Visitors contribute their cilantro stories...

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 "I never encountered cilantro until about 9 years ago. I grew up in south central Florida and had been exposed to little ethnic foods. Even through 10 years of being an Army wife and living in TX and OK,I was never exposed cilantro.

My first experience was at a Mexican restaurant while eating salsa. I had been eating salsa for years and never bit into anything disgusting before! All I could think of was that someone had gotten pieces of metal in my food.

After eating with some co workers for lunch one day, I told someone how awful the food tasted. I was then informed that there was cilantro in the food. I didn't even know what it was and had to do some inquiring about the stuff. Of course, they had to tell me how much they loved it!

Over the past few years, I have asked at restaurants if there is cilantro in what I'm ordering and even when they say no, sure enough, it's still in there.

Last Saturday, (May 10th), my husband took me to The Cheesecake Factory for a Mother's Day lunch. (Nothing in there is a low priced meal.) I saw salads that had cilantro in them and made sure NOT to order one of those. So, I ordered the Asian Chicken salad. No mention of cilantro on the menu and for $12.95, I thought I could stay on my Weight Watcher's diet and still have a nice meal. Wrong!

First bite and my face went sour. My husband asked what was wrong and I said "there's cilantro in this salad". He asked how I knew because it was a lot of greens and small amount of chicken. I told him I know that taste and I hate it. I politiely asked the waitress if this salad was supposed to have cilantro in it because it was not listed in the ingredients. She said no and I explained how I HATE cilantro. She was great. Took my salad back and said she'd have a new one fixed without the nasty stuff.

I got my new salad after my husband was totally done with his food and again on the first bite, there it was! I was starving at this point and thought I'd just pick out the shredded (4 ounces)of chicken they put on the salad. When the waitress came back, she asked if it was any better. I just looked at her and said "no, this has it too".

She didn't understand because she said each dish is prepared to order. Now, I've worked in a restaurant before and know that lettuce is chopped and prepared ahead of time because there is no way they chop it for every single order of salad. Especially in a restaurant that has lines hanging out the door!

The waitress asked if I would like to talk to a manager. I told her no. I was too hungry to wait for another meal and I wasn't trying to get one for free. But, I did ask for a box and took the remains home for my husband.
I'm sure that since they have salads on their menu that DO have cilantro, they just go ahead and chop it up and put it in the entire prepared batch of greens and think that no one will notice.

This totally ruined my Mother's Day meal and the fun I was having, plus I had to go home and eat a meal because I was so hungry! What if I had been allergic to it?

My mother says she loves cilantro and puts it in all kinds of food now. She thinks I'm being picky because I tell her how much I dislike this green stuff. Thank goodness she has never put it in anything she prepared for me.

P.S.
I also used a spray several years ago to keep my cat from scratching my furniture. I got it at a pet store made especially for cats who scratch furniture. When I sprayed it on the furniture, I smelled this awful scent. I told my husband that I knew that smell but couldn't place what it was. I kept thinking about what it could be and suddenly it dawned on me. It was cilantro! No wonder the cat won't touch the furniture when you spray that stuff on it!

I HATE CILANTRO!
Tamara
Tampa, FL"




 "Sometime in the late 1980s, I went to a Mexican restaurant in a mall near me. I had gone there many times and enjoyed their food. This time, the dish I ordered tasted funny. I can't remember what it was now, but it might have been tortilla soup. It smelled odd too. I ate some and started getting severe stomach cramps. Since then, I've not touched cilantro knowingly. Even the smell of it makes me ill. It wasn't until years later, maybe 20, that I learned my brother also was allergic to cilantro. We had never discussed it before. It must be a genetic thing. My kids seem able to eat it, but I can't eat any food they cook that has it in it. And they try to fool me too, but I can still smell and taste it."




