Having eaten some asparagus on several occasions recently, I finally just had to find out. Googling "why does asparagus make your pee smell" finds us bunches of answers. Three relatively random ones here:
So, the causes include none or one or several of:
- methanethiol
- several S-methyl thioesters, specifically S-methyl thioacrylate and S-methyl 3-(methylthio)thiopropionate
- metabolites
- six sulfur-containing compounds
- methyl mercaptan
Let's forget for a moment the fact that I cannot pronounce several of these. It appears that science has not yet caught up to this very important biological phenomenon. There are numerous other supposed causes as well, I am sure. It also appears that people individually must have the proper smeller set up; that is, not everyone can smell this. Some people consider this to be lucky on behalf of those who cannot. Personally I really don't give a crap either way; I am just curious ...
