Both Ends of a Carrot (And a Spot of Butter Lettuce)

L’Artisan “Fleur de Carotte” *

Abdul Samad Al Qurashi “Water Lily Oil” ***

Brooklyn Bunny “Lettuce” ***

One of the very best things about living in the Bay Area is the market for and commitment to local, organic, and fresh produce and prepared foods—we’re vicious food snobs here, don’t we know it. This is the homeland of Chez Panisse and Alice Waters, and if we didn’t invent the locavore movement, well, we certainly embraced it in full. If you’ve never traveled to San Francisco, one of the sights to see is our remodeled Ferry Building, erected in 1898 as, well, a place to catch ferries. But in the early 2000s, the City got the great idea to gut it, put in a wonderful glass roof, and opened it in 2003 as a food-porn emporium. If you do come to our fair city, it's defintely worth a look.

You can find all kinds of wonderful, shockingly expensive local delicaies there. I could prattle on and on about the knockout crabby-lesbian artisan cheese makers, the Cowgirl Creamery (run by famously, as it turns out, a gaggle of crabby lesbians); or the crazy-good chilequiles (home-made tortilla chips soaked in chile sauce, fried, along with organic scrambled eggs) that we stand in the 45-minute line every Saturday morning, even in the rain, to get a plate of; or the $8/pound heirloom tomatoes that we live and die for every August.

However, I have a love/hate relationship with the whole yuppie food phenomenon. Ideologically, of course, I’m on board all the way: food should be nutritious, fresh, and tasty. The food distribution system that makes it possible for every single American to have fresh, yellow banana slices on her cereal no matter where she lives or what time of year it is has become increasingly suspect. (How to square nutritious + fresh + tasty = affordable is the big question.)

But food is SO political here, it becomes completely exhausting. My hands would drop off if I were to even spend the time typing out the broadest contours of all the various food fights (!!) we engage in here in the Bay Area: vegetarians vs. vegans vs. fruitarians vs. pescetarians; the anti-soy/corn/wheat movements; the raw food restaurants; the politically correct fishes; free-range chickens and eggs; fair exchange citrus; gluten-free bakeries; lactose-free ice cream parlors; tofurkeys; pro-Palestinian chocolate Hanukah gelt; and which no-name, hole-in-the-wall underground coffee shop serves the truly boffo Cafe Americano—I’m just barely getting started. What makes it worse is you often don't know why a person is taking his/her stand: is it for political reasons? Religious reasons? Health concerns? Ethical considerations? Just because they're crazy, and they're trying to drive you crazy? You can never be sure.

Just to give you a taste (!!) of what life is like here, I had a dinner party last year—myself and three guests. Here were the dietary restrictions: a vegetarian; someone who is wheat- and lactose-intolerant; someone with deathly blood-sugar issues who does not eat sugar or starches (me); and someone who eats almost anything but wheat, as long as it’s organic. Bon appetite!! (Actually, we did a tapas-thing with about 10 different little dishes. Everyone could avoid what their poison was, and it worked out swell!) But still. The dream of the three-course sit-down, everyone-eat-the-same-thing dinner party? Not possible.

So there's the local food movement, there's the I-have-a-reason-for-every-morsel-that-goes-into-my-mouth people, and then there's the I-must-have-the-very-best-of-everything-the-whole-world-has-to-offer attitude exemplified by a lot of our food boutiques. As in: my champagne must be from France (well, all right. Champagne only does come from France-- the stuff we make/sell in the Napa Valley? Sparkling wine.) My goat cheese must come from a tiny hill-town in Spain. My clotted cream must come from Surrey. Only the most obscure and far-flung delicacy is good enough for me.

David Rakoff wrote a wonderful piece in his howler of a book Don't Get Too Comfortable: The Indignities of Coach Class, the Torments of Low Thread Count,the Never-Ending Quest for Artisanal Olive Oil, and Other First World Problems entitled "What is the Sound of One Hand Shopping?" on the preciousness of the modern gourmand and how the need to have every morsel be authentic, fabulous, far-flung, exotic, and rare says more about the person partaking of it than the food itself. (David Rakoff is like David Sedaris with a political consciousness. I love him.) His great example: a Scotch whiskey company that will overnight you real Scottish ice cubes chipped right off a frozen Scottish stream to properly serve your single-malt-on-the-rocks. No kidding. (Remembering this was written a few years back...) Like you need special ice to truly experience this swaff. Kill me.

So my goal in this life is to not let extremes drive me to extremes. I support local businesses when I can and do my best to be mindful. I don't shop dainties for dainties's sake. Then I eat whatever I feel like.
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This past Saturday morning, I was down at the Farmer’s market with Bazr, my Other Nostril, (!!!) and bought these glamorous red carrots:

It got me to thinking about the tensions that we experience in this globalized world between having the ability to have dainties and marvels from all over the world delivered right to us—all the magnificent things the world has to offer, stacked up against having the good sense to enjoy the bounty that is right in front of us.

I don’t have any more wisdom than that—all three of the perfumes I’m reviewing are rare and exclusive to their place of origin. But I’d love to hear about what food movements are doing in other parts of the country/world.

L’Artisan “Fleur de Carotte” *

A limited edition released only in France, the scent notes say baby carrot, cucumber, lettuce, tarragon, apricot, ginger. Too weird? I think that line-up sounds swell.

