If anyone actually tried baking soda they would see that it works. As for why it works the Advisory Board, I venture to say, got it right. Many people in here are talking about anaerobic vs. aerobic and throwing around words like thiols and esters. It really isn’t that complicated. The bacteria and fungus living on food in your fridge are respirering aerobicly because there is plenty of oxygen unless you had an air tight jar and presumeably the fridge smell isn’t coming from that. Therefore most of the sugar, starches, and fats are being turned into CO2. When the offensive microorganism metabolizes proteins, however, it produces some nitrogenous waste in the form of some small amine. Nearly every voltile amine smells awful. I here make make the assumption that most of the wretchedness of fridge smell comes from amines.
Bicarbonate will, lucky for us, will turn any primary, secondary, or teriary amine into an ammonium carbonate salt. This is because bicarbonate is a stronger acid than the ammonium ion. Salts like crystals and polar solutions but do not like to float around in the air. No more offesive smell.
Some people on this thread have argued that bicarbonate can’t neurtalize bases because its an acid. The truth is that bicarbonate is acid and a base. It looks like this HCO3 it can act like a base and accept a proton to become carbonic acid H2CO3 or it can act like an acid, as it does with amines, and donate a proton to become cabonate CO3. Thats the definition of a buffer.
An interesting follow up experiment, try a solution of bicarbonate in water. If it is effective it should prove that some chemical reaction is taking place.