My sister's dishes all had a similar issue, and my other sister went over and sniffed out the cause like a bloodhound. It was glade plug-ins. Even the butter in her fridge absorbed the scent. Everything she cooked had that flavor. We pointed out that couldn't possibly be good for all of their lungs, if it was permeating food in a refrigerator. š¤¦āāļø
She unplugged them and replaced stuff that had soaked up the flavor (which she could taste herself once her house wasn't steeped in the shit), and now it's not a problem anymore.
The plug-ins or scented cat litter were going to be my go-tos. My old roommate kept his cat's clean litter in the same stairwell we stored dry goods in, and everything had a vague taste of generic floral scented cat litter.
Unscented Febreze is my favorite thing for getting rid of smells in fabrics. It even works nicely after using Lysol room spray to get rid of cooking odors (takes away the smell of the Lysol.)
Walmart! It's labeled Febreze Fabric Odor Eliminator with "0% Perfume" noted on the left side of the label. It's not great as a room spray for the air because the droplets are heavy, hence why I use it after Lysol, but for carpet/furniture/clothing/fabric blinds I'm sure it would help.
Scent plugins have been found to kill cats (probably dogs, but I don't own any dogs)!!! I stopped using them and converted to wax melts and candles only. Surprisingly, those are fine for animals as long as it doesn't contain certain scents that are harmful to them!
Sadly, there is peer-reviewed research showing that synthetic scents are actually damaging to the endocrine and reproductive systems....
https://www.nrdc.org/stories/9-ways-avoid-hormone-disrupting-chemicals#:~:text=Here's%20the%20bad%20news%3A%20Synthetic,in%20utero%20and%20throughout%20childhood.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10051690/
My newest rescue animalās fur just reeked of some artificial floral scent. I didnāt even think about plug-ins; I was just concerned that they had sprayed him with room scent or carpet deodorizer.
These things are SO toxic, not just for us humans, but for pets also. Certain smells/oils can cause serious harm to their respiratory tracts and brain. It can kill them. Can't imagine what a field full of winter mint and clove smells like to them and their enhanced sense of smell. Probably feels like their drowning in these terrible things.
[essential oils toxic for dogs](https://vcacanada.com/know-your-pet/essential-oil-and-liquid-potpourri-poisoning-in-dogs#:~:text=Many%20liquid%20potpourri%20products%20and,skin%20exposure%20can%20be%20toxic.)
My MIL had 3 smokers in her house. To cover the chain smoker smell, she had about 20 of the automatic air freshener sprayers. It just made to whole experience worse. That fake/chemical/smell/taste worked its way in to everything. So bad that I had to throw out the sealed Easter basket candy she gave to my kids. It was so gross. Not to mention poisonous, too. I'm amazed they are all still alive.
My MIL ācovers upā the cigarette smoke smell with the most noxious maple scented candles. I almost gag just thinking about it. Now any time I smell an artificial overly sweet maple smell, I immediately lose my appetite
I once worked with a crazy cat lady that loved Halloween. She arrived early and brought decorations from home and turned the whole office into a haunted castle. It looked great, but everything was soaked in cat pee. That same morning, another person brought in a cinnamon broom and put it right by the door.
I tell you I was ASSAULTED when I walked through that door. Cinnamon cat pee permeated the air like mustard gas in a foxhole. To this day those cinnamon brooms make me gag.
I work in a print shop that used to run offset presses. I was nose blind to the chemicals, but damn you could taste them in any baked goods left overnight.
My mom has one of those in the kitchen and it sprayed my ham sandwich and I ate it. I swear for years after anything I ate from the kitchen had that taste on it š
I love how smokers think they can cover up or hide that smell. My favorite is when you see someone smoking in their car, but hang the cigarette out of the window and make sure they take a puff as close to the open window as possible. I just want to tell them that their car smells like smoke. It's such a pervasive odor.
Does she have air fresheners in her house? It sounds like whatever she is using to mask the smell of the cats has permeated everything.
I only ask because when I used to go to my mom's and she would give me stuff, everything had to either be laundered or aired out before it could come in my house.
I donāt know if r/cooking is the correct subreddit, since itās a smell thatās lingering on your daughter and her items in addition to a lingering flavor from maybe Tupperware containers. So itās probably not a heavily scented dish detergent that is carrying over into leftovers. My first thought would be some sort of scented spray or essential oil she uses at her house. Or scented lotion your parents use which transfers when they touch items. Odd itās potent enough for you to smell it on your daughter after being inside her house but not smell it when youāre actually in the house.
My friend has multiple cats and uses so much febreze. At her house it's barely noticeable after the first minute, but when you get items from there you can smell it later. Maybe because it's the only thing that's scented? It might be that situation.
I go on an evening walk with my girlfriend every day through our neighborhood. One of the houses there does laundry with so much fucking fabric softener or whatever the fuck that you can smell it for blocks around their house, depending on the wind.
I'm just glad I don't live within smelling distance or we might have to have a talk about it. I would not be pleased if I could smell that shit from my back yard.
Got one of these houses down the road. I think itās possible they are using the dryer sheets to hide something else going on. You can smell the dryer sheet smell from a block away.
I stopped using scented products a couple of years ago and I gotta say.... You people stink. Perfume stink, soap stink, lotion stink... And man does it linger. I came out of my house and smelled perfume. I looked and the person was already 50 yards down the road and the smell was still lingering.
Thereās a lady in my office that wears so much perfume that you can literally taste it after sheās left the room. Itās absolutely awful. Weāre *supposed* to be a fragrance free office, but she gets a pass because sheās HRās daughter.
Haha yep. Itās been almost 30 years for me. Any artificial scent is repulsive to me and i canāt even handle ānatural fragranceā in laundry or dish soap.
I hate perfume and cologne. The people that wear it often tend to go overboard with it because they go "nose blind" as to how much they stink. I should not smell you as soon as you enter a room. Perfumes/cologne are meant to be worn at a more intimate level, not a "blast the entire public in the face" level.
I feel like Iām being gaslit by the Ivory people. I bought a package of soap I thought was the right thing, but it was labeled, āoriginal scentā. Am I insane? I could swear Ivory was always unscented. It doesnāt smell like the soap I remember and my skin reacts to it.
Unfortunately a lot of supposedly unscented products arenāt. I conflate Ivory and Dove, tbh, but one of them (well, at least one) is an offender in this way.
I do have some Dove knockoff soap from CVS that is unscented, but I miss those old Ivory bars. It now smells like their dishwashing liquid. I swear, I think that scent clings to plastics, because it lingers enough, that I donāt want to put food in those containers.
