I just had some of my mom’s leftover spaghetti, and I realized that it always has a slightly more bitter taste in the morning after being reheated. What causes this kind of reaction?

Question

It happens both when stored in pyrex or tupperware.
Ingredients aren’t anything unusual; onions, garlic, hamburger, tomato paste, etc.
Tastes sweeter when fresh off of the stove, but has a more bitter taste when reheated as leftovers.

In: 159

Answer 1

There is a lot of reactions that happen in the food that may cause the formation of bitter tastes.

Without a full actual ingredient list , and the ingredients of the ingredients, it would be difficult to check.

Bitter tastes may be related to protein breakdown: if you mix milk with green papaya, pineapple or figs will for sure have a VERY BITTER product after a few minutes. This sort of breakdown may also happen with cheese. This is because these fruits, specially when green, contains enzimes (papaine, bromeline, ficine) that break down the milk proteins at random places, forming bitter compounds.

[https://hal.science/hal-00929271/document](https://hal.science/hal-00929271/document)

Citric products are known to form bitterness after time. So if your mom likes to place lemon or lime into the tomato sauce, even if only a little bit, this may cause formation of bitter tastes. [https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-642-79660-9_4](https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-642-79660-9_4)