In the lives of each of us, from time to time there are setbacks and unexpected situations for which we are completely unprepared. At these moments, we do everything possible to not fall in the eyes of others and save our reputation.
One such situation is meeting an important person after a large meal with spicy and odorous ingredients. To avoid a communication barrier, everyone should know how to get rid of the smell of onions, as well as garlic and other savory things from their breath.
Believe me, history knows many cases when, due to poor oral hygiene, business meetings were disrupted, love unions collapsed and bloody wars began (but this is not certain).
That is why it is important to take care of the mental health of your interlocutors as soon as possible and neutralize the threat in the form of an unpleasant odor. Especially when the fate of the world and all humanity is at stake.
So, here are the 16 main ways to get rid of the smell of onion and garlic from your mouth. Remember them and pass them on to next generations.
Why does onion and garlic cause bad breath?
Before we start saving your situation, let's figure out why eating onions and garlic affects our breath so much. In fact, there are many reasons for this, but the main one is the increased content of sulfur compounds in these products.
The main chemical that causes problems with fresh breath is allyl methyl sulfide (AMS). It is this that prevents you from overeating on onions and garlic without affecting your fresh breath.
Moreover, you must understand that rinsing your mouth or brushing your teeth will not be able to completely eliminate the unpleasant odor, because sulfur elements enter the bloodstream after eating. Thus, the smell of onions comes not only from your mouth, but also from inside your body when you start talking.
Moreover, in hot weather this smell can come from the pores, so be vigilant. However, you have every chance to minimize the consequences of taking onions and garlic, which we will talk about now.
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Ways to combat unpleasant odor
It is not always possible to independently guess that your breath smells bad. A person does not perceive an unpleasant aroma, so he can judge its appearance by indirect signs. If you have any suspicions, you can use the edge of a spoon to collect plaque from your tongue and smell it. The condition of the saliva is judged by licking the wrist and waiting for it to dry.
You can get rid of an unpleasant odor using traditional methods. At home, a decoction of dill is used to rinse the mouth. At home you can prepare an infusion of medicinal herbs with anti-inflammatory and antibacterial effects:
- chamomile;
- Oak bark;
- sage;
- mint;
- calendula;
- St. John's wort.
At home, a decoction is prepared from a mixture of several herbs to increase effectiveness. The infusion must be highly concentrated to suppress the growth of bacteria and cleanse the oral cavity.
If halitosis is associated with eating foul-smelling ingredients, parsley or celery root will help get rid of it. They block foul odors, and chewing the fibrous structure cleanses the teeth. Observance of a drinking regime relieves halitosis. Clean water cleanses the oral cavity and keeps saliva in a liquid state.
The reason why these methods do not help are pathologies of digestion and metabolism. You can get rid of them at home only under the guidance of a doctor.
Folk remedies
Unconventional methods help eliminate onion odor quite well.
Various types of herbs help cope well with this task.
The following recipes also help eliminate onion aroma:
- Mint freshens breath due to its antiseptic properties. Grind a small bunch and fill it with hot water. Cover with a lid for 10 minutes, strain, add honey. You can also chew fresh mint leaves.
- Prepare a mixture of two tablespoons of sunflower or olive oils. Add a teaspoon of salt. Rinse the mouth.
- Add equal parts of fresh dill and mint leaves to boiling water. Infuse the decoction for half an hour, strain, and drink.
- Add a tablespoon of a mixture of chamomile, wormwood, and strawberries to a glass of boiling water. Leave for half an hour and strain. This rinse has a refreshing and disinfecting effect.
- Cranberry juice can also neutralize the effects of eating dishes with onions.
- Carrots and potatoes will also help.
- The oral cavity is rinsed with decoctions: cumin seeds and alder leaves are poured with boiling water and cooled. Mint and sage leaves are also poured with boiling water, left for an hour, and cooled.
- Oatmeal can activate saliva production.
How to remove onion smell from hands
Sometimes simply washing your hands with soap does not help get rid of the ingrained smell of onions. What can you do in this situation:
- We prepare liquid soap/gel and some kind of soft abrasive in advance. If you don’t have liquid soap on hand, grate a small piece of bar soap on a small kitchen vegetable grater, add a small amount of warm water, and stir. In 15 minutes you will have hand washing gel. As a soft abrasive you can use fine Extra salt, soda, coffee grounds, tea leaves, sugar, crushed oatmeal, chopped orange, lime, lemon zest (or a little bit of everything).
- Mix the soap base and abrasive, begin cleaning the skin before the salt or sugar, soda (if present in the composition) dissolve.