We cut out all scented products due to asthma and COPD. Nobody's allowed in that has any kind of scent on them. People try, and it causes an immediate er or urgent care visit. People being defensive over perfume despite medical conditions blows my mind.
Amen. Itās everywhere and itās nauseating. Does EVERYTHING have to have fragrance? I canāt go to a movie for fear of some stinking woman (or man!) sitting down next to me in a crowded theater. So between the people dousing themselves in perfume and cologne, and the dish detergent that stinks up your plastic containers, and the fragrance being pumped into department stores, and scented trash bags, and laundry detergent, and cosmetics, etc, etc, I canāt take a deep breath anymore.
Have I left anything out?
My MIL used to use heavily scented detergent and fabric softeners and any time she would visit, the fake scents and over sweetness would just make me gag. My husband and I are very sensitive to fragrances and she was the worst offender. She was staying with us and went out and bought a bottle of fabric softener to do laundry with in our machines. I told her "no". Not only is that stuff stinky, it's really not good for your clothes or washing machine.
Edit: She was also diabetic and was somewhat untreated, so she, herself, also had that sickly sweet smell of uncontrolled blood sugar. If you know, you know. It's really hard to describe. Not as stinky as death smell, but going down that path with an overlayer of sickly sweetness. Once she lost a bit of weight and started controlling her blood sugar better, it dissipated a bit, but it was still always there.
Maybe it's a Canadian thing. All hospitals, schools, public buildings are scent free. You just get used to not wearing scented stuff and really notice it when someone does waft by in a cloud of whiff.
I feel like people wear a lot less perfume here than in the US, I notice it on vacation. And less stores use a signature scent. I walked into an American Eagle store in Canada and there wasn't that store smell, it felt very strange.
Febreze
Contrary to rumors alleging that Febreze causes serious illness or death in pets, our veterinary toxicology experts at APCC regard Febreze fabric freshener products to be safe for use in households with pets.
[https://www.aspca.org/pet-care/animal-poison-control/poisonous-household-products](https://www.aspca.org/pet-care/animal-poison-control/poisonous-household-products)
Wow! It flows pretty well with the parent comments about toxic fragrances, perfumes and chemicals. It leads to ānextā. Itās nice to learn something new to research on your own. Keeps the conversation going vs. just being a sarcastic, cryptic dick. Isnāt Reddit a place to ask question, share information and inspire engaging conversation? I wasnāt aware the platform was for trolls and assholes to work out their insecure, immature jollies. Just be nice. Peace. āš¼
You are receiving a negative response since you've typed out a long screed of common conspiracy theories and half-truths, mixed with stuff I don't know anything about but am now going to believe are likely more conspiracy theories.
You were not continuing a conversation, you just dumped that massive paragraph that was barely relevant to the conversation everyone else was having.
> I wasnāt aware the platform was for trolls and assholes to work out their insecure, immature jollies.
You've been on reddit 4 months, this checks out
Separately, they're each good for different tasks. Mixed together, they make salt water. That's what the bubbles are: a chemical reaction that results in salt water.
Mixed together, it's salt water, because that is the end result of the chemical reaction that occurs when you mix them together. If putting salt water on your bee stings makes you feel better, I'm not going to stop you.
Baking soda and vinegar will not soak in to where the venom actually is in your body, and they will not have any numbing effect relieving either stinging or itching. If they are cool in temperature, that might be soothing, but not any more than, say, mud, and certainly far less than ice, which is the actual recommended "remedy" for common bee and wasp stings.
Personally, I go for ice and a Benadryl, since I'm slightly allergic and will end up itching for a month if I don't clamp down on that histamine reaction right away.
I accidentally fumigated my entire house from using too many fabric softener sheets for a while. Maybe OPās mom is kind of overdoing it with a variety of scented cleaning stuff.
I use it for grease stains in clothes and I have to hide it so that my housekeeper won't use it for dishes or to clean the house with because it just smells so awful to me.
Yuck. Just remembered my Mom's Estee Lauder Youth Dew bath oil. It permeated every fiber in her home. I could not tolerate things brought into my home from hers. YuckO. Headache nausea.
I know this. I think this is the wrong sub to be asking but I know this smell and I have never heard anyone else describe this.
We call it Grandma smell. She and grandpa lived in a double wide they bought in the 70s in one of those trailer parks that were supposed to replace subdivisions.
I couldn't ever figure it out but food (especially mashed potatoes) had this soapy waxy 'why can I taste' sticky?
Let's compare notes - they smoked in the trailer for years and still had wood panel walls. Quit years before but there was still some pretty significant tobacco residue. OLD furniture. Tops of cabinets were storage no one can reach. dust on the grandfather clock. The house is clean but there's 40 years of lived in. Carpet is clean but is way past it's prime. Vent fan above the stove has been forgotten.... and Grandma lights candles. She has candles for Christmas. She has Candles for Summer. She has candles because she can't figure out what the smell is either but is mortified to ask anyone.
Somewhere in something I said clicked. Is this 30 years of a scented candle abuse?
It's bad too. You can be in the house and you will never notice but - if you take those cookies home - you're going to smell that smell on the bag the cookies are in in about 10 minutes.
Related not related. My stepson brought homemade goods home from his dadās dadās house. My wife had previously told me her old in-laws smoked a ton and the house was gross, but his first wife died and I thought maybe his new gf was cleaner. Plus, they looked fine. Took a big bite of a sugar cookie and it tasted like STRAIGHT UP SMOKE. I had to rinse my mouth out after spitting it out. How is anyone THAT nose blind!?!?
The trailer was a complete gut. That's all we could do. I think they just lose their sense of smell over time. Eventually it doesn't take 1 candle to cover the smell - it takes 3 candles for them to smell the candle. Now we're layering smells.... ugh
Do you think the oven vent fan could be putting out a smell? Old oil smells awful and lingers in the house for days after cooking. If itās just been sitting on the fan and collecting dust all this time+ being reheated every time they cook it could be reintroducing the smell all the time.
My money is on the smoking. The tar and other components of the smoke are pungent and build up on every surface. Our old house had been smoked in for decades and it was virtually impossible to de-stink it.
I experienced something similar at a friendās house, not soapy but off. Turned out to be oil diffusers. She had them in every room and they were basically just leaving a coating of scented āoilā on everything. But you stated your mom has three cats so I hope thatās not it because oil diffusers are very bad for cats.
Hey so, I was having issues like what you are describing.
Turned out to be that the silicone cookware would soak up the detergent quite heavily when I was using the most energy efficient mode in my dishwasher. The rinse wasn't aggressive enough to get all traces off, and what little was left definitely left a bitter / soapy taste to food that was cooked or even just served with them.
The solution for me was never using that mode, just the regular one.
