See my initial comment:
It absolutely tasted like soap to me.
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I have no idea whether I have the gene or not, sorry.
If cilantro tastes or tasted like soap…yes, you have the gene that makes it taste like soap.
You and @linguafood have been able to overcome it and now enjoy cilantro. I, on the ither hand, haven’t been able to get pasty the soapy taste and at this point in my life, just avoid it entirely.
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I guess I got over it then. The first time I remember working with cilantro, I think I accidentally bought it in place of parsley for a meal I made sometimes in the mid 90s. I have a vivid memory of being in my mother’s new kitchen, in the house she finally bought after her divorce from my dad while I was making whatever it was. I recall thinking the cilantro was deeply soapy and unpleasant. At this point, almost 30 years later, I love it. I do agree with some of the posters who have said it seems to be less intense tasting when it comes from mega supermarkets now. But, I am willing to believe that my sense of taste may also be dulling as I head into my 50s.
Now, cooked red cabbage? That can go right into the trash. Every. Time.
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Does cilantro not taste like soap to you anymore, or did you learn to enjoy it, soapiness and all?
Cilantro tasted like stinkbugs to me
So maybe I now like stinkbugs 
Since I love cilantro now.
Natto.
No! That brings back bad memories. The smell, the look and the taste. Definitely not for me.
Although it has been over 30 years since I tasted it.
Funny, but I can still remember it
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Me too. My grandmother lived in PA and would always bring it when she visited us growing up. Unfortunately I don’t see much of it here in San Francisco so now only eat it every year or so.
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I wonder if those folks truly mean they eat anything (like Andrew Zimmerman anything?) or if they just have a very wide palate and haven’t found anything yet that they strongly dislike and are a hard stop on. Some folks perhaps will try anything, but don’t mean that they would eat it regularly, if they have a full spectrum of choices available.
I consider myself to be fairly open minded from a taste perspective (this excludes not eating certain things for ethical reasons) but I have things that don’t appeal to me. There’s a long list of certain flavor profiles or single ingredients that divide a lot of eaters (dill, licorice, durian, most bug foods, stevia/insert any other alternative sweetener) that I pass on too.
The one other thing that I don’t relate to is probably the obsession most people have with cheese. I do enjoy in slight moderation some cheese (cheese popcorn, cheese on a burger, some in a salad), but it’s a fairly narrow spectrum. I don’t understand just wanting to eat a block or piece of cheese. 
I remember year’s ago dining at L’Espalier (a very fancy French restaurant in Boston) and they are known for having a high-end cheese course. They bring over the trays, and I thought all of them were gross. So salty, so funky toe-jammy, and if this were at my house they would have all ended up in the trash. The one that my sister and I found more palatable we agreed tasted like that block of onion dust you sometimes find at the bottom of a bag of Onion Ring chips.
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The couple of times I’ve had natto, I thought it was a very ammonia type smell, like brie that has gone too far to make it onto the cheese plate. The flavor was ok, but the texture was too off putting for me to want to try it again.
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And here I am, one of the pickier eaters I know of, and yet I LOVE the funky, sweaty, stinky-feet end of the cheese spectrum. Epois, Stinking Bishop, Limburger. Give me some nice bread, maybe some candied nuts as an accompaniment and I will eat 'til I hurt myself. I love all sorts of cheese, from super-mild and creamy chevre to a pungent, crumbly blue…
My partner LOVES cheese, but cannot abide the truly funky side like I can. She also can’t stand the odd ‘funk’ that is uni, nor will she go for a nice chopped liver or foie gras, which I like very much.
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If you love these things, what are the foods/ingredients you are picky about?
Veggies, mostly. It’s largely a texture thing, though some flavors (asparagus, broccoli, cucumbers) I can’t abide in any form. Most of it is leftover poor eating habits from childhood. Even at 50+, I’m still trying to make myself get over my aversion to, say, raw tomatoes. Love tomato sauce. Hate slices on my sandwich. Exactly the opposite of onions and spinach, which I like raw on tacos / in salads, but can’t get past when cooked (french onion soup, cream of spinach). Which is dumb, because I like the FLAVORS of those things a lot. I’m working on it.
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Curious if you’ve tried different kinds of tomatoes. While I don’t have an aversion to tomatoes, I generally hate tomato slices on certain things, unless it’s “glued” down like tucked into a grilled cheese sandwich (yes, I do like grilled cheeses). I will almost never put them in a sandwich or burger (I tolerate them in BLTs), because they just slip and slide all over the place. What’s the point if one bite means the tomato falls right out? I also dislike the overly watery type tomatoes, which is unfortunately the default in the market. I much prefer certain heirloom varieties that have the webbed flesh vs the large, wet seed pockets.
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It doesn’t seem to matter much, variety wise. While I really dislike the tomato ‘goop’ that’s found in the average supermarket tomato, I have just as much of a problem with the diced tomatoes in, say, pico de gallo (where the raw onions don’t bother me at all.) The most I can narrow it down is that it’s a texture thing, mostly. But it’s also not rational in the slightest. It’s an automatic rejection of something based on years and years of habit. So I can’t even express, clearly, WHY thing X should provoke such a reaction and thing Y, which might be very similar, does not.
As I said before in this thread, people are WEIRD, and we’re even weird about HOW we’re weird.
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I can’t do organ meats – and I’ve tried, oh, I’ve tried. No heart, no kidneys, no intestine, no liver, no brains, and no thymus for me, I’ll pass. I can have a wee bit of chicken liver pate now and then but I reach my threshold after a few crostini. I suppose I like duck liver pate alright. There are exceptions to every rule.
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Im wondering if you might have a low key allergy.
My son will eat tomato sauce til I swear he’ll burst at the seams but he will be violently ill if he eats raw tomatoes…doctor says its a legitimate ans fairly common sensitivity…heat destroys the compound that he cant digest.
Even as a small child he would spit out raw tomatoes…his body warning him not to eat something that will make him ill, I suppose
Very little I don’t choose to like - caraway comes to mind. I went through extensive chemo for advanced breast cancer and was left unable to tolerate any smoked foods but it was not my choice and doesn’t seem to be leaving me free from the aversion. My DH & I read food labels very carefully and avoid anything BBQ or with chipotle or liquid smoke to the extent that I ask that a restaurant doesn’t add paprika onto my coleslaw because of my weird sensitivity.
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At the urging of my then neighbor and classmate, I bought and tried scrapple. She raved and raved about it, and she had a sophisticated palate and had lived internationally. Mine went straight into the trash. And yes, I prepared it properly.
I am one of those people for whom cilantro used to produce a soapy taste but no longer does.
Two of my siblings love it and two won’t eat it. It is not for everyone, but I love the porky flavor and simple peppery corn meal mix. Crispy outside and soft middle if cooked right, served with some apple butter, hot sauce and eggs.
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