 "It started out innocently enough. About ten years ago, the four of us were enjoying a leisurely day walking around a North Chicago neighborhood and at lunchtime we decided to stop into one of these new 'noodle' shops for a quick bite. We all ordered our version of the noodles and sat down to enjoy our meal when it started..."What's that funny taste?" my 15 year old said. My wife took a bite of his dish, wrinkled her face a bit and said to me, "try this". First of all, when my wife says 'try this', it's an absolute warning that you should clamp your mouth shut 'cuz whatever it is, you don't want it. Well, the boys are looking so I can't appear weak. I put a few noodles into my mouth and immediately say, "it tastes like pennies". Again, because my boys were there, I swallowed the stuff instead of spitting it onto the floor. I know my wife enjoyed watching me... We called the waitress over and she beamingly told us it was cilantro - wasn't it great?? We all hate it to this day and ask frequently if a dish contains it prior to ordering. Where did this damn stuff come from? It's like, all of a sudden, it was there...everywhere... "





 "My first experience with cilantro was not directly with the herb itself, but with the a simple science experiment. As a sophmore in high school, my science class had a large unit on genetics. To illustrate recessive and dominant genes, my teacher had each of us taste a peice of paper with an edible chemical on it. (I now believe that chemical was most likely phenylthiocarbamide [PTC].) Just as he told us, 25% of us would be able to taste this substance and the other 75% would taste nothing. Me and the five other kids who could taste it all agreed that it had a horrible soapy/metallic taste. All six of us have a set of recessive genes in this particular trait, allowing us the taste the nastiness of PTC. Fast-forward a few years later and I'm eating some authentic Latin American dish and I'm hit with that SAME TERRIBLE TASTE!! My mother tastes the same thing with cilantro. I strongly beleive that this is genetic and we need a more conclusive study concerning the link between PTC and cilantro. Maybe then our voices will be heard!!

P.S. I saw a show on the Food Network where they were trying to find the ulimate chicken dish and one contestant had some sort of cilantro sauce on hers. A judge told her it tasted "medicinal" and she lost! Score one for the cilantro haters!!! "




 "about one year ago i decided to go on a grand adventure... i decided to become an exchange studnet. i choose the country of Costa Rica beacuse i speak spanish and suppossidly the food is delicious. boy was i wrong...

i moved here about one month ago with my host family. i was very excited to try all the new foods.. and on my first day i was served up a heaping plate of declious looking rice and beans. i took one bite and resisted the urge to spit it all out. my food tasted like dish soap!! SOAP. there was soap in my food. i looked at my new family memebers to see if they had dected the soapy food disaster.. but no. they exclaimed how delicious the meal was. by means of magic i managed to choke down the rest of my meal convincing myself that the next would be better.

and once again... i was wrong. the evil green soap plant lurks in all my food here. it is the herb of the country. its in my eggs my beans my rice my soup. i cant seem to escape the horrid flavor. its been two months and there is no end in sight. my host family adores the rancid taste of cilantro. i guess i am stuck choking it down for another eight months... if i make it that long..
"





 "I have hated cilantro for my entire life. And if we have previous lives, those too. My parents tried to tell me it was spinach or some other herb when I was little, just so I would eat the dishes they made with it. But there was no way I could ever eat it voluntarily. It tastes like putrid Elephant poo that has been regurgitated by a albatross with yellow fever into a vat of tar mixed with sewage and the most revolting lard soap. I feel stupid and snobby sometimes when I ask for "NO cilantro, please," But really I'm not trying to be picky. I just plain DETEST cilantro. It ruins Thai, Afghani, Indian, Mexican and Peruvian cuisine for me. The downfall of the world will most likely be related to cilantro. Every last revolting piece of it should be destroyed. Countless amounts of times I have had to "skip out" on meals because of this malicious herb. I hate it so much, and no offense, but anyone who likes it should IMMEDIATLY check themselves into a pysciatric word, wrap themselves in an extra stong straightjacket and ask for a room with extra thick yellow padded walls. It would be doing a big favor to mankind and Mother Earth. I fear every time I eat that the disgusting thing will be in my food. I can't stress how much I loathe it... "




 "I never really thought about it tasting like soap, I just knew that I didn't like its flavour, but that I especially couldn't stand its smell. When my mom would be cutting some up, in the kitchen, the smell would make my whole face hurt - like when you have a bad sinus cold, but without the pressure. I'd have to go upstairs, and even then, I could still smell it a bit and it would make my face uncomfortable. I lived in Indonesia for a while, and Asian food generally is a big thing in our house, and growing up in Vancouver, cilantro was certainly not unheard-of.