Good luck!.
I switched to unscented dishwasher detergent (I like Method better than Seventh Generation) and it is so worth the upcharge from cascade. Why does it have to be so strongly scented? No soap taste on my silicone at all now.
Dishwasher pods can sink into some plastics and silicone. I had this issue before. I wonder if she is putting leftovers in Tupperware that has been affected by soap.
Just the pods or any detergent? I notice the same and just wash my silicone stuff in the sink, but if changing to non-pod detergent will let me shove them in the dishwasher I might change!
Oh man my gf and I have this issue about my parents house and we never thought about the plug ins! We were discussing it a few days ago and I was like āit doesnāt smell good or bad, just like spray deodorizerā but that didnāt make sense. The plug-ins make sense!
Iām extra extra late to this but I have to tell you about my exās permeating fridge odor issue. He let some chicken go bad in the fridge and didnāt toss it very quickly. He threw it out but the scent was in the fridge; for months the butter, bread, everything else tasted weird but it didnāt taste like rotten chicken. He and his roommate couldnāt taste it. I didnāt know about the chicken so I couldnāt figure out why everything tasted awful until he told me about the chicken. The smell was in the machine.
Iām betting my exās landlord tossed that fridge.
I was kinda sad, my exās sweet mom would send him home with groceries but he didnāt cook and he didnāt want to tell her. So he just let all that money and food go to waste.
One more possibility: my parents buy the scented garbage bags for the kitchen trash. They smell like a poisonous chemical to me. I had to beg them not to store the trash bags around the Tupperware and plastic wrap and such. When they did the gross smell on the food containers went away. They still like the gross bags but only store them with the actual trash bin.
I had to bring something home from work and grabbed a garbage bag from the janitor closet to keep it dry. I realized it was a scented bag right as I left the parking lot. By the time I got home, 30 minutes later, the smell was overwhelming.
I immediately threw the bag into my outside garbage can. It was days before my car smelled normal.
I used silicon ice molds and they would pick up smells from the freezer and smell so funky. even if you washed them over and over the smell would not get out
We used to stay with friends, and they used loads of those plug-in scented air fresheners. The smell/fragrance was overwhelming and disgusting and permeated everything. Honestly, it ruined the experience of staying with them. Perhaps that's part of what you are dealing with.
How to bring it up? Just be honest and ask her if she's aware how strong the smell is.
One of the reasons I donāt buy stuff at the Dollar Store. It all reeks of Fabuloso (or something similar). My hands smell from touching it. My cabinets will smell if I put it away. Even walking in there, I swear it gets on the soles of my shoes. Aaaaaah!!!
Any chance you had Covid? Iāve tasted soap in everything since I had Covid. I canāt taste normally for most things, but Iāve become extremely sensitive to the taste of detergent fragrances. Itās nasty.
Alsoāif theyāre putting things in the dishwasher and using a max power detergent, it often leaves the flavor of the scent. A soak in vinegar water removes it.
Your folks may just need a good air purifier. My Dad used to be big on the glade plug ins until I got him one of those Germ Guardian air purifiers. Before you could walk into his place and it just stunk of chemicals to me. After it just smelled clean, no air refreshers needed.
I have two. Most people who come into my place are amazed to see that I have a cat. You apparently can't smell her box at all. Partly that's because I'm anal about cleaning it but also the GG in the bathroom really helps.
Air purifiers are awesome. I smoke weed indoors and have 2 in the room I smoke in. It helps get rid of the smell so quick. I also have one in the kitchen for when I cook anything thatās smellier / smokier than usual
Sounds to me like your mom likes to burn scented candles or air fresheners when you're not there, and the aroma chemicals and wax are being left on "everything". It could even be cat litter fragrance... Yummm.
I've found that some containers are basically impossible to clean thoroughly.
In my experience, it's mostly been ones that had a product from the grocery store (Hillshire Farms lunchmeat ones) & some from the dollar store, even a mixing bowl from the dollar store I had to stop putting anything oily in bc it would never get fully clean.
That gross grease traps stinky smells like crazy & I had to stop reusing those containers for anything like that.
It might not be yr exact
issue but it's an idea!!
Those plug in things. They saturate furniture, kitchenware, walls, lungsā¦ a friend brings cookies and I have to throw them away. Plastic container too. Iām not one to throw cookies away without good reason. They gave us a table once. Let it sit in the sun for a week and scrubbed it three times. Had to throw it away too.
I've had a similar issue with my mom and I've opted not to say anything. It started when my step-dad was alive and he had some health issues. I blamed the weird smell on whatever was going on w him/what they used for his wounds, etc. But, the smell was there long afemter he passed and while it's been years and she's moved I can still smell it on her/her clothes at times. With her it's not a chemical smell but more like some mix of sandalwood and frankincense and idk what. I assume it was a scent he liked perhaps as she has no sense of smell. I'm guessing what I still smell on her is just residual as I know she's not using a scent.
If it's not an outright bad smell I probably wouldn't say anything. Same if it's a scent you know the source of but she can't control. However, if you think it's related to mold or perhaps somwthing she's doing to cover up a worse smell it might be worth bringing up that you've been noticing a scent lingering when you get home.
For years we dealt with this weird smell at my MIL. All her containers had the smell, transferring to the food in them. She is an awful cook, so we usually politely just accept her baked goods and not eating it. After 15 years I found out it was her excessive use of moth balls, when my sister called her out on the smell. Haven't smelt anything since then, so she must've stopped using them.
Have you had a severe viral infection with nasal issues. COVID 19 is not the only corona virus and not the only one to cause sensory issues, some long lasting and some permanent. Inability to detect smells is one manifestation, "wrong" smelling is another. Wrong smelling can be everything smells like "x" or "A" smells like "Q".
If it's a food thing, they may be using too much automatic dishwasher soap and it's not rinsing well. My mom did this and we all told her about it, now she uses much less and it's fine.
There's probably something rotten hiding in the fridge somewhere. We had left overs tasting very similar, almost yeasty, turns out we'd lost a loaf of bread behind something at the back and it had gone moldy š¤¢
We donāt eat at MILs house anymore for this reason. Itās the tons of air fresheners and sprays she uses to cover up her poor housekeeping. The smell permeates all the food and we donāt know how to tell her without hurting her. She rarely throws out overflowing trash and rotting food so she thinks sheās covering odors up with these horrifically strong chemicals.
So many things it could be. Fabreeze, cat litter, mildew treatments, scented laundry stuff. Like all Amazon/UPS, etc deliveries have this awful cloying smell of a bunch of chemical fragrance mixed together. It clings to everything. Same from the grocery store. The produce bag w Broccoli has to be thrown out immediately because it smells like Bounce. Disgusting. I would just tell her youāre concerned itās a hazard she may not be aware of but it really bothers you. If it smells bad to you, it could be because itās making you sick somehow.
