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8 Perfumes That Smell Like Dessert
Dessert in perfume means marzipan, brown sugar, marshmallow, chocolate and lemon tart, and each one has its own molecule. These eight go round the menu. Start with Dior Hypnotic Poison for almond and vanilla, Kayali Vanilla 28 for brown sugar, and Dolce & Gabbana Pour Femme for marshmallow with orange blossom.
What Makes a Perfume Smell Like a Bakery?
The same chemistry as the bakery itself. Benzaldehyde is bitter almond and marzipan. Coumarin, from tonka beans, smells of almond and fresh hay. Vanillin is vanilla, and ethyl maltol is caramelised sugar. Lactones give cream and coconut, and diacetyl is the smell of butter. Mix them in different proportions and you move from custard to praline to cake.
Perfumers add these to a structure that also has flowers, woods and musk, which is what turns a pudding into something wearable. Dessert perfumes started with Mugler’s Angel in 1992; our sweet perfume list has the story.
| Perfume | The dessert | What’s with it |
|---|---|---|
| Dior Hypnotic Poison EDT | Marzipan | Jasmine sambac, vanilla |
| Kayali Vanilla 28 | Brown sugar | Tonka, amber woods, patchouli |
| Dolce & Gabbana Pour Femme | Marshmallow | Orange blossom, mandarin |
| Lancôme La Vie Est Belle | Praline and spun sugar | Iris, patchouli |
| Britney Spears Fantasy | Cupcake | Lychee, kiwi, white chocolate |
| Prada Candy Night | Cocoa | Bitter orange, iris, tonka |
| Montale Chocolate Greedy | Chocolate orange | Coffee, tonka |
| Tulip Lemon Sugar | Lemon tart | Raspberry, caramel, sugar cane |
8 Dessert Perfumes
Dior Hypnotic Poison
Annick Menardo’s Hypnotic Poison (1998) is bitter almond, jasmine sambac and vanilla, and that’s the whole recipe for marzipan. Jasmine adds a warm, slightly animal floral note, so it smells of almond paste in a perfumed room. One wearer can’t stop thinking of root beer, which makes sense: root beer flavouring leans heavily on vanilla too. This is the Eau de Toilette; the EDP and Eau Secrète are separate versions.
Kayali Vanilla 28
Vanilla | 28 brings together vanilla, vanilla orchid, jasmine, tonka, brown sugar, amber woods, musk and patchouli. Brown sugar is the dessert: darker and more molasses-like than white sugar. With patchouli and amber, it’s a crème brûlée where the top has been taken slightly too far, and that’s a compliment.
Dolce & Gabbana Pour Femme
Dolce & Gabbana describes Pour Femme through green mandarin, orange blossom and marshmallow. Orange blossom is honeyed and slightly soapy, and marshmallow makes it fluffy and powdery, like an orange-flower meringue. It’s the most floral dessert here. Look for the 2012 Eau de Parfum, not Pour Femme Intense or the different 1992 perfume.
Lancôme La Vie Est Belle
La Vie Est Belle is an iris accord, patchouli, vanilla and spun sugar. The spun sugar and vanilla are the praline; iris makes it powdery, like icing sugar on a sponge. It came out in 2012, twenty years after Angel, and is the gentler of the two.
Britney Spears Fantasy
Fantasy names its cupcake accord outright, with red lychee, golden quince and kiwi on top and a white-chocolate orchid accord, musk and orris below. Kiwi and lychee are the trick: sour fruit keeps the frosting from going flat. It’s the most literal dessert on the page.
Prada Candy Night
Candy Night lists bitter orange, iris aldehyde, cocoa absolute, tonka, patchouli and musk. Cocoa absolute is the bitter, powdery kind of chocolate, so this is a dark truffle with orange peel, not a sweet. It’s the grown-up dessert here, and our chocolate list has more like it.
Montale Chocolate Greedy
Chocolate Greedy opens with bitter orange, puts cacao and vanilla in the heart, and finishes on coffee bean and tonka. It’s a chocolate orange you break into segments, with a cup of coffee next to it. Where Candy Night is dark and powdery, this is milky and fun.
Tulip Lemon Sugar
Lemon Sugar is a roll-on perfume oil of lemon, bergamot, raspberry, caramel, sugar cane, vanilla and musk. Lemon and caramel together are a lemon tart with a burnt-sugar top. It’s the cheapest and freshest pick here, and the oil format keeps it close to the skin.
More Sweets
For candyfloss and caramel, see our candy perfumes. The marshmallow list follows Pour Femme further, and the vanilla list goes deeper into vanillin.
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