to reduce blood pressure. The results of a study by Toshiro Matsui and others on the blood pressure with the new soy sauce have been reported in the Journal of Food Science.

A soy sauce that can lower blood pressure will be a real boon to culinary pursuits. I’m hoping that this product becomes commercially available. Many people have learned to enjoy the flavor of soy sauce, but have also learned that soy sauce, even the low sodium versions add more sodium that they would like. It would be so nice to receive the flavor of soy sauce, plus the benefits of blood pressure lowering – a double benefit.

Stir-Fry Flavors in Balance - Umami

Ingredients:

1 ½ tablespoons fresh ginger, minced

1 cup onions, sliced

3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

2 cup sweet potatoes, sliced in ¼ inch pieces

1 1/2 cup mushrooms, sliced

4 cups bell peppers, sliced

1 pound shrimp

5 ounces bamboo shoots, drained

1 cup celery, sliced

2 teaspoons garlic, minced

2 teaspoons sesame seeds

4 cups fresh spinach, packed

2 tablespoons soy sauce, low sodium

Directions:

Sauté the ginger and onions in the olive oil for a couple of minutes. Add the sweet potato pieces and mushrooms. When the sweet potato is almost tender, add the green peppers, shrimp and celery and sauté for a couple of minutes, until tender. Add spinach, bamboo shoots, and sesame seeds and stir until the spinach is just wilted. Stir in the soy sauce and serve with brown rice or wheat berries.

Peel and mince the ginger.

Peel and mince the ginger.

Saute the ginger oil and onions.

Saute the ginger oil and onions.

Gather the ingredients.

Gather the ingredients.

Add the Yam slices.

Add the Yam slices.

Next the mushrooms.

Next the mushrooms.

Stir the shrimp until they're pink and cooked.

Stir the shrimp until they're pink and cooked.

Add the coarsly chopped spinach, it will wilt just stirring it into the hot wok.

Add the coarsly chopped spinach, it will wilt just stirring it into the hot wok.

Serve your flavorful stir fry with brown rice or wheat berries.

Serve your flavorful stir fry with brown rice or wheat berries.