weird smell while mixing sodium alginate with water

[climbdaveParticipant]

Hi all,
I am pretty new to molecular gastronomy. I have done a few basic things, and I am trying to experiment the basic techniques.
Today I wanted to try some raspberry-cream caviar. Since the raspberry-cream is alcoholic I used the technique explained here: http://www.molecularrecipes.com/spherification-1/caviar-cointreau/.
However, given the very small quantity of water, I wasn’t able to use an immersion blender, and I mixed the sodium alginate into the water by hand using a fork. It took a while, but it worked pretty well.

However, while mixing, I noticed that the solution smelled a bit weird. I am not sure if it was acetone-like, or benzene-like, or alcohol like ( I am no chemist) but it smelled weird. The smell disappeared after I let it rest for a few minutes.

Is this normal?

What causes it?

thanks

dave

[Author]

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