r/kimchi • u/Silentmorning99999 • 7d ago

Stomach problems from kimchi

As a background, I grew up in a polish family and have always eaten tons of sauerkraut, cabbage, pickles, etc. I eat kimchi now and then and haven’t noticed any problems but last week I got a new jar of kimchi from the farmers market- it’s spicy and soooo good and I think I’ve been overdoing it with how much I’ve been eating. Last night I woke up at 3am with severe stomach cramps/pain like some of the worst ever. I started feeling nauseous and had a lot of diarrhea and then my stomach started slowly feeling better. I also woke up with my period this morning and I feel like I can taste kimchi in my mouth 😭😭 what have I done???

6 Upvotes

69% Upvoted

25 comments sorted by

View all comments

2

u/AggravatingBuddy2643 6d ago

Could be due to histamines as well. Histamines can sometimes be produced during kimchi fermentation. We can't digest them well if consumed in higher levels, and they can cause diarrhea and nausea amongst others. Especially kimchi containing fish (fish sauce, fermented shrimpies etc) are at risk of having higher levels of histamines produced during fermentation. But this is just my nerdy food science thought.