Which spices are the source of the milk flavor in perfume?

Some perfumes carry a sweet, silky milky aroma that smells warm and soothing, easily comforting the soul and bringing a sense of security and satisfaction.
These enchanting creamy notes mostly come from botanical ingredients—such as vanilla, tuberose, gardenia, sandalwood, and fig; musk, an animal-derived note, also often carries a subtle milky nuance.
Let’s get to know these amazing ingredients that add a “milky” touch to perfumes!

Vanilla
Vanilla is an orchid plant and one of the most precious spices in the world, second only to saffron in price. After processes like fixation, fermentation, drying, and aging, vanilla pods release a rich, sweet aroma with creamy, powdery, and slightly woody notes, reminiscent of butter and ice cream. That’s why it’s often used in gourmand fragrances, and it’s also widely applied in food, daily chemicals, and pharmaceuticals.

Recommended Fragrances:
Mancera Roses Vanille
Vanilla Sex
PDM Layton

Tuberose
Tuberose is known for its long-lasting scent—even two days after being picked, its fragrance lingers. It smells silky, like coconut milk, with green and animalic undertones. Its scent is subtle and fresh during the day but becomes rich and intense at night. Due to the delicacy of the flowers, tuberose must be handpicked and extracted via solvent extraction. It takes about 7 tons of flowers to produce just 1 kg of absolute, making it extremely precious. The scent of tuberose is seductive and alluring, often called the “flower of forbidden pleasures.”

Recommended Fragrances:
Gabrielle
Do Son
Honour Woman

Gardenia
Gardenia blooms are pure white with a sweet, lush fragrance, featuring a creamy texture and a hint of greenish indole. The scent is complex and long-lasting. However, its petals are too delicate to extract natural essential oil effectively. Thus, the gardenia scent in perfumes is usually recreated through synthetic means or by blending other white floral notes. Besides perfumery, gardenia is also widely used in cosmetics and food flavoring.

Recommended Fragrances:
Gardénia
Gardenia & Oud Absolu
Flora Gorgeous Gardenia

Sandalwood
Sandalwood is a rare wood that grows very slowly, taking decades to mature. It is one of the “Four Great Incenses” in Chinese tradition. Due to limited supply, it has always been highly prized. Sandalwood has a warm woody character with a smooth, creamy sweetness that feels almost edible. The higher the quality, the richer the milky note. Common varieties on the market include Indian sandalwood (known as white sandalwood), which is sweet and distinctly creamy, and Australian sandalwood, which has more green and earthy tones with a lighter creaminess.

Recommended Fragrances:
Santal Blush
Santal 33
Sacred Wood

Fig
Fig offers a fresh, sweet fruitiness accompanied by a milky creaminess and green accents—pleasantly sweet without being cloying. Due to its thin skin, natural extraction is not feasible, so its scent is typically recreated synthetically. Although categorized as a fruity note, fig evokes a smooth, coconut-like gourmand character that feels uniquely creamy and subtly sweet.

Recommended Fragrances:
Philosykos EDP
Fico di Amalfi

Musk
Originally derived from the gland of the male musk deer, natural musk boasts complex layers: animalic facets, creamy nuances, powdery softness, and woody undertones. Since the musk deer was listed as an endangered species in 1979, natural musk has been banned, and all musk used in modern perfumery is artificially created. Among the many synthetic variants, “White Musk” stands out—it removes the animalic edge while retaining a soft milky quality, resulting in a clean, skin-like scent often used to create a subtle skin-scent effect.

Recommended Fragrances:
TBS White Musk
White Suede