i used to work at a poke shop and I had one regular that had a special kind of bowl: he wouldn't get any rice or greens, not even any protein, he would request like 4 or 5 big scoops of cilantro. covered with crunchies like sesame and tempura flakes with sauce. Like this bro just eats cilantro salad every day
I have the soapy cilantro gene. Cilantro is one of my favorite flavors. No, I don't generally like the taste of soap. The soapiness of cilantro is very mild for me and is lost in the strong flavor of the herb unless I specifically am looking for it.
I worked at a grocery store and the produce department got a big load of fresh cilantro in. My eyes watered as I walked into the back room. I thought they had just done a shitty job of cleaning the floors.
I don't mind the taste, but I'm extremely sensitive to it. If there is one bit in the dish, all of it tastes like cilantro and nothing else. Is this also part of the soap gene.
It seems there is a difference in america where people call coriander parts different things like cilanto. Never knew that. Knowing american way of the names of some herbs is already a good achievement for me.
I've always known people that said they can't tolerate or really dislike coriander in food, but never have I heard about the phonmenon of it tasting like soap. I don't think any of those people ever explained the taste as soap, just that they dislike it for no reason, so for me it is just picky people in my mind. But now I learned that it's some genetics weirdness. Always learning.
I definitely have the soapy gene, but don't mind the taste. I blame thrills soap gum, I occasionally enjoyed that as a kid. My sister also has the gene and can’t stand the taste.
I have one allele of the soapy gene variant at rs2741762, and I really like cilantro and coriander. But I also like any weird or different smells, it appears as if I smell everything a little more strongly, and nothing is truly disgusting for me taste-wise (texture though: can't stand anything that has a vein-like quality). I have ADHD though, and one emergent behavior from that is pursuing the interesting/novel over the good, smells included.
Yes, I tested through 23andMe and then downloaded my genes. Occasionally I compare them to recent studies with https://codegene.eu, which is how I learned a bit about a cholesterol metabolism gene mutation increasing the probability of Alzheimer's.
My attitude to privacy is probably more complacent than it should be.
A gene has been identified as a likely cause of why some people enjoy the smell and taste of coriander (also known as cilantro) while others have exactly the opposite reaction to the point of repulsion. Depending on ancestry, somewhere between 3% and 21% of the population associate it with unpleasant taste, including a combination of soap and vomit, or say that it is similar to the foul smelling odor emitted by stinkbugs. This is due to the presence of aldehyde chemicals, which are present in soap, various detergents, coriander, several species of stinkbugs and cinnamon.
So, if cilantro tastes to me like the smell of Irish Spring, I have the gene? I definitely still enjoy it, though. Funny enough, I also enjoyed one brand of Sangria that tasted exactly like the smell of the floor cleaner from my last job.
I find it similar to parsley . It's not soapy to me, but I'm not a hardcore fan. I guess I can enjoy though, does that count or you are looking specifically for people who sense it like soap and like it too?
I don't taste parsley at all. Love cilantro. No soap flavor. Hate tomatoes. Taste like a juiced corpse. So, I'm convinced parsley and tomatoes have an associated gene.
So it's interesting, I have the soapy gene but have found that I do enjoy it, in modest amounts, in certain foods. It primarily just exists for me as an acquired, slightly off flavor that balances the rest - think like trying coffee for the first time versus later in life.
That said, some food trucks really just give you whole scoops of the stuff and I can exhaust that good will pretty quick when I have a bowl of hot soapy pork broth
I have a similar thing but with celery. I cannot stand celery because to me it smells extremely bad. Like, the worst thing I have ever smelled or will smell bad. If there’s even a tiny bit of celery somewhere, I can smell it. I don’t even know how celery tasted because I can’t get it close enough to my mouth to try.
I saw a video of someone teaching himself to like celery, and coerced my girlfriend to do the same - it works!
You literally just start by nibbling a bit every day and start eating more and more as you can handle it. She loves celery now, to the point where she just eats it raw as snacks.
Whether it's worth the apparent torture is up to you. To be frank, picky eaters give me second hand embarrassment when out dining, since you can teach yourself to like basically everything. Usually it's just people who didn't get much variety as children.
I got plenty of variety as a child, but there are some foods I just can't stand. I'm not about to force myself to eat them when I have so many other options.
But I'm glad I wouldn't accidentally end up eating out with you. Someone who cares so much what other people are not eating makes me embarrassed for them.
I used to hate cilantro because I thought it tasted soapy. Then my kid was telling me about this "gene" one day and I said that I must have it. Then I asked them what they thought cilantro tasted like, and they told me it was onion-y like chives.
We were at a restaurant at the time and I was eating something with cilantro which is why it came up. So I took a bite and tried to see if I could taste what they meant by onion-y. And damned if I couldn't make out that chive sort of flavor.
Since then, I can't taste the soapiness, it just tastes good.
So I doubt it is actually a gene of any sort if you can reprogram your brain like I did to get the taste.
So because you were able to gaslight yourself into liking it that means genetic science is fake?
FUCK Cilantro. It tastes like someone wiped their ass with a sweaty gym sock. I don't even get the "soap" taste that many people report, it just tastes awful and even the tiniest amount ruins whatever dish its in.
Yeah it's not really soap, but more the idea that this thing you're eating is definitely not food. Like if you got a wad of grass and doused it in terpentine.
Yeah, it's always tasted more like bug spray to me. My friend loves it and says it just tastes "earthy." But mushrooms taste "earthy" to me and I love them. Cilantro just tastes like big spray!!
AFAIK different parts of the plant are used in seasoning, but only the leaves will taste like soap. The leaves have a kind of citrus flavor (so I've heard) and the root is just bitter/earthy.
The seeds are sometimes used in brewing beer, most commonly Belgian Whit style beers with the most popular of those being Blue Moon. I have the gene, and I've tried the seeds straight up when my old room mate was brewing beer, and it tastes the same as the leaf. It finally made sense why I hated all Belgian Whit style beers.
I grew up eating it too. I thought maybe I didn't like the ones from our tree, but I got one from the supermarket once and it was the same flavor. I understand grapefruit is supposed to be fairly bitter but to me it tastes more like bile.
You would think the parents that love it would feed it to their kid, but kids are weird about food so maybe OP didn't eat anything but bananas and peanut butter.
I have soap gene. But honestly that flavour only becomes an issue when there is too much coriander. The other day I was happily adding it to a cucumber raita.
I like coriander seeds instead. While the coriander leaves (cilantro) taste like soap to me and are not nice, the seeds are fine and actually pretty delicious in certain dishes.
Am I the only human in the top left?? When I first learned of the gene, I was like “ahhhh that must be why,” then tried it again and did not taste soap. I just kinda hate the taste. It’s like too-much-vegetableness-to-make-up-for-overpowering-whatever-it’s-added-to but I don’t taste soap.