Incense in The Wind: 2024

Thursday 25 April 2024

Fumino Indian Spices

Oooh, this has a pleasant Indian spice mix aroma - a bit like a masala chai tea. Cardamom, cinnamon, aniseed, clove, fresh beechwood sawdust, and - oddly, but not unpleasantly - sweaty socks. It's a rather fascinating and compelling scent, unlike anything I can recall having from Satya, the company who appear to be very similar to whoever makes this incense for Fumino. I love it. So what third generation family incense house in Bangalore makes a spicy masala style incense?

The blurb on the back

The scent on the burn approximates that on the stick, though is more sombre, deeper, and complex. Some of the higher notes don't quite come through so something is lost, but there is a matching gain in depth and impact. It is a little more challenging on the burn, with more of the stale sweat notes being felt. I'd welcome a little more sweetness and balance or contrast, but I am intrigued by the nature of the fragrance - the various spice strands. There is a cinnamon sweetness here, which does offer some relief to the otherwise rather grim cardamom pungency with its emphasis on camphor and burnt curry spices.

This is not a standard room freshener, nor is it an incense I'm likely to burn often - but there are times when I will be wanting something this complex, challenging, and different. This is kind of like a breath of fresh air to anyone who may have had weeks of unadventurous mainstream incense.

Date: April 2024 Score: 45

***

Fumino

Fumino Oudh

There is a distinct similarity in the Fumino sticks with each other - they look the same, and have a generic house style. It's a style that is shared with Satya. Fumino is the brand name of Inbound To Anglia Ltd, a small wholesale importer currently based in Southampton, who source their incense from a third generation incense family in Bangalore, a description that matches Satya.

I like oudh, the Arab name for agarwood. It is one of the great incense scents, and works well as a fragrance for incense sticks, though is usually based on a synthetic oudh, such as Firmenich or Givaudan Black Agar. This stick presents as a masala with the melnoorva powder dusting on the paste, though how much the incense house has used natural ingredients as compared to either oils or synthetics is hard to say.

There is a warm men's cologne scent on the stick, which is common to all the Fumino sticks I have tried so far. The scent does have an oudh feel - woody, slightly spicy, warm and mildly sensual, softly prickly, some awareness of halmaddi. I like it, though it does have a sense of cheap corner shop oudh men's perfume. This is not quality oudh. And though I am saying that there is a similarity between Fumino and Satya, I'm not saying that Satya make these sticks - they may be or they may not be; but if they are making them, I think they are using lower quality perfumes than they use in their own Satya branded sticks.

The blurb on the back

The burn is reasonably attractive - there's a fruity note which contrasts and lifts the basic woody scents. It's warm, sensual, and almost beautiful. This is a good quality room freshener, and would be useful in the bedroom, or as a welcomer to someone you wish to seduce. Yeah, it's seducing me.

Date: April 2024 Score: 36

***

Fumino

The best agarwood incense

Fumino Cinnamon Apple Clove

A Satya style incense from Fumino, an incense and home decor brand owned by Inbound To Anglia Ltd, a one man company currently based in Southampton. The incense is made in Bangalore by an unnamed third generation company, a description which matches Satya. Six pack deals on Amazon are available for under £10.

This one is functionally named Cinnamon Apple Clove, which seems typical of cinnamon apple scented incense, such as Hari Darshan Red Apple Cinnamon and HEM Cinnamon-Apple. There is a perfumed fragrance on the stick, which leans more on men's cologne than apple or cinnamon. It's a warm, woody, mineral, marine, aroma, quite appealing and mildly sexy and seductive.

The blurb on the back

The scent on the burn is vague, woody, mildly smoky, though has elements of the fragrance on the stick. It's a modest, though attractive, scent, and makes a pleasant, warming room freshener. I'm not getting a sense of any of the named ingredients - this is not a fragrance to "bring to mind the comforting smell of a freshly baked apple pie". It is a decent scent from a decently made incense stick, the sort of thing that Satya do, though perhaps not to the same quality or strength. This is a decent enough, modest, gentle, relaxing, warming everyday room freshener at a good price. Perhaps a bit too much smoke in comparison to scent, but that's not a major complaint.

Date: April 2024 Score: 29

***

Fumino

Best cinnamon incense

Fumino Autumn Breeze

Fumino is the brand name for incense and home decor items imported by Inbound To Anglia Ltd, a one man company founded in Cambridgeshire, though currently based in Southampton. The City Road, London address on the packets is a convenience address. The company sells mostly via eBay and Amazon. The incense is sourced from "a team of expert ladies at our third-generation family factory in Bangalore", which could apply to a number of companies, including Satya. Six pack deals on Amazon are available for under £10. All the sticks are masala style, and they look and behave like Satya sticks. There are approx 14 sticks per packet. The packets all have the same design - a cool black, with a simple though elegant stylised design of incense smoke. Each scent has a different colour for the smoke design. There is a short blurb on the back relevant to each scent. Each packet has a card with a voucher code for 10% off the next purchase at fumino.co.uk, a website that doesn't work for me.

