Mimosa & Cardamom Jo Malone

Desirability:Full bottle and a back up

Source: pinterest

Never say never. 

I haven't been particularly inspired by Jo Malone before. Something about the sleek minimalist bottles and transparent juice did not speak to my soul which tends to seek out the deep, dark and darker. 

Until recently that is. I have loved mimosa since Une Fleur de Cassie and having quenched my recent thirst for all things roses, my attention was caught by these delicately sweet little yellow flowers in the form of Too Much, which I chanced upon in a blind swap. Since Too Much is out of production and the bottles on Ebay have exorbitant shipping costs tacked to the otherwise reasonable prices, I was determind to find another mimosa to love. Something as sunny and ethereal as Too Much. Mimosa & Cardamom was released at perfect timing in my case and I snagged a bottle during a weekend in Hong Kong, on a five minute break between eating and more eating. Heavenly. I mean Mimosa & Cardamom but yes food in Hong Kong is sublime too. 

There's nothing dark about Mimosa & Cardamom. It's almost like the scene in Stardust where Claire Danes bursts into light and floods the entire place with brilliant illumination which somehow kills Michelle Pfeiffer. But instead of pure white light, Mimosa & Cardamom is radiant with a golden glow that warms you up and turns you into a fuzzy marshmallow inside. The cardamom does not detract from the main focus but instead lends its aromatic spiciness to the subtle sweetness of the flowers. It feels like being surrounded by mimosa trees! Projection and longevity are both pretty good. 

Comparing Mimosa & Cardamom with Too Much and Une Fleur de Cassie, I would say that Too Much is more sparkling and a lighter yellow like champagne, whereas Une Fleur de Cassie is more of a darker honeyed gold and Mimosa & Cardamom being somewhere in between. All are fantastic mimosa scents!

Petite Cherie Annick Goutal

Source: parfumglamour.com

More fruity than floral and showcasing pear, I prefer Petite Cherie to other scents I've tried with pear in the notes as it's not too sweet (Montale's Wild Pears was candied pears on me and Slumberhouse's Pear & Olive didn't suit me at all, I'll politely say it was weird on me and not in a nice way unlike some other perfume-heads who got all sorts of loveliness from it) and what sweetness there is seems to come from the fruit itself rather than added sugar. The opening is sheer and fresh with fruit and green notes, rose is listed but I didn't detect any.

I enjoyed the first hour of Petite Cherie as opposed to the later part where it turned to a soapy pear, too soapy for my liking. It stayed this way for the rest of its eight hours on me, subtle but steadfast. My search for THE pear scent continues.

Anima Dulcis Arquiste

I love a good chocolate as much as the next gourmand lover but these days it takes a little more than just chocolate to rock my world. Anima Dulcis does just that. 

The opening of Anima Dulcis is a peppery, dry dark chocolate that smells like it's 90% dark with that raw cocoa taste and low on sugar. The vanilla and cinnamon slowly make their way in and the chocolate turns to a more creamy milk chocolate, the spices keeping it from being overly sweet and giving it a more grown-up feel, away from chocolate scents like The Body Shop's Chocomania and Guerlain's Elixir Charnel Gourmand Coquin that smells like a rosy Lolita bingeing on rum and Godiva chocolate hearts, a delicious scent but that price-tag, really? 

As it further evolves, Anima Dulcis loses some of the vanilla and gains back more dark cocoa with its bittersweet earthy flavour. The overall concoction smells realistic and organic, I can almost taste it. The edible version of Anima Dulcis would be Lindt's Chilli Dark Chocolate, as strange as it sounds it's pretty good stuff, semi sweet dark chocolate with a subtle spicy flavour to give it that extra kick in the taste buds. 

Lindt Chilli Dark Chocolate, image courtesy of Flickr.

Anima Dulcis dries to a dusty spiced chocolate, reminding me of making hot chocolate from chocolate powder, but this time with cinnamon and maybe some cardamom and chilli flakes? The scent has a moderate projection and very good longevity, my cardigan from last night still smells delicious after 24 hours. 

Spicy Hot Chocolate, recipe below, courtesy of www.shape.com

Since this is probably triggering cravings, I found an interesting recipe on shape.com for spicy hot chocolate and have included it here.

Ingredients:

1/2 pound butternut squash (about 2 cups cubed)

Cooking spray

7 cups nonfat milk

8 7/10 ounces Mexican or semisweet dark chocolate

30 1/2 ounce semisweet chocolate

1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1 teaspoon grated nutmeg

1/2 teaspoon cardamom

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Peel squash and cut it into 1-inch cubes. Arrange squash on a baking sheet in a single layer and spray lightly with cooking spray. Bake for 30 minutes, or until tender.

2. In a blender, puree squash with three cups of milk until smooth. Stir remaining ingredients in a large saucepan over low heat, until chocolate is melted.

3. Add pureed squash mixture to pan and continue stirring until it's heated (do not boil). Strain mixture through a coarse sieve and serve.

Dans Tes Bras Frederic Malle

It was during my search for the perfect violet two years ago that I met Dans Tes Bras and the Frederic Malle Editions de Parfums, of which I am a devotee. 

Dans Tes Bras did not have a promising opening to match its affectionate name and we almost gave up on the relationship from there. It started out chilly and metallic, nothing like the fresh sweet violets of Annick Goutal's La Violette or the Ophelia-like Apres L'ondee, it seemed more a relative to the hyper green Les Nez's Unicorn Spell and the astral violet Stephen Jones by Comme des Garcons. "It's Maurice Roucel," I said to myself and kept faith even though this was clearly not going to be Guerlain's pouting candied violet Insolence Eau de Parfum. 

So Dans Tes Bras stepped in from the icy cold, letting in the arctic wind that sent me into a recoil. Sensing my distress, he chased the chilly elements out and closed the door of our mountain home, made of rough hewn logs and stone with walls of leaded glass. I jumped up for a cuddle, happy that he was home and stayed in his arms for a long moment, breathing in the combination of my favourite slightly powdery sweet violet perfume and the outdoorsy smell of musk and woods rising from his skin heated up from his morning workout outside. The smell of intimacy.

  And we lived happily ever after. 

Dans Tes Bras keeps close to you like a security blanket or a comforting hug and hangs around for a very long time. Like until you shower and wash your clothes. Worth at least a sample if you enjoy violets and skin musks. Clean skin. Just ride out the strange hospital 90% alcohol antiseptic opening.