Cilantro!

[Bob]

The Curious Cook - Why Cilantro Tastes Like Soap, for Some - NYTimes.com By HAROLD McGEE
Published: April 13, 2010

FOOD partisanship doesn?t usually reach the same heights of animosity as the political variety, except in the case of the anti-cilantro party. The green parts of the plant that gives us coriander seeds seem to inspire a primal revulsion among an outspoken minority of eaters.

Culinary sophistication is no guarantee of immunity from cilantrophobia. In a television interview in 2002, Larry King asked Julia Child which foods she hated. She responded: ?Cilantro and arugula I don?t like at all. They?re both green herbs, they have kind of a dead taste to me.?

?So you would never order it?? Mr. King asked.

?Never,? she responded. ?I would pick it out if I saw it and throw it on the floor.?

 

[TreeFrog]

If you don't like cilantro, fine.

That just leaves more for me!

 

[HD Lady]

Mee Too!

 

[Lynnie]

Me three. I do have a friend who suffers from this strange phenomenon that it tastes like soap? Strange, I tell you!

 

[Bob]

If you don't like cilantro, fine.

That just leaves more for me!

i loves cilantro!!!!

 

[NotDeadYet]

I love it too.

Here is my favorite cilantro recipe. Recreated after many tries - now tastes just like the soup from a family-owned Mexican joint that opened in 1929. My parents ate there during the depression and I grew up eating this soup. But they never gave away their recipes. A friend and I tried to make it many times and this is, finally, it.

Albondigas (Mexican Meatball) Soup

Ingredients


One pound lean ground beef
Two big onions
Three or four teaspoons of finely minced jalapeno

Two garlic cloves
One can stewed tomatoes (Del Monte Original Recipe with celery, onions and green pepper is the best)
One bunch each fresh cilantro and Italian parsley

Red pepper flakes

Cumin

1/3 cup bread crumbs

One egg
Salt

Method:

Place ground beef in a big mixing bowl.
Slice onions into thin rings. Finely chop enough of these to make ? cup. Put the chopped onions in the bowl with the meat and put the remaining onion rings in a soup pot.
Mince the garlic cloves very finely. Divide in two ? put half in the meat mix and half in the soup pot.
Mince up three or four teaspoons of jalapeno. Add one to the meat mix and the rest to the soup pot.
Wash the cilantro and parsley. Strip the leaves from the stems, mostly, and cut up them up. You want about one cup of each, packed down in the cup, sort of. Place half of each in the meat mix and the other half in the soup pot.
Add the bread crumbs and the egg to the meat mix.
Salt ? ? teaspoon in meat mix, ? teaspoon in soup mix
Red pepper flakes ? ? teaspoon each in meat mix and soup pot
Add 1/8 teaspoon cumin to soup pot only

Add the can of tomatoes and six cups of water to the soup pot, turn on medium heat. While the soup is heating up, make the meatballs.
Mix all ingredients thoroughly with your hands. Roll them into small balls (makes 25-30) and place them on a plate until soup is simmering. Then drop them one by one into the soup, slowly enough that the soup stays hot as you go. Return soup to simmer, and simmer slowly 1 ? to 2 hours.
Taste after an hour or so and if you think it needs it, add more salt and/or red pepper, and black pepper if you want it.

This soup is much better the next day. Refrigerating the whole amount in a big bowl overnight also gives you the opportunity to skim off the congealed fat the next day. Even though the recipe calls for lean beef, since the meatballs are not precooked, all the fat ends up in the soup and might be more than you like. Leftovers, if you have any, freeze well.

 

[bluecat]

Love it.

 

[DD]

I love it too.

 

[Mango]

Cilantro contains a natural chemical called Linalool, which is used commercially in soap, shampoos, cleaning products....if someone tastes buds or smell is super sensitive, it will taste like soap.

Cilantro also is a great chelating agent if you have metals in your body, like mercury amalgams. Some people really feel ill from it as it binds to any metals in the brain and makes it way out of your body.

There you go....your soap answer.

 

[Kurt]

I like a little salsa with my cilantro.