I usually do a pretty good job of avoiding it, and a little amount doesn't really do much to me (especially if I'm not present for the preparation of the food), but our office ordered Indian food, which I like, the other day, and the rice had some cilantro in it. Urggghhhh. It wasn't in every bite, either, which just contributed to its cruel trickery. "Oh yum, this is some good rice - NOOOOO!"

Sometimes I feel bad about hating it - does it make me a white-bread eating, chain-restaurant dining, won't eat unusual or foreign food loser? I don't want to be that kind of person! I'm adventurous, I like cooking, I happily devour a variety of interesting foods and cuisines - I even taught myself to like pickles after not eating them all my life, but I just can't handle the cilantro. After all, I just used to think pickles tasted yucky - they never caused me PAIN."




 "I recentley lived in Chile for two years. The first month I was there I was presented, at a house of a native Chilean, with a very aptizing looking dish of salmon, avocado and green leafy plant that I thought to be a parsey garnish. I took a bite and nearly threw up. I quickly learned that this horrible bane was cilantro and that it was the most popular herb and flavoring ingrediant in Chile. As I often ate at peoples houses I was forced to gag my way threw many a meal not wanted to be rude. I had never heard of cilantro before in my life and didn't know anything about it. Everyone else around me loved the stuff and I was so confused about how anyone could enjoy this rancid noxious weed.
I am so glad to back in the U.S. where I am not forced to eat this devil herb. However I have learned that I cannot eat at Indian restaurants as they cover everything they make with cilantro as well.
I was so happy to learn that there are fellow cilantro hater out there and that there isnt something terribley wrong with me. I think that there must be some chemical in the plant that only some people are able to taste and most people are simply unaware about how bad it can taste to us.
Thanks so much to the starters of this website who have made me feel more normal.
"




 "At our office today, we ordered in some Asian food for lunch.

We ate together in the conference room, everyone was happy and chatting and then….”it” hit me... that God Awful taste and smell that all of a sudden consumes every single thing on my plate.

I have never known what exactly it is, in the past I guessed it was lemongrass (because that smells horrible too). I stopped eating and left w/o saying much. Afterwards, I described it to our office coordinator and she told me, "oh, that's cilantro..." Word got around the office and I could hear the office-hens in cackling with laughter as I ran down the hall to expel lunch. To a man, er I mean women, they all said they love it but some did say that their S.O. (male) couldn't stand it.

Cilantro would appear to be the female equivalent to what a cigar can do for guys… send women running! The next time I encounter this poison called cilantro, I’m lighting up a stogie and spreading the misery.

I see it’s grown in California… keep it there."




 "I have always hated the taste of cilantro or coriandernbut didn't realize I was allergic until I was at the produce section of the supermarket waiting to order a platter. the manager came in with a box of fresh clantro and I took one whiff and felt faint and couldn't breathe - like when I am not taking asthma medication. I had to go outside in the winter in 20 degree weather in Boston. but at least I figured it out. I spent several years trying to tell waiters not to give ut to me and they would bring it anyway as many of your readers have said. I discovered the best way to deal with it is to write a card - on your own computer that says that "I am highly allergic to cilantro, coriander and chinese parsley. Please do not serve it to me, please give this to the chef." that usually does the trick. When I was in Australia, I found out that another name for cilantro or a close cousin is thai basil and that was confirmed for me by the chef at Daniel restaurant in NY. so you should all try handing the waiter or chef the card. Most restauranteurs are concerned about liability and won't serve it to you. I now have to change my card to allergic to cilantro, coriander, chinese parsley and thai basil. I also have it translated into Chinese and Hebrew. In French it is "coriandre" or "feuille de coriandre". I hope this helps everyone."





