I do, I do, I do Heart Les Carrottes!

Love them.

Also it, the perfume Olivia Giacobetti created for Honore des Pres.

From the odd, bitter rooty vegetal opening, to the iris reveal, to the cozy drydown which sometimes reads as a fairly simply buttery iris, and occasional as a sort of mildly dense sweetened carrot souffle, the kind of thing you could serve either along with a meal or afterward for dessert.

In chatting with other folks about this one, I am noticing that a) a lot of people found it, well, odd, b) a few people looked askance at me when I called it an iris scent, especially a "buttery" iris one, and c) Vamp a NY is still getting a LOT of love.  Followed in second by I <3 Coco.

Fine.  Go hang with the big bombs, the dense chewy things.  I'm going to hang back here, keeping a low profile, but totally enjoying snarfling every stage of I ❤ Les Carrottes.


photo, as usual, the result of the author's mischief
Signature on carry out sleeve presumably that of Ms. Giacobetti, and a welcome surprise

Things I Remember I Know When I am On The Road

*I used to get carsick when I was a kid. There is no escape from your own --or anyone's-- perfume in a car cabin.

*I generally like amber as a category. I tend to think I ignore it during hours 2 and 3. But I just pretend to ignore it, or ignore it enough. (see above)

*when traveling alone, there's no one to blame but yourself. (see above, plus stands alone)

*you can smell cow manure at any speed

*when I was a kid, a house with its own pond and diving raft seemed to be all that and a bag of chips. Today, I saw two ponds with "narrows" and footbridges over. Footbridge = bag of chips. Pond still desired.

*last time I was on along road trip, Amouage sandalwood attar nearly killed me, then was my happiness. Luckily, I remembered this without recreating the incident.

*you can smell freshly cut grass at most any speed

*tandem trailer trucks make me nervous. Triples scare the bejeezus out of me.

*the Falling Timbers rest stop is still frozen in time. With the addition of the smell of Cinnabon.

*I used to be able to smell a lit cigarette is a passing/passed car. I don't know if I still can, but I do know these days there is always a spot near an entry door where the few, the unrepentant, the smoking crew congregate. And it smells like it used to when you opened the door to my dad's office,

*I may never afford a car that does not have cabin noise.

*tomorrow, I will not challenge the scent gods. The next 450 miles will get a cool iris, thank you very much.

The wintery texture of Heure Exquise

It is winter.

This may or may not be clear to you, or even true for you.  But here, where I sit, the temperature on the other side of the window is below freezing, a blanket of snow covers the ground, it in turn covered by a crust of partially thawed then certainly refrozen ice.  There is still enough of the powder to make it pretty, but the ratio of ice makes it the kind of environment you step into gingerly, testing the traction, making sure you can get your footage.

As it turns out, there was just enough thaw yesterday to soften it up, so that the sheen is indeed slippery, but has some give.  You still need to be alert, but you can relax a bit.  Enjoy the walk.  See the landscape as beautiful, because there's a little bit of cush under that crust.

This is the texture of Heure Exquise.

Drop the temperature a few degrees, and there's no hint of plush.  That is the texture of Iris Bleu Gris.

**
Have you ever had a perfectly made shortbread, where the crumble was right even as it veered dangerously close to too dry?  Where the amount of butter used was enough to let those fatty molecules hover around your tongue without obscuring all other flavors, letting the slightest hints of sugar caramelized by the heat of the oven come through?

Have you ever heard of a flavoring called Fiori di Sicilia?  An extract you can use in baking, a la vanilla or orange, which some call a citrus vanilla but which really rings of a field of flowers?  Try to conjure it even if you haven't; if you have smelled it, remember it.  Got it?  Now, a hint of that in the shortbread.

And shoot the whole thing through with orris root.  Or maybe wash the shortbread down with orris tea, should such a thing exist.

This is a dream shortbread, and is the flavor of Heure Exquise.

*
I love wearing perfumes in winter.  I love listening to them in the same way you hear sounds across a snowy landscape: overall input is attenuated, but specific qualities or registers carry further than ever.  There is both a hush, and an amplification; if nature were an auditorium, the outdoors in winter is full of both sound absorbing baffles and chutes that channel input straight to your ears.

A light wind through a few tenacious leaves on an otherwise bare tree across the way.  Laughter on the other side of the park.  A train in the distance.  You can hear it all, and still feel ensconced in a cocoon that makes you feel like you just might be all, entirely, wholly alone.

Perfect for listening to your feet in the snow and gauging the temperature based on amount and quality of crunch and smoosh.

Also wonderful for listening to the smell of things.  Even inside, the quality of smell "acoustics" is different in winter.

While I now know I am going to love Heure Exquise any time of year, and that I am NOT going to become impatient and assume it is on its dying away drydown two hours in, because four hours in a surprise powdery beauty will emerge...while I now know that in the middle I will be rewarded with a green smooth floral something that will feel lovely in the heat...while I now know I will find this beauty any time of year, I may not have fallen in love unless I played with it in winter.  When it sounded different, and I could pay attention differently.

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photo by Matheson Beaumont, available for purchase here
I have gotten Fiori di Sicilia from King Arthur Flour