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

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 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 Patchouli Luxury Incense Sticks 
Nov 2023 - Score 15

   

Scents reviewed: 4
Top score: 26

Bottom score: 15

Average: 21

***

The Best Incense Makers

Top Incense Brands in India

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

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

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

Balaji Essentials Cinnamon (M)
March 2024 - Score: 40 

HEM Cinnamon Masala Incense (M)
March 2022 - Score: 39 

  

Nandita Organic Cinnamon Premium Masala (PM)
April 2024 - Score: 37 

 

HEM Cinnamon (P)
March 2020 - Score: 36

  

Sifcon 100 Sticks Cinnamon Cedarwood (P)
Nov 2023 - Score: 35↑↓↓

Hari Darshan Red Apple Cinnamon (P)
April 2022 - Score: 28 

 

SAC Arruda Cinnamon Incense Sticks (P)
Nov 2022 - Score: 28 

HEM Cinnamon-Apple (P)
Jan 2024 - Score: 28 

 

Moroccan Bazaar Cinnamon (P)
Jan 2018 - Score: 24

  

HEM Cinnamon Incense Cones (P)
Jan 2019 - Score: 23

Padmini Cinnamon Incense (P)
April 2023 - Score: 23↑

  

   

Ancient Wisdom Cinnamon Orange (P)
Jan 2016 - Score: 20

Match Incense Cinnamon cones (P)
Feb 2020 - Score: 20

  

SAC Archangel Uriel Canelo (P)
April 2021 - Score: 19↓

  

 

 Stamford Cinnamon (cones) (P)

May 2019 - Score: 19*

 

  

Just Aromatherapy Cones Apple & Cinnamon (P)
Nov 2021 - Score: 13

Scents reviewed: 16

Top score: 40 

Bottom score: 13

Average top five: 37
Average all: 27

Total score: 32

***

Best Scents

Nandita Original Amber Premium Masala Incense

 

I like Nandita incense - what I've had has generally been good quality at very reasonable prices: a 15g pack of approx 12 sticks will usually be under £2, and deals can be had, such as from this eBay dealer of 6 packs for £5.49 with free postage (must be the same scent), or from Online London Store who do packs at £1.19, buy four get one free (plus VAT and postage).  

These are decent quality, professionally made sticks. The present as perfumed charcoal, and appear to be machine extruded. There's no melnoorva, but the sticks have a very very fine dust which comes off on my fingers when rubbed. The scent on the stick is divine. It has the aromatic qualities associated with amber (or, more appropriately, labdanum, the resin from the rock-rose which was valued by various ancient peoples in the Middle-east, including the Egyptians) plus touches of orange, brown sugar, cinnamon, and fresh earth. The scent on the burn is a little more earthy and vegetal than on the stick, less sweet and divine, and with some measure of smoke; however, it is attractive, and it informs the room pleasantly. If the fragrance on the burn matched the fragrance on the stick, this would be an awesome incense, and the score will lose some points because of the sense of disappointment that the burn scent is so considerably lesser than the promise on the stick; however, this is still a damned fine incense. 

Date: April 2024    Score: 41

***

Nandita of Mumbai

Amber

Aromatika Ace Scents Palo Santo

 

This is the last of the Amazon bundle of Aromatika's Ace Scents  range, which has enabled me to explore new scents in the range, as well as revisit some scents I burned and reviewed around 10 years ago.  I have been reasonably satisfied with the range as a whole, and the price of £10 for 200 sticks of ten different scents is very fair. These are not traditional masala sticks as claimed on the packs, but they are decent quality everyday synthetic perfumed room fresheners. 

Palo Santo is a fragrant wood from Peru. I'm pretty sure that at some point I did buy some to explore, but at the moment they are lost in one of several boxes of incense that has been consigned to the spare room in order to free up some living space in my study. Recently I tried some Palo Santo fragranced sticks from a Peru incense maker, Ispalla, but sadly they had a manufacturing problem. The incense house have got in touch to say they will send me some fresh, improved samples. I look forward to that. 

Meanwhile, the scent on this stick, as with the rest of the Ace Scents range, is perfumed, synthetic, attractive, and oddly moreish - I keep sniffing the stick. There's a subdued sweetness, some citric notes, some sweet jam (strawberry?), mint, and fresh shoe leather. Very likeable. Not profound. But certainly likeable. As standard with perfumed incense the scent on the burn is a little weaker and less attractive than that on the stick; however, it remains attractive, albeit with a smoky warmth that hinders total enjoyment. This is OK, but one of the weaker sticks in the Ace Scents range. 