- Thoroughly rub the mixture into the skin of your hands, paying special attention to your fingertips that were in contact with the raw onion. To enhance the effect, you can use a soft brush (or an old toothbrush).
- Leave the mixture on the skin for a few minutes, rinse with cool water.
The following methods will also help remove the smell of onions from the skin of your hands:
- Take a slice of lemon in your hands and rub it with your fingers. Make movements as if you were washing your hands, let the lemon juice cover the entire surface of your palms. Leave for 3 minutes and rinse your hands with cool water.
- Wash your hands with soap, take a piece of raw potato and rub its juice into the places on your skin that give off the unpleasant smell of onions.
- Rub a few fresh mint leaves with your fingers.
To avoid the problem of onion smelling on your hands in the future after cooking, use rubber gloves when chopping vegetables. Or at least rinse your hands with cold water before cooking, the pores of the skin will narrow and the epidermis will not absorb the onion aroma too much.
Useful video
Below is a useful and informative video about ways to get rid of odor on your hands:
Onions contain a large amount of vitamins and microelements, protect the body from various infections and help with colds. In addition, it has a piquant taste and is indispensable in cooking. Despite the unpleasant disadvantage of onions, you should not limit the consumption of this healthy vegetable. By following simple recommendations, you can easily get rid of the consequences of eating onions without denying yourself the pleasure of enjoying your favorite food.
Do you need a diet?
To eliminate the onion stench, people do not need to exhaust their bodies with diets. It is enough to reduce the amount of this vegetable in your diet to reduce discomfort for others.
If it is used to prevent colds, it should be used in dried form.
During the drying process, the onion will not lose its natural properties, but at the same time it will lose its pungent odor.
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How to remove onion smell from dishes and kitchen appliances
Usually, the kitchen board on which it is cut is the one that suffers the most from the ingrained smell of onions. Moreover, it does not matter what material it is made of (except glass, which is not susceptible to food odors). If it is made of plastic, onion juice penetrates into small crevices from cuts, and the unpleasant aroma lingers for a long time. If the board is wooden, this is even worse, since even the densest and strongest wood perfectly absorbs vegetable juice with all its aromas. So let's start with how to remove onion smell from a cutting board, here are a few ways:
- Rinse the product under cold running water, using a brush with stiff bristles.
- Take salt and soda in equal proportions, add a few teaspoons of lemon juice, mix. Before the bulk ingredients have time to dissolve in the citrus juice, apply the mixture to the entire surface of the board and begin to rub it in with a brush. Make circular motions as if you were polishing a surface. Rinse the cutting board with plenty of cool running water.
- Wash the board with detergent (preferably liquid laundry soap or soap shavings dissolved in water). Then wash the surface with table vinegar and rinse the product.
- Wet the board with water (plentifully), apply dry mustard to the surface, rub it in with a sponge or brush, and rinse with water.
- Pour the already washed board generously with an aqueous solution of citric acid. We take the proportions “by eye”, several teaspoons of powder per glass of water. Leave for 5-10 minutes, then rinse thoroughly under the tap.
If the smell of onions has ingrained itself into other wooden or plastic kitchen utensils (dishes, for example), simply soak them for 30 minutes in a solution prepared according to one of the above recipes. To ensure that the solution completely covers the products, they can be placed in a large container and pressed with some kind of weight. If the dishes/kitchenware are made of glass, ceramics, steel, or covered with enamel, it is very easy to eliminate the smell of onions - just wash the items with detergent in cool water.
Prevention
It is almost impossible to prevent the appearance of an unpleasant odor after eating onions.
But, if people follow the general recommendations given by experts, they can reduce the intensity of the stench:
- Before use, chopped vegetables should be doused with boiling water or marinated in vinegar.
- If a person eats onions cut into small pieces, then a less pungent smell will be left behind.
- Since after each meal the smallest fragments of food settle not only on the surface of the teeth and in the interdental spaces, but also on the tongue, it is recommended to clean this organ during hygiene measures.
- When brushing your teeth, you need to use not only a brush with toothpaste, but also a special floss.
- If possible, people should try to consume this “seasoning” in the evening, when they do not need to leave the house.
Fruits and vegetables
Fans of fresh onions who want to quickly get rid of the not-so-pleasant aroma need to make sure that they always have fruits and vegetables in their home. Fruits, which tend to quickly darken in the air, are, oddly enough, a very effective remedy. You just need to cut an apple or pear and wait until the fruit darkens. The fact is that these fruits contain an oxidizing enzyme, which, when it enters the oral cavity, reacts with sulfur compounds and neutralizes them. And there are no sulfur compounds - no smell.
