MY PROGRESS REPORT TINCTURING AMBERGRIS, AMBRETTE, VANILLA AND DRAGON'S BLOOD

[Guest guest]

Well, I have been a little busy during the last few weeks with work

and tincturing a little bit during my spare time. I recently acquired

some ambergris of the white variety, some ambrette seeds, and organic

madagascar vanilla beans. I am not an expert so I did some reading and

homework online to learn how to tincture some of this raw material and

began working on my own. Below is a little recoup of my progress. I

would like to ask the wonderful people of this group to let me know

what you think, if I did something wrong, or what could I have done or

avoided to improve my tincturing.

I'll begin with the Ambergris. I acquired 2 grams from a dealer in the

UK. It was supposed to be of the white variety and finest grade. I

have never smelled real ambergris in my life before so it was a

wonderful experience to finally expose my nose to the nuances of this

wonderful exotic raw material. My first impression was definitely

marine, animalic and bit flowery underneath all. Following Arctander's

instructions and what I have read online I did 5% dilution in alcohol.

Now, I have never been the brightest person when it comes down to

numbers and math so I am not sure if I messed up the dilution

percentages. I have a feeling I did. I grounded the 2 grams of

ambergris to a fine power and added it to 190ml of Everclear. I

thought I was suppose to ad 95ml of alcohol per every gram of

ambergris to end up with a 5% tincture. This was done on 6/26/08.

During the first couple of days I could still smell the ambergris in

the tincture the same way it smelled when it arrived as a solid piece,

but after a week or two I can't smell much or anything in the tincture

anymore. I agitate the container every day or so, but the scent of the

blend is very very faint, almost no smell at all other than the

alcohol in it. Like I said before, I have a feeling that I messed up

somewhere, so if I did can someone please point out exactly what

amount of alcohol should be used per every gram of Ambergris to obtain

a tincture of 5% strength?

My second tincture was Ambrette. I managed to acquire some from

another natural perfumer that had apparently purchased a few kilograms

last year. She did informed me in advance that the ambrette she had

was from a 2005/2006 harvest. The price was very reasonable, so I

decided to give it a try. I bought 1 full pound which came up to about

$2/lb. I grounded some of it and indulged my self to getting

acquainted with the smell. Definitely nutty, and lightly musky, but

more nutty than anything. It smelled a lot like the Ambrette Abs I

purchased from Liberty Natural which I just noticed recently appears

to be going rancid. I found some floating white debris floating in the

bottle. I proceeded to get ready to tincture the ambrette at a 50/50

ratio so I added 30 grams of Ambrette seeds, and 30 grams of alcohol

in the container. Now, for this tincture instead of using Everclear I

used Snowdrift Farms Artisan Perfumer's alcohol which is supposed to

be I believe 190 or 200 grade. I agitate the blend every day since it

was made. This tincture was made on 6/24/08. As of today's date

7/25/08 about a month after I smell absolutely nothing other than the

very strong smell of alcohol in this tincture. The Everclear in my

vanilla tincture doesn't smell this strong. I am aware that the seeds

are suppose to be fairly fresh for tincturing and these seeds were a

harvest from 2005/2006 so perhaps they have lost their juices, but

when I grounded them they did smell nutty and lightly musky. Following

suggestions from other members I tinctured them whole, and not

grounded. Did I do something wrong, or does the scent take much longer

than 1 month to develop? I am fully aware that Ambergris does take

about 6 months to fully mature, but Ambrette I believe I have read

that it only takes about 2-3 months to macerate and that after 2 weeks

you can already smell the musky nutty note in the tincture. What did I

missed or do wrong?

My third tincture and most successful so far was the vanilla one.

Bought 1/4 lb of organic madagascar vanilla beans from a supplier

online. The stuff arrived fresh and smelled just heavenly. Following

online recommendations added 10 grams of the beans finely cut into

pieces in the container, and added 180ml of alcohol. Agitated every

day for two straight weeks. After 2 weeks replaced the beans in the

tincture and added new ones, 10 grams again. This tincture does smell

heavenly, almost like a vanilla liquor. I did noticed that the

strongest vanilla smell was present after exactly 1 week. After that 1

week the strength appears to faint or diminish a little. Does this

means that the beans should be removed and replaced as soon as the

tincture reaches it's peak to avoid loosing strength, or should I

leave the beans for a full 2 or 4 weeks? I plan to remove the second

batch of beans in another week, and then leave the tincture to age a

little for 1-3 months. Anything else that I could have done to improve

or make my vanilla tincture any better?

Final tincture was dragon's blood. I'd some of it for years laying ina

drawer since I have always had a little stack of natural resins to

burn as incense during my metaphysical adventures and the dragon's

blood is one of the finest resin incenses that I have ever been

exposed to. Dragon's blood has always smelled pretty strong to me when

burned as incense. I read somewhere online that it could also be

tinctured, although I have not found any reference to dragon's blood

being used in natural perfumery. I added about 10-15 grams of dragon's

blood to 60ml of Graves grain alcohol 151 proof. Within a matter of

days the alcohol had turned almost blood red. To my amazement the

tincture did actually turned to have some smell to it. I don't have an

expert's nose, but the dragon's blood tincture smells to me very very

light, earthy and slightly floral/musky, but definitely more earthy

than anything, and again is a very light faintly smell. Like the

vanilla I feel that my dragon's blood tincture was also a success, but

I have no idea as to whether or not this material has any use in

natural perfumery other than to color blends a little.

Any comments, critique, suggestions are very very appreciated about

all 4 of my tincturing attempts especially with the ambergris since I

feel I over dosed with the alcohol and ruined my ambergris tincture.

Like always thanks in advance to the wonderful people of this group

for your time reading, and input. It means a great deal to me.

Moon