The Zen Hippie Blog

Calamus Root and Kyphi Recipe

The Zen Hippie — Wed, 05 May 2010 18:22:25 +0000

Calamus Root, (Acorus calamus) is also known as Calmus, Sedge, and Sweet Myrtle. It is a wonderfully spicy, aromatic, and very cinnamon-like fragrance that has been enjoyed since at least The Epic of Gilgamesh where it is mentioned as an incense ingredient. It is also referenced in the Bible as one of the ingredients of the anointing oil in Exodus 30:23. The Egyptians used it for the Kyphi recipes as well.

When reading a book about Medieval times I discovered that it was also called a “strewing herb” because people in those times, well, “strewed” it on their floors along with pennyroyal, and lavender to help with insect problems. I thought that was great and would be a terrific thing in modern times except for the fact that your floor would resemble that of a roadhouse. Still, the next time I go camping I think I will toss a little of it on the floor of the tent. It might not control mosquitoes, but it will smell wonderful.

Given that the scent is warm, spicy, woody and very much reminiscent of cinnamon, it works very well with the following ingredients. Cedar, Myrrh, Patchouli, Borneol Camphor and Benzoin.

Although complicated, here is a wonderful Kyphi recipe where Calmus is featured.

4 parts Frankincense

2 parts Mastic

1/2 part Juniper berries

1/4 part Calmus

1/4 part Galangal

1/2 part Cardamom

1 part Cinnamon bark

1 part Myrrh

1 part Lemon Grass

1/2 part Rose leaves (dried rose buds)

1 part Benzoin of Siam

1 1/2 part Sandalwood

Pinch of Aquillaria wood

1/2 part Honey

Tablespoon at a time of rich red wine

8 parts Sultana raisins, unsulfured.

Soak the raisins overnight in red wine and pulverize the frankincense, myrrh, mastic and benzoin with a mortar and pestle. Pulverize individually the cinnamon, juniper berries, calmus, galangal, cardamom and sandalwood. Mix all the ingredients together and cut the lemongrass and crumble the rose buds. Use 1/2 teaspoon of aquillaria wood to 1 cup of this mixture. You can do without the aquillaria wood if it is not available to you.

Remove the raisins from the wine and blend everything together with a blender so that it is pulverized then use the honey to add to the mixture so that you get a dough-like substance that you can knead well and easily. You can either crumble it in your palms and allow it to dry (turning it often over 7 to 14 days) or you can roll it into pea-sized pellets as the Egyptians preferred and allow to dry as above.

Congratulations, it is one of the more complex and difficult recipes from antiquity but one that is well worth the effort.

Burgundy Pitch

The Zen Hippie — Wed, 05 May 2010 17:31:15 +0000

“Burgundy Pitch” is the resin from the Spruce pine (Pinus glabra) that is collected and clarified through a melting process to yield a higher quality and more wonderfully fragrant end product.

Spruce pine, also called cedar-pine or bottom-white pine, is a member of the southern yellow pine group. It is the most shade-tolerant species of southern pine and is scattered throughout the southeast in mixed hardwood stands, rarely occurring in pure stands.

The wood from spruce pine is brittle and close-grained. It lacks durability and has little commercial value, except as a pulpwood. Occasionally, spruce pines are grown for Christmas trees because of their attractive coloring and spruce-like appearance.

The trees provide important resources for numerous wildlife species, including bobwhite quail and squirrels, who eat the seeds. Songbirds, owls, and hawks all use the trees for cover or nesting.

Burgundy pitch blends well with the following incense ingredients: benzoin, cedar, juniper, lavender, oakmoss, rosemary or white sage.

A very pleasant incense recipe featuring burgundy pitch also features sage for a wonderfully refreshing outdoorsy scent.

