Eat Spray Love: Cozy Meals, Perfect Scents

As a general rule you should always use your nicest things first. So many of us do this bass ackwards, believing that we should go through our dull, practical purchases first and save the good stuff for some notional future day. This is a terrible idea. Crack open the good stuff now because if not now, then when? Every day needs to celebrated. (This is also one of the reasons that I fundamentally disagree with wedding culture and its ‘best day of your life’ extravagance. But that’s an argument for another day.)

Ostensibly tied to Valentine’s Day, but really more of a mid-February uplift, here are some fragrance and meal pairings to inspire you to treat yourself better. The recipes are not grand and show-offy. They’re cozy, so if you want to eat sitting on the couch instead of at the table, then definitely do that.

And three of them contain cheese, because cheese is love.

Gris Dior and Cacio e Pepe Scrambled Eggs

Sprayed throughout Dior boutiques around the world to olfactorily transport you to the Avenue Montaigne mothership, Gris Dior is earthy (hello, oakmoss and patchouli), gently floral and ineffably elegant. I made a vow to myself to not use the expression ‘quiet luxury’ but boy, does this fragrance epitomize that notion. Spray some on yourself and notice how you immediately feel more put together even if you are in your most stretched-out, not-for-public-viewing sweats.  

Gris Dior will also magically turn you into the sort of person who easily elevates even the most basic breakfast-for-dinner into something special. Cacio e Pepe Scrambled Eggs from much-missed New York City restaurant Maialino fits the bill perfectly. it’s very easy to make with none of Cacio e Pepe’s complicated emulsion building, so please try it. Serve with sourdough toast soldiers or flatbread crackers.

Cacio e Pepe Soft Scrambled Eggs

Recipe by Maialino Chef Nick Anderer  
Serves four

Ingredients
10 fresh eggs
½ c. whole milk
1 c. grated pecorino, plus more to taste
2 tbsp. coarsely ground black pepper
1 tbsp. butter
Salt to taste

1. Melt butter in a nonstick skillet (9 to 10 inches in diameter) over medium heat.

2. Whisk together eggs and milk; pour into the skillet.

3. Stir continuously for four to five minutes with a heat-resistant rubber spatula until the eggs begin to lightly scramble.

4. Stir in the pecorino, black pepper, and salt.

5. Transfer eggs to a platter before they cook to a hard scramble. The final product should be creamy and loose.

6. Sprinkle more pecorino over the top and serve with the bread of your choice.

Carolina Herrera Good Girl Blush and Truffled Grilled Cheese

Carolina Herrera Good Girl Blush is what happens when a big, attention-loving gourmand perfume decides to have a quiet night at home.

Image from Stacey Todd Boutique instagram (I added the chips. Duh.). Model is wearing Another Grey Day cashmere sweats.

Soft and powdery, Carolina Herrera Good Girl Blush eau de parfum might at first telegraph a luxe clean vibe. But it also has an irrepressibly narcotic white flower and thumping rose heart that says “I can pull off a big night out. I just choose not to.” Even with its signature Good Girl gourmand heart, Good Girl Blush is way more sophisticated than any of the scores of baby girl candy fragrances out there. If you wear this to stay in, do not cook. Maybe have some truffle chips, but eaten from a porcelain bowl, never straight from the bag.

And if you must eat cooked food, have someone prepare it for you. I have a friend whose husband makes truffled grilled cheese sandwiches for her whenever she wants. May everyone have a partner like that.

Cheese is love.

Narciso Rodriguez All Of Me and Pastina

Narciso Rodriguez All of Me eau de parfum is a skin scent masquerading as an irreproachable floral fragrance. What starts out straightforwardly floral unfolds into an elevated sandalwood and musk that is equal parts soothing and sexy. Wear it while eating the classic Italian comfort dish, Pastina. ( It was given new life when it went viral two years ago on social media and the video recipe at this link is my favourite and is dead easy to make.)