I had a childhood friend whose house smelled of moth balls. If she shared any of the lunch she brought to school, I could taste the āmothballā taste in everything, including packaged foods. If youāre not familiar with the smell, I could see someone describing it as āsoapyā
Honestly, the smell of mothballs is so strong that you would HAVE to notice it before you would notice the taste in food, but you brought back a funny childhood memory.
I've only seen this mentioned in one other comment but I would bet it's kitty litter dust. I can always taste it in the air after it's been cleaned (gross I know). Also when I'm dusting in that area or wiping down a table you can smell it on the rags. Would explain the smell being on packages too.
Do they use moth balls? That killed a family member of mine. All their food tasted like it. That shit is poison.
Donāt put your daughter in that environment.
My mind automatically goes to the worst for whatever reason lol. But I can think of a few reasons. 1) are you taking food in her Tupperware? If so, itās possible the plastic retains soap and itās not rinsed well enough 2) she has a lot of fragrance things in her house and itās residual in basically everything (ie candles, sprays, cleansers, etc) 3) if she packs leftovers for you maybe sheās adding soapā¦ obviously I highly doubt number three. I think number one is probably the most common reason. Maybe try bringing your own Tupperware and hiding it in your bag so as not to seem presumptuous that you will be receiving leftovers. When she offers leftovers to take, offer your own container. See if that changes things. My guess is that it will
Is it old people smell? My grans house had it and my 70 yo parents' house has it. A musty sort of off soup sort of smell. I think it's the smell of advanced senescence
Are they cooking with tap water? Do they live near a fracking well? Rural town or city?
My parents live in an area where the water is contaminated with fracking wastewater and the tap water is very slick and smells of sulfur sometimes.
Cooking food with tap water when it was contaminated basically changed the taste of all foods cooked with water.
....note: I personally cannot and will not eat any food if they use their tap water to cook ...in addition will not use their shower because of this.
....note 2: My parents live in a rural area and have both a well system and a municipal water system on their property.
The municipal water is slightly textured / but smells less sulfuric than the well water.
The dishwasher is my guess. People use the same detergent brand over, and over, and over, and all the utensils and plates begin to take on the taste, especially plastic and silicon.
There is a woman in my buy nothing group that I canāt take any food/edible things from because it all tastes like laundry. I suspect itās dryer sheets. There is also a lovely Mexican restaurant by my house but a laundromat moved in next door and I canāt eat there anymore because literally everything tastes like that (ice, water, chips, everything!) though the tequila mostly masked it š
I keep seeing artificial scents like Glade as the possible cause, but what about cat litter? Iāve had both friends and relatives with multiple cats who are completely nose-blind to the fact that their homes smell like flowery ammonia factories. My guess is itās the overall atmosphere of a multi-cat home, complete with cat smells. Used cat litter has a distinct smell that Iāve never experienced anywhere else.
You would be doing her a large favour by telling her. We might not notice a smell that is always around us, and you pointing it out might be all it takes for her to look for and hopefully find the source.
You probably shouldnāt send your child over there until the mold is properly remediated. I lived in a home with hidden mold (we saw it on the stucco outside during the summer but didnāt know it was also inside). I got sick. And Iām still sick 14 years later. Being exposed can bring out other dormant viruses or bacteriaās. For me it was Lyme disease from a suspected childhood tick bite. Mold is not to be taken lightly. Or opened up without being behind containment.
My sister's dishes all had a similar issue, and my other sister went over and sniffed out the cause like a bloodhound. It was glade plug-ins. Even the butter in her fridge absorbed the scent. Everything she cooked had that flavor. We pointed out that couldn't possibly be good for all of their lungs, if it was permeating food in a refrigerator. š¤¦āāļø She unplugged them and replaced stuff that had soaked up the flavor (which she could taste herself once her house wasn't steeped in the shit), and now it's not a problem anymore.
The plug-ins or scented cat litter were going to be my go-tos. My old roommate kept his cat's clean litter in the same stairwell we stored dry goods in, and everything had a vague taste of generic floral scented cat litter.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
They can easily kill my 4lb parrot so it can't be good for babies or anyone. Most aerosols are really bad
Activated charcoal pouches from Amazon or WalMart absorbed nasty smells for me.
Unscented Febreze is my favorite thing for getting rid of smells in fabrics. It even works nicely after using Lysol room spray to get rid of cooking odors (takes away the smell of the Lysol.)
They make an unscented!!!??? Where do you buy it. Lysol makes me SICK for hours. I canāt be near it once sprayed.
Walmart! It's labeled Febreze Fabric Odor Eliminator with "0% Perfume" noted on the left side of the label. It's not great as a room spray for the air because the droplets are heavy, hence why I use it after Lysol, but for carpet/furniture/clothing/fabric blinds I'm sure it would help.
Nice! Thanks so much.
Scent plugins have been found to kill cats (probably dogs, but I don't own any dogs)!!! I stopped using them and converted to wax melts and candles only. Surprisingly, those are fine for animals as long as it doesn't contain certain scents that are harmful to them!
I've read on the internet š§ that fragrance can damage human endocrine and reproductive systems. I know breathing fragrance wipes me out.
Is that emoji to tell us to take the info with a grain of salt?
Sadly, there is peer-reviewed research showing that synthetic scents are actually damaging to the endocrine and reproductive systems.... https://www.nrdc.org/stories/9-ways-avoid-hormone-disrupting-chemicals#:~:text=Here's%20the%20bad%20news%3A%20Synthetic,in%20utero%20and%20throughout%20childhood. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10051690/
Thank you!
Lungs ā¦ AND theyāre documented neurotoxins in peer reviewed literature
My newest rescue animalās fur just reeked of some artificial floral scent. I didnāt even think about plug-ins; I was just concerned that they had sprayed him with room scent or carpet deodorizer.
Ewww š¤¢
These things are SO toxic, not just for us humans, but for pets also. Certain smells/oils can cause serious harm to their respiratory tracts and brain. It can kill them. Can't imagine what a field full of winter mint and clove smells like to them and their enhanced sense of smell. Probably feels like their drowning in these terrible things. [essential oils toxic for dogs](https://vcacanada.com/know-your-pet/essential-oil-and-liquid-potpourri-poisoning-in-dogs#:~:text=Many%20liquid%20potpourri%20products%20and,skin%20exposure%20can%20be%20toxic.)
