Burn of the Day

[Oudamberlove]

An extended session today

Oudwoodvietnam black kinam.
I got top notes bright, zesty, and fruity......
then it settles down to a long gently heated kyara session. Not as flamboyant as green oil, but very good.

followed with Kevin’s plantation kinam, started on low heat, beautiful.......makes me want to plant a kinam tree at home. Then I fried it on high! The little sliver puts-out amazing performance for a plantation wood.

followed by IO Filipino squares
revisited these chips, hadn’t burned them in a while. The profile is Filipino.....but different.
There’s a barn, but I wouldn’t say barn, up close it’s like a wet dog😱, not recommended for Monkoh, but turn it up high and fumigate the area, then it suits the aroma better, the animalics flavors the smoke and is no longer brutish.

 

[Oudamberlove]

AH Maluku Malaki
The piece I heated smelled like oud oil and crayons at very low temp, then I moved to high heat which brought out sweetness and something fruity, more heat and I’m getting a nice incense fumigation.

Next up Oudhub Filipino agarwood
The piece I heated was more resin than oil, if there is any oil left because these chips look ancient. That reminds me of Habz Baby Kings, it’s more about heating resin than oil. So basically, you need higher temps.
The Oudhub would does fumigate fairly well.... not a total bust😕...... I will explore more pieces in due time. Same with the Baby King, I need more exploration.

Final wood.....
The highest grade Shoyeido Kyara that I possess.
This has to be my personal favorite of all my kyaras and kinams, very special scent at low heat. It just goes to show that all kyara’s are not equal. Some can be dynamite Then for kicks I zapped them on very high temperature, even then the smoke was sweet and powdery. Mesmerizing

 

[Mr.P]

Puresacra frankincense with some crumbs of Somali myrrh and sub-alpine pine sap. I hit the ratios just right - and I finally understand why people might combine these two. Myrrh is so bitter - in the past I have put way too much myrrh in my blends and it was just too intense. This time it was about 20:1 (frankincense:myrrh) and the combination was sublime. The bitterness of the myrrh made the sweet piney notes of the frankincense more palatable!

 

[EJayB]

I just spent an hour heating some Wild Hindi wood I got from Habzoud! Wow I could really Put some time in with this sweet scent. such a soft touch of deep plum almost a sandal almond but the whole mess of scent is projecting as I turn up the heat it just rolls over to more sweet..... wow!!! Thanks Habz for this amazing wood at a real price
Another offering I would suggest buying before it’s gone.

 

[Rasoul Salehi]

An extended session today

Oudwoodvietnam black kinam.
I got top notes bright, zesty, and fruity......
then it settles down to a long gently heated kyara session. Not as flamboyant as green oil, but very good.

followed with Kevin’s plantation kinam, started on low heat, beautiful.......makes me want to plant a kinam tree at home. Then I fried it on high! The little sliver puts-out amazing performance for a plantation wood.

followed by IO Filipino squares
revisited these chips, hadn’t burned them in a while. The profile is Filipino.....but different.
There’s a barn, but I wouldn’t say barn, up close it’s like a wet dog😱, not recommended for Monkoh, but turn it up high and fumigate the area, then it suits the aroma better, the animalics flavors the smoke and is no longer brutish.

The barn like note in IO tawi filipino wood is a compound called rotundone. Is what gives white pepper corn it’s Barn like note. Is a naturally occurring aroma compound.

 

[Rasoul Salehi]

AH Maluku Malaki
The piece I heated smelled like oud oil and crayons at very low temp, then I moved to high heat which brought out sweetness and something fruity, more heat and I’m getting a nice incense fumigation.

Next up Oudhub Filipino agarwood
The piece I heated was more resin than oil, if there is any oil left because these chips look ancient. That reminds me of Habz Baby Kings, it’s more about heating resin than oil. So basically, you need higher temps.
The Oudhub would does fumigate fairly well.... not a total bust😕...... I will explore more pieces in due time. Same with the Baby King, I need more exploration.

Final wood.....
The highest grade Shoyeido Kyara that I possess.
This has to be my personal favorite of all my kyaras and kinams, very special scent at low heat. It just goes to show that all kyara’s are not equal. Some can be dynamite Then for kicks I zapped them on very high temperature, even then the smoke was sweet and powdery. Mesmerizing

Indeed. Kinam/kyara are NOT all equal. Yellow oil kyara doesn’t even register as kyara to me. Shin kyara leaves loooots to be desired if compared to green or black oil.

 

[Mr.P]

my burn of the day is this mystery agarwood.

I spent a little time cutting some nice sections from a largish branch section I picked up many years ago. This would make great beads - really nice strong sweet fragrance even unheated. Its origin is mysterious, but it reminds me of scents I have smelled in oud from Kalimantan and sometimes of Malaysian oud. The pieces are fast sinkers...