Pastina is baby-sized pasta stars cooked in chicken or vegetable broth instead of water, with a healthy amount of butter and a generous grating of cheese for the perfect, nurturing meal. Giant blanket to wrap yourself in like a human burrito optional but encouraged.

Aesop Ouranon and Nigella’s Pumpkin & Chickpea Thai Curry

Aesop’s Ouranon Eau de Parfum is time lapse photography in a bottle. A journey through the changing seasons, it starts with sun-warmed lavender, then takes a spin through harvest season with dried hay before ending up at a giant stone fireplace welcoming the warm embrace of a smoky fire.

It’s what to wear when eating Pumpkin and Chickpea Thai Curry from Nigella Lawson. This stew is vegan but hearty, full of soluble fibre (my new obsession) and you can adjust the spice level from lightly warming to yeow. Perfect for a cold or rainy night when you need to thaw your poor bones.

Nigella Lawson Pumpkin and Chickpea Thai Curry

3 tablespoons vegetable oil

1 1/2 cups finely chopped onion

1/4 teaspoon salt, or to taste

2 teaspoons Thai red curry paste, or to taste (available in Asian markets. If you can avoid the grocery store versions made for western palates, then do so. The best Asian ones are Maeploy, Aroy-D and Maesri brand.)

1 teaspoon ground cumin

1 teaspoon ground coriander

2 pounds peeled seeded pumpkin, cut into 1 1/4-inch chunks

2 (15-ounce) cans coconut milk

1 cup chicken or vegetable broth

1 Tablespoon Thai fish sauce*

4 15-ounce cans chickpeas, drained

Freshly ground black pepper

1 cup loosely packed finely chopped cilantro leaves.

Place a large wide pan over medium heat, and add oil. When hot, add onion and salt, and saute until softened but not browned. Add curry paste, and saute for 1 minute. Add cumin and coriander. Raise heat to medium-high, and add pumpkin. Stir for about 1 minute. Stir in coconut milk, chicken broth and fish sauce. Partly cover with a lid, and reduce heat to low. Simmer gently until pumpkin is almost tender, about 20 minutes. Add chickpeas, partly cover, and simmer for 10 minutes more. Stir gently, and adjust salt and pepper to taste. If more heat is desired, add more curry paste. Ladle hot pot into serving bowls, sprinkle with cilantro, and serve.

* As reader Tracy points out in the comments, fish sauce is not vegan, so you can substitute miso paste or tamari or just skip that ingredient entirely.

Yield: 4 to 6 servings.

Klorane Baby Cologne is pure #sweaterweatherperfume

Is it a cheat to recommend baby cologne as #sweaterweatherperfume? Isn’t it just a liquid version of baby powder?

Except Klorane Petit Brin Eau Parfumée is French baby cologne (technically alcohol-free, scented water) for those Parisian infants being wheeled down Boulevard St. Germain in prams by impossibly beautiful young mothers. Elegant yet softly cozy and comforting, it is #sweaterweatherperfume in its purest state.

A mix of white flowers with (apparently, because I don’t detect them) ‘fruity’ notes, Petit Brin smells like luxurious bath oil not classic North American baby powder.

Sure there are more sophisticated powdery fragrances with added musk and amber notes to make them even more sweater weather-y and more adult. I love them too, but sometimes you just want full-on powdery comfort and nothing else.

Klorane Petit Brin needs to be on any pharmacy shopping list when you travel to France, but it’s also available in Canada at Well.ca for only $24, so you can get it right now.

Spring Scents for Rain or Shine

Spring does not know her own mind. Chilly and rainy? Sure. Hot and blowy? Also possible. Both extremes are epitomized, above, by Christy Turlington, all bundled up on top, but with bare legs. If Christy were shopping for a blazer in Canada, surely she would get it from Smythe, known for beautifully made toppers and impeccable tailoring, season after season.