Sticks are 8 inches with approx 6 inches of hand rolled paste which has been coated in a generous dusting of melnoorva - finely ground tree bark which is mainly intended to stop the freshly rolled sticks gluing together as they dry. There is a pleasant aroma on the stick - men's cologne, bubblegum, wet leather, some prickle of halmaddi - a tree resin used as a plasticiser to strengthen and lengthen the fragrance of the perfumes used. It is a fresh, lively, and attractive scent.

The blurb on the back

The burn is steady, well mannered, and polite, with a moderate Satya style scent. There's sandalwood, halmaddi, and some aspects of the aromas noted on the stick. It's a vague, generalised fragrance which is modestly pleasant, and which modestly informs the room. It's a decent scent on a decently made stick, and offers good value for money as a decent quality and moderate everyday room freshener. Not a scent that excites or interests me, but it does the job. I quite like it.

Date: April 2024 Score: 31

***

Fumino

Phool Luxury Incense Cones Tuberose

Tuberose is a highly fragrant night flower that has been used as a floral note in perfumes since at least the 17th century. It was used by Marie Antoinette, who imported the tuberose plant from Mexico. It is known as an overpowering scent. When opening the plastic inner bag of these Phool Tuberose there is a sense of being overwhelmed, though not in a pleasant manner: there's an odour of death and decay and damp clothes left too long. It's a smell that I am now associating with Phool. While some of the cones have been better than others at overcoming that basic decay odour with the keynote perfume, others, as here with the Tuberose, struggle.

On the burn the perfume struggles against the core material, so initially what is detected is smoke and burning cardboard with some vague floral notes battling almost in vain to be noticed. It gets a little better as the cone burns down, though never to the point of being attractive.

I love the idea of Phool, and I love the bright, colourful packaging - it feels special to open a box of Phool; but the production method is really a problem for me. It is possible to reuse temple flowers positively, as with the Cycle brand Pushkarini, or possibly overcome the mouldy odour with a more intense use of perfume, but until I hear reports of Phool improving, then, once I have finished my current stock, I'm unlikely to buy any more Phool.

Date: April 2024 Score: 17

***

Phool Incense

Monday 22 April 2024

Phool Luxury Incense Cones Lavender

I'd been aware of the buzz around Phool for a little while, that they were collecting discarded temple flowers and turning them into incense, so I was keen to try, especially after burning Cycle Brand's Pushkarina. When I saw that Aavyaa were selling Phool cones for ₹290 (approx. £2.90) with free shipping, I was excited to order a few (The price has since gone up to ₹435). I liked the social intent of Phool, the positive recycling, the sustainability, and I loved the quality packaging. But I didn't get on at all with the formulations and the scents, and after reviewing four of them, I put the remaining cones and sticks to one side.

I am returning to the cones now for the prosaic reason that we need more cones for the bathroom. And I've been pleasantly surprised by how much I've enjoyed these Lavender cones over the past couple of days. I'm not overwhelmed or anything, but I'm getting on with them a lot more than I did with most of the others (which have now all gone because they were simply consigned to the bathroom, so I'm not able to easily return to them and see if I've simply adjusted my thinking, or if the Lavender really are better than the others I've already reviewed - but my recollection is that, other than the Jasmine, we didn't hugely enjoy using them in the bathroom).

There is a modest lavender aroma on the cone, which is repeated in the burn. There is a general room freshener fragrance about them, but on the whole this is quite palatable, and doesn't smell like stale damp clothes, which is my main experience with Phool so far. To be fair, there is still that little whiff of decay about them, but it's modest, and simply acts as an interesting balance to the quite acceptable mild room freshener lavender. I'm OK with this. It's a reasonably pleasant everyday perfumed room freshener.

Date: April 2024 Score: 28

***

Best of Lavender

Phool Incense

This is more of a placeholder, with text copied from my first review. I'll update later.

I've been curious about Phool for a little while, as there's been a buzz of interest in them because of their sustainability marketing, especially the re-using of temple flowers. So I was pleased to get a box of 40 cones from aavyaa for ₹290.00 (approx. £2.90) with free shipping. The using of temple flowers in incense is becoming popular, Kailapira do it with Alaknanda and others, and Ranga Rao do it with their excellent Pushkarini. In my limited experience, the use of temple flowers is not mainly for the scent, but as part of the burning material as the crushed petals contain carbon elements, though when the petal powder is blended with oils, it can assist the aroma.