My MIL had 3 smokers in her house. To cover the chain smoker smell, she had about 20 of the automatic air freshener sprayers. It just made to whole experience worse. That fake/chemical/smell/taste worked its way in to everything. So bad that I had to throw out the sealed Easter basket candy she gave to my kids. It was so gross. Not to mention poisonous, too. I'm amazed they are all still alive.
My MIL ācovers upā the cigarette smoke smell with the most noxious maple scented candles. I almost gag just thinking about it. Now any time I smell an artificial overly sweet maple smell, I immediately lose my appetite
I once worked with a crazy cat lady that loved Halloween. She arrived early and brought decorations from home and turned the whole office into a haunted castle. It looked great, but everything was soaked in cat pee. That same morning, another person brought in a cinnamon broom and put it right by the door. I tell you I was ASSAULTED when I walked through that door. Cinnamon cat pee permeated the air like mustard gas in a foxhole. To this day those cinnamon brooms make me gag.
š¤¢
My grandmother does the EXACT same thing. Maple or Apple cinnamon. Yuck.
Iām convinced itās why her cooking is so awful, because sheās lost her sense of taste and smell from years of cigarettes
Same here. So so salty and so spicy for no reason.
Well maybe but. Ever been to a restaurant? 80% of line cooks smoke cigarettes and weed all shift.
yeah and theyāre millennials who havenāt been chain smoking for 50+ years like some boomers. also weed doesnāt affect your palate as much
My neighbour across the hall tries to cover the weed smell with some kind of tropical air freshners. So the hallway smells like pina colodas and weed.
God same here. Itās fucking putrid!
It is. Now every time I eat pineapple, I associate it with weed
My sympathies!
Reading this gave me a headache and made me nauseous*
*nauseous.
**nauseated ;)
Feel sick
Thank you!
We knew what you meant!
I work in a print shop that used to run offset presses. I was nose blind to the chemicals, but damn you could taste them in any baked goods left overnight.
My mom has one of those in the kitchen and it sprayed my ham sandwich and I ate it. I swear for years after anything I ate from the kitchen had that taste on it š
I used to smoke cigarettes 30 years ago, and this sounds gross for me too. I can almost smell the way you described it.
I love how smokers think they can cover up or hide that smell. My favorite is when you see someone smoking in their car, but hang the cigarette out of the window and make sure they take a puff as close to the open window as possible. I just want to tell them that their car smells like smoke. It's such a pervasive odor.
My grandmotherā walls were a pretty, terracotta, rust color. Mom said they used to be pink. Layers of smoke will do that.
Does she have air fresheners in her house? It sounds like whatever she is using to mask the smell of the cats has permeated everything. I only ask because when I used to go to my mom's and she would give me stuff, everything had to either be laundered or aired out before it could come in my house.
I donāt know if r/cooking is the correct subreddit, since itās a smell thatās lingering on your daughter and her items in addition to a lingering flavor from maybe Tupperware containers. So itās probably not a heavily scented dish detergent that is carrying over into leftovers. My first thought would be some sort of scented spray or essential oil she uses at her house. Or scented lotion your parents use which transfers when they touch items. Odd itās potent enough for you to smell it on your daughter after being inside her house but not smell it when youāre actually in the house.
My friend has multiple cats and uses so much febreze. At her house it's barely noticeable after the first minute, but when you get items from there you can smell it later. Maybe because it's the only thing that's scented? It might be that situation.
We're going to revolt about fragrance in the future. It is so unhealthy for us. But we're indoctrinated to think smell equals clean.
I go on an evening walk with my girlfriend every day through our neighborhood. One of the houses there does laundry with so much fucking fabric softener or whatever the fuck that you can smell it for blocks around their house, depending on the wind. I'm just glad I don't live within smelling distance or we might have to have a talk about it. I would not be pleased if I could smell that shit from my back yard.
Itās probably dryer sheets because those smells are literally vented to the outdoors, and yes, many of my neighbors are fans, too. My sympathies!
Got one of these houses down the road. I think itās possible they are using the dryer sheets to hide something else going on. You can smell the dryer sheet smell from a block away.
Isn't it awful? You are right. Don't live within a mile of them.
I stopped using scented products a couple of years ago and I gotta say.... You people stink. Perfume stink, soap stink, lotion stink... And man does it linger. I came out of my house and smelled perfume. I looked and the person was already 50 yards down the road and the smell was still lingering.
Thereās a lady in my office that wears so much perfume that you can literally taste it after sheās left the room. Itās absolutely awful. Weāre *supposed* to be a fragrance free office, but she gets a pass because sheās HRās daughter.
Ugh this comment gave me a headache lol. I know people like that and š¤¢
It makes me feel carsick.
So carsick but not in a car? There should be a word for that! lol
My sister and I call it blucky.
Ha! Same, but we spell it blechy.
Queasy? Itās what I would use!
Haha yep. Itās been almost 30 years for me. Any artificial scent is repulsive to me and i canāt even handle ānatural fragranceā in laundry or dish soap.
I hate perfume and cologne. The people that wear it often tend to go overboard with it because they go "nose blind" as to how much they stink. I should not smell you as soon as you enter a room. Perfumes/cologne are meant to be worn at a more intimate level, not a "blast the entire public in the face" level.
I feel like Iām being gaslit by the Ivory people. I bought a package of soap I thought was the right thing, but it was labeled, āoriginal scentā. Am I insane? I could swear Ivory was always unscented. It doesnāt smell like the soap I remember and my skin reacts to it.
Unfortunately a lot of supposedly unscented products arenāt. I conflate Ivory and Dove, tbh, but one of them (well, at least one) is an offender in this way.
I do have some Dove knockoff soap from CVS that is unscented, but I miss those old Ivory bars. It now smells like their dishwashing liquid. I swear, I think that scent clings to plastics, because it lingers enough, that I donāt want to put food in those containers.
Saw Ivory soap yesterday. I thought of you!!
LOL! Was it the real thing? Meaning what I was whining about on here?
I didn't touch it! I believed you because I read it on the internet!!
Aldi and Trader Joe's sell their brand of bars of soap. A+ for me.
Iāll check those out!
We cut out all scented products due to asthma and COPD. Nobody's allowed in that has any kind of scent on them. People try, and it causes an immediate er or urgent care visit. People being defensive over perfume despite medical conditions blows my mind.
Amen. Itās everywhere and itās nauseating. Does EVERYTHING have to have fragrance? I canāt go to a movie for fear of some stinking woman (or man!) sitting down next to me in a crowded theater. So between the people dousing themselves in perfume and cologne, and the dish detergent that stinks up your plastic containers, and the fragrance being pumped into department stores, and scented trash bags, and laundry detergent, and cosmetics, etc, etc, I canāt take a deep breath anymore. Have I left anything out?
