Sai Handicrafts UK Hand Rolled Pitcholi

 

I like these Sai Handicrafts incenses. Everything I have tried so far, bar one - Masala, has been single scent - sandalwood, agarwood, loban, and now this Pitcholi, which is clearly patchouli, though with an unusual spelling. The scents are pretty much as you'd expect them to be - there's no flourish of individuality, these are simply decently made incenses producing decent scents on target for the named scent. The sticks are hand rolled, and present as masala; that is, they have a reasonable application of black paste, coated with a dusting of wood powder (melnoorva). The sticks are fragranced by oils or perfumes - they have that volatility that liquid scents have. But there is also an awareness of halmaddi, a substance strongly associated with masala, or at least, with quality incenses as it doesn't have much of a scent of its own, but does have the ability to enhance and project the fragrance in the mix.  I have over the years I have been doing this blog pondered the whole nature of "perfumed" (or "perfume-dipped" or "scented") incense v "masala" (or "natural" or "flora") incense. Incense originated as solid particles - woods and resins mostly - which were burned on fires or smouldering charcoals to release their scent, and also the smoke, which feels an essential part of the incense experience. At some point, for ease and convenience, dhoops were developed by priests in which the solid particles were ground down and blended with binders and combustible material (charcoal dust and/or wood dust), and then rolled into thin sausage or stick shapes. The use of a bamboo splint on which to hold the dhoop paste is relatively recent in the history of incense, having been developed around 1900 by two Mysore businessmen in order to simplify and speed up the process of incense making so that incense could be made by women at home on a semi-industrial scale.  At some point oils or attars were included in the making of incense sticks - though I've not yet discovered much secure information on that, though I have learned that around the 1920s and 30s synthetic fragrances such as musk xylol and musk ambrette were being used in the manufacture of incenses in China, Japan, and Mysore. And I suppose it is the introduction of synthetic fragrance into incense making that really marks the divergence into "masala" and "perfume-dipped". Whatever "masala" signified at one point (I assume it originally indicated the blend of ingredients - fragrant and non-fragrant - into the paste that was rolled onto the bamboo splint), at this stage it appears to signify for most people that the incense is intended to be decent quality with an eye on tradition. And for most people the term "perfume-dipped" would suggest a quick, cheap, and crude method of incense making with synthetic liquid fragrances. That much "masala" incense is made these days with synthetic fragrances (due to cost and availability, as well as that today's synthetic fragrances are safer and better quality than that used twenty years ago, let alone a 100 years ago), and that some "perfumed-dipped" incense can be made with high quality oils or perfumes, confuses the issue.  All this waffle is just me saying that these sticks look like masala incense, but present as perfumed incense, and that such categorisation is probably unhelpful. 

The scent on the stick is herbaceous, musky, woody, floral, sweet, sexy, calming, bright, delicious, and harmonious. A beautifully balanced scent. Nips of volatility are not offensive, but do eventually dissuade from prolonged sniffing. The stick is hand rolled and well made. It burns at a steady rate, the fragrance unfolding firmly but gently in the room. It neither overwhelms nor underperforms. The scent on the burn largely echoes that on the stick, though is slightly warmer and deeper with a keener focus on the musk element, and with the sheep wool prickle of halmaddi. It's a great scent, though doesn't seduce me. This is a solid, decent, value for money, quality patchouli incense. They cost £2 for twelve sticks (the weight of the packs are generally between 20 and 25g). That's a very good price for the quality and amount. 

Date: Dec 2023   Score:  41 

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Patchouli

Sai Handicrafts UK