Bad breath after garlic consumption
Garlic and onions are very healthy and aromatize wonderfully the most different recipes, but they leave - especially the garlic - the typical bad breath, the garlic flag.
The bad breath after garlic consumption - which lasts for up to 24 hours or longer - is the result of the sulfur compound allicin. It is made from the substance Alliin, when you cut, squeeze or chew the garlic, that is, when the cells of the garlic are destroyed. Allicin, in turn, then produces various malodorous substances called diallyl disulfide, allyl methyl sulfide, allyl mercaptan, and allyl methyl disulfide, which in their entirety make up the garlic flag.
However, these substances are not only exhaled, but also get into the blood and are therefore also released through the skin pores. So, anyone who eats garlic not only smells out of the mouth, but also exudes the garlic smell through the skin, which makes it all the harder to get rid of the smell.
Measures against garlic smell are already necessary out of consideration
Now, of course, one could say that in many other countries garlic consumption is completely normal, there is no bothering the next smell and we should just take an example. What may be normal in one country, however, is far from the other - and since garlic is clearly a matter of taste at least in our latitudes, one should take care of his fellow human beings.
Although there are people who do not mind the garlic smell of their counterparts, even if they have not eaten garlic. In the same way, there are people in whom the garlic flag causes someone else to feel nauseous. Therefore - if you can not avoid garlic despite social obligations - measures are necessary, which largely neutralize the garlic odor.
What can you do about bad breath for garlic?
The garlic flag develops particularly extremely when the garlic is eaten raw. You should really only eat raw garlic if you do not come across anyone who has not bitten the raw tuber in the next 24 to 48 hours.
Stew garlic
If the garlic is steamed, roasted, cooked or otherwise heated, this alone reduces the subsequent bad breath in comparison to the raw consumption enormously.
Use whole garlic cloves and remove again
You can also cook or fry the whole garlic cloves and remove them from the sauce (or another dish) before eating them. The food is thereby flavored while the subsequent garlic odor of the breath is limited.
Even in the dressing you can pull whole garlic cloves for 30 to 60 minutes and remove them again before preparing the salad.
Eat apples? Mint leaves munch? Drink green tea?
In a study from September 2016 to investigated the effect of different foods on the garlic breath. The subjects consumed water, a raw apple, boiled apple, apple juice, raw or cooked salad, mint leaves, juice from mint leaves or green tea immediately after eating garlic. Then you measure the content of the typical garlic substances in the breath within the next hour.
The raw apple, the raw salad and the mint leaves could reduce the garlic substances in the breath. Presumably it is the polyphenols (phytochemicals) that remove the said substances from the respiratory air via an enzymatic reaction. Apple juice and mint leafy juice were also still effective, but not as effective as the whole foods. Interestingly, green tea did not show any effect in this study.
The latter may be recommended again and again against the garlic flag, because it is very well suited as a mouthwash to prevent tooth decay and plaque and one concludes that he can generally improve the breath. However, green tea has no particular influence on a garlic flag, as the study presented below confirms.
Brushing your teeth and chewing gum do not help much
The usual tips like drinking water after eating garlic, brushing your teeth and cleaning your tongue will not help against the smell of garlic. Even minty chewing gum, mint dragees or strongly flavored mouthwashes may overpower the odor in the first few minutes, but then immediately the garlic breath comes to the fore again.
Not even against normal halitosis, the measures mentioned could permanently do something, as a study of 2008 showed. In this study, after all, green tea proved to be more helpful than the other remedies (brushing teeth, chewing gum etc.). He was able to better reduce the content of the sulfur-containing substances in the breath, but also only for a short time. After only one hour after green tea consumption, no effect was observed.
Of course, the green tea could only reduce the odoriferous substances in the first hour, but not completely eliminate them.
Drink milk?
In earlier studies, besides apples, green tea, the bitter Kuding tea, plums, pears, mushrooms and milk are also mentioned. Milk, however, should be drunk directly to garlic. Then, it is said, it would help reduce the sulfur compounds of garlic. Whole milk is more effective than fat-reduced milk. Dairy products such as yoghurt, cottage cheese, etc. should be similarly effective. It is best to keep the respective milk product in the mouth for a while in order to work optimally.
Of course, this tip is only of use if the dairy product suits the particular dish and if you would like to eat / drink dairy products or even tolerate them. In addition, as milk protein components are believed to inhibit the action of some antioxidant substances, dairy products may reduce the health properties of garlic, which is again unfavorable if one wants to eat garlic for health reasons.
Drink lemon water?
Even lemon water (1 tbsp freshly squeezed lemon juice to 150 ml of water) is recommended again and again in the fight against the garlic flag. The lemon water should be drunk immediately after a garlic-containing dish.
One option is to place the raw garlic in lemon juice before cooking or steaming and then use it. But also the lemon tips can mitigate the garlic breath experience, only slightly.
Soda, herbs and ginger
Other home remedies for bad breath after garlic consumption are soda, herbs and ginger.
Soda is considered a natural deodorizer. The substance can absorb odors, apparently without having to swallow soda. Put a small spoon of the powder in a glass of water (150 ml) and make a thorough mouthwash.
Certain herbs such as mint leaves (see above), parsley, basil, cardamom seeds and sage mask the odor for a short time. These are best chewed fresh herbs or seeds. However, the garlic smell returns after a short time. You have to chew the herbs practically nonstop to get a helpful effect.
By chewing small pieces of ginger , an enzyme is mobilized in the saliva that breaks down the substances responsible for onion or garlic odor. The effectiveness depends on the extent of garlic consumption. If you have eaten a lot of garlic or possibly raw garlic, you need a lot of ginger pieces to achieve a lasting effect.
However, one not only smells of garlic from the mouth. As explained above, the garlic smell exudes from all skin pores. How could one prevent these body exudations?
What can be done to prevent the smell of garlic?
Since the sulfur compounds of garlic are in the blood and are released only gradually over the skin, it is necessary to accelerate this process by cranking the welding production.
This succeeds over sweaty sports activities, a visit to the sauna (please use only the private sauna out of consideration for the other saunas) or hot baths.
How can you remove garlic smell on your hands?
The garlic smell often sticks to the hands of the cook or the cook. There are different methods that are quite successful:
Very simple is the use of the so-called stainless steel anti-odor soap, an egg-shaped piece of stainless steel, which is simply used as if it were a soap. The stainless steel neutralizes not only garlic odors, but also fish or onion odors.
You can also simply wash your hands with a mixture of vinegar and lukewarm water, or rub your hands with a mixture of salt and lemon juice and then rinse with water. Then dry hands should be creamed or you can add some olive oil to the salt-lemon juice mixture.
Also coffee grounds or soda can be rubbed into the hands instead of soap and immediately rinsed with lukewarm water. Both neutralize bad odors.
How to remove garlic smell from rooms?
Even the rooms smell of garlic, if cooked there with the spicy tuber or even if it was only eaten there.
Just as with the odor neutralization of hands, the same remedies can also be used in rooms. So you can, for example, bowl with vinegar or soda or freshly ground coffee beans set up.
Or boil water with vinegar in the ratio of at least 1: 1 and let the vinegar water evaporate in small bowls. It may also be helpful to rub one or the other piece of furniture with the vinegar water.
Or one uses fragrance lamps, especially with citrus scents.