Milk
Creamy, soft sweetness with a warm, slightly buttery, sometimes caramel-like smell.
You may know it from a glass of warm whole milk
Where it comes from
Usually built from synthetic aroma materials rather than extracted from dairy milk.
Worth knowing
It usually does not contain actual milk.
About milk
Sandalwood from the Mysore region of India is famous for a rich, satisfying milky scent. Milk in a perfume, though, is rarely derived from actual milk. Perfumers build the creamy impression mainly from lactones, which are cyclic esters. Lactones also contribute significantly to the flavour of fruit and of fermented and unfermented dairy products.
Scentspiracy describes delta-decalactone as intensely coconut-like with creamy, sweet, milky and buttery nuances, and reports it as the main flavour compound of nonfat dry milk and of evaporated and dried whole milk. Delta-dodecalactone appears in The Good Scents Company's database with a longer list: fatty, sweet, creamy, dairy, fruity, peach, apricot, milky and buttery. Givaudan patented Methyl Laitone, a powerful aroma material named from lait, the French word for milk.
Sources do not agree on the recipe for a milk accord. Scentspiracy lists delta-decalactone and gamma-nonalactone, with low-level musks and subtle sweeteners such as ethyl vanillin or maltol derivatives. Mimya names gamma-undecalactone and gamma-nonalactone instead. Scentspiracy gives a reason for building the accord this way: synthetic bases avoid the oxidation and rancidity commonly seen in dairy-derived extracts.
Perfumers who stay with naturals have to work around the gap. Ayala Moriel points to massoia bark, whose lactones give dark coconut notes and a full-bodied presence like condensed milk. Perfume Shrine, in its piece on creamy, milky and lactonic scents, names Serge Lutens' Santal Blanc among the perfumes with those facets. Mimya says the accord is often paired with gourmand elements such as marshmallow, vanilla and honey.
Scentspiracy states that delta-decalactone contains no allergen and is not restricted under the 51st amendment of the IFRA Standards.
Accords it shows up in
How many of the fragrances listing Milk in our catalogue also carry each accord. We counted this ourselves.
Often paired with
The notes that appear next to Milk most often in our catalogue.
Well-known fragrances with Milk
Fragrances that list it in their notes, most-rated first.
Houses that use it most
Ranked by how many of their well-known fragrances list Milk.