Gourmand

Chocolate

Note Profile

Prepared 452 perfumes

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About

Chocolate in perfumery is a warm, roasted, faintly bitter gourmand note built on cocoa's dusty, powdery character rather than on confectionery sweetness. It has a faintly fruity edge, and reads darker and drier than the word suggests - closer to unsweetened cocoa mass than to a filled bar.

Also Known As

Cacao, Cocoa Bean, Cocoa Beans, Milk Chocolate, West African Cocoa Absolute

Scent Profile

Chocolate presents a roasted, cocoa-dusty aroma with bitter edges. Nutty warmth and a faint fermented fruitiness support it. A dark, balsamic, slightly animal depth, close to tobacco and old leather, sits underneath. Some sweetness is there, but it is drier and less sweet than its name implies.

ScentWheel

Breadthmedium

EnvelopeBase · ~12h lasting

Family Sweet & Gourmand

Read off the wheel, not a label applied to the note.

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ScentArt

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Materials That Can Make This Note

Perfumers can make Chocolate from this natural extract.

Natural extract Cacao absolute chocolate · cocoa · powdery

Smell words come from published sources.

A given perfume with this note may use some of these, or something else.

Origin

Cocoa absolute is extracted from the roasted, fermented beans of Theobroma cacao. Unlike most gourmand notes a genuine material exists: the absolute is dark and viscous, and perfumers also reach for reconstructions built on vanillin, lactones and coumarin.

Usage in Perfumery

Perfumers use chocolate as a base and heart accent in gourmand compositions, where its bitter edge keeps sweetness from cloying. It pairs with vanilla, tonka and orange, and a little goes far.