KNOX Incense Cones: Vanilla, Pine, Incense Myrrh, Almonds, Honey, Baked Apple, Gingerbread
I received this selection of KNOX incense cones from Steve (Incense in The Wind); here‘s his overview of the brand, where you’ll also find links to his reviews.
Steve put all cones together in a bag and sent me the following photo by email so I could identify them:
The boxes contain 24 incense cones of size ‘M’ and cost 2,49€ at the KNOX shop; about 0,10€ per cone.
I forgot to pay attention to how long they burn; I estimate it was under 10 minutes each.
Since the varieties weren’t individually packed and labelled, I took the opportunity to test whether I could recognise them by smell. I could still remember some names, but not the corresponding colours; so it wasn’t a complete blind flight.
Afterwards, assigned the notes from that first round to the respective varieties and subsequently tried them a second time. You can read a summary of my notes below.
As the boxes show English names, I’ll list them according to those.
Like the KNOX retro-design cones, I burnt these outdoors on my balcony.
Vanilla
Cream-coloured cone.
I knew that Vanilla was one of the included varieties. All I noted down the first time was: ‘This can only be Vanilla. It smells sweet, but somehow like burning plastic.’
On the second round, I caught a vanilla note right after lighting for a second or two, but after that, the impression was the same as the first time.
Pine
Green cone.
The smell is fresh and vaguely green; also sweetish, somewhat pungent, with a peculiar spiciness.
I still knew that Pine was included, but couldn’t find a real coniferous smell in it either the first or second time.
Note: This scent is called Tannenduft in German, which would translate to “Fir Scent”, not Pine.
Incense Myrrh
Black cone.
First round: This smells resinous; frankincense, perhaps?
On the second attempt, I could make out the myrrh based on a somewhat darker, more tart tone in the background.
Note: This should be called “Frankincense Myrrh“, but because “Weihrauch” – the German word for Frankincense – is often also used as a general term for incense (the word literally translates to “holy smoke”) this is a very common translation mistake, especially for machine translation.
Almond
Pale red cone.
First impression: This fragrance is sweet in a gourmand way, almost a little milky. It reminds me of Dampfnudeln with vanilla sauce.
After a while, however, a pungent smoke note is added.
Second attempt: The same impression as the first time. I couldn’t identify the fragrance as “almond”, but it’s a nice gourmand smell (at least, if the burnt smell of the base material weren’t there).
Honey
Orange cone.
First round: I’ve no idea what this could be. The smell is very pungent and smoky smelling, with a slight sweetness and perhaps a hint of florality.
Second round: With the knowledge that this is supposed to be honey, the smell makes somewhat sense, but that makes it good either. It simply smells pungent and smoky way too fast, and the perfumed sweetness doesn’t make it any better.
Baked Apple
Red cone.
First attempt: The fragrance is sweetish and somehow – fruity? It simply smells unpleasant and very artificial.
I didn’t let the cone burn completely.
Second impression: I only lit the second cone very briefly to see if I could recognise it as “apple”, but no. The smell is just artificial, sweet and unpleasant.
Lebkuchen
Aubergine-coloured cone.
First as well as second impression: It’s a sweetish, somehow perfumed fragrance with an unpleasantly burnt base smell.
Conclusion:
The only really usable variety in my opinion was Incense Myrrh. With this one, I didn’t find the base smell particularly bothersome. Either they have a different formulation because they contain resins, or the robust scent drowns out the off-notes.
To my great surprise, I also found the fragrance of Almond quite attractive; though, I found the burnt smell of the base material really unpleasant.
All other varieties were just underwhelming to borderline unpleasant.