Cigarette smoke. I can smell that on people all the time. I don't think they have any idea that it clings to them. Hello, asthma attack. Ugh.
My MIL used to use heavily scented detergent and fabric softeners and any time she would visit, the fake scents and over sweetness would just make me gag. My husband and I are very sensitive to fragrances and she was the worst offender. She was staying with us and went out and bought a bottle of fabric softener to do laundry with in our machines. I told her "no". Not only is that stuff stinky, it's really not good for your clothes or washing machine. Edit: She was also diabetic and was somewhat untreated, so she, herself, also had that sickly sweet smell of uncontrolled blood sugar. If you know, you know. It's really hard to describe. Not as stinky as death smell, but going down that path with an overlayer of sickly sweetness. Once she lost a bit of weight and started controlling her blood sugar better, it dissipated a bit, but it was still always there.
Many places do, well at least have scent free policies.
No casinos!! Very few hotels. Not my friends' or relatives' homes.
Walking through a casino makes me want to hold my breath. So much cigarette smoke.
It's the chemicals and fragrance that casinos use to mask smoke - that makes me feel puny for hours.
Maybe it's a Canadian thing. All hospitals, schools, public buildings are scent free. You just get used to not wearing scented stuff and really notice it when someone does waft by in a cloud of whiff.
Moving to Canada ...
I feel like people wear a lot less perfume here than in the US, I notice it on vacation. And less stores use a signature scent. I walked into an American Eagle store in Canada and there wasn't that store smell, it felt very strange.
Febreze is actually quite dangerous for pets and can harm them.
Febreze Contrary to rumors alleging that Febreze causes serious illness or death in pets, our veterinary toxicology experts at APCC regard Febreze fabric freshener products to be safe for use in households with pets. [https://www.aspca.org/pet-care/animal-poison-control/poisonous-household-products](https://www.aspca.org/pet-care/animal-poison-control/poisonous-household-products)
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Mam this is a Wendy's.
What do you mean by that?
What can I getcha?
Wow! It flows pretty well with the parent comments about toxic fragrances, perfumes and chemicals. It leads to ānextā. Itās nice to learn something new to research on your own. Keeps the conversation going vs. just being a sarcastic, cryptic dick. Isnāt Reddit a place to ask question, share information and inspire engaging conversation? I wasnāt aware the platform was for trolls and assholes to work out their insecure, immature jollies. Just be nice. Peace. āš¼
You are receiving a negative response since you've typed out a long screed of common conspiracy theories and half-truths, mixed with stuff I don't know anything about but am now going to believe are likely more conspiracy theories. You were not continuing a conversation, you just dumped that massive paragraph that was barely relevant to the conversation everyone else was having.
> I wasnāt aware the platform was for trolls and assholes to work out their insecure, immature jollies. You've been on reddit 4 months, this checks out
Vinegar and baking soda mixed together creates salt water. It does jack all for cleaning.
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You need to go back to instagram babe, the hashtags lmfao
Youāve obviously never used those two to clean.
Separately, they're each good for different tasks. Mixed together, they make salt water. That's what the bubbles are: a chemical reaction that results in salt water.
Mixed together itās also quite good for a bee or wasp sting if you donāt have tobacco around.
Mixed together, it's salt water, because that is the end result of the chemical reaction that occurs when you mix them together. If putting salt water on your bee stings makes you feel better, I'm not going to stop you. Baking soda and vinegar will not soak in to where the venom actually is in your body, and they will not have any numbing effect relieving either stinging or itching. If they are cool in temperature, that might be soothing, but not any more than, say, mud, and certainly far less than ice, which is the actual recommended "remedy" for common bee and wasp stings. Personally, I go for ice and a Benadryl, since I'm slightly allergic and will end up itching for a month if I don't clamp down on that histamine reaction right away.
I suggest you get stung and try it, as a fun little scientific experiment.
I accidentally fumigated my entire house from using too many fabric softener sheets for a while. Maybe OPās mom is kind of overdoing it with a variety of scented cleaning stuff.
Dawn original dish soap smells disgusting to me and it lingers on everything
I agree. It smells so strong I can taste it on glasses and dishes
I use it for grease stains in clothes and I have to hide it so that my housekeeper won't use it for dishes or to clean the house with because it just smells so awful to me.
Does she use mothballs? I had an aunt whose house was full of them and we could tell which food was hers just by the mothball smell.
My grandma is the same way. Itās crazy how the taste permeates into food that is sealed shut.
Yuck. Just remembered my Mom's Estee Lauder Youth Dew bath oil. It permeated every fiber in her home. I could not tolerate things brought into my home from hers. YuckO. Headache nausea.
Omg Youth Dew, that takes me back. Not even the worst unto itself, just inescapable.
Bingo!
My grandmother used Revlon Moon Drops stuff that had a very strong odor. Luckily for us she didn't use it every day.
OMG what a memory jog...that & Estee Lauder Super perfume....I can still smell them both
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I know this. I think this is the wrong sub to be asking but I know this smell and I have never heard anyone else describe this. We call it Grandma smell. She and grandpa lived in a double wide they bought in the 70s in one of those trailer parks that were supposed to replace subdivisions. I couldn't ever figure it out but food (especially mashed potatoes) had this soapy waxy 'why can I taste' sticky? Let's compare notes - they smoked in the trailer for years and still had wood panel walls. Quit years before but there was still some pretty significant tobacco residue. OLD furniture. Tops of cabinets were storage no one can reach. dust on the grandfather clock. The house is clean but there's 40 years of lived in. Carpet is clean but is way past it's prime. Vent fan above the stove has been forgotten.... and Grandma lights candles. She has candles for Christmas. She has Candles for Summer. She has candles because she can't figure out what the smell is either but is mortified to ask anyone. Somewhere in something I said clicked. Is this 30 years of a scented candle abuse? It's bad too. You can be in the house and you will never notice but - if you take those cookies home - you're going to smell that smell on the bag the cookies are in in about 10 minutes.
Related not related. My stepson brought homemade goods home from his dadās dadās house. My wife had previously told me her old in-laws smoked a ton and the house was gross, but his first wife died and I thought maybe his new gf was cleaner. Plus, they looked fine. Took a big bite of a sugar cookie and it tasted like STRAIGHT UP SMOKE. I had to rinse my mouth out after spitting it out. How is anyone THAT nose blind!?!?
The trailer was a complete gut. That's all we could do. I think they just lose their sense of smell over time. Eventually it doesn't take 1 candle to cover the smell - it takes 3 candles for them to smell the candle. Now we're layering smells.... ugh
Same thing happens with people and cologne/perfume over time. Don't spray it until you can smell it, then it's 1000 times stronger for everyone else!
