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?
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.