Date: March 2024  Score: 26 

***

  Aromatika

Aromatika Ace Scents Rose

 

I've been slowly working my way through a bundle of Aromatika Ace Scents I picked up on Amazon a little while ago, updating reviews I did back in 2015, and reviewing scents in the range I'd not yet burned. I just have this Rose and a Palo Santo left, and I have been moderately pleased with these sticks. They are not what I understand as masala, though to be honest I'm not entirely clear on what Indian incense houses expect buyers to understand when they use that term, other than to say that an incense termed "masala" will be of a higher quality in some way than the standard everyday perfumed incense. I think different incense houses will have different understandings of the terms masala, same as they have different understandings of terms such as flora and natural. Anyway, in my experience with the Ace Scents range, they are to me a perfumed incense, using well made but clearly synthetic scents. They are not a budget incense, but nor are they a connoisseurs incense, they are essentially a decent quality everyday room freshener incense. And I'm fine with that.  Some of the scents I like more than others, and that will be purely down to individual preference. 

Rose is one of those scents that if you ask me, I would say is not my favourite. It's not a scent that is cool with a sense of style and sophistication. Yet, when I look at the rose incenses I have burned, I find that on average I enjoy rose, and a good number are among my all time favourite incenses.  It is a popular and classic scent for good reason. 

Anyway, the scent on the stick is sweet and perfumed and fresh, with little bubblegum notes - some jasmine, some peach,  some candy sugar, and some Turkish delight rose.  It's attractive and moreish - I want to keep sniffing!  As is common with perfumed incense (though less dramatically so the better the quality of the perfume and formulation used) the scent on the burn is not as attractive as the scent on the stick; however, it does remain very appealing with most of the sweet floral features on the stick. It's a soft, subtle, and gently beguiling fragrance. Nice. 

Date: March 2024  Score: 34

***

  Aromatika

Best rose incense

Aromatika Ace Scents Sandalwood Myyrh

 

Very attractive men's cologne scent on the stick. It's quite perfumed and synthetic, but appealing none-the-less. 

I'm up and down with this Ace Scents series from Aromatika. There's the sense that it's machine made and synthetic rather than the natural and hand-made impression given by the "Natural Masala" of the sub-title; but, despite that, the scents on a number of the Ace Scents sticks are really quite beguiling. And this one certainly has claims to being beguiling. 

The scent on the burn, while not quite as charming as that on the stick, certainly closely matches it, hindered only by a certain vagueness and some soft smoke. There's the warm, sweet, sexy, slightly musky notes of sandalwood - or, rather, αlpha-Santalol, the key ingredient in both synthetic and genuine sandalwood. There's an interesting chalk edge, which stops the sandalwood from becoming too sweet and cloying. Some mineral notes, a bit of floral, a gentle hint of spice. An attractive and soft burn that informs the room pleasantly. I like this. 

Date: April 2024  Score: 35

***

  Aromatika

Ansaam Incenses Mini Galaxy Sticks Arabesque

We've just come back from Cairo, where we brought home one of my daughters who has been teaching there for the last six months. Hectic place Cairo, and the drivers are extraordinary, swerving with one hand at high speed around cars travelling in both directions, while texting with the other. If it wasn't for the nauseating levels of  toxic exhaust fumes coming in the windows (few cars have working air-con), it would be good fun. We visited Khan el-Khalili, the touristy shopping area - not quite a souk, more like The Lanes in Brighton. It was Ramadan, and we were leaving as Iftar was approaching - most shops were closing, and people were gathering at tables to break their fast. And I spotted some incense on a stall outside a shop. Conscious that this was not really the time to be trading, I was still curious to see if any of the incense was made in Egypt. Unfortunately the stall holder descended on me and began thrusting various bits of incense at me asking silly prices. It was difficult to focus, but I managed to establish (despite his insistence that all his incense was Egyptian) that most of his incense was made in India (there was Tulasi among others on his stall). But I did notice the galaxy sticks - huge sticks that burned for over 5 hours. Way too large for me. But then I found two packs of mini galaxy sticks - still rather large and daunting, with a burning time of 3 hours, but more manageable. I would have liked to explore further, but we had to move on.  

The incense is made by Ansaam Incenses of  Cairo, who also make regular size sticks and cones. I've looked, and they do not appear to be available outside of Egypt. I have written to the company asking for details of sellers in the UK, or if I can buy direct from them, but no response yet. 

