Available in the UK in 15g packs for less than £2, such as 0.89p from AlliBhavan. This is a masala incense using traditional finely ground fragrant ingredients with fragrant oils - as seems to be the common way these days.
The scent on the stick is glorious. Very sweet, yet with sober tones of stone or mineral, sprinkled with vanilla, drizzled with honey, and kept active and on edge with a prickly awareness of halmaddi. There's benzoin in this - layers of caramel and almonds; some wood, some ash, some stone dust, some of that rubbery and chalky smell from medical gloves. It's quite fascinating and attractive.
The scent on the stick is glorious. Very sweet, yet with sober tones of stone or mineral, sprinkled with vanilla, drizzled with honey, and kept active and on edge with a prickly awareness of halmaddi. There's benzoin in this - layers of caramel and almonds; some wood, some ash, some stone dust, some of that rubbery and chalky smell from medical gloves. It's quite fascinating and attractive.
I've been burning this in various parts of the house over the past few days, and I really enjoy it. A good, clean, proper incense smell with notes of frankincense and myrrh on the burn, though the benzoin is also there underneath. It diffuses well - never aggressive, yet also never knowingly undersold. It has a distinct warm presence in the house, and it lingers beautifully for hours afterwards. This is great value incense. Good, traditional stuff. And a touch heavenly. At that price from AlliBhavan, I'm getting in a few packets!
This is currently my highest rated HEM incense.
This is currently my highest rated HEM incense.
I love this blog because we can have nice conversations here without fear of being judged or banned. Thank you, Steve.
ReplyDeleteLet's do the math on £0.89 masala incense from HEM. It's a very sweet price, isn't it? The wholesale price of HEM Masala per dozen (12) 15g boxes is $3/£2.30 (for reference, Satya sells for $3.50/£2.8 per dozen 15g). This means the wholesale price of one 15g box of HEM masala is $0.25 or £0.19. I’ve been told by industry players in India that companies like HEM are operating at huge margins. So the question is: how much was the woman who rolled this incense paid?
Google says, "The average hourly wage in India is around ₹180, based on the assumption that people work 8 hours a day for six days a week. The minimum wage in India for unskilled workers is ₹178 per hour." This translates to $2.12 or £1.2 per hour. How many sticks can one woman roll within an hour? I just want to make sure that HEM is not paying below the minimum hourly rate for incense rolling their masala. Could someone do the math, please?
I was in Bangladesh last year and saw massive factories, built and owned by Chinese companies, making £3 T-shirts for Primark. Knowing how the Chinese treat animals, I wouldn't be surprised to see children working there. So the question is: is it ethical to buy a product from a company where you know women or children are exploited mercilessly and possibly underpaid?
Yes, I've looked into the financial situation as regards Indian incense workers a few times.
DeleteCurrently they get around 35 Rupees per thousand sticks if they work in a factory. 30 Rupees if they work at home. Most workers aim to do 5,000 sticks a day. Around 150 Rupees at home – 175 Rupees in a factory. It's not a lot. Yet a lot of the workers have husbands who have irregular work, or no work at all. And some don't have husbands. They value the work, as it keeps their family going. That's not to say they like it, but they value it – they depend on it.
Some incense companies, such as Goloka, train women to roll incense, and pay them a decent wage. But not all do. More incense companies are using agarbarttie machines, which are operated by men. This is taking work away from women. There are around 200,000 women in India who depend on making incense to support themselves and their families. A number of them have joined SEWA , which brings them together, and helps them improve their conditions and opportunities.
The situation regards child labour is interesting. We tend to view it from a somewhat condescending and moralistic Western perspective. We seem to assume all kinds of horrors. Yet when I travelled around Southeast Asia I saw a number of families working together in harmony – with no sign of cruelty or neglect. As I am sure you have in your own travels.
DeleteAnd in the West we expect our children to do some work around the house, and encourage them to get part-time jobs (less so these days, but that was very common when I was a child).
I'm anti-cruelty, and I'm anti-denying opportunities, so keeping children off school, or beating them to work, is clearly wrong. But helping out the family business for a few hours after school, especially when the family are poor, doesn't look evil to me. That's just reality. No more evil than parents getting their children to wash the dishes or sweep the floor or clean the car.