And they now have their own eponymous fragrance created by niche perfume house Fueguia 1883 (eau de parfum, $275, shopSmythe.ca) that is genderless and deeply, deeply sexy (I try never to use that word, but it applies here.) It’s loaded with sandalwood and cedar, like a fire roaring in the fireplace at the Gramercy Park hotel (going forward, all my references will be hotel-based because I yearn to travel) and is smokily earthy with patchouli. But then it’s shot through with sharp, sunny, almost astringent bergamot. I predict it will become the scent you smell on striking women as you attempt to dissect what makes their outfits so cool.

Feuguia 1883 also created the signature fragrance for Stockholm’s luxury Ett Hem boutique hotel, that was briefly available at Toronto’s Holt Renfrew for an eye-watering $514 CAN (photo, right.) I couldn’t spend that much on something ephemeral, no matter how much I wanted the cozy, black pepper, cedar and sandalwood scent. But I did take this picture, because I knew I’d never believe a perfume could be so expensive.

No-one does discreetly elegant and achingly expensive-smelling floral perfumes like Valmont. Just spray on their newest Collezione Privata, Just Bloom (eau de parfum $380, Holt Renfrew) and I swear a Chanel tweed jacket will magically appear draped over your shoulders, and instantly you will be ready for tea at the Paris Ritz. Just Bloom, which layers optimistic white flowers (lily of the valley and gardenia) over an enigmatic ‘damp forest floor’ scent of ambergris, has that transformative power.

Aerin Cedar Violet eau de parfum ($155, esteelauder.ca) may have came out last fall, but it quite accurately bottles the sensation of being out on a rainy spring day. Cedar Violet opens all fresh and positively herbal with bright violet leaf and lily of the valley before warming into creamily soft gardenia and cedar. It’s protectively cozy like wearing a paper thin, soft merino wool T-shirt under your rain gear when the skies open up.

Shower Joy: Haircare Dupes for Expensive Fragrances

There’s nothing as deflating as heading into your morning shower, half asleep, only to be jarred awake by the smell of aggressively scented, ordinary shampoo. We need beauty in those early hours to gently coax ourselves into the ‘what fresh hell awaits us today’ world.

These three haircare products above are excellent and their fragrances are “inspired by” best-selling perfumes. Do I like them more because they smell so good? Yes I do.

Left to right: Unbreak My Blonde Leave-in Treatment from Matrix, Chatters,ca $24.50, softens and strengthens straw-like, bleached blonde hair, all the while evoking Bvlgari’s classic Eau Parfumée au Thé Vert, ($130, Holt Renfrew), the smell of the early ‘90s. Endless copied since its launch in 1992, Bvulgari’s mix of seemingly disparate notes like bergamot, coriander, orange blossom jasmine and rose on a woody and green tea base still smells new.

Bounce.Me Curl shampoo from DesignMe, $27, (centre) is note-for-note Bobbi Brown’s Beach, $105, Sephora, another classic, this one an homage to 70s sunscreens like Coppertone and Bain de Soleil. Remember that metal Bain de Soleil tube of orange ‘gelée’? Nothing was more glamorous. Bounce.Me transforms even the most egregiously fuzzy steel wool hair into soft waves and defined curls. (I always adored the Beach scent and never forgave Bobbi Brown for discontinuing their Beach-scented ‘sandbar' soaps, with their thick crowns of sand for handy exfoliation. They were probably massively injurious to skin, but I loved them.)

From the singular white flowers and sandalwood scent to its suede-finished, parchment coloured bottles, Authentic Beauty Concept’s line for damaged hair both looks and smells like Donna Karan iconic Cashmere Mist deodorant (the Bay, $39). It makes sense given that - fun fact - Cashmere Mist stick deodorant, has been the #1 best selling prestige body product in the US since 1996. ABC’s replenish line (conditioner, above) provides much needed moisture to restore winter-battered hair. And the sueded bottles are especially nice to grip with soapy hands when you are still asleep during that morning shower.

For screen-capping:

Let’s Keep Chanel Cuir de Russie Our Secret

Chanel Cuir de Russie, photographed against a sweater because it is the most luxurious #sweaterweatherperfume ever.

