How to Get Rid of Cooking Smells, Fish Included

The salmon you cooked last night is still in the hallway at breakfast. If you want to know how to get rid of cooking smells, the answer is air, surfaces and trash, in that order, not sprays. Here is what to do before, during and after cooking, how to handle fish, fried and burnt food, and where fragrance honestly fits.

The short answer

Ventilate while you cook and keep going afterward: the EPA suggests leaving a range hood on for 10 to 20 minutes after you finish. Then remove what holds the smell. Wipe the stovetop and counters, wash the pan, carry scraps and packaging outside, and wash the dish towels. A diffuser comes last, because fragrance covers a smell and never removes it.

Why cooking smells travel and linger

Cooking is a genuine indoor air source. The EPA states that "many cooking appliances and the process of cooking itself can increase levels of indoor PM" (particulate matter), and that the food, the cooking method and the cooking fat all change how much is produced. A 2019 study in the journal Indoor Air, built on more than 100 cooking experiments and a model of a typical European home, concluded that "cooking is the most important source of gas-phase and particle species indoor."

The same study explains why the smell outlasts dinner. Some compounds deposit on surfaces and later release back into the air, which the authors say "nicely explains the long-term odorous contamination of the house after certain cooking procedures like cooking fish or preparing dishes with onions." So the strategy has two halves: move the air out, then clean the surfaces the smell landed on. (A kitchen that smells stale on nights you do not cook is a different problem; see our guide to getting rid of a musty smell.)

Before you cook: set the kitchen up

• Air first. Turn the range hood on, or open a window, before the pan is hot.
• Back burners. The EPA advises cooking on the back burners whenever possible.
• Lids and screens. A lid on a simmering pot and a splatter screen over a frying pan keep steam and oil in the pan and off the backsplash.
• The right oil. For high-heat cooking, the EPA recommends oils with higher smoke points and names canola and peanut oil.
• Contain the house. Close bedroom doors and set out a bag for scraps.

While you cook: run the hood or open windows

The EPA puts it plainly: "If you have a range hood over your stove, use it whenever you are cooking," oven included. A hood that vents outdoors beats one that "just recirculates the air," so if yours recirculates, open a window too. Without a hood, the EPA's fallback is to open windows or doors when safe and run a wall or ceiling exhaust fan, which "will improve the flow of PM and other cooking fumes to the outdoors."

Watch the heat, too: a hotter, smokier pan puts more into the air.

After you cook: the cleanup that removes the smell

Keep the hood running for the EPA's 10 to 20 minutes, and the window open for the same stretch if you used one. Then work through the places the smell settles:

• Stovetop, backsplash and counters. Treat splatter as part of the smell, not just a mess, and wipe it with hot soapy water while it is still soft. The EPA advises routinely cleaning kitchen surfaces and appliances.
• The hood filter. It catches grease every time you cook. Clean it as the manual directs before it becomes a smell of its own.
• Trash and packaging. Fish wrappers, meat trays, onion skins and greasy paper towels go out of the house tonight, not into the kitchen bin overnight.
• Sponges and towels. They soak up grease and food. Wash towels after a heavy cooking night and replace a sponge that smells sour.
• Drain and disposal. Empty the drain basket, run the disposal with plenty of water until it clears, and scrub the rubber splash guard, where film builds up.

How do you get rid of fish smell in the house?

Fish is the hardest case, for a chemical reason. Researchers in the Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology call trimethylamine (TMA) "a well-known off-odor compound in fish" and note that "being volatile, TMA constitutes one of the major components of fish off-odor." It forms as bacteria convert a compound that fish muscle holds in large quantities, and its smell is used as an indicator of freshness. That gives you three levers.

1. Start fresh. Because the smell tracks freshness, the freshest fish you can find, kept cold and cooked the day you buy it, starts with less of it.
2. Cook gentler. The Indoor Air study found that "higher cooking temperatures and frying processes enhance emissions significantly." If fish smell is your complaint, bake or poach it covered instead of searing it in an open pan.
3. Clean twice as hard. The Indoor Air authors name fish when describing smells that come back from surfaces. Wash the pan that night, wipe everything near the stove, and double-bag the skin and wrapper and take them outside.