In some agricultural countries it is quite common to keep children off school in order to work on the farm. In Ukraine, for example, between 9 and 10% of children are kept off school to work. The UK school summer holidays were designed to allow children to work on farms in the summer. Children helping the family has always been with us, and is present in all countries. Having children help the family is not in itself an evil - it is any abuse that may result from this which is evil. A family that abuses a child will do so regardless of if there is work involved.
As regards children in India – they are not allowed to work in incense factories by law. Some of the better run companies, such as HEM, will enforce this, but the Indian govement estimates that around 7,000 children do work in incense factories (the worse offenders are cigarette companies who employ around 28,000 children). A number of Incense companies put “No Child Labour” on their packets. I'm not sure how well they monitor that. Large companies such as HEM and Moksh, and Satya and Goloka are probably able to ensure that children are not involved, as they have their own regulated factories, and don't use home workers (as far as I am aware). But outside of such companies, I speculate that at least 100,000 children are involved in incense production at home, or in small, local factories. And I speculate that without the children's help, the families would be worse off.
I have not seen children working at any incense factory and I visited a lot of them. That`s a good part. Not sure about Bangladesh - I don`t think Chinese owners would be kind to anyone, including children, so it is possible. Also, jumping to another topic, did you see this?: https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/ahmedabad/increasing-sale-of-imported-misbranded-incense-sticks-harmful/articleshow/52359263.cms
ReplyDeleteHa. I've seen similar alarmist reports on imports.
DeleteThey like to stress that Fenobucarb is "toxic" and "lethal", but they don't make clear that it is lethal to insects, but not to humans! Carbamate is used precisely because it has a very low toxicity both on the skin and orally for mammals. It is replacing other more toxic pesticides. Though it can kill if ingested in large doses - it is a known suicide method in some Asian countries. I suppose if someone wanted to eat a bunch of those incense sticks they'd get ill, but if they burned them and inhaled the smoke, it would be the wood smoke that would be the most harmful They are importing those sticks from China where they mostly use wood powder. Charcoal is much safer.
I've been looking into the dangers of incense smoke on and off for a while now, and I'm at the stage where I feel that incense make of wood powder should be banned. Despite all the instructions to burn sticks in a well ventilated room, and not to inhale the smoke, people still do. And it is harming them.
Oh, I forgot to mention incense sticks that are made primarily from wood powder (without charcoal) and imported from China to India. These are called 'Whitebatti' in India because they are machine-made, light brown sticks made with wood powder only, no charcoal. Some Indian companies buy them unscented from China and then dip them in fragrance. These Whitebatti sticks are awful and should be avoided at all costs. The wood powder is bonded by glue, and they leave a clean white ash when burned, which is the first sign of concern. In contrast, Masala incense produces uneven, darker ash. I strongly advise against burning such incense (Whitebatti), as they are likely harmful. Perhaps this is what you were referring to when you mentioned sticks made with only wood powder!
ReplyDeleteWood Smoke
DeleteBritish Heart Foundation
Wood Smoke and Your Health
Etc
The risks associated with charcoal tend to be in producing it (it can be made from coconuts and other substances, but is mainly made from wood), and from cooking with it, when it burns the food, and people breathe in the charred particles.
Charcoal actually produces little smoke, so there are fewer harmful particles. However, there are gases produced when burning charcoal which can be lethal if the room is not well ventilated.
Over the past year or so I have thought about no longer using incense, and warming fragrant oils instead. But I actually like the notion of burning incense, and I like watching the smoke rise.
Modern masala incense relies mostly on liquid scents - essential or fragrant oils. Charcoal is very good for absorbing such liquid scents. In order to hold and disperse the scent, fixatives are used. The most popular fixatives are gum Arabic and DEP. Vanilla is also used (notably by HMS), but not much. Halmaddi is an older fixative, which faded from use long before there were problems with halmaddi tree production. It was felt that the scent of halmaddi (which is not that attractive) inferred too much with the fragrance. Gum Arabic is purer, and so is more popular. But halmaddi has come back into popularity due to the desire by some buyers to have a more traditional incense.
DeleteWood powder is not a good carrier because wood powder has a scent of its own, which charcoal does not. Also, wood powder does not in itself hold, release, and disperse the perfumes. It is the fixatives which do that.
I'd be interested in your double dipped Amber Oudh.
DeleteI believe I sent it to you and SamsaSpoon, if not I will send again with a bunch of new incense.
DeleteI'll take a look. Much incense was moved upstairs during a tidy up (my study is also our dining room, so sometimes it gets cleared if we have someone staying over), but I have a bunch of your incense still here in my study. I took photos of them in prep for reviewing. I'll take a look now.
