Q. Thanks for the soy sauce hint. I spilled boiling hot honey on the back of my hand. After flushing the burn with cold water to remove all the honey, I remembered the soy sauce and liberally poured straight Kikkoman over my hand. I had no more pain, no blister, not even any redness. Unbelievable but true.
A. You have summed it up: unbelievable but true. We have found applying soy sauce after cold water works well to ease the pain and redness from an ordinary household burn. Severe burns deserve immediate medical attention.
We don’t have a good explanation for this, but it may have something to do with the sodium content. One reader found that low-sodium soy sauce was not effective, but Bragg’s Liquid Aminos (which contains sodium) worked.