If it hangs on into the next day, check nearby fabrics: towels, oven mitts, a jacket by the door.

Fried food and burnt food

Fried food spreads two smells, the food and the hot oil, and frying is what the Indoor Air study flags for higher emissions. Give it the full routine: hood on, splatter screen, window open. Let the oil cool, then seal it in a container for the trash rather than pouring it down the drain.

Burnt food is a bigger problem. The EPA warns that "burning food during cooking quickly produces large quantities of indoor PM." Take the pan off the heat, open windows on opposite sides of the house for a cross-breeze, run every exhaust fan, and wipe the kitchen down once the air clears. If smoke reached the rest of the house, our guide to getting rid of smoke smell in a house goes further.

Where scent fits, once the kitchen is clear

A diffuser does not remove cooking smells. Fragrance covers. Run it over a strong fish smell and you get fish and perfume together, which reads worse than either. Scent belongs after the routine above, when the kitchen smells of nothing and the only leftovers are faint traces cleaning cannot reach, in a sofa, the curtains or the next room. Our guide to making your home smell like a luxury hotel makes the same case: housekeeping first, scent second.

Put the diffuser near the kitchen, not in it. Cooking wins any contest with fragrance, and a running hood pulls scented air out with everything else. The dining area, hallway or living room next door works better; our diffuser placement guide explains why airflow decides this.

For an open-plan kitchen and living room, the Wireless Starter Kit covers up to 1,200 square feet, runs on its rechargeable battery or plugged in, and has Bluetooth app control; it ships with two oils, White Tea among them. For a hallway or dining nook, the Smart Plug-In II covers up to 800 square feet from a wall outlet, leaves the second outlet free, and has a 1, 3, 6 or 12 hour timer on its buttons and app. Next to a kitchen we lean crisp over sweet, and White Tea comes in 200 mL and 500 mL. The honest trade-off: a cold-air diffuser costs more up front than a basic ultrasonic one.

The practical version: tonight's dinner

Before: hood on, lids out, back burners, scrap bag ready. After: hood on for another 10 to 20 minutes, stove and counters wiped, pan washed, scraps outside, towels in the wash, drain cleared. Tomorrow morning, if the house smells of nothing, set a diffuser running in the next room. Not sure which scent suits your home? The scent quiz will point you to one.

Sources

1. EPA: Sources of Indoor Particulate Matter (PM). Updated 2026.
2. Klein et al., Indoor Air: Impact of cooking on indoor air pollutants. 2019.
3. Park et al., Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology: Trimethylamine Off-Odor in Fish. 2020.

Frequently Asked Questions

How do you get rid of fish smell in the house?

Run the range hood or open windows while the fish cooks, and keep the hood on afterward; the EPA suggests 10 to 20 minutes after you finish cooking. Then wash the pan, wipe the stovetop and counters, and take the skin and packaging out of the house that night. Cooking compounds settle on surfaces and drift back into the air later, so the cleanup matters as much as the ventilation.

Why does a cooking smell linger for days?

Some cooking compounds deposit on surfaces and release back into the air over time. A 2019 study in the journal Indoor Air pointed to this to explain the long-lasting smell after cooking fish or onions. Airing the house out is only half the fix; wiping the surfaces near the stove and clearing the trash, towels and drain removes what keeps the smell coming back.

Should I leave the range hood on after cooking?

Yes. The EPA suggests leaving the range hood on for 10 to 20 minutes after you are done cooking, and recommends using the back burners whenever possible. Without a hood, the EPA advises opening windows or doors when it is safe and turning on a wall or ceiling exhaust fan.

Does a diffuser get rid of cooking smells?

No. A diffuser adds fragrance; it does not remove odor. Clear the cooking smell first with ventilation and cleaning, then run a diffuser in a room next to the kitchen once the air smells of nothing. Fragrance over a strong fish smell gives you both smells at once.