I’ve been wondering for a while now if I might have that gene or whether Cilantro is just a herb i dislike. I can stomach dishes with cilantro in them, but it just stings through everything. No matter how little was put in, it tastes to me like somebody over-cilantro’d the dish. I’ve never eaten anything where I thought “Mmmh, yes, there’s a subtle hint of cilantro” - it’s always “Oh, there’s the cilantro, and it’s just too strong”.
But whenever I read about this online, people say that it tastes like soap. It’s been a couple of years since I was toddler enough to just put soap in my mouth. But in my mind, the taste of soap is mostly bitter, with an overwhelming tropical/fruity/citrussy flavor of whatever the producers decided to make the soap smell like. I also imagine it having a really unpleasant texture/mouthfeel. I have no urge to try eating soap, just so I can compare it with the taste of a herb. And I assume that most people with the Cilantro-gene also haven’t made an actual taste-comparison. So hence my question: In what way does anything - but cilantro in particular - taste like soap?
It tastes like drinking water from a glass that has been cleaned with dish soap but not rinsed properly and you can taste the residue and distinct smell/taste of soap. I used to have this response as a child but later as an adult the taste completely changed and now I can taste its real flavour.
I experience the soap taste, not with cilantro but with certain beers. There’s a local brewery I go to that makes a certain beer that tastes like soap for me, like the smell(?) / aftertaste of a wax candle. It happens every time. And when I order a different beer, it’s gone. It’s not the glass. Drives me crazy not knowing what the heck it is lol. A genetic quirk I guess. Always a light colored beer, never dark. My partner thinks it’s some of the yeast notes.
Likely some variety of hops they use in that beer. Cilantro apprently share some flavor compounds with hops.
Mosaic hops do something similar for me. I nearly vomit any time I have a beer brewed with them, so not really trying many new IPAs these days unless they got the hops listed.
I have a really weird one where shandy (beer mixed with lemonade) smells like rubber to me. Like when you rub a balloon really hard.
You guys can smell balloons being rubbed, right? 😅
My one that I share with my mom is that jalapeños taste like mold. I don’t get it with other kinds of peppers, and vinegar will mask it so picked jalapeño or hot sauces with it are usually okay. But it’s always just a bit there.
I had no idea it could change over time, that’s really cool. Makes me wonder what other genetic factors can change like that.
I couldn’t eat something that had come near cilantro until I was in my 20s. But I was intentional about it. I love Mexican food, but really couldn’t eat it at restaurants because of this so I decided I was going to try an experiment.
I would make a small amount of food at home with a little bit of cilantro and as I cut it up I would inhale deeply and tell myself out loud this smells delicious. I love this.
I would eat the prepared food and do the same. I did this once a week or so for a few months and eventually the soap taste disappeared. It tastes like delightful fresh herbs now.
See, yes. This is what adults do.
Being grown and refusing to eat something that millions of humans eat every day is, frankly, embarrassing. When I meet any otherwise neurotypical picky eater over the age of 13, all I can think of is, “Christ, grow the fuck up.”
A lot. Genes have a weird ability to activate or deactivate, or simply have a different effect, based on environmental factors.
Look up “Epigenetics”.
Thanks for the new rabbit hole! :D
Your taste buds also dull over time, so strong flavors get weaker.
many tastes change over time. certain foods are really sharp to children in unpleasant ways, but to an adult they are more mellow and nuanced.
Right, I know this from experience. I was talking about the genes thing which I have been informed is Epigenetics (thanks Crankenstein!)
The flavor to your immature taste buds wasn’t real?
There is the thing as it exists and then the thing as I perceive it. I’d say I’m tasting the more accurate version of it today but it probably is still debatable.
What something tastes like is part of your perception of it though. It’s an interaction that is based as much on the tongue doing the tasting as the substance being tasted.
I don’t think either way you tasted it was more “real” or “accurate”, but could be closer to what the majority of people experience.