There are five sticks in each pack. These "mini" galaxy sticks are a regular length - 61/2 inches of incense on a thick 9 inch stick, but they are very thick - around 1/2 inch. The fragrant masala style paste has been extruded onto the bamboo core (I'm calling it bamboo, but I'm not sure what it is), with a ridged appearance that makes it look like a dozen or more regular thickness sticks have been mashed together. 

A mini galaxy stick next to a regular incense stick

 

The scent on the stick is delightful. There's a faint awareness of bakhoor, though mainly it's a sweet floral scent with jasmine, rose and bubblegum being the most prominent. The bubblegum is a curious scent to find, and I think my mind has latched onto that as the most familiar, though there is an array of aromas in here - various fruits; watermelon, peach, strawberry, plus nips of tobacco and spice. It's fascinating and very appealing. 

Because of it's size I was dubious about burning it indoors, so set it up initially in the outhouse, where we normally burn the least appealing incense to keep the cats company when they eat - though mainly to keep the flies away. However, I was impressed that neither the scent, nor the smoke was overwhelming. So I went around the house, smudging the rooms. The size of the stick makes this a good smudge incense. Plenty of smoke, but not at all dominating. However, because of the length of the burn, I did find that if left in a room for an hour, it will accumulate too much smoke for comfort.  Best used with windows open, or used outside, or simply go around cleansing the house, then extinguish to burn again another day. 

The scent on the burn is true to the scent on the stick, which to me tends to be a sign of quality incense. There is a clean, natural feel to the scent - an absence of chemicals or synthetics. It's quite possible there are synthetics or chemicals used, but they don't present during the burn. It all feels very natural, soft, and beautiful. I love this incense!  


Date: April 2024    Score: 44 

Incense Around the World

 

Bhagwan Incense (own label distributor)

 

I'm quickly putting this together, and will work on it later.  The wording is from my Review of 2023:

One of IncenseInTheWind's readers, Eugene from Ukraine, has been chatting with me for some time, and at the end of 2022 was in India sourcing incense for an online own brand shop he opened earlier this year - Bhagwan Incense. We did an incense exchange, and he sent me some of the incense he had sourced and was interested in. I particularly liked the B.G Pooja Store Nag Champa. We had discussed his shop, including names for it, and he asked if he could use stuff from my blog, and I of course agreed. When he did open the shop I had forgotten about it (as I do), and folks got in touch to say that there was this new shop that was copying info from my blog. After some moments of confusion, it was all sorted out - and a positive outcome was that I was able to put Eugene in touch with Irene from my favourite incense blog, Rauchfahne, which I feel has really grown in stature this year. She has a particular insight into incense which I find very valuable, and I think is informed by her own incense making, which is profound and gifted.  

My favourite of the incenses that Eugene sells that I have tried so far has been Bhagwan Incense Hari Leela Masala Incense.  Eugene buys incense in bulk from several sources, and then boxes it and puts on his own label. As such, a quantity of his incense is likely to be available from other sellers, and it is up to the buyer to sort out who is selling what, and who has the best price, etc. I noted some similarities between the Bhagwan Hari Leela and a vintage stick I had of Gokula Gaura Absolute Hari Leela (Oct 2023 - Score: 44), which is now sold by Gokula as Bakula Flower.  There may well be other sellers, possibly at higher prices. I continue to have some uncertainties about the rebadging of incense, but it certainly can be a more convenient way of exploring Indian incense, and a number of my favourite incenses have been supplied by British own brand importers. 

Eugene has told me that he will provide samples for postage cost . A good opportunity to try out the Bhagwan range.  Link: Bhagwan-incense Samples. 

There is a choice of three different sample sets. Only one free set may be ordered. Postage is 4.95 Euros in Europe, 5.95 to the UK, 9.95 to America and the rest of the world. All three sets may be ordered for 10 Euros plus postage, giving a total of 14.95 in Europe, 15.95 to the UK, and 19.95 to America and the rest of the world. That seems to me to be the most attractive deal. 

Here are the sample sets:

Set 1

Set 2

Set 3

Reviews

Bhagwan Incense Hari Leela Masala Incense 
 Oct 2023 - Score: 44 

Bhagwan Incense Spring Blossom Masala Incense
Oct 2023 - Score: 39

  

Bhagwan Incense Mango Masala Incense
Oct 2023 - Score: 37

  

(HMS) Bhagwan Incense Patchouli
March 2024 -  Score: 37

 

Bhagwan Incense Himalayan Musk Masala Incense
Oct 2023 - Score: 35

(HMS) Bhagwan Incense Lavender Bliss Masala Incense
Nov 2023 - Score: 28

***

Own brand distributors