Monday, January 12, 2009

My Oatmeal Tastes Like Soap

When I was a tot, my parents threw me a birthday party at McDonald's and invited all the neighborhood kids. It was amazing (well, to a two-year-old, at least)! And, as an added bonus, McDonald's treated me to a present as well! They presented me with a plastic bowl and cup (with a sippy type lid) that had pictures of all the great McDonald's characters. It was love at first sight.

To this day, I have my little bowl (the cup and lid were lost to two separate and equally devastating incidents in the dishwasher) and I have it kept neatly away in my office desk drawer. Of course, the little characters have long since disappeared, but the bowl remains. I use it to eat a multitude of meals requiring a bowl and I wash it by hand in our little sink with a dollop of dish soap after each and every use.

However, sometimes I can't wash the bowl right away and it requires a little soaking. I have learned that you cannot soak with the soap in the bowl as it is very old plastic and it seems to eat any material cradled in it's aging arms. This has not been a problem with my salads or my soup, but for some reason the magical powers of oatmeal have seemed to be able to draw the soap back out and into the creamy oats, which find their way into my mouth.

I have never had my mouth washed out with soap, but I can understand why it is such an unpleasant experience. I think I will requiring a different bowl specifically for my oaty breakfast.

5 comments:

Unknown said...

Just stumbled over this.. it isn't your awesome bowl 'o memories that makes your oatmeal taste like soap. I think old oatmeal just tastes like soap somehow. The first time this happened to me I thought it was the bowl (I'd just taken it fresh from the dishwasher and thought it hadn't rinsed enough) but no... it's just the oatmeal and its funky soap taste. Your bowl is innocent!
<3

Unknown said...

I just opened a box of "my essentials" oatmeal, expiration date is a year from now-- tastes very soapy. I'm sure it's not the bowl or the spoon what is going on with the oatmeal industry?

Unknown said...

I just opened a box of "my essentials" oatmeal, expiration date is a year from now-- tastes very soapy. I'm sure it's not the bowl or the spoon what is going on with the oatmeal industry?

Time2Change said...

Yep. It's not your bowl. I finally got tired of tasting soap every time I eat my container of oatmeal and decided to Google search "oatmeal tastes like soap." Now it is confirmed for me that soapy oatmeal is a "thing." I knew it wasn't my bowl because (scientific experiment #1) my bowl is a porcelain mug which has been well rinsed to prevent any soapy tastes; (scientific experiment #2) none of the other food I eat in my porcelain mug - washed with the same soap and cleaning process - taste like soap, and (scientific experiment #3) when I prepare my oatmeal using the paper coffee cups at work, it STILL tastes like soap. Scientific (lol) deduction: it's the oatmeal.

Unknown said...

Glad to see I'm not crazy. My old fashioned quaker oats taste like soap (5 lb box). I plan to switch to another brand soon.