2 parts Colophony Pine resin

1 part Burgundy Pitch resin

1/2 part Pine Needles

1/2 part Desert Sage

Borneo Camphor

The Zen Hippie — Wed, 05 May 2010 17:08:39 +0000

Borneo Camphor, sometimes called Borneol Camphor is a pale, straw colored resin from the Dryobalanops aromatica tree. It is an evergreen that can reach heights of more than 120 feet. The Japanese refer to this tree as the hon-sho and the sacred camphor tree at the Hachiman shrine in the Kagoshima district of Japan is more than 1,200 years old.

This species was one of the main sources of camphor and attracted early Arab traders to Borneo. Camphor at that time was valued more highly than gold and was used extensively in incense and perfumes of the period. This was during the time of Marco Polo, around 1269 or so, and he remarks on the trade of camphor for gold.

Camphor has a clean, clear scent and mixes will with aloeswood, clove, cinnamon and frankincense. There is however a synthetic camphor called Borneolum syntheticum that should never be used for incense making as it has a pronounced turpentine-like scent. So beware and purchase only natural ingredients for your incense creations.

A very pleasant recipe you can try that features camphor is:

2 parts Frankincense

1 part Camphor

1 part Cloves

1/2 part White Pine needles

1/2 part Juniper Tips

When burned, it produces a fresh, woody fragrance with a high clear note. Personally, it reminds me of the smell of evergreen trees in the snow.

Hem Rain Forest Incense Review

The Zen Hippie — Wed, 05 May 2010 02:03:29 +0000

Regular readers will no doubt be aware that I am not the biggest fan of Hem incense. The fact that it is charcoal based and is (probably) dipped in fragrance oil rather than being made from finely ground ingredients gives it a characteristic odor that I find very distracting on occasion. Sometimes though, Hem creates something that defies my expectations and can truly be classed as something special. That is the case with their Rain Forest scent. I am not certain, but perhaps Hem has changed their formulation a bit. I do know that the inner packaging is not the familiar semi-opaque bag that I have known for some time. Instead is is clear and is sealed differently as well. Those things are clues to me that perhaps something has changed at Hem during the production of the newer scents.

In any case, the scent is floral but not overpoweringly so. It is slightly musky around the bottom notes and yet clear, sharp and a little spicy near the top. Although the scent is a bit too “bright” to smell exactly like a forest with fallen trees and wildflowers dripping with rain, that is exactly what the scent manages to evoke in me. If it had a bit of patchouli for a more earthy smell and to tone down the top notes just a but it would be a wonderfully sensual, warm, floral and yet clean scent with a touch of spice. Of course, that is my personal preference and penchant for earthy notes talking. Either way, this is a surprisingly good stick and one that I am certain will find its way into my rotation of incense scents in the near future.

On a more personal note, the memory that came to me in a flash when I lit this stick is one of being caught by an out of season thunderstorm while walking in Oak Mountain State Park. The air was cool and leaves were falling and the last of the summer flowers were just about gone. I huddled in the chilling rain underneath a granite outcropping and enjoyed an amazing barrage of scents released by the rain on the fallen leaves, the rocks and the few wildflowers hardy enough to have lasted this long. It is that combination of cool air, florals, spice and the tiniest bit of a musky scent that this stick does so well.

Hem Dragons Blood Incense Review

The Zen Hippie — Wed, 05 May 2010 01:16:41 +0000

There are few incense ingredients as confusing as Dragons Blood. The name Dragons Blood can refer to no less than sixteen different resins from the same number of trees. It can also refer to the extremely poisonous mineral cinnibar (mercury sulfide) although not in recent times to my knowledge. It is also another name for red rock opium, but it contains no opiates and its intoxicating properties are dubious at best.

Most commonly though dragons blood incense is made from either the Dracaena draco or Daemonorops draco trees. The former being referred to as “true” dragons blood. The scent is variously described as sultry, deep, penetrating and often, sweet. Given those properties of scent it is no wonder that it is often included in rituals and spells by our Wiccan and Pagan friends as an aid to sexuality and desire. I find the scent to be a bit “floral” on occasion depending on the manufacturer. That may be just my nose and my penchant for earthy, warm notes like patchouli though.