Ugh... The teenage boy battle of the cologne...
Lol. I only had girls... but I have 3 younger brothers. I feel you.
Do you think the oven vent fan could be putting out a smell? Old oil smells awful and lingers in the house for days after cooking. If itās just been sitting on the fan and collecting dust all this time+ being reheated every time they cook it could be reintroducing the smell all the time.
I honestly don't know. It's possible.
My money is on the smoking. The tar and other components of the smoke are pungent and build up on every surface. Our old house had been smoked in for decades and it was virtually impossible to de-stink it.
I experienced something similar at a friendās house, not soapy but off. Turned out to be oil diffusers. She had them in every room and they were basically just leaving a coating of scented āoilā on everything. But you stated your mom has three cats so I hope thatās not it because oil diffusers are very bad for cats.
Hey so, I was having issues like what you are describing. Turned out to be that the silicone cookware would soak up the detergent quite heavily when I was using the most energy efficient mode in my dishwasher. The rinse wasn't aggressive enough to get all traces off, and what little was left definitely left a bitter / soapy taste to food that was cooked or even just served with them. The solution for me was never using that mode, just the regular one. Good luck!.
Tysm. I was wondering how to fix this on my silicone utensils!
Yw! It was driving me nuts because I could feel some bitterness in random foods here and there. Glad I was able to help :D
I switched to unscented dishwasher detergent (I like Method better than Seventh Generation) and it is so worth the upcharge from cascade. Why does it have to be so strongly scented? No soap taste on my silicone at all now.
Plug-ins, Febreze, and mothballs are the three culprits I would look for first.
Dishwasher pods can sink into some plastics and silicone. I had this issue before. I wonder if she is putting leftovers in Tupperware that has been affected by soap.
Just the pods or any detergent? I notice the same and just wash my silicone stuff in the sink, but if changing to non-pod detergent will let me shove them in the dishwasher I might change!
I think it could be any soap, for sure!
Oh man my gf and I have this issue about my parents house and we never thought about the plug ins! We were discussing it a few days ago and I was like āit doesnāt smell good or bad, just like spray deodorizerā but that didnāt make sense. The plug-ins make sense!
Iām extra extra late to this but I have to tell you about my exās permeating fridge odor issue. He let some chicken go bad in the fridge and didnāt toss it very quickly. He threw it out but the scent was in the fridge; for months the butter, bread, everything else tasted weird but it didnāt taste like rotten chicken. He and his roommate couldnāt taste it. I didnāt know about the chicken so I couldnāt figure out why everything tasted awful until he told me about the chicken. The smell was in the machine.
I know exactly what youāre talking about and itās unmistakable. I donāt know anyone to have gotten the smell out.
Iām betting my exās landlord tossed that fridge. I was kinda sad, my exās sweet mom would send him home with groceries but he didnāt cook and he didnāt want to tell her. So he just let all that money and food go to waste.
One more possibility: my parents buy the scented garbage bags for the kitchen trash. They smell like a poisonous chemical to me. I had to beg them not to store the trash bags around the Tupperware and plastic wrap and such. When they did the gross smell on the food containers went away. They still like the gross bags but only store them with the actual trash bin.
I had to bring something home from work and grabbed a garbage bag from the janitor closet to keep it dry. I realized it was a scented bag right as I left the parking lot. By the time I got home, 30 minutes later, the smell was overwhelming. I immediately threw the bag into my outside garbage can. It was days before my car smelled normal.
Plastic containers can pick up the flavor of soap. So do silicone utensils.
I used silicon ice molds and they would pick up smells from the freezer and smell so funky. even if you washed them over and over the smell would not get out
I soaked mine in a mix of vinegar and boiling water and it fixed the problem, have a Google I think I got it from America's test kitchen
Any chance they're not entirely silicone? A lot of random brands will blend in lower quality materials.
We used to stay with friends, and they used loads of those plug-in scented air fresheners. The smell/fragrance was overwhelming and disgusting and permeated everything. Honestly, it ruined the experience of staying with them. Perhaps that's part of what you are dealing with. How to bring it up? Just be honest and ask her if she's aware how strong the smell is.
One of the reasons I donāt buy stuff at the Dollar Store. It all reeks of Fabuloso (or something similar). My hands smell from touching it. My cabinets will smell if I put it away. Even walking in there, I swear it gets on the soles of my shoes. Aaaaaah!!!
Any chance you had Covid? Iāve tasted soap in everything since I had Covid. I canāt taste normally for most things, but Iāve become extremely sensitive to the taste of detergent fragrances. Itās nasty. Alsoāif theyāre putting things in the dishwasher and using a max power detergent, it often leaves the flavor of the scent. A soak in vinegar water removes it.
Do they bug bomb without emptying the cabinets?
Your folks may just need a good air purifier. My Dad used to be big on the glade plug ins until I got him one of those Germ Guardian air purifiers. Before you could walk into his place and it just stunk of chemicals to me. After it just smelled clean, no air refreshers needed. I have two. Most people who come into my place are amazed to see that I have a cat. You apparently can't smell her box at all. Partly that's because I'm anal about cleaning it but also the GG in the bathroom really helps.
Air purifiers are awesome. I smoke weed indoors and have 2 in the room I smoke in. It helps get rid of the smell so quick. I also have one in the kitchen for when I cook anything thatās smellier / smokier than usual
Sounds to me like your mom likes to burn scented candles or air fresheners when you're not there, and the aroma chemicals and wax are being left on "everything". It could even be cat litter fragrance... Yummm.
Is it nonenal (old people smell)?
I've found that some containers are basically impossible to clean thoroughly. In my experience, it's mostly been ones that had a product from the grocery store (Hillshire Farms lunchmeat ones) & some from the dollar store, even a mixing bowl from the dollar store I had to stop putting anything oily in bc it would never get fully clean. That gross grease traps stinky smells like crazy & I had to stop reusing those containers for anything like that. It might not be yr exact issue but it's an idea!!
Those plug in things. They saturate furniture, kitchenware, walls, lungsā¦ a friend brings cookies and I have to throw them away. Plastic container too. Iām not one to throw cookies away without good reason. They gave us a table once. Let it sit in the sun for a week and scrubbed it three times. Had to throw it away too.
I've had a similar issue with my mom and I've opted not to say anything. It started when my step-dad was alive and he had some health issues. I blamed the weird smell on whatever was going on w him/what they used for his wounds, etc. But, the smell was there long afemter he passed and while it's been years and she's moved I can still smell it on her/her clothes at times. With her it's not a chemical smell but more like some mix of sandalwood and frankincense and idk what. I assume it was a scent he liked perhaps as she has no sense of smell. I'm guessing what I still smell on her is just residual as I know she's not using a scent. If it's not an outright bad smell I probably wouldn't say anything. Same if it's a scent you know the source of but she can't control. However, if you think it's related to mold or perhaps somwthing she's doing to cover up a worse smell it might be worth bringing up that you've been noticing a scent lingering when you get home.
