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Does inhaling the strong smell of food, such as curry, not invalidate the fast, and does inhaling the steam from a cooking pot invalidate the fast, especially given the hardship this entails for women in the kitchen?

1 min readAlso available in العربية

According to the Maliki school, if the smell of incense from a cooking pot reaches the throat due to intentional inhalation, it invalidates the fast. However, if it reaches unintentionally, the fast remains valid. As for the Shafi'i school, inhaling smoke or smells, even intentionally, does not invalidate the fast, because a smell is not a physical substance. Therefore, if the smell of food was not inhaled intentionally, there is no issue with the fast. If it was inhaled intentionally, the Shafi'i school permits that the fast is not invalidated by it.

Summarized from the full answer at Ftawy · reviewed Sep 2, 2026

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