Out of the bottle, it’s 1 on a scale from 1 to 10 saturation. Ok. It’s an eau de toilette. Out of the bottle, it smells like a dead ringer for Robitessen. Hmmm. Both on my skin and on paper. And I most certainly do not mean in a good way. I never appreciated the cucumber element in cough syrup before.

Then, after 2-3 minutes all that unpleasantness blows off, and a lovely, light-light-light waft is left behind. I smell the carrot (the greens, actually, rather than the root), cucumber, tarragon, and apricot/tea rose—pretty much in that order, but so faint, it smells sort of like: “ca….cu…tar…ape…ro…” And that’s it. It smells like unscented glycerin soap. And for a while, that is truly swell.

Then, after 30-45 minutes, the deadly Robitessan thing comes back, and then no matter how delicate FdC might be, I do not wish to be smelling it on my person.

I hate these kinds of scents. Or, more specifically, the conundrum of scents that have fabulous and difficult passages in equal measure. Will I ever wear this again? No. Am I glad I smelled it? Yes. Can I imagine spritzing a few friends with it and having a lively conversation about it? Yes. Yuuuurrrgh.

Alright. No more whingeing. Rating rule of thumb: always round down. One star. And the French can keep it for themselves. More for them.

Abdul Samad Al Qurashi “Water Lily Oil” ***

So, the idea of traveling the world to sample exotic, exclusive things gives me the kind of pleasure that makes my toes curl. (Is that different, somehow, from having someone else discover them and deliver them to my door?) The House of ASAQ is out of Saudi Arabia, and save for a single shop in Paris from all I can gather, is exclusive to the Middle East. The website, while kind of fabulous, doesn’t seem to let you buy from them directly. So how to get your hands on it?

I was so smitten by the water lily oil, I spent some time trying to see if I could buy a bottle. I believe it is possible but only if one:
A) Travels to Paris or the Arabian Peninsula and/or
B) Speaks and/or writes fluent Arabic and/or
C) Is willing to type one’s credit card information into one of those dodgy websites plastered in flashing pop-ups and weird glitches. Like, enter your CC# here and be prepared to have your identity stolen to fund Eastern European mob activity for the rest of your natural life—you know the sites I’m talking about…

So, I’m just going to have make good with my tiny little sample from theperfumedcourt for right now. I understand that this sample is the pure water lily oil—no fillers. The stuff is the color and consistency of honey, thick and viscous. Just opening the sample bottle, the scent is demanding, penetrating, heady, and rich.

I really traveled with this scent—it went through all sorts of twists and turns for me. I was going to try to put all this into some sort of clever narrative, conjuring a magic carpet ride, or some such nonsense as that, but I think the experience is wild enough to speak for itself.

From my notes:
Opening: Fresh and piney; buttered & spiced carrots (!!), honey and cardamom.
After about 45 minutes: sweet clover hay, honey, pine nuts, and amber.
After another half hour—go back and sniff again, now it’s sweetened and softened out, smelling like cinnamon, almonds, marzipan (“Baklava!!”).
Not through transforming yet, after some more time, it conjures the egg yolk, vanilla, and heavy cream of a good French vanilla ice cream, along with rose water.
Finally, nearly spent after about 3 hours, it smells like gardenia, a deep rose, and coconut flesh. (For some unknown reason, then I wrote “NOT a Twinkie.” Underlined for emphasis. Just so you know.) Really, really fun. And imagine, I wasn’t even hungry when I wrote this!

It’s a bit too “foody” for me ever to wear regularly, and there is nothing subtle about this stuff. I pulled it out at a perfume party, and in a room filled with some big stinkers, this was the one that everyone was talking about. However, it is a wonderful scent experience for people who object to perfume for being fake or chemically. And it’s hugely useful as a touchstone note—now I smell water lily oil ringing through loud and clear in scents like Ormonde Jayne “Sampaquita” and David Yurman. Answers the question in the affirmative: Can you travel the world on a smell?

Brooklyn Bunny “Lettuce” ***

I spent a happy 18 months living in Brooklyn, going to graduate school, so Brooklyn feels like my other hometown. I was delighted to be reminded of my days living in DUMBO, taking leisurely strolls along the East River.

I just got "Brooklyn Bunny Lettuce" in the mail two days ago—this is a scent created by Christopher Brosious of CB I Hate Perfume fame, inspired by Roebling the white fluffy bunny, Internet sensation. I guess some Brooklyn hipster decided that his ticket to the big time was to put a web cam on his pet rabbit for the purpose of “transmitting soft white soothing signals,” and then sell a whole lot of Brooklyn Bunny-inspired swag. Aaaahhhh…. Remember, back in the day when people had things like disposable income, and an *adorable* business model like that made sense?

Anyway, the lettuce water worked just fine—I read that it’s sold out. It’s supposed to conjure “the light and sweet scent you get when cracking a head of cool, fresh lettuce in your hands.” It certainly is cool and light, and the word -:¦:-•:*'""*:•.-:¦:-•*Happy!*•-:¦:-•:*'''''*:•-:¦:- floated into my head-- feeling just about like how I spelled it out there, with little fireflies and songbirds and butterflies flittering and twittering all about.

I wouldn't say this is CB's most realistic scent-- it leans a little too hard in the tea rose/apricot direction to be a true lettuce scent for me, and like everything else he does, the water creations have a half-life of about 15 minutes. But really, I don't mind a whit. Ethereal, of a certain place, and fleeting-- I don't need to hold onto the experience too hard. I hope Roebling does get to smell this all day cooped up in his 24/7/365 Real World life. Sniff happy, Brooklyn Bunny.

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