Hem‘s Dragon Blood incense smells pretty much like a host of other dragons blood offerings from other manufacturers. Note, this does not include the pure resin dragons blood. That scent is far richer and altogether more alluring than any stick version I have ever experienced. This stick is lightly spicy, sultry, sensual in a way and surprisingly rich. In fact, this is one of the few times that I can think of that the “Hem Scent” that usually bothers me so much works with the scent instead of against it. The oily and slightly bitter scent that I find to be characteristic of Hem incense sticks adds a mysterious bottom end to the scent that I actually find quite pleasant.

I sometimes arbitrarily assign incense scents to things that go on in everyday life and this is definitely a “the thunderstorm has knocked the power out tonight, so lets sit in the dark and talk” scent. It has that sort of sensual, mysterious yet lightly spicy scent that I think would go wonderfully with conversation in the dark.

Hem Sage Incense Review

The Zen Hippie — Wed, 05 May 2010 00:31:04 +0000

The hexagonal packaging for Hem‘s Sage Incense has the word “Salvia” on an opposing side to the word “Sage”. Do they mean to imply that this stick is based on Salvia apiana which is also known as “White Sage”, “Sacred Sage” and depending on who you ask, “Bee Sage” or is it just based on the Salvia genus in general?

The distinction is important because white sage plays a tremendous role in Native American rituals as well as various Wiccan and Pagan spells and rituals for cleansing everything from space to Athames, crystals and more. The cleansing properties of white sage are well documented in hundreds of works and I am not about to argue with the wisdom of the ages. So with that in mind, and a trip to the Native American festival in Fort Walton Florida where plenty of white sage was burned still fresh in my memory, lets see what Hem has to offer with this stick.

First, if you purchase this and expect it to smell just like a sage bundle or “smudge stick” burning, you will be disappointed. On the other hand, the scent is pleasant and clear without too much of that “Hem Scent” that I have written about in the past. I confess to not knowing a great deal about Hem’s manufacturing process, but I do know that their sticks are charcoal and by association I assume them to be dipped in oils rather than made from finely ground natural ingredients. As such, that “Hem Scent” I mentioned is a slightly oily, mildly bitter undertone that I find gets in the way of the top notes all too often.

So in this stick you have a clear, bright and very pleasant version of white sage competing with that oily, bitter note. I think it may be possible to learn to ignore or tune out that scent after a while, but I find it to be too distracting. I have a stick of it burning while I write this review and the scent is pleasant and very sage-like most of the time. Every now and then though it is almost as if a richer deposit of the fragrance oil burns and that distracting note springs to the forefront.

I would say that this is a good approximation of white sage, but if you want to truly enjoy the crisp, clean and high note scent of white sage you would be better served to buy an actual white sage bundle from any one of a dozen reputable vendors. Especially if you are going to use sage for any sort of ritual work. If you are a fan of Hem incense in general though, and many people are, then I think that you will be pleased with this stick overall.

Benzoin

The Zen Hippie — Fri, 16 Apr 2010 02:23:03 +0000

Benzoin is a resin obtained from Benzoe Siam-Styrax tonkimensis Craib. and Benzoe Sumatra-Styrax benzoin Dryand. It belongs in the Stryraceae family and for incense burning the resinoid is what we are interested in. It is obtained through an extraction process and yields a more solid product.

Benzoin is highly prized in India for its soft, sensuous and warm properties. It mixes very well with most other incense ingredients and gives them fragrance. Mixed with sandalwood it is one of the most typical incense mixtures of Asia.

The people of India use it as a remedy for skin diseases and respiratory ailments. Believing that the smoke is particularly helpful for dry coughs. It is comparable to frankincense in that it occupies a place in worship as it is burned before statues and paintings that represent Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva.

Typically you can find it as Benzoin of Sumatra and Benzoin of Siam when you are shopping for it to make your own incense creations.