DeleteThis is what I have downstairs: Bhagwan The Amber Oudh must be in the attic.
DeleteUnfortunately, the link does not work,
ReplyDeletecould you upload again please?
Others have reported it as OK.
DeleteNo worries, Chrissie will bring the Amber Oudh down from the attic at some point.
I've been thinking that your description of double dipped sounds something like the process for flora incense, which is generally a dipped masala. The melnoorva powder (masala powder) is often quite moist with fragrance liquids.
I don
DeleteI don’t believe that flora incense is made much differently from other masala incense. The uniqueness comes from the mix and strength of the oils - floral and sweet, and others. The powder itself doesn’t carry any fragrance, if you put it in oil it will change the colour. I understand that the proportion and concentration of oils in flora incense are much higher than in a typical Nag Champa.
ReplyDeleteI’ve asked several manufacturers if halmaddi is responsible for making the sticks soft, especially in flora or fluxo incense, but their response was that honey is what makes the stick soft. So, if you want to achieve a wet masala grade, you need to add a lot of honey.
The basebatti format (like the ones in your picture Imperial Sandalwood, Royal Sandalwood, Royal Mysore Sandalwood) is mostly chosen for woody incenses such as Sandalwood, Oudh, Myrrh, and Frankincense. If you add those oils to a masala dough, the pure scent of the oils won’t come through as clearly, leading to a sweeter result. That’s why masala is ideal for flora incense or Nag Champa, where sweetness is desirable.
From what I’ve gathered, they don’t dip flora or fluxo incense in oils again; they simply add a large amount of honey and a high concentration of oils during the mixing process.Amber Oudh was oiled twice not to make it stronger but to give more depth and softness to the fragrance, creating a multi layered profile. It is basically a nectar of oils in the air, you can almost drink it, so smooth.
Interesting. Thanks for that Eugene.
DeleteWhen I chat with makers about flora I get various responses. The more information we all can get and share, the better. I've had fat floras, thin floras, wet floras, dry floras, etc. Mostly they tend to be masala style, but I've had clearly perfume-dipped sticks called flora. Pooling my observations, coupled with what makers have told me, and with information gleaned from others such as yourself, I would say that flora is a style influenced by the success of Sai Flora, and which copies some or all elements of that incense - including sometimes copying the styling on the packing. While there is variance, most are generally masala in style, and most are rich with oils, yet they are not always expensive. Most tend to be standard length, but fatter and heavier - some sticks will bend with the weight. Honey has been traditionally used as a binder (holds together the dried powders - allows them to mix and hold together), and is still used by some makers, especially if they are traditional or wish to make a traditional style incense. I'm not entirely sure of the advantage of using more honey than necessary - wouldn't that be like using more water than necessary? Too much honey or water, and surely there would be problems with burning. Also, using honey would push up the price, yet there are some very moist floras, like Sai Flora, which are dirt cheap. I find it hard to balance that in my mind. I have often wondered why most floras are so moist -I have thought it couldn't just be more fragrant oils because the price point of many floras is same as or even lower than less moist sticks. I have privately speculated that it may be due to heavy use of some liquid chemical such as DEP (agarbatti oil).
When I visited Meena Perfumery last year, they showed me the honey they use. It’s a lower-grade honey, not something you'd want to eat, but it’s perfect for incense making. In my opinion, flora or fluxo types, which are super thick and moist, can only be masala to achieve that complex fragrance. One shopkeeper showed me a list of ingredients used in Sai Flora, claiming someone had decoded the scent in a laboratory. According to him, Sai Flora is a blend of 40 ingredients, though I’m not sure if that's true, especially since it’s sold at low prices in India. I'm also concerned that using too much honey might prevent the stick from burning properly. They could use ghee instead, which burns better than honey. I believe ghee is primarily used in incense made in Vrindavan/Mathura, where all incense has that typical ghee scent. Mike from Gokula might know more about Vrindavan-style incense since I think he's selling some.
DeleteI've had some incense made with ghee, such as Vaishnodevi Chandan Dhoop. It's not an ingredient I like. Burning ghee (rather than heated ghee, which can be nutty and caramelly) is acrid, pungent, sharp, acidic, nasty, like diesel oil. It will certainly clear the home of unwanted spirits and insects, which is likely its main use. It's not a pleasing scent. Each to their own, though, and if some Indians like it, then so be it.
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