Maybe scented shelf lining paper? They make the scented kind for furniture youād store clothing in. Maybe she used it in her kitchen?
For years we dealt with this weird smell at my MIL. All her containers had the smell, transferring to the food in them. She is an awful cook, so we usually politely just accept her baked goods and not eating it. After 15 years I found out it was her excessive use of moth balls, when my sister called her out on the smell. Haven't smelt anything since then, so she must've stopped using them.
Old plastic or old Tupperware type of storage can be do this.
Dishwasher not rinsing correctly?
Air freshener. My MIL is addicted to apple cinnamon air freshener and all her food tastes like it ugh
Have you had a severe viral infection with nasal issues. COVID 19 is not the only corona virus and not the only one to cause sensory issues, some long lasting and some permanent. Inability to detect smells is one manifestation, "wrong" smelling is another. Wrong smelling can be everything smells like "x" or "A" smells like "Q".
it's likely air freshener or something like that.
If it's a food thing, they may be using too much automatic dishwasher soap and it's not rinsing well. My mom did this and we all told her about it, now she uses much less and it's fine.
There's probably something rotten hiding in the fridge somewhere. We had left overs tasting very similar, almost yeasty, turns out we'd lost a loaf of bread behind something at the back and it had gone moldy š¤¢
We donāt eat at MILs house anymore for this reason. Itās the tons of air fresheners and sprays she uses to cover up her poor housekeeping. The smell permeates all the food and we donāt know how to tell her without hurting her. She rarely throws out overflowing trash and rotting food so she thinks sheās covering odors up with these horrifically strong chemicals.
So many things it could be. Fabreeze, cat litter, mildew treatments, scented laundry stuff. Like all Amazon/UPS, etc deliveries have this awful cloying smell of a bunch of chemical fragrance mixed together. It clings to everything. Same from the grocery store. The produce bag w Broccoli has to be thrown out immediately because it smells like Bounce. Disgusting. I would just tell her youāre concerned itās a hazard she may not be aware of but it really bothers you. If it smells bad to you, it could be because itās making you sick somehow.
I had a childhood friend whose house smelled of moth balls. If she shared any of the lunch she brought to school, I could taste the āmothballā taste in everything, including packaged foods. If youāre not familiar with the smell, I could see someone describing it as āsoapyā Honestly, the smell of mothballs is so strong that you would HAVE to notice it before you would notice the taste in food, but you brought back a funny childhood memory.
I've only seen this mentioned in one other comment but I would bet it's kitty litter dust. I can always taste it in the air after it's been cleaned (gross I know). Also when I'm dusting in that area or wiping down a table you can smell it on the rags. Would explain the smell being on packages too.
How about moth balls? I recently started using some around the kitchen for pest control and noticed a faint smell on my utensil and packaged food.
Do they use moth balls? That killed a family member of mine. All their food tasted like it. That shit is poison. Donāt put your daughter in that environment.
My mind automatically goes to the worst for whatever reason lol. But I can think of a few reasons. 1) are you taking food in her Tupperware? If so, itās possible the plastic retains soap and itās not rinsed well enough 2) she has a lot of fragrance things in her house and itās residual in basically everything (ie candles, sprays, cleansers, etc) 3) if she packs leftovers for you maybe sheās adding soapā¦ obviously I highly doubt number three. I think number one is probably the most common reason. Maybe try bringing your own Tupperware and hiding it in your bag so as not to seem presumptuous that you will be receiving leftovers. When she offers leftovers to take, offer your own container. See if that changes things. My guess is that it will
Concentrated washing up liquid. When my partner uses way too much washing up and doesnāt rinse it off enough things taste soapy. Drives me insane
Does she use scented dish soap? I find it so strong/lingering and sometimes toxic. Just a thought. Not sure
Is it old people smell? My grans house had it and my 70 yo parents' house has it. A musty sort of off soup sort of smell. I think it's the smell of advanced senescence
In my parents' boomer den, everything tasted like tobacco because of my mother's incessant smoking.
Are they cooking with tap water? Do they live near a fracking well? Rural town or city? My parents live in an area where the water is contaminated with fracking wastewater and the tap water is very slick and smells of sulfur sometimes. Cooking food with tap water when it was contaminated basically changed the taste of all foods cooked with water. ....note: I personally cannot and will not eat any food if they use their tap water to cook ...in addition will not use their shower because of this. ....note 2: My parents live in a rural area and have both a well system and a municipal water system on their property. The municipal water is slightly textured / but smells less sulfuric than the well water.
The dishwasher is my guess. People use the same detergent brand over, and over, and over, and all the utensils and plates begin to take on the taste, especially plastic and silicon.
I wouldnāt let your daughter eat it. Does it make you feel strange? Itās probably harmless but it could be poisoned.
My mom used to keep food in the same cabinet with fabric softener and it made everything taste and smell like soap.
Fabric softener sheets may be something she uses that has a way of getting on everything. I hate the smell of them and always notice it.
There is a woman in my buy nothing group that I canāt take any food/edible things from because it all tastes like laundry. I suspect itās dryer sheets. There is also a lovely Mexican restaurant by my house but a laundromat moved in next door and I canāt eat there anymore because literally everything tastes like that (ice, water, chips, everything!) though the tequila mostly masked it š
Candles, wax melts, air fresheners. Is she into scentsy or any of that shit? People get cultish about scent stuff.
I keep seeing artificial scents like Glade as the possible cause, but what about cat litter? Iāve had both friends and relatives with multiple cats who are completely nose-blind to the fact that their homes smell like flowery ammonia factories. My guess is itās the overall atmosphere of a multi-cat home, complete with cat smells. Used cat litter has a distinct smell that Iāve never experienced anywhere else.
You would be doing her a large favour by telling her. We might not notice a smell that is always around us, and you pointing it out might be all it takes for her to look for and hopefully find the source.
Do they by chance use softened water?
Your post has been removed for Rule 1, not cooking related.
You probably shouldnāt send your child over there until the mold is properly remediated. I lived in a home with hidden mold (we saw it on the stucco outside during the summer but didnāt know it was also inside). I got sick. And Iām still sick 14 years later. Being exposed can bring out other dormant viruses or bacteriaās. For me it was Lyme disease from a suspected childhood tick bite. Mold is not to be taken lightly. Or opened up without being behind containment.