Tolu Balsam

The Zen Hippie — Fri, 16 Apr 2010 02:18:16 +0000

Tolu balsam (Myroxylon balsamum) trees grow in the northern part of South America. Primarily Colombia. Supposedly, the best tolu trees grow in the lower delta of the Magdalena River near the city of Santiago de Tolu.

A member of the Fabaceae family, the same as the Peruvian balsam tree, the tolu tree can grow its straight trunk up to 40 feet high. All parts of the tree have an aromatic fragrance and the balsam discharges from V-shaped cuts in the bark and is collected in containers.

The balsam is soft and can be kneaded easily. It can contain small crystals and it hardens over time to to a dark or reddish-brown color. It has been used for centuries for a variety of ailments including coughs, headaches, gout and various stomach ailments.

It combines the smell of vanilla, cinnamon and (oddly) fresh mown grass due to vanillin, cinnamon acid and coumarin in the resin. It is a calming and relaxing scent when burned and lends an air of harmony as well. It is a great resin to burn just before sleep to calm your busy mind and to prepare for a good nights sleep.

It works well when blended with tangy ingredients in an incense mixture as it softens them and enriches them as well.

Balsam

The Zen Hippie — Fri, 16 Apr 2010 02:14:39 +0000

Known also as Balsam of Mecca or more commonly Balm of Gilead, this resinous gum from the Commiphora gileadensis (synonymous with Commiphora opobalsamum) tree has been used since ancient times as a perfume and medicinal ingredient.

Besides being mentioned in the bible, Gen. 37:25, Jeremiah 46:11 and Jeremiah 8:22, it also gets a mention in Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Raven”. So from ancient times to modern, the perceived effects of this resin is well known.

According to history Mary Magdalene’s father owned a balsam grove and as such he was under orders from the king to produce a consecrated oil. Judea kept a monopoly on balsam for quite a long time and exported it throughout antiquity. The ancient Egyptians used balsam for embalming and the production of the most precious and sacred salves. During the Crusades balsam arrived in Europe and was considered one of the rarest and most precious of the incense burning substances.

It has a lemony, gentle, herb-like, warm and velvety fragrance. Unfortunately it is very difficult to find pure balsam nowadays. Generally people are referring to Tolu Balsam when they are talking about balsam.

The tree known throughout the Eastern United States and Canada as Balm of Gilead is not the same thing. That tree is Populus candicans. Also known variously as Balsam Poplar, Canary Balm, True Balm of Gilead, Willow Poplar and Mecca Balsam.

Arjuna

The Zen Hippie — Fri, 16 Apr 2010 02:11:07 +0000

Not to be confused with with one of the Pandavas, the heroes of of the Hindu epic Mahabharata, the medicinal tree of the same name is used for incense burning in Tibet among other things. It belongs to the Combretaceae family and bears the Latin name Terminalia chebula.

It is a deciduous tree that can grow up to 90 feet tall or more. This tree yields smallish, ribbed and nut-like fruits which are picked when still green and then pickled, boiled with a little added sugar in their own syrup or used in preserves or concoctions. The seed of the fruit, which has an elliptical shape, is an abrasive seed enveloped by a fleshy and firm pulp. It is regarded as a universal panacea in the Ayur-Vedic Medicine and in the Traditional Tibetan medicine. It is reputed to cure blindness and it is believed to inhibit the growth of malignant tumours.

In Urdu and Hindi it is called Harad, Haritaki, or Harada, respectively ‘Inknut’. In Sri Lanka it is called Aralu. In Marathi it is called as ‘Hirada’, in Kannada it is called ‘Alalekaayi’ and in Tamil it is called ‘Kadukkai’. In Bengali it is called horitoky. In Assamese it is called Xilikha. In Telugu it is called ‘Karakkaya’.

People burn the pulverized fruit to treat asthma, but they also add the pulverized bark to incense mixtures. When burned the fragrance is a very gentle, warm and woody scent.