 "Last night I went to a favorite Tandoori restaurant with my wife and some friends. I have known for some time that I dislike cilantro as I once had it sprinkled on some pizza and I couldn't finish the pizza slice - unheard of for me. I ordered my usual garlic naan bread which, the menu read, was sprinkled with cilantro. I meant to ask for it without the disgusting herb, but the conversation diverted my attention. I figured that I would just chance it since it was only a light garnish. Soon into the meal I felt an ache in my stomach and a discomfort that permeated down to my intestines. Cilantro had also been put on the saffron rice but I had not noticed. I spent some quality social time in the restaurant bathroom. It ruined my evening out.
I did some quick research and the disgusting taste/reaction is apparently caused by a congenital enzyme that is not present in the whole population. Too bad, it should be."




 "Actually, we avoided a horrible mishap thanks to this web site. My husband was in the kitchen trying a new recipe for arroz verde (Mexican rice dish), since he invited his mom over for lunch. He was chopping all his ingredients, pablano peppers, green oinion, a lime, ....
then got to the cilantro.
We've never bought it before and he picked it up and said, "Hey, this smells weird. I don't think I should use this in this dish. I think it's bad."
Well, I went on the web to see what it should smell like and lo and behold, I found this website! We laughed for a at least a half hour. My husband said, "See I'm not makin this up!" He prudently left THAT ingredient out of his rice dish.
This site is very clever and very informative. THANX!!!"




 "A few years ago I was making some salsa for a party. Oh it was going to be so good. Fresh tomatoes, peppers yum yum. Before I added the cilantro called for I had tasted it, I should have stopped there as it was the best salsa ever. The party was for some hippie friends and I sadly added the cilantro. I figured it couldn't be that bad. Well, I tasted it again and almost lost my lunch for the last month. It was the grossest food I'd ever tasted.
I brought the salsa to the party where it was eaten all up.
Never again will I ever add cilantro to anything.
I think it tastes like soap."




 "We moved to west San Jose, California many decades ago. I did not encounter cilantro at all while growing up. Being from the east, it was never in our home, and it was not found in any restaurant I visited. Back then, I thought the Mexican restaurants around here were the best. [We are, after all, in San Jose.] Cilantro was not in widespread use at any Mexican restaurant I ever went to back then. I did grow up on the Los Gatos side of west San Jose, but even the Mexican restaurants there were not heavy on cilantro use [back then anyway]. I used to enjoy wonderful salsas all the time. I love Mexican food. That is, I used to love Mexican food, before the cilantro craze. In the late 80's, early 90's it started showing up in the chinese chicken salad at my favorite restaurant. {Ironically, it was not even a Mexican restaurant. It was a new food buffet which gave you a wide choice of healthy fresh foods, which began sometime in the 1980's]. It ruined that [otherwrise]wonderul salad for me. I noticed that every few bites I would get this horrible, nasty, taste in my mouth. I remember thinking "This must be what watered down latrine water tastes like.] I didn't know what it was at first, I just knew it was awful tasting. I eventually discovered the cause -- cilantro. I used to try and pick it out of the chicken salad, because the salad is really excellent otherwise. It never worked very well so now I just have to avoid it. [Note: this buffet is still my favorite restaurant. Except for the chicken dish, everything else is still fresh and wonderful!] As the years went by, cilantro started creeping into more and more restaurant dishes, in a wide variety of restaurants, not just Mexican. The use of it has become epidemic in San Jose. When I first started requesting "no cilantro" the waiters looked at me like I was either crazy or kidding. When I tell people I hate it, and that it makes me physically ill, they act surprised, as if what I'm telling them can't be possible, and I wonder if they actually believe me. This is very irritating. A few days ago I went to a Mexican restaurant for lunch and had to pick around the cilantro. I'm sure I ingested some. I should have known better than to have gone in the first place. But somewhere inside me, I still remember the "cilantro-less Mexican restaurants or yore" , and I keep thinking that "THIS restaurant will be different." I don't know if this borders on insanity or just wishful thinking. Hope springs eternal.

