Often we associate the Victorian Era with a degree of primness that falls helplessly into parody–nowhere better illustrated than in Oscar Wilde‘s The Importance of Being Earnest (1895)–but as with all eras, the Victorian offers a dark underbelly as well as a laced-up exterior. I shan’t elaborate on the entirety of this dichotomy, but content myself with the extremities of Victorian perfumery, from the nosegay to the nether regions of the civet, and from the ancient coaxing of flowers by …
Don’t Be Bitter About Dry January: Alleviate the Pain of Sobriety with Hydrosols and Bitters
As regular readers may have noticed, I love using hydrosols to flavor my vodka, but these natural flavorings with little or no sugar, are great for flavoring water too, and hence, indispensable tools for making it through Dry January. Be sure to get your hydrosols from reputable sources. I recommend Aromatics International and Stillpoint Aromatics. You want to make sure that they have nothing in them besides the hydrosol–just water that has been run through the still with aromatic material. …
The Spirit of St-Germain Elderflower Liqueur
There was “sad news in the spirits world” when it was reported by Eater.com and countless other food and beverage blogs that Robert Cooper, the founder of the wildly popular St-Germain elderflower liqueur, died suddenly at the age of 39. Cooper was born into the booze business, but struck out on his own when his idea to make an elderflower liqueur (like those he’d encountered in London) was pooh-poohed by his father. The elder Cooper had cause to regret his …
Alchemy, Aromatherapy, and Distillation: An Interview with Cathy Skipper
Cathy Skipper is English by birth and spent much of her adult life in rural France, where she farmed, trained and worked as a herbalist and aromatherapist, and taught practical herbalism, botany and aromatherapy. Together with her husband Florian Birkmayer, she founded Aromagnosis.com. They live in New Mexico and offer courses live and online centralized around the work of Carl Jung, alchemy, aromatherapy, aromatic molecules and the mind. Her new book The Alchemy of Menopause helps women transform “the time …
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Helen Keller on Smell, the Fallen Angel
“SMELL, THE FALLEN ANGEL” is Chapter SIX of The World I Live In (1908), a magnificent book that tells of perceptions beyond seeing and hearing. In it, Helen Keller offers vivid descriptions that blend her practical and poetical appreciation of what is arguably our most undervalued sense. We at Aromatica Poetica present this as one of our foundational texts, alongside Proust’s Madeleine. This was gently edited for apparent scanning errors and the odd British spellings were Americanized. Smell, the Fallen …
Proust’s Madeleine: The Smell & Taste of Recollection
Many have written on the stunning way smell and by extension taste seem to circumnavigate our intellect to bring us face to face with the past, but few have written the phenomenon so eloquently and influentially as Marcel Proust. At Aromatica Poetica, we acknowledge this famous madeleine scene from the first book of A la Rechearche du Temps Perdu, translated variously as Remembrance of Things Past and In Search of Lost Time, as a foundational text. Here it is excerpted …
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Individuation & the Power of Scent: An Interview With Florian Birkmayer MD
Florian Birkmayer is the kind of multidisciplinary spirit we love at Aromatica Poetica. Trained as a psychiatrist, deeply influenced by Jung, and devoted to the healing power of scent and the natural world, particularly aromatherapy and equine therapy, his practice has led him to found Aromagnosis with his wife Cathy Skipper. Together they are developing an online and live learning curriculum that is truly unique, including classes such as Alchemy, Aromatherapy and Medicine of the Soul, Intuitive Plant Communication, Hydrosols …
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‘There’s Rosemary, That’s for Remembrance,’ With Recipes!
Ophelia, as her wits unwind, uses the language of flowers to express what her modesty as a young maid won’t let her say directly. She says, “There’s rosemary, that’s for remembrance. Pray you, love, remember,” to her brother Laertes, perhaps as a stand-in for the lost Hamlet. Rosemary has long been renowned for its stimulating effects on the brain, and modern science seems to be catching on. I remember well a roommate in Santa Cruz who burned rosemary sprigs to …
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The Appreciation and Distillation of Milkweed Hydrosol in Three Acts
Act One, by M. Leona Godin, is about her encounter with milkweed hydrosol in a class taught by Cathy Skipper & Florian Birkmayer MD. Act Two is a poem written by Cathy Skipper, who created the online hydrosols certification program through The School for Aromatic Studies. Act Three details the collection and distillation of milkweed in the beautiful Taos region of New Mexico by Cathy Skipper & Florian Birkmayer MD. Act One: Drinking Monarch Nectar, AKA Milkweed (Asclepias) By …
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Cooking and Cocktailing with Hydrosol: Rose Geranium Martini, Bay Laurel Marinade, Clary Sage Punch
When we were nineteen, my best friend and I backpacked through Europe from Germany to Greece, ending our epic adventure in Athens. In the final days before returning to the US, we found a bottle of rose–not rosé–wine and took it to the rooftop hostel where we drank with bats swooping over our heads. The dark floral richness, like theatrical curtains opening on my tongue, stuck in my imagination as a pallet-expanding experience that busted through the confinement of the …