I got this at a truly excellent Chinese herb shop in Mountain View California that has since moved and lost some of its character. This was back in 1998 and the guy had all kinds of crazy stuff. Whole musk pods, ambergris, and large decorative sculptural type logs and branches of beautiful resinated agarwood. This piece was just sawed off the end of a larger branch. When I returned several years later the owner no longer carried Agarwood as he was not able to get good quality wood anymore. This is the only traditional Chinese medicine shop I have seen that actually had true heirloom quality Agarwood like this. Usually the wood is painted with some black tar, or at best is white bunk wood with very little resin or oil. The owner told me that his father had run a shop in Hong Kong, and much of his materials had been moved over to California with him when he immigrated. I wish I bought much more of this wood.

 

[EJayB]

WoW mrP!!!!! That looks amazing thanks for sharing the whole story

 

[amanitamusc]

Great looking wood Mr P. !

 

[Rasoul Salehi]

Left to right:
Two lighter pieces are the almahera wood from maluku. Cumin nutmeg and a spicy powdery note. It looks plain or young infection oil rich wood but in fact is all resin. Hard as nail and brittle. Pretty wicked stuff

Middle darker piece is sumatora. Don’t really care for it. Low aroma. Even on high heat doesn’t really sing. There is a antique old, no sweet, oudy oud note to it but not in a rich satisfying way

Far right is the ceram tasbih. Orris butter and sweeeeeeeet creamy buttery purple floral. Delish

 

[Oudamberlove]

Heated some Brunei Heartwood from Kyarazen.

This batch is not the sinking grade stuff but it is very satisfying, almost psychoactive.

 

[EJayB]

Today my subitism electric box shorted out!!
So I am heating with a coal! Love it!
Quang NAM

 

[Oudamberlove]

Habz Baby King

When heated just right, you can have a very long heating session. Mostly resin, little or no oil.

 

[Joe King]

Burning some Kalimantan from Al Shareef Oud, nice sweet smelling think I can smell some fruits.
Note it does look much different to advertising photo.

 

[Rai Munir]

@Joe
Where is the photo advertised?

 

[Martin]

@Joe
Where is the photo advertised?

Quite frankly I’m not a fan of sales deception in any form. What do you think?

 

[Mr.P]

Well look at the background colors - one is shot against a dark background, the other against a white. In both cases a typical camera on auto mode will be unlikely to expose correctly. Unless it’s on spot metering mode, if the background is dark, the camera will measure low light levels and increase exposure resulting in the wood looking paler than it otherwise would. When the background is white, the opposite happens: the camera senses lots of light and decreases exposure, making the wood look darker than it would on a neutral gray background.

you could examine histograms of the images and see if it had been deliberately darkened if you were trying to get a sense of what the wood might look like in person.

I’m guessing in this case that the wood is somewhere between the two? The one with the white background looks underexposed

 

[Martin]

Top photo is 20g Kalimantan agarwood received today.
Middle 2 photos are is ASO sales photos.
Bottom photo is Kalimantan wood a friend bought at a Malaysian shop earlier this year.

 

[Al Shareef Oudh]

View attachment 9694

Quite frankly I’m not a fan of sales deception in any form. What do you think?

We were very clear on our website regarding the woods and did not give a specific grade to them but rather mentioned "These pieces were not picked for their looks, nor their shape, nor because of them sinking or not sinking, nope none of those reasons. These were handpicked for one reason, and only one reason; olfactory engagement."

Secondly we provided 2 takes on the same photo on our website, one with natural light and one with camera light/flash so that you could see the difference.

Thirdly we also put a pic of the piece on the heater which is a different surface and lighting to provide a different perspective for comparison.

<<Here>> is the link of the product

@Martin if you or anyone else arent happy with your purchase and you feel that it is because of our photography drop us an email at [email protected] and we will organise a refund for you.

 

[PEARL]

@Martin customers are not able to smell the wood before purchase and typically buy based on photos, with the description being a secondary consideration. Unfortunately, most customers equate wood darkness with resin density and hence, quality. The two sales pictures are of the same pile of wood and IMO appear to be edited. The first picture appears to use a warm filter, which brings out more of the yellow in the background and makes the wood appear much darker. The second picture appears to use a cooler filter, which brings out the blues in the background and makes the wood appear darker and more monochromatic to a small extent. A simple way to know would be to ascertain if the background is indeed white. IMO neither appear to be natural daylight or have anything to do with flash.

Regardless of smell, which a customer will never know before receiving, a better way forward with pictures of wood is to place it next to something customers would know the color of such as currency or a coin, as Mr.P has done in one of his photos above.