In perfumery, the gourmand facet is a new expression of femininity. Unlike salty, citrusy, or bitter flavors, the sweet taste of a gourmand has a retro effect and tends to evoke some nostalgia for the sweets, cakes, and toys of our childhood.

Adolescence is often characterized by gourmand scents and sweet fragrances, but it is also appreciated by adults because it is polished and leaves a powerful wake-up call.

The history of gourmet perfumes

The first vanilla fragrances were not officially declared "gourmand".

Guerlain made a great contribution to the development of this aspect with perfumes such as La Guerlinade with vanilla, vanillin, tonka bean, resins and patchouli accord found in Shalimar 1925 and Habit Rouge 1965. There was also a gourmand facet in Heure Bleue 1912 with its accord of marshmallows based on blossom Orange and vanilla, as well as in many other fragrances of the House of Guerlain.

Without Shalimar, there would have been no Angel (1992) which was the first fragrance officially announced as gourmand with patchouli, red fruits and caramel accord. Angel became the leader of this new wave of gourmand fragrances, followed by Lolita Lempicka and many others.

You will find the marshmallow accord in Florentina from Sylvain Delacorte's Musk collection (the marshmallow accord is the union of orange blossom and vanilla).

Natural ingredients for appetizing features

Gourmet's color palette is very wide. There are notes of vanilla, benzoin, and tonka bean, as well as many synthetic ones.

vanilla

The sweet ingredients used in perfumery to reproduce the scent of vanilla are actually synthetic molecules: vanillin and ethyl vanillin.

There are different types of vanilla:

• Vanilla planifolia: It comes from the orchid flower in Mexico and was pollinated by a bee. Today, the pollen is collected by hand by women known as "matchmakers". It takes a year and a half to obtain the fruit of a black vanilla bean, then it is boiled and covered for a whole day, then dried in the sun, which kills the bacteria.
• Madagascar vanilla: It is a rare and luxurious substance, therefore it is very expensive because it contains real olfactory wonders with notes of milky, honey, amber, woody, spicy, animalic and earthy.

Another type of vanilla from the botanical group Tahitensis is more floral.

Vanilla can be processed in two ways: by soaking the cut beans in alcohol for one month (a technique no longer used today, it was used to obtain a vanilla tincture) or by extracting the beans with a volatile solvent, making it possible to create vanilla absolute. The aroma of vanilla can also be obtained from synthetic products (vanillin and ethyl vanillin). Vanilla is said to be a cure for anxiety, and that it brings strength and health.

resin

Benzoin is a balsam secreted from the stem of the benzoin benzoin, a tree of the family Styracaceae, native to Siam and Sumatra. This material (also called "gum" or "tear benzoin") is white in its liquid state and yellow when dry.

Benzoin gives off a very subtle fragrance, and is particularly appreciated in the form of incense. In the perfume industry, the gum is processed by extraction with volatile solvents to obtain benzoin absolute. This raw material has a vanilla, sweet, almond, close to the aroma of roasted coffee, but also slightly honeyed, floral (with a note of cloves), licorice, even a somewhat medicinal aroma.

Benzoin of Siam is one of the most appreciated by perfumers (it is very rare and expensive, it has a strong vanilla facet).

tonka beans

Tonka bean comes from the South American tree, dipteryx odorata. Also called cumarona or sarabia, tonka bean is a black bean that curls up when dried (this is when it starts to give off its true aroma). Tonka beans can be used in a variety of ways: placed in cupboards among piles of laundry, processed with the extraction of volatile solvents in perfumes to obtain tonka bean absolute, grated in pastries, or to flavor snuff and pipe tobacco, such as 'Amsterdam' (this use is now banned in France). and the United States).

This raw material is a real perfume in itself, thanks to its many facets of wood, balsamic, vanilla, almond, pistachio, tobacco, hay, and so on.

The main molecule of this raw material is called coumarin, which was synthesized in 1868 (it was first used in Guerlain's Jicky with linalool and ethyl vanillin).

You will find a note of tonka bean in Vahina from the Vanilla collection by Sylvaine Delacourte.

The other ingredients for a gourmet face

There are many other notes used in gourmet aspects, such as:

Bitter Cocoa Extract: A slightly sweet chocolate flavour.

Bitter Almond: There is a natural note that comes from the apricot kernel that gives this almond scent, as well as the benzoic aldehyde molecule.

Natural honey component.

Synthetic gourmand notes

The gourmand face also includes synthetic ingredients such as caramel notes and warm milk notes.

Caramel note in the gourmand face

The caramel note is composed of synthetic molecules such as ethyl maltol, maltol, sacrasol, coumarin, or furanol. The latter allow to obtain many notes, from caramel to cotton candy.

Warm milk flavor in the gourmand face

Lactone leaves, which present a pleasant aroma of warm milk, were first used in Feu d'Issey Miyake.

Other synthetic gourmand notes

The chocolate note is also a textural note for the gourmand facet and is the base note of the Chocovan perfume by Givaudan. Fruity notes like raspberry, strawberry, cherry, and mango go well with vanilla notes. Most of these fruit notes are found thanks to the synthesis. Some of these fruity notes are now available naturally.