With all this (social) distance, some of us have been ‘free pouring’ our perfume to make a big olfactory statement. Forget that ‘your fragrance should only be detectable by your lover in your arms’ nonsense. We need scent that can be smelled across a room and through a mask, and perfume houses have obliged with ever-bigger smoky, leathery fragrances (Tom Ford’s new Ebène Fumé is selling out everywhere) that are as brash and aggressive as a banker bro loudly ordering ‘top shelf’ vodka shots in a noisy bar.

But the perfect bold leather-and-woods scent already exists and surprise - it’s from 1927.

Les Exclusifs de Chanel Cuir de Russie, (75 ml, edp $250 CAN) is a velvety, smoky dream created by Ernest Beaux to sate Madame Chanel’s obsession with all things Russian. In addition to birch tar (that ‘Russian leather’ note) it packs in musks, woods and smoke all encircling a very Chanel-esque rose and jasmine heart. (Ernest Beaux, after all, created Chanel No 5 six years earlier.)

If you’re going to spring for one Verdura Maltese cross, you might as well get two. (This pair actually belonged to Mme. Chanel herself.)

It’s arguably a men’s fragrance for women, although what does ‘unisex’ even mean anymore? Cuir de Russie would be equally at home on a gentleman in a Charvet shirt or a woman who pushes up the sleeves of her Chanel jacket to show off twin Verdura Maltese cross bracelets. But you can just wear it with your athleisure and marvel as it makes you unconsciously put your shoulders back and stand straighter than any Pilates class ever could.

And unlike formerly niche scents (remember when Le Labo Santal 33 went from cool to over-exposed?) you still don’t smell Cuir de Russie everywhere. It has maintained its ‘deep cut’ status. So if you buy it and someone asks what you’re wearing, just fib, ok?

#sweaterweatherperfume Moroccanoil Brumes du Maroc

There’s a house-cleaning cheat where you only do the bare minimum of wiping down the stove and sink with your most heavily-scented cleaning product to make the whole house smell like you deep-cleaned even when you didn’t.

Moroccanoil Brumes du Maroc hair and body fragrance mist, $36, Sephora.ca, operates from the same principle. Spray your dry hair and body with that signature Moroccanoil amber, floral, earthy scent to trick you into thinking you just did a hair mask. And because Brumes du Maroc contains argan (aka Moroccan) oil, vitamin E and glycerin, your winter-parched skin and hair will even get some immediate and always welcome moisture. Spray liberally when you emerge from the shower and then wrap your beautifully scented self in your favourite sweater. It’s a perfect lift when we’re smack in the middle of winter.

And if you spray your hair after washing and then twist it into a top knot, when you release it after a time, not only will you get summery waves, but also that wonderful scent which will have somehow amplified in the intervening hours. And while I would never endorse getting an actual sun tan, this fragrance is also perfect to wear after using self-tanner, both as a complement to your ‘faux’ bronzed skin and also to hide that, uh, ‘singular’ self-tanner smell.

Tom Ford White Suede: #sweaterweatherperfume for bitterly cold days

Tom Ford’s White Suede eau de parfum should have been a superstar.

Launched in 2009, White Suede (50 ml, $335, The Bay) has been quietly earning fans as a smoky-into-powdery, musk skin scent. Beloved but always under the radar, it never reached the front ranks. Maybe it was too subtle to be a huge, noisy hit?

Back then, Tom Ford was best known for his room-filling, attention-grabbing Black Orchid, so it’s easy to see how White Suede slipped by unnoticed. Unlike Black Orchid, which smells like seduction or the promise of a party, White Suede is what you want on ‘big sweater and undone hair’ days, which are most days to a lot of us. Maybe this stealth allure resonates more now?

White Suede is quiet. Even though it is rich and layered, courtesy of rose, oud, saffron and frankincense, with unexpected brightness from thyme and lily of the valley, it never shouts. It’s a powdery, soft musk, in a quietly smoky leathery frame.

It’s perfect when you want something singular and not easily identified. And it will never turn sweet or overly floral as it dries down. Which is the kind of integrity and steadfastness we need going forward.

