This Is Why Durian Smells Absolutely Disgusting (Or Absolutely Amazing)
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This Is Why Durian Smells Absolutely Disgusting (Or Absolutely Amazing)

Thanks to a recent study undertaken by the American Chemical Society, we now know that that putrid stench is the result of two very specific things.

This article originally appeared on MUNCHIES.

Foreigners have a lot of harsh descriptions of the durian. It's like "French-kissing your dead grandmother," it "smells like shit and tastes like farts," and it's smells like "gym socks," are not comparisons that you would want to associate with any fruit (or any food at all), let alone the supposed "King of Fruit."

And yet, millions across Southeast Asia are still drawn to durian, with everyone from Pizza Hut to condom companies capitalizing on a smell that is familiar to anyone in Indonesia and has proven to be a huge draw for Western travelers seeking an extreme gustatory sensation that they can use to describe their super-"authentic" travel experiences to friends and dates when they get back home.

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But a fundamental question remains, or at least, remained: Why does durian smell  so bad to foreigners? Well, that's what scientists are for, and thanks to a recent study undertaken by the American Chemical Society, we now know that that putrid stench is the result of two very specific things.

The paper, with the appetizing title of "Insights into the Key Compounds of Durian (Durio zibethinus L. 'Monthong') Pulp Odor by Odorant Quantitation and Aroma Simulation Experiments," breaks down the durian's signature stench into 16 distinct compounds.

The smell of the durian is a complex one, and among its most potent "odor activity values" were the compounds that "smelled of fruit, rotten onion, and roasted onion," followed by "chemicals with strong notes of cabbage and sulfur," authors wrote. Yum! Cabbage, sulfur, and rotten onions—no wonder that delicious durian smell has become so infamous and so hard to pin down.

The results of research, set to appear in an upcoming  Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry, also found that it was possible to elicit the perception by combining just two of those 19 compounds.

"Further experimentation found that putting just two specific compounds together—fruity ethyl (2S)-2-methylbutanoate and oniony 1-(ethylsulfanyl)ethanethiol—effectively resembled the fruit's entire set of odoriferous and fragrant compounds," authors wrote in a press release.

So, mystery solved… now if scientists can only figure out what made this smelly fruit so appealing in the first place.