Skip the bento box. Get a steel tiffin.

The best stainless steel lunch box for avoiding food smells is a classic Indian tiffin — no plastic, no silicone, just layers of steel held together by a metal clip.

The steel was never the problem. Stainless doesn’t absorb odors the way plastic does. The culprits are always the extras: silicone gaskets, plastic lids, rubber seals. Those are the parts that taste like last Tuesday’s fish.

Fancy bento brands like LunchBots and PlanetBox use stainless bodies but stuff silicone seals into their lids to make them leakproof. That silicone will hold smells no matter how well you wash it. A simple two- or three-tier tiffin (Milton makes a good one, or buy an inexpensive one from an Indian grocery) has no gaskets at all. The clip holds it shut, and everything washes clean with soap and water.

If you need something flat and single-compartment, U-Konserve makes stainless containers with polypropylene lids that resist odors far better than silicone. But honestly, the tiffin does the job better and doubles as the plate.

If a smell does ever linger in any steel container, rub it with a baking soda paste and let it sit overnight. Problem solved.

Your lunch box should not remember yesterday’s curry.