Accidental bio-lab in the kitchen...Ew!

Jem

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So 4 days ago, I made creamy/cheesy scalloped potatoes, meat loaf and broccoli for dinner.
I put the pans, covered in foil, from the scalloped potatoes and meatloaf (empty but still dirty) back in the oven so the cats wouldn't get at them while we were eating, and pushed the steamer aside (again, empty but still dirty) then decided to be lazy and left them overnight. Well, I forgot about them in the oven, as I didn't use it, and at a glance the steamer didn't look dirty so nothing "triggered" for me to wash the dishes.
Well, this morning, I could smell something funky, and it was the stagnant broccoli water in the steamer trap....OMG! cooked broccoli smells bad as it is, but rotting broccoli is....no words. Then, it clued in...the pans in the oven. When I pulled the foil off the meatloaf pan, it wasn't the worst, but then I pulled the foil off the scalloped potatoes, and I could thrown up!
I rinsed, quickly washed and then put them in the dishwasher to be sanitized well. But there is still a lingering funk wafting in my kitchen. :paperbag:

Anyone else ever accidentally have a science experiment or bio-lab in their home?
 

susanm9006

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Not in the house but I had a really bad one in the car. My sister gave me some “friendship bread” starter in a Tupperware container and I forgot it in the backseat. A warm day and yeast stuff in a bowl created a explosion that covered the back seat in this stinky goo. The worst thing is that despite scraping and washing the seats repeatedly they not only remained stained but every time I got in the car for the rest of the time I owned it, I smelled something like rotting bread. It was just awful.
 
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Jem

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A warm day and yeast stuff in a bowl created a explosion that covered the back seat in this stinky goo.
Wow! that's awful! But, I'll admit and I'm sorry that I did laugh a bit. :paperbag:
 

susanm9006

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Wow! that's awful! But, I'll admit and I'm sorry that I did laugh a bit. :paperbag:
That’s ok, it’s funny now. Not then. And I have been offered bread starter several times since then and I practically shudder as I quickly say No Thank You.
 
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Willowy

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My mom once lost a package of bologna in her car, it rolled out of the grocery bag and she didn't notice (this was before she had kids). She wondered what that odor was for a long time. . .
 

fionasmom

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I lost a bunch/stalk of broccoli from my market bag in the back of my SUV. I had all the back seats down so it rolled into a hidden crevice. Evidently, it did not dawn on me that I was missing some produce when I unpacked my groceries. A few days later I decided that there was some gas or exhaust leak in the car and took it back to the dealer to have them "fix" it.
 

Katie M

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Mom and I once left a gallon of milk in the car. It had rolled under the seat. Two weeks and one AWFUL smell later, we finally found it. We were at a shopping center, so I had to throw the jug in a trash can right outside a store. I wonder if business was affected that day . . .
 

MoochNNoodles

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I have had sippy cups of milk get pushed under the couch or put in places that only make perfect sense to toddlers.:rolleyes2: They can be funky!! Some just got tossed. We used to count cups all the time to see if we had to go searching. I usually could tell what color was missing and I’d send DD looking.:lol:
 
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Winchester

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My sister once put a whole chicken in her oven to thaw. A few weeks (yes, weeks!) later, they couldn't understand what the god-forsaken odor was in the kitchen. She opened the oven door and.........ewwwwwwww!

I had two 5-pound bags of potatoes in the basement and forgot about them. Well, I'd go down to hit the treadmill and I kept smelling this odor. I kept telling Rick, but he'd go down and then tell me I was crazy. Finally it got so bad he could smell it. We opened an ice chest and almost gagged.
 

susanm9006

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This a funny kitchen smell story from about 35 years ago when I started smelling something really really bad in the kitchen. I checked under everything and emptied out each cabinet looking for a dead mouse. I washed wastebaskets and sink drains and pulled out the fridge and cleaned it’s drip pan. I cleaned everything I could think of but still this nauseating smell, better sometimes, worse others.

The mystery was solved when my son walked in the door and the overwhelming smell of decay came with him. It was coming from his shoes, which looked perfectly fine on the outside. But the sweaty feet of an athletic teen boy apparently rot shoes from the inside. It hadn’t happened before because a pair of shoes usually only lasted six weeks or so before they were outgrown but his growth had started slowing down and these were maybe three months old. I immediately ushered him out the door and we drove with windows open to the shoe store. New shoes and socks purchased we stopped in the parking lot so he could put on the new and toss old shoes and socks in a trash bin.
 

LTS3

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Happens all the time at my parents house:rolleyes: I can remember a few things: food put in the microwave to heat up and then completely forgotten about (it does beep but sometimes my parents leave the kitchen to do other stuff and then return) until the next time it is used which may not be for a week later. Mom bought a bag of onions once and the grocery bag it was in got taken to the basement. She put the bag on top of a pile of random junk and took the shelf stable pantry items out of the bag to put away on a shelf. Then she somehow forgot about the onions. A few weeks later I discovered the onions, which had gotten buried under more junk that was piled on top of it, and they had gone mushy and gross :barfgreen: Another time I pulled out a pot from the cabinet to use and it felt oddly heavy. I took the lid off and found moldy liquid with moldy won tons inside :barf: Mom said she forgot that there was won ton soup in the pot when she put it away. (???).

My brother somehow got a ham sandwich lost under his bed for a few weeks and it stunk for weeks until we finally discovered it
:barfgreen: Mom just kept using spray air freshener all the while complaining about the smell instead of actually looking for the source. And, no, my brother was not kid at the time. He was a fully grown adult :bat:
 

susanm9006

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My sister once put a whole chicken in her oven to thaw. A few weeks (yes, weeks!) later, they couldn't understand what the god-forsaken odor was in the kitchen. She opened the oven door and.........ewwwwwwww!

I had two 5-pound bags of potatoes in the basement and forgot about them. Well, I'd go down to hit the treadmill and I kept smelling this odor. I kept telling Rick, but he'd go down and then tell me I was crazy. Finally it got so bad he could smell it. We opened an ice chest and almost gagged.
Rotting chicken is just the worst. Even leaving raw scraps in the trash for a few days will just about do you in. And rotten potatoes smell just about as bad.
 

bbdoll22

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Around the end of March there was a funky smell in my pantry. I looked and looked and finally thought I found the culprit being a yucky potato. I threw it out but the smell lingered a few days longer. Unfortunately that was not it. Two weeks ago we had a heat wave and the smell was back with vengeance. I traced it to my sons backpack, which is on a hook on the pantry door. He hadn’t used it since schools closed March 13th due to Covid. I know I emptied it when school closed. The smell was horrible! It turns of he had a hidden pocket I didn’t know about and in a baggie was leftover sandwich? Wrap? 🤮I have no clue as it was unidentifiable.
It almost made me throw up. I made my son put it in the curbside garbage can.
 

catapault

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Trash goes down to the street on Monday late afternoon for Tuesday early morning pickup. I only defrost shrimp for dinner on the weekend. If the shells are in the trash in the garage for more than a couple of days . . .
 
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