Tip: Use a travel/sample perfume spray to neutralize food smells from hair and clothing

Maybe I’ve been living under a rock, but when I went for the Chanel Fragrance Journey a while ago, that was the first time I found out about something called a “Hair Mist”. Apparently, although it sounds like a decadent beauty item to own, it’s one of their most popular fragrance products. Go figure eh?

But that wasn’t my take-away from it. What I learned is that the Hair Mist can not only refresh hair and leave it smelling softly of your favourite scent, if your favourite scent is No. 5, but it can also be used to neutralise food smells. Now, that was a bit of trivia I filed away in my memory palace. I knew it was going to come in handy one day.

And it did! I don’t own the Hair Mist, but I decided to try something of my own using travel/sample perfume spay vials

I don’t know how it is in other parts of the world, but if you ever have to eat in a food court, a hawker centre or locally, a mamak stall or shop, or even if you have some smokey or strong smelling foods for lunch, you may find that the food smells linger on your clothes and hair when you return to the office after lunch.

Often, this can be quite unpleasant after a while, and as Murphy’s Law will have it, it will be the strongest and most unpleasant smells that last the longest on you. Don’t you hate that feeling of sitting at your desk, in that post-lunch stupor, smelling of the Mamak shop that you were just at? Suddenly that curry fish head you had for lunch doesn’t seem to smell so good anymore.

It happened to me one day. I’d come back from a quick lunch to find the smells of Indian spices stuck to my hair and clothing. I love my spicy Indian foods, but I don’t quite fancy smelling like I just fell into a vat of curry. It was at this point that my Memory Palace threw up the bit of trivia about using a hair mist.

I don’t have a Chanel Hair Mist, but I do carry a travel size vial of perfume with me. It’s not intentional, if I’m to be honest. I just never got round to removing it and since it was in one of my favourite scents – Dior J’Adore – I left it in my makeup pouch. I just spritzed a couple of sprays of the perfume a few inches away from my hair and on my clothes and much to my surprise, it not only shrouded me in my favourite scent, but helped to neutralize the food smells! I’m sure everyone else around me breathed a huge sigh of relief as well

This Dior J’Adore purse spray is what I carry with me. But a miniature spray or sample spray vial works as well

I was so excited, I had to tell my chat buddy about it, and she warned me very practically, to not be too lavish because perfumes can dry out the hair due to the alcohol content. That is one of the things that the Chanel Hair Mist promises not to do. It says that it will not dry out the hair, maybe because it has a lower alcohol content. I don’t know, but now I’m interested to find out!

So, here’s my tip of the day. Don’t toss the sample spray vials of perfume that you may get in a gift with purchase, or sample freebie. Keep a couple in your bag for emergencies, when you need to neutralize food smells, because I know that here in Malaysia, we’re foodies and we are quite happy to huddle together in hot coffeeshops to partake of popular fare especially at lunch time. Having a perfume spray on hand ensures that while you may return to the office, satiated, you don’t have to take the food smells home with you!

Have you used a Hair Mist before? Have you tried this trick to neutralize food smells from hair and clothes?

As I said, a Hair Mist was something new to me and I’m quite interested to pick up a bottle now. But even if you think it’s just too gimmicky for you, refreshing your hair and clothes after a meal with a few spritzes of perfume is quite a neat trick! Now, I’m quite happy to collect sample vials of perfume sprays. I might discover a new scent to like and even if I don’t, at least I won’t smell of food after lunch!

Paris B

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