by Euphorium Brooklyn
EAU DE PARFUM
Family: Oriental gourmand
Perfumer: Stephen Dirkes
Year: 2015
Notes: Mexican cocoa, nutmeg, clove, cassia, black pepper, myrrh, coffee, neroli, davana, raisin, prune, labdanum, angelica, honey, vanilla, caramel, palm sugar, copal, peru balsam, benzoin, tolu balsam, castoreum, musk
Experience an ancient ritual with raw cacao from the jungle combined with coarsely crushed spices, dried fruit, and fragrant herbs. Chocolatl is an exploration of cacao as a plant, not necessarily only as a confection, with all of its potential nucances (fruity, spicy, tangy, sweet, creamy) played up to create the ultimate chocolate indulgence. Quite the aphrodisiac.
Awarded “Best of Scent 2015″ by Pam Barr, cafleurebon.com
Narrative:
PERFUMER RUDOLPH KOMODO
“CHOCOLATL. Warm liquid trickles slowly down my skin and I am lost. Lost to daylight. Lost to thought. I am found in my pleasure. Found in a decadence which is rich and warm, spiced and honeyed with delight. Warm liquid trickles slowly on my skin. CHOCOLATL I am lost.” – R. Komodo, (Visionaries Magical, Knowing & Transcendence 1854)
PERFUMER’S INSPIRATION
The CHOCOLATL fragrance accord came to Rudolph Komodo while convalescing in a Mexico in 1855 to soothe, comfort, inspire, and transcend himself. He began with a dark cocoa sweetened with palm sugar and warmed with rich Mexican vanilla bean. Deep notes of Javanese coffee and myrrh were added to support the fragrant cocoa
Bright pine notes of incense and freshly cracked black pepper offer a clangorous fanfare to introduce the layers of spices that follow. Notes sparkle and weave like the burgundy and chocolate brown fibers in the Ikat weavings of Sumatra. Sharp Indonesian nutmeg and bright cardamon form harmonies with warm clove and “Kayu Manis” or “Sweet Wood” cinnamon bark.
PERFUMER’S INSPIRATION (extended)
Rudolph Komodo knew well of cocoa, coffee and spices as a child in Java, Indonesia. He would slowly brew his own cocoa variation of a traditional unfiltered “kopi tubruk” coffee with an Arabic twist he had learned from an Omani perfumer he knew in Bandung. The freshly ground dark coffee, still warm from the roaster, would be carefully measured. Cocoa and palm sugar would follow to complete the accord.
Stirring the cocoa into a paste with a few drops of water and staring at the fire, Komodo would gently mix the precious brew until the sugar began to caramelize and bubble up. After grinding in his stone mortar, he would experiment with additions of various amounts of fragrant clove, nutmeg and cardamon. Young Komodo would observe and record how each element in measure would add to and exalt certain notes in the cocoa while other notes would be masked or muted by the spices.
Komodo developed his first true affinity for drinking pure cocoa and its sensual potential as a young man in the salon’s of Batavia era Amsterdam.
Komodo’s first window into this protected world of exotic refinement and opulence, his 1850 grand tour of Europe with the Sultan of Komodo’s court, began and ended for the young man with the beautiful creatures of Amsterdam.
Rudolph quietly marveled in reverence at the Dutch cocoa ceremonies he observed. Usually officiated and attended by cream coloured, silk robed fawns of polite society, Rudolph esteemed how the elegant and delicate porcelain service contained and decanted this sensual warm liquid into sets of ornate translucent-thin, gilded cups. This liquid so primal and powerful. It was hard for him to imagine such rich indulgent sips to be measured in the gentile refinement of it all.
Rudolph developed an appreciation for “proper presentation”. (see “The Theatre of Ritual and Manner in Modern Transcenedalism” – R. Komodo, 1852) He was soon to know of the decadent passions of the salons of Amsterdam and the creatures with porcelain complexions and passions that enveloped and transported him into warm liquid like the CHOCOLATL he would later create.
SOUTH and CENTRAL AMERICAN TRAVELS
Rudolph Komodo traveled to Brasil in 1855 with the sponsorship of the Sultanate and the backing of a wealthy German business man involved in the petrochemical industry. While sourcing materials in the Mato Grosso region, Komodo became entangled in the affairs of Dr. Christian Rosenkruez, his wife Sybil, Segfried Humboldt and a Bororo tribe. (see “The Bororo Affair”, R. Komodo, 1857. see “The Great Journey of Knowing-Becoming” Humboldt-Rosenkreuz, 1855)
Harrowing travels from Brasil to Mexico in 1855 allowed Komodo to continue his foraging for and study of botanical psychotropics and entheogens throughout South and Central America. From the fragrant Peru Balsam, Cassia and Guaiacwood to DMT rich plants and fermented fruits in honeyed macerations, Komodo sniffed, sampled and drank his way up the continent.
With funds secured in trade for his herbal elixers, Komodo was quick to establish the “Euphorium” in a once luxurious, but by then, largely disheveled villa in Mexico City. It was both a location to sell his wares and also a haven for his clients to indulge in their vices. In Mexico, Komodo’s journey came to a euphoric climax, but not a conclusion.
Komodo had a period of exhaustive sensual research for CHOCOLATL. He spent several weeks living in apartments at the Euphorium in an opiatic haze, bathing in warmed CHOCOLATL and frequently receiving honeyed fruit massages and spiced incense stimulation. Seeking to create an extended orgasmic delirium, Rudolph also sank into a world of carnal abandon and drug addled sensual experimentation during this time. (- see, “The Velvet Spoon of Señora Bustelo’s Apartments and Other Tales of an Enlighten Lizard” – R. Komodo, 1856)
Komodo’s decadence reached its apex during the famed Copal harvest of 1855. Komodo claimed to have left his body, returned to Indonesia and lived for 5 years as a bonang player in West Java (metalophone in traditional Gamelan Degung ensemble) before returning to his body in Mexico and regaining consciousness after being comatose for 72 hours.