An Authentic NYE With This One Simple Trick

Dark red lipstick and a pair of diamonds encrusted snakes winding their way up your arm is all you need for New Year’s Eve.

I’m going to make our quiet New Year’s Eve feel like a crowded 1990s party by getting Craig to blow cigarette smoke directly into my hair after I go hard with red lipstick and spray myself with an extravagant evening fragrance. I really miss the perfume-plus-smoke smell of a party and want to feel like I had a wonderful time at an overcrowded fête without actually spending time in an unventilated room with drunken strangers.

But where can I buy just one cigarette? Maybe lighting and then blowing out a stick of Palo Santo to wave around my head would work equally well, because Palo Santo is something I actually have.

And these two newish perfumes epitomize the big party vibe I crave.

Mugler Angel Nova eau de parfum, $115, Shoppers Drug Mart, launched last year when no one was feeling particularly festive, so I am drawing your attention to it now. It doesn’t smell much like the famously vanilla/patchouli/cotton candyish Angel. It’s more of a tipsy, smeared lipstick scent: all waxy rose and woods, patchouli and musk. It smells like being beautifully dressed and somewhat slutty, but slutty somewhere cool, like Venice.

Carolina Herrera Very Good Girl eau de parfum, $130, Shoppers Drug Mart, starts out as a happy, fizzy cocktail with lychee and red currant before deepening into dark rose and resinous vetiver. It’s like a shiv hidden under a poofy crinoline. Or like a sleek-limbed vamp in a black and white Helmut Newton photo (see above).

Burt’s Bees 100% natural Lip Crayon in Napa Vineyard, $9.99, London Drugs, is an under-appreciated gem with clean beauty bona fides at a drugstore price. The colour is a deep rich red, the formula is beautifully moisturizing and the twist up crayon format makes it easy to apply. We need the small joy of buying a glorious product that doesn’t make our wallets shriek. New year, new budgetary restraint, amirite?

#sweaterweatherperfume For Only $14

We interrupt gift guide season to suggest you buy yourself something small when you’re stuck at the mall with your long list and your waning patience.

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It’s very Cool Girl to not let price dictate what you like. Carolyn Bessette Kennedy was known for wearing Karim Abdul Egyptian Musk Oil that she would buy from NYC street vendors. The Body Shop White Musk perfume oil has that same quiet cool energy. It’s a gentle skin scent that doesn’t smell like ‘perfume’ per se, but instead becomes a part of you. This is especially welcome during sweater season when you are hiding your actual skin away under so many layers.

White Musk was the first non-animal derived musk, when it launched in (gulp) 1981 and its most recent iteration, launched this year, is now 100% vegan. And if you did wear it way back in the early 80s, when we all flocked to The Body Shop for Kiwi Fruit lip balm and Peppermint Foot Lotion, you’ll be happy to know it is still the same great ‘laundry’ musk, with floral notes to subtly amplify its clean vibe.

Isn’t it reassuring when something you loved in your youth hold ups and isn’t a massive embarrassment now?

Oribe Desertland is #sweaterweatherperfume

The biggest upside to colder weather is being reunited with your favourite sweaters that have been reverse-hibernating, patiently waiting for the falling temps.

Desertland eau de parfum, $156 CAN, Oribe.com, was born to be paired with your best-loved knits. Inspired by a trip to Marfa, Texas, every note, from the herbal opening of juniper, lavender and wild flowers to its Texas cedar, vetiver and sandalwood dry-down is sun-warmed and comforting. It’s the perfect vibe to carry with you as you bundle up against November’s signature gloom.

Desertland is the latest from Oribe, the cult haircare range that became a de facto perfume house after parlaying the fan favourite jasmine-and-citrus scent of their line into Cote d’Azur eau de parfum. This was both a clever marketing move and a public safety measure, as I know people who would literally huff Oribe Superfine Hairspray because it smells so good.

Wallet-melting pro tip: Both Côte d’Azur and Desertland would make excellent, if somewhat pricy, room sprays.