How I've lived for +6 months with (barely) any taste or smell. COVID aftereffects in a food blogger.

I want to talk about something I've kept for myself for months for two main reasons. The first one is that I wasn't sure how long it would last, I had COVID in mid-late December 2020 and I thought the loss of smell and taste would last some days, weeks maximum. The second reason, and the main one, is that this is a space I started to show my cooking, photography and food writing. The irony of the ironies is that I haven't been able to grasp the taste and smell of most foods for the past half-year. Yup, I had COVID and the aftereffects have lasted for over half a year, recovering a little at a time at an extremely painfully slow rhythm.

Back in December, when I initially tested positive for COVID-19, my taste and smell remained intact. It lasted 5-6 days. Bear in mind we had been getting ready to go on holiday to Spain and spend Christmas with my family. By 20 December, it was official. We would miss Christmas and all the excitement to spend the entire holiday season at home vanished. If you know me, you know celebrating Christmas is my thing, I live for everything Christmassy and I start planning it by the end of summer. Because we were planning to go for 2 weeks, we had barely any food at home (God bless my obsession to freeze anything and everything!), so we had to order food and groceries.

At first, I was extremely tired, I couldn't leave the couch/bed, I had headaches and I could do anything but watch TV, but at least I was able to taste food. Then one morning, as I was brushing my teeth, I noticed I couldn't taste the peppermint in the toothpaste. "Odd" I thought. I was suspicious something was off, so I sprayed myself with my favourite fragrance only to find out I couldn't smell it.

It truly felt I was being punished. After months of global pandemic and looking forward to the holidays, I was missing my favourite holiday with my family. We couldn't travel anywhere because we had to remain at home for at least 10 days until the effects passed. And, to top it all, I couldn't do the one thing I enjoy most doing: EATING. Well, I could eat, but SAVOURING AND ENJOYING FOOD.

Peaches are one of my favourite fruits. When roasted, they become soft like jam.

Falafel. I definetely can taste a lot of it due to the spices and ingredients.

At first, I thought it would last for some days, similar to catching the flu. Days passed and there seemed to be no improvement. I remained hopeful because my husband had completely lost smell and taste and recovered after 4-5 days. By the time he fully recovered, I had absolutely no grasp of any food or smell. The funny thing is that my husband's sense of smell used to be extremely bad, and now he's the pro 😅

One might think I wouldn't care about preparing food or eating much. Yet, I couldn't help myself. I kept on cooking and eating as if nothing had changed. To say the truth, my appetite remained intact, hence the frustration. Once we recovered from COVID and were able to leave the house, we went to Spain. On the way to my parent's house, we stopped at a petrol station to buy some goodies for the trip. My husband was astonished when I grabbed a croissant with pralined chocolate (the most expensive pastry sold in that café). At some point, I understood that it was important to nourish my body and mind as usual. I remain hopeful I will fully recover my smell and taste someday.

This might sound dramatic but smell and taste are two very important human senses that I've relied heavily upon all my life. I know I could always live a (sort of) happy life without taste and smell, but where's the enjoyment of smelling a cake being baked? A candle burning? A freshly brewed coffee? Or roses? I'm aware there are WAY worst things out there, and I'm grateful my vision, hearing, and sense of touch remain intact, not to say my health or that of my loved ones. But it's sad because I miss out on many things. At least temporarily.

After some time of self-reflection and learning, I've grown used to this new dynamic. One of the things I've learned is to savour food differently, putting a lot of effort into tasting the elements and parts of each and every thing I put into my mouth. For example, if I'm to eat a strawberry, I'll take my time to bite and sense the seeds, the meat, and acidity, the different notes that compose it. When I munch on chocolate, I'll inspect the character, the sound it makes when it breaks, if it's creamy or it's more solid, the quality of the nuts inside. There's a lot of insight I've gained by being deprived of flavour. I guess it depends on how one looks at it. I tend to see the glass half-filled, not half empty.

Pici cacio e pepe. Pici is a thick type of pasta typical of Tuscany. When cooked, the texture is thick, like eating candy bears. Whereas the sauce, caucio e pepe, was creamy, full of flavour from the cheese and pepper.

I'm able to taste if something is sweet, savoury, or astringent, but many foods are completely bland, for instance, coconut milk, fresh mint, nuts, or most fruits. Other foods, because they are so strong, I can taste much better, like cheeses (pecorino al Tartufo, stilton), sweet foods like dates, ripe fruits. I want to think that these are foods with character, but I know I'm kidding myself 😄

For the past months, I've realised I'm slowly gaining some of my smell back but it's not progressive, some days are better than others. If I'd have to give an estimate, I'd say I've regained about 35% of my taste and smell. When I eat something, is like there's a protective layer making it impossible to fully taste anything. In the beginning, when I baked or sautéd food, some of the foods were burnt or went to waste. You have to understand, I've relied heavily on my smell all my life. By simply smelling, I'd know when a cake was done, or when was the right time to flip a Spanish tortilla or a pancake.

There are two smells that I smell A LOT in the most unexpected places: roasted garlic and artificial vanilla. I might be walking around my neighbourhood where there are plants or bushes and I might start smelling roasted garlic. The 99.9% of times, there's no trace of garlic, nor roasted garlic anywhere. I hate it, I'm completely fed up with the roasted garlic smell 🙃 At home, whenever I open a bar of chocolate for baking, or when I enter into the sweet food section of a grocery store, a smell of cheap, artificial vanilla will invade me. Other times, when I'm cooking curry, I'll smell curry EVERYWHERE to the extent that I'll have to open all windows, burn incense and spray house spray in every single room.

It all makes me think: have I gained a new sensibility towards certain ingredients? My sense of smell used to be flawless, I could smell anything from meters away, and identify what is what pretty easily. That's why I want to believe these are hints that I'm gaining back my senses. I try to smell different things as often as I can: essential oils, detergent, perfume, foods... And of course, I keep on eating to check myself!

Panda liquorice: I absolutely can taste pure liquorice and I'm trankful I do because I ADORE black liquorice.

Luckily for me, most of my cooking is truly improvised, I have a good intuition when it comes to pairing ingredients together. If I need to taste any dish, I'll make my husband try it; most times it's the salt that's off. Actually, I never add too much salt to any food as my grandmother suffered a stroke when I was little and we dramatically reduced, almost removed its consumption.

The lack of smell and taste hasn't affected my love for food. If anything, I've realised the world of food is extremely important for me, and I want to continue exploring it further in the future. Surely, food is one of the things I'm more passionate about, it's always been. The lack of my senses has only invigorated this idea. I've also become creative, trying odd combinations and ingredients.

I'd love to hear your thoughts! Let me know in the comments section if you have ever gone through a similar experience. And if you did, what made you go through it?

Lots of love and happy baking!

M🤍