That night at dinner, at a typical family restaurant [that serves typical American style food, i.e. pot roast and mashed potatoes], I ordered what I thought would be a simple shrimp salad with all the normal seasonings you would expect. Quess What? It was a light sprinkling, but I could still tell. Once again, however, I was with a group of friends I hadn't seen in a long time and didn't want to make a big scene so I ate the salad anyway. For the next several dys and nights I had severe cramping in my abdominal tract. I knew immediately what had caused it and made a vow on the spot to never order anything at a restaurant in San Jose again, except for drinks or dessert. [I doubt that cilantro has found it's way onto the dessert cart, but given a few years, who knows?}

I understand the herb is an aid to digestion in some people and it seems most folks around here love it, and that's fine, but it is extremely painful for those of us who are allergic to it, and I wish that more people and more restaurant owners would become aware of it. Our city has an old, rich and very beautiful Spanish heritage, which I have always been very grateful to be a part of. In San Jose, cilantro has become a very popular, healthful, and helpful herb for many people, but not all. Its growing use is becoming a real hardship for those with allergies to it or those of you who just plain don't like the taste. I know that my allergy to cilanto will not stop the tide, but if restaurant owners really knew how many people were going to stop frequenting their establishments because of their use of it, perhaps they would be more willing to put "cilantro-free" dishes on the menu for folks like me -- or at least put on the menu that there's cilantro in the dish so we know to order something else.

Maybe the problem is just because people are not aware that there are so many of us who can't tolerate this herb. I learned on your website of a person who is allergic to parsley. Since I love parsley -- it's garnish on my plate or in my food at a restaurant has never a problem for me. The thought that some people might not be able to tolerate it never occured to me. Perhaps its the same with cilantro. Perhaps just getting word out would be enough to encourage restaurants to consider using it less frequently. If I were a restaurant owner, I would want to know. I'd rather alter my menu then lose good customers. At the very least, I would advise my pa"




 "I first determined there was something I was allergic to in Tex-Mex food when my tongue would swell up and my mouth cover itself in blisters. As I got older, I got a job and was promoted to a cashier in a grocery store. I quickly learned the source of my Tex-Mex food allergy. Everytime a customer would come through with cilantro and it was near me, I would begin to sneeze, break out in hives, and itchy, watery eyes. I asked the customers to personally bag that one themselves because of a severe allergy that I could not even touch it. Only by asking my customers what they USED the disgusting thing in, did I figure out it was the ingredient in Tex-Mex that I could not have. Over the years, I can no longer eat anything in it at all without going into anaphylactic shock. I have to be VERY careful in buying food in the groceries stores that advertice spicy or medium anything. It seems that every company must contain a LUNATIC that needs the stuff in everything. I have also heard word that many companies are actually considering using it as a preservative. Lo and behold if that ever comes to pass. For those of you who DO like guacamole, I can successfully say that the plain Avomex guacamole contains NO cilantro. Also, I have many Hispanic friends, and NATIVE Mexican food does NOT contain cilantro..most do not even like it. "




 "I first encountered cilantro in some homemade salsa that my mom made. I couldn't get over how horrible it was and how I was the only one who seemingly noticed. At that time, I didn't know it was cilantro, and didn't figure it out until years later! The only way I can describe the taste is that it tastes what I envision poop would taste like mixed with soap. (Weird, I know, and I've only seen one other person on this site who thought it tasted like poop would taste, if one so felt inclined to eat it). Gross, gross, gross. My friends are always telling me to get over it...but they can't taste it like I do. Pure evil, ss soon as cilantro hits my palate...I have a violent urge to regurgitate and I spend a minute dry-heaving. If you put me on Fear Factor, cilantro is the only thing I wouldn't eat for $50,000. I wish every leaf of cilantro on Earth would spontaneously combust, leaving only a distant memory of its soapy poopness. Oh, P.S., in addition to cilantro being in Thai, Indian and Mexican cuisine...add Moroccan to that list. P U K E. I am so glad I found this site; I can finally vent my distaste to people who understand! lol :-)"




 "When I was a boy some 40 years ago, we played in these caves. The caves had a rank odor and would leave an unpleasant taste in the mouth. It was caused by a large population of bats in the caves. Bat gauana or bat ****, some would say, was very disgusting. Growing up and leaving the caves and alot of memories later. I saw a recipe for some soup which called for this stuff called cilantro. after a little investigating I discovered it was from coriander. well thats what the manna from Heaven was likened to, so it must be good. I made the soup with that cilantro. I was a little excited, I tasted, gagged spit that **** out when my wife said whats wrong, I said that bat **** from my youth returned..... Amazing how something so disgusting could remain in your psyche so long."