Reviews

Phool Luxury Incense Cones Lavender
April 2024 - Score: 28

Phool Luxury Incense Cones Jasmine
Nov 2013 - Score: 26

Phool Luxury Incense Cones Nagchampa
Nov 2013 - Score: 23

Phool Luxury Incense Cones Indian Rose
Sept 2013 - Score: 20

Phool Luxury Incense Cones Tuberose
April 2024 - Score: 17

Phool Patchouli Luxury Incense Sticks
Nov 2023 - Score 15

Scents reviewed: 6
Top score: 28

Bottom score: 15

Average: 21

***

The Best Incense Makers

Top Incense Brands in India

Sunday 21 April 2024

Vrindavan Bazaar Temple Grade Patchouli

I've recently been working through my backlog of samples from Gokula-incense, but got somewhat side-tracked by looking into HMS, who are a main source for Gokula and a good number of other retailers, such as TOI, Happy Hari, Primo, Bhagwan, Prasad Gifts Celestial, etc. In my HMS research I bumped into VrindavanBazaar.com, who have an attractive range of masala incense that looks kind of similar to HMS. At the price they charge - £1 or £2 for 20gm, and only £7 for international shipping, I ordered a bunch to try them out. Bless them, they packaged it securely, and popped in several free packets, so I got the pictured catch for only £31, including delivery.

22 packs for £31 from Vrindavan Bazaar

The sticks are 9 inches long with 7 inches of paste. The paste is a soft, crumbly charcoal, very neatly and expertly hand-rolled onto a plain, machine-cut bamboo splint. There is a thin covering of melnoorva powder to stop the damp sticks from gluing together as they dry. The scent on the stick is mildly volatile, sharp, yet rather attractive - it's quite green, earthy, floral, cat pee, mushrooms, mildly musky. It's clear that the main fragrance work will be done by liquid scents - a fragrance oil of some sort, diluted with a carrier and a plasticiser.
The burn is gentle, but a little hot, so some of the top notes initially burn off too quickly to be noticed, though eventually it sort of settles so they begin to makes themselves known. The resulting fragrance is pleasant, but nothing special. It kinda feels natural, and it informs the room in a modest though attractive manner. I like it, but I'm not excited by it. I can be persuaded that there is some patchouli here, but it's not presenting as classic patchouli. There's a general air of slightly warm and sweaty (fresh, intriguing) wool. There's a kind of wildness and roughness about this, in a charming way, like a rough sleeping and attractive teenage hippy who doesn't wear chemical deodorants.
I like it more and more as it develops, and it is settling into an area of patchouli now, but without the sweetness and musk that, for me, is the essential draw of the fragrance.

Date: April 2024 Score: 33

Patchouli

Saturday 20 April 2024

Nandita Organic Cinnamon Premium Masala

Cinnamon has an attractive fragrance, so is appropriate as an incense ingredient, and I find many cinnamon incense sticks, as here, to be pleasantly seductive and relaxing.

This one has some distinct clove elements added to the cinnamon, which makes it more interesting, though less attractive, than a straightforward cinnamon. It informs the room softly, creating a relaxed and cleansing atmosphere. A very pleasant incense.

Date: April 2024 Score: 37

***

Nandita of Mumbai

Best cinnamon incense

Friday 19 April 2024

Best cinnamon incense

Cinnamon harvest (photo by Tripper)

Cinnamon has a gorgeous fragrance - warm, spicy, inviting, and uplifting; that it makes a wonderful ingredient for incense. Mankind has been beguiled by the fragrance of cinnamon since the dawn of civilization. It was known to the Phoenicians - the great early traders and city builders of the Mediterranean; indeed, the name cinnamon comes from the Phoenician language. And it was known to the Ancient Egyptians, who, according to the Ancient Greek historian Diodorus of Sicily, used it during mummification: "they carefully dress the whole body for over thirty days, first with cedar oil and certain other preparations, and then with myrrh, cinnamon, and such spices as have the faculty not only of preserving it for a long time but also of giving it a fragrant odour." It is sometimes named as one of the ingredients of Kyphi, the legendary incense of Egypt. It was a such a prized product that dealers concealed where they obtained it, leading to fantastical stories of the Cinnamon bird which built its nest out of cinnamon sticks.

Cinnamon is made from the inner bark of several related trees: true cinnamon comes from the bark of Cinnamomum verum, also known as Ceylon cinnamon; though there are other cinnamons from the related cassias trees, giving Indonesian, Saigon, and, the most common, Chinese cinnamon, which accounts for almost half of all cinnamon sold. Cinnamon is mainly associated with food flavouring, especially in things like milk puddings, apple pies, pastries, curries, and Chai tea or coffee, though also has various health properties. The active ingredient in cinnamon, and the one mainly responsible for the familiar scent, is cinnamaldehyde, which can be synthesized, but natural cinnamaldehyde is cheap and easy to obtain via steam distillation. If an incense house wanted to cut costs, they would more likely dilute natural cinnamon oil or powder with something like DEP rather than use a synthetic. And they would likely use the cheaper Chinese cinnamon rather than Ceylon, and also use an oil that was distilled from other parts of the tree, like the leaves, rather than the bark.

Reviews