Ethyl maltol (&Co) in making berries

Image of ethyl maltol formula from Wikipedia

Russian version - click here

After reading that Alex consider to sign his future fragrant creations with raspberry accord I wanted to play with its main components: vanillin, beta-ionone and raspberry ketone. The last one is not an easy thing to understand – it doesn’t smell “the promissed” raspberry there as the name would suggest. So, I think I’ll have to smell fresh raspberries one time and try to understand what aspects the juicy red berry it’s reminiscent to. Now I smell rather a slightly bitter green leave scent (that could be a raspberry leave altough).

Ionones – very unique aromachemicals with various applications. They smell is more likely to violet or iris with a fruity and woody note. I don’t have a beta version, so I decided to use a gamma one (alfa-iso-methyl-ionone). The fruity note of ionones makes them suitable for use in various berry-like compositions.

The raspberry I got from the mentioned components was a poor creature. It was rather a cheap candy flavouring reminding on raspberry after you read an etiquette. And I do understand why. First of all I have just mixed a couple of drops together without making an effort to get a balanced accord. And I haven’t used a proper ionone. But when balanced properly, this raspberry accord might be very promising. But balancing might be a good goal for the future experiments.

Later I added a drop of ethyl maltol to the raspberry. This is a very nice molecule smelling of burned sugar. A very pleasant and balanced note that doesn’t need any modification or imrovement. Just a drop of it gives a perfect sugary note to any gourmand base from canned fruits to Butterschotch chocolate. I think it’s ethyl maltol, that was used in Angel perfume.

Adding a drop of ethyl maltol to my poor raspberry made a… strawberry. Not a perfect one and it was in need for some further balancing. But it was very close to a strawberry perfume oil I bought once. May be if I substituted methyl ionone with beta (or even alfa that is less woody and more soft and floral) and used less of it…

A drop of so called “strawberry aldehyde C-16” turned my potion into a candy made from sugar and milk called “Strawberry cream” (like the one I know from my childhood). And the drop of so called “peach aldehyde C-14” was very good in taming too prominent ionones. And even a drop of 10% solution was powerful enough almost to “kill” all the fragrance. This peach aldehyde is a real beast – use with caution. And it’s the same peach aldehyde that was used to tame the dominant smell of the oakmoss in “Mitsouko”.

After all that fruity and sugary staff it was nice to put some freshness. I decided not to use a famous “leaf alcohol” (cis-3-hexenol), but one of its ethers – salicylate that combine a green note with a sweet medicinal one (like a bit of an anti-cough syrup). The strawberry turned into a pineapple guava berries (feijoa – a green berry).

It was like a magic where each drop called another creature to appear on the smelling paper.

It’s very interesting to mention the strength of ethyl maltol. When I was awake I smelled a weak and pleasant scent of burned sugar. It was coming from a smelling paper left on the table with a strawberry mixture on it. Ethyl maltol was strong enough to “separate” itself from the mixture and reach my nose.