Important! Similar properties are endowed with: eggplant, cucumber, zucchini and tomato.
Apple
An apple works instead of a toothbrush (Photo: pixabay.com)
One of the most effective remedies. Apple contains acid and phenols, which helps not only get rid of odor, but also “clean” your teeth without a brush. Of course, you can’t completely replace brushing your teeth with fruit, but the method is suitable for a one-time solution to the problem. Pineapple and citrus fruits (orange, grapefruit, lime) act similarly.
To remove odor, eat only fresh apples. Dried and baked fruits will not work.
Medicines
How to remove bad breath using pharmaceutical products? It helps a lot, especially if you drank a large amount of alcohol the day before, the drug Atoxil, Polysorb. These drugs have an adsorbent effect, which consists in the rapid removal of alcoholic breakdown products from the body.
A solution of Chlorophyll, which contains a green pigment found in plants, will help in the fight against unpleasant odors. It has a deodorizing effect. In addition, regular use of the medicine helps to destroy microbes in the oral cavity, eliminate wounds and inflammatory processes in the gums.
Chlorophyll is also added to toothpastes and mouth rinses. The substance is found in spinach, broccoli, dill, etc. Therefore, these products must be included in the diet of a person with halitosis.
Hydrogen peroxide 3% eliminates stench for a long time and gets rid of pathogens. The rinsing procedure is carried out 2-3 times a day.
An effective disinfectant is Septagol. This is an antiseptic, which contains eucalyptus ester, mint, as well as thymol, menthol, benzalkonium chloride. The drug is able to destroy bacteria, relieve irritation from mucous membranes, and improve breathing.
The drug Asepta refreshes and eliminates microbes in infectious and inflammatory diseases of the oral cavity. It contains peppermint oil, methylparaben, carboxymethylcellulose, metronidazole and chlorhexidine.
Infresh lozenges are very popular for poor breathing. They contain extracts of mint, alfalfa, wheatgrass, as well as chlorophyll. Lollipops have a long-lasting effect.
What to do to get rid of onion smell
Well-known ways to help:
- Drinking milk is an excellent remedy to combat the repulsive odor. The amber will quickly go away if you drink a glass of dairy products.
- The zest of citrus fruits will relieve a person of the taste of garlic or onion in the mouth in a short period of time. It is enough to eat a small piece of the product.
- You can use nuts after your main meals and snacks.
- Rinse your mouth with clean water after eating.
- Chew parsley leaves.
- Roast almonds and walnuts and chew.
- Brush your teeth with special toothpastes.
- Use chewing gum.
- Karmadon grains must be chewed to give freshness to the breath. If you don’t have plant seeds at home, use coffee beans. Seasonings, tea, cinnamon, and cloves can help very well.
- Cranberry juice destroys the aroma of dishes that contain onions or green onions.
- Oatmeal stimulates sufficient saliva production.
Methods that urgently neutralize onion odor from the mouth help quickly eliminate the unwanted effect and leave the opportunity to eat a healthy vegetable at a convenient time.
How can you tell if you smell?
- Cover your nose and mouth with folded palms and exhale. If there is an unpleasant odor, it will be easy to smell. This method is well suited for testing breath in a public place, as it is the most invisible to others.
- Lightly lick the inside of your wrist - the smell that appears after the saliva dries will give you an idea of the smell from your mouth. You should not carry out such a check if there are strangers around.
- Exhale air into a clean cup that fits tightly to your face. Then take a deep breath - this way you can smell the breath.
Recommendations
In order to remove the smell of onions from the mouth, use products belonging to one of the following groups:
- Products with a rich but pleasant aroma.
- Natural or artificial antiseptics that kill bacteria in the mouth.
- Products that accelerate oxidation processes - this allows you to quickly remove from the blood the remnants of onion sulfur compounds, which are the source of the unpleasant odor.
In addition, there are a number of general recommendations that can reduce the negative impact of onions on human breathing even before consuming the product:
- in a dish that is served before an important meeting, the onion is cut as finely as possible - this way a large proportion of allicin will disappear from the cut before it enters the human body;
- at a festive feast, it is better to eat dishes with onions first - so there is a high probability that the subsequent drinks and dessert will overwhelm the specific smell of onions;
- During cooking, onions can be scalded with boiling water - heat treatment destroys a significant part of the sulfur compounds.
Using these tips when preparing dishes, you won’t have to eliminate the unpleasant odor after eating them.