B.G Pooja Store Sambrani

  

One of our readers, Eugene Andrushchenko (a Ukrainian forced out of his country by the Russian invasion, but hoping to go back one day and re-establish his incense business), has recently come back from an incense gathering trip to India, during which, while they were in Tiruvannamalai, they picked up three packets of masala incense from a pooja store near the impressive Raja Gopuram (gateway entrance) of Arunachalesvara Temple. The store, B.G, was opened in 2004, and sells its own B.G branded incense along with other common brands, such as Satya, Hari Om, and Vijayshree. Eugene sent us some generous samples of the three B.G scents he had picked up. 

This is the Sambrani. On the stick it has a delightful herbal, menthol, floral, vanilla scent typical of benzoin, with some touches of TCP, though quite faint. It is a very tidily rolled charcoal paste on a machine cut bamboo splint. The paste has been covered in a fine powder which has some benzoin scent, though that has probably transferred from the paste, as the powder is too light to be designed as the fragrance carrier, and is more likely to be a melnoorva - a non-fragrant wood powder used to stop the charcoal paste sticks from gluing together as they dry. 

On the burn the scent is dry and inclined toward mineral. It's a little disappointing after the promise on the stick. However, as with most sambrani named incense, you get a lot of bang for your buck. The aroma is clean and invigorating, and it penetrates and cleanses the house and appears to fill it with energy.  It's an OK incense, and fits in well with other sambrani incense I have burned. Modestly pleasant aesthetically when burned, though filling the house with energy charged aroma.   

I'm classing this as a ritual incense, and as perfumed-charcoal. 

Date: Feb 2023    Score:   33 

Benzoin / Loban / Sambrani