[It’s back in stock!]
Here’s another new nunnery incense I loved off the bat, and one that is quite a bit different than all of the red sticks usually created by nuns in Tibet. The ingredients here include white and purple sandalwood, saffron, black agarwood, nutmeg, clove, cardamom, rhizome of conic gymnadenia, and fructus amomi (another type of cardamom). It’s a very woody incense primarily but does not lack for a middle.
Probably most noticeable is the big spice mix in the center of it. Where the wood could over-dominate, this mix really helps push things to the center and keep any campfire like elements from overwhelming things. It’s actually a fairly complex mix, but the nutmeg is probably the most in front of this mix, everything else feels largely right behind it. The incense sort of hints but falls short of being sweet, which makes all the spices shift a bit more in the direction of the cardamom(s). There’s a bit of thickness in the middle that’s a little hard to explain the origin of (it may just be the high quality of ingredients), but it keeps things quite rich. The presence of “black agarwood” sort of implies a higher grade of the wood, but I don’t detect anything abnormal to the way agarwood usually shows up in a Tibetan blend, it’s fairly mellow here as well. I’d suspect there must be some other woods in the mix as the ones listed don’t usually lead to what I’d call the more evergreen qualities that something like juniper, cypress or even cedar might impart. But probably what is most subtle about this is there feels like a light floral sort of mix at the very top, it’s not something I notice every time I burn it, but it’s a note that really ties everything together. Overall, the Tsogyal Latso Nunnery Incense is a very balanced incense, it’s a bit tangy and a bit salty but it’s primarily woody and spicy in equal measures. I don’t think I’ve tried too many nunnery incenses that weren’t excellent, and while this one is different from many of them and possibly closer to healing/therapeutic incenses, it’s still pretty wonderful in its own right.
Olfactory Rescue Service 
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