Pushkar Temple – Kobra
This is another bundle I purchased in September 2023 from a Kleinanzeigen seller who brought back a selection of these Pushkar Temple incense sticks from a trip to India to sell here. I paid about €5 per pack. These are 8″ (approx. 20.5 cm) sticks, sold in 50g units.
In another second-hand purchase, I also received a few more sticks of Kobra from an older, opened pack.
Pilgrimbazaar, an eBay shop in England, has them available for £3.56 (approx. €4.10).
Additionally, there is an option to order them directly from India via this Instagram profile. The owner is a very friendly Kazakh named Pavel. There is a minimum order quantity of one kilo here, so 10-20 packs, depending on the size.
Kobra is one of the few varieties where the paper hasn’t absorbed the oil from the sticks, leaving it translucent.
The scent description on the above-mentioned Instagram profile reads: ‘It combines notes of coconut and sweet strawberry. The fragrance is warm, sweet, and alluring.’
Similar to Poonam Flora, I initially find Kobra’s scent relatively resinous, in a fresh way, like how some incense labelled ‘Frankincense’ or ‘Copal’ smells fresh. But soon, an intense, creamy sweetness sets in, along with a fruity aspect. Strawberry does fit as a scent description, though I don’t think I would have come up with it on my own.
I find the fragrance rather soft. By now, the sticks have aged well and mellowed. When they were new, I detected the same piercing note in Kobra as I do in most of the other varieties. I no longer smell it in the older batch, although I still pick up a hint of it in the newer pack. From the start, however, it wasn’t particularly prominent in Kobra. In the newer batch, I also detect an additional creamy note that reminds me of Sandal Woods from Pushkar Temple.
Kobra ranks among my favourites from this manufacturer and seems to be very popular in general. Mike’s review on ORS is also very positive. However, I should mention that Pushkar Temple scents aren’t quite my thing overall, and I wouldn’t buy any of the varieties I’ve tried a second time.
So far, I’ve found that I appreciate them more as they age, and with Kobra, I also prefer the older batch.
I liked this one, though found other Pushkar incense that I liked a bit more.
I am somewhat interested in the Western response to these clearly cheap and crude sticks. The maker does not have a fine nose – the fragrances are thrown together in the pile ’em high and pile ’em cheap method of bargain basement stores, with a very generous use of “agarbathi oil” to cut costs and strengthen the smell. But I guess that’s largely the appeal – the cheap, crude, vividness of it all.
If you find yourself getting into these – becoming attuned to the bright headiness of domestic Indian incense – then I would recommend exploring Koya’s and Balaji a bit more. And BIC, now that Ashish Shah, the nose for some of Balaji’s best fragrances, is creating incenses for them. So you get the bright, bold, headiness, but also an experienced and knowledgeable perfumer to carefully construct interesting, intelligent, and sophisticated fragrances.
I do get along with Koya’s very well. I hope someone in Europe or even Germany will start to sell them.
Balaji is a bit hit or miss for me. But I’m interested in trying more., a sample Silver sent me. They are crazy expensive in India; ₹55 per stick!
Currently, I’m burning The Great Indian Amber by
I largely agree with her description, but like it way more than she did.
I wonder what the EU retail price would be. :O