Montezuma's Pride: Xocoatl by Fueguia 1833

Xocoatl is the Aztec word from which our "chocolate" derives, and when you discover that a scent is called "Chocolate" you are naturally going to develop a few quick assumptions, all of which are wrong in the case of Xocoatl. You will be expecting it to smell sweet, rich and vanilla-drenched and gourmand — chocolatey, in other words. And it is none of those things: it is herbal and dry, with a core of dusty cocoa and a decided patchouli-and-wood base. It isn't as complicated as I would like it to be: it suggests a Serge Lutens scent, if Serge were having an off day. (And Lutens has of course already done a chocolate-patchouli scent, Borneo 1834, which I just can't wear: too much of the wrong kind of patchouli.)

Xocoatl hovers somewhere between Borneo 1834 and the alas-discontinued cocoa-vanilla-patchouli Cocoon by Yves Rocher, and I should be thinking that it's a kind of knockoff, or at least nothing new, and yet I find it magnetically attractive: I took pleasure in every drop of my sample and found myself wishing I had more. I still cannot get over that price point (see below), but if you are looking for a subtle and fascinating scent that is purely unisex and not like anything else I know of on the market, this could be just the thing.