What recommendations can I get for a good sandalwood bath soap?
Need a good Sandalwood Soap
- Thread starter Curious Shaver
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Mysore Sandal Soap. Great scent and can be found for cheap in most south asian grocery stores.
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Absolutely. Most of the sandalwood soaps you find in Indian stores are probably pretty good, but Mysore is wonderful stuff. The talc is good too.
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+1. It's great. I saw a big bottle of Mysore Sandal shower gel the other day too--I'm going to nab one this weekend.
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where did you find it?
I don't know if it's good but my boss swears by it and I pick up about eight bars for him every time I go near Whole Foods. It's an ayurvedic soap called Chandrika. It is very strong smelling and sandalwood is one of the ingredients. He swears it gets him very clean and his skin feels great. It's also really cheap. You can also get it at iherb.com
I kept a bar for myself last time I went to Whole Foods but I cannot bring myself to use it. I just don't care for the smell but then I don't like Tabac either. I smelt it the other day and it was just a smell that reminded me of pervy old guys that hit on me when I was a teen.
I kept a bar for myself last time I went to Whole Foods but I cannot bring myself to use it. I just don't care for the smell but then I don't like Tabac either. I smelt it the other day and it was just a smell that reminded me of pervy old guys that hit on me when I was a teen.
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At a South Asian market in Cary, NC.
Get some counseling and then try it again. It's that good.
Are you talking about Tabac? Meh!
I will try the Chandrika at some point though cos its stinking up my closet.
There is a Chandrika sandalwood now, too. A fairly new item, as I understand it. Comes in a biege, oval bar, if I recall. It is very nice and not as stinky as the orginal green square bar, which has some sandalwood in it