What it smells like
The lift of alcohol over the depth of something aged in a barrel. Boozy notes carry a volatile sharpness at the top and a sticky, oxidised sweetness underneath. That is why they read as fresh and decadent at once.
Boozy is fermented sweetness. Fruity is fresh sweetness. Rum raisin has crossed the line. Plum has not.
Notes that load on it
Notes from our catalogue whose position on this facet is 0.40 or higher, strongest first. A note is not filed under one facet: it carries a value on all 34 at once, and these are the ones where this axis is doing real work.
-
Whisky
Vanilla
Dry Wood
Base · ~20h
Prepared
126
-
Liquor
Vanilla
Heart · ~5h
Prepared
80
-
Moonshine
Heart · ~4h
Molecule
-
Boozy Notes
Heart · ~8h
Prepared
5
-
Plum Brandy
Fruity
Heart · ~6h
Prepared
-
Brandy
Fruity
Heart · ~8h
Prepared
27
-
Apple Liquor
Fruity
Vanilla
Dry Wood
Heart · ~7h
Prepared
-
Cognac
Fruity
Heart · ~8h
Prepared
210
-
Peaty Whisky
Smoky
Earthy
Base · ~22h
Prepared
-
Red Wine
Fruity
Base · ~12h
Prepared
48
-
Vodka
Top · ~1.5h
Prepared
34
-
Port Wine
Fruity
Heart · ~6h
Prepared
-
Rhum Agricole
Green
Vanilla
Heart · ~4h
Prepared
-
Soju
Top · ~2h
Prepared
-
Cachaça
Green
Vanilla
Heart · ~5h
Prepared
-
Rum
Vanilla
Fruity
Base · ~12h
Prepared
634
-
Wine Lees
Fruity
Sour
Nutty
Base · ~10h
Prepared
-
Yeast
Earthy
Sour
Animalic
Heart · ~5h
Botanical
-
White Wine
Fruity
Heart · ~4h
Prepared
7
-
Hops
Green
Aromatic
Heart · ~4.5h
Botanical
2
Materials that carry it
Real substances, each keyed by its CAS registry number, that an external perfumery vocabulary publishes with a term meaning this facet outright. This is the layer that makes a facet checkable against something outside our own database.
| Material | CAS | Terms | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| ethyl formate | CAS 109-94-4 | alcoholic, cognac, winey | |
| methyl acetate | CAS 79-20-9 | cognac, rummy, winey | |
| propionaldehyde | CAS 123-38-6 | alcoholic, cognac, winey | |
| ethyl heptanoate | CAS 106-30-9 | cognac, rummy, winey | |
| 2-methylpropyl but-2-enoate | CAS 589-66-2 | alcoholic, cognac, rummy | |
| heptyl acetate | CAS 112-06-1 | rummy, winey | |
| allyl hexanoate | CAS 123-68-2 | cognac, rummy | |
| butyl hexanoate | CAS 626-82-4 | cognac, winey | |
| isoamyl alcohol | CAS 123-51-3 | alcoholic, cognac | |
| isoamyl laurate | CAS 6309-51-9 | alcoholic, winey | |
| decyl propionate | CAS 5454-19-3 | cognac, rummy | |
| ethyl propionate | CAS 105-37-3 | rummy, winey | |
| heptyl decanoate | CAS 60160-17-0 | cognac, winey | |
| pentyl decanoate | CAS 5933-87-9 | cognac, winey | |
| pentyl octanoate | CAS 638-25-5 | cognac, winey | |
| propyl octanoate | CAS 624-13-5 | cognac, winey | |
| ethyl isobutyrate | CAS 97-62-1 | alcoholic, rummy | |
| propyl heptanoate | CAS 7778-87-2 | cognac, winey | |
| geranyl heptanoate | CAS 73019-15-5 | cognac, winey | |
| phenethyl octanoate | CAS 5457-70-5 | cognac, winey | |
| tetrahydrofurfuryl acetate | CAS 637-64-9 | cognac, rummy | |
| 3-hexanol | CAS 623-37-0 | alcoholic, rummy | |
| 2-pentanol | CAS 6032-29-7 | alcoholic, winey | |
| 2-methyl-1-butanol | CAS 137-32-6 | alcoholic, winey | |
| ethyl but-2-enoate | CAS 10544-63-5 | cognac, rummy | |
| 3-methyl-1-pentanol | CAS 589-35-5 | cognac, winey | |
| ethyl (E)-hex-2-enoate | CAS 27829-72-7 | rummy, winey | |
| 1-butoxy-1-ethoxyethane | CAS 57006-87-8 | rummy, winey | |
| trans-2-hexenyl valerate | CAS 56922-74-8 | cognac, winey | |
| 2-methylbutyl isovalerate | CAS 2445-77-4 | cognac, winey |
Showing 30 of 192. The full set ships with the published standard rather than being paginated here.
Declarable means the substance appears in Annex III of the EU Cosmetics Regulation, so it has to be named on the ingredient list once it passes a concentration threshold. IFRA means an IFRA Standard restricts or prohibits its use. Both are facts about the substance, not about any fragrance: a perfume can contain a declarable material below the threshold and never print it, and a restricted material used within its limit is used correctly.
The source also supplies no common name for a large share of materials, so those display as a bare registry number and are ranked last. They are kept because they are real evidence: dropping them would make the vocabulary look better described than it is.
Anchor terms
A facet on its own is just a word we chose. An anchor is what makes it checkable: a term in an external, independently maintained vocabulary of odour descriptions, built for perfumery materials rather than for us. The material list above is drawn from the direct terms only, because a partial term corroborates too weakly to stand as evidence on its own.
- alcoholic
- boozy
- cognac
- oak wood,cognac
- rum
- rummy
- winey
- fermented
- fermented, rotten fruit
The rest of Sweet & Gourmand
The other facets in this family. A note can load on any of them at the same time as this one, so they are neighbours rather than alternatives.