 "I knew nothing about cilantro until that fateful evening at dinner. My wife makes the best soup ever, and I looked forward to her latest masterpiece. The parsley leaves looked a bit larger than usual, and the soup smelled a bit different, but I am one who "eats anything" and enjoys it. But this was different. The taste was not pleasant, but I could eat it, and I didn't want to criticize my wife's cooking. She didn't hesitate to comment on her soup, however, and immediately connected the strange taste and smell to the parsley she had just bought at the produce store the day before. She retrieved the parsley, and the label that tied the bunch together spelled out CILANTRO! Oh, well, she wondered how that happened, because she bought Italian parsley - she thought. (A few days later at that store, she realized the parsley and cilantro were in adjacent trays, and she, in her haste, picked up the wrong one. Not food-wasters (we're both in our 70's - that's how we all are) we did finish the soup.
THAT'S NOT THE WORST PART OF THIS STORY.
Almost immediately after I finished our dinner, I had trouble breathing. Serious trouble, reminding me of my bouts with asthma when I was younger. Was my asthma returning? My wife, not only a great cook but a great amateur analyzer of medical symptoms, thought of an allergic reaction, since I was recently diagnosed as latex-allergic. She forced me to take a benadryl tablet. My breathing difficulties continued, unable to lie down, until 2 A.M., when I could finally lie in bed and sleep.
But was the cilantro the culprit? Later that day, I googled "cilantro allergic" and this site was number 1.
NOW I KNOW THE FULL STORY. Thanks for your site.
I plan to tell the produce store owner about this experience, and maybe he will post a warning. Or at least recommend going to this site.
I didn't read all the postings here, maybe one-third, but did not find an allergic reaction quite like my breathing problem. But I could not be the ONLY one to react like that. There ought to be an investigative reporter to cover this story - to warn others of cilantro's taste and allergic dangers. "




 "The first time I "met" cilantro was in 1998 during a visit to California. We were eating at the swanky Mr. Chow's and I ordered a chinese tofu dish. I took a big heaping mouthful and almost immediately I emptied my mouth contents into my napkin! Ugh! I had no idea what I put in my mouth but I was sure it was pieces of a dirty dish rag from the kitchen. I sent the dish back and got something else. THEN, in the Mexico pavillion in Disney's EPCOT, I ordered some steak dish, took a big forkful and ...there it was again! That taste! Finally, I did some investigating and came to find that I loathed CILANTRO. I am happy to see that I am not alone. Even a minute amount in food will render it inedible to me."




 "About 30 years ago, I had a friend who was Peruzian, and she kept telling me how she missed an herb tht was used extensively in their food in Peru and wondered how she could obtain it in Oregon. She told me the herb was called cilantro. I helpfully suggested that she buy some corinader seeds and plant them, because, being a person who cooked and read recipes, I knew that coriander was the seed of the herb, altho' I had never tasted either myself. She, being desperate for the taste of the herb, did as I suggested and borrowed some land from another friend who lived in the country for the purpose of planting a garden. The cilantro garden flourished and was the bane of the country. The Peruvian was delighted and the friend from whom she rented the land was horrified when rows and rows and rows of the stuff grew waist high! I still had not tasted it, but eventually I stored a bit in my refrigerator and was disgusted at the smell everytime I opened the door. Eventually, I used it in some kind of food I prepared and was horrified at the taste. I blame myself, in part, for the horrific malignancy of the cinlantro invasion of the U.S. and regret sincerely, my part in leading an immigrant toward obtaining the awful stuff! "





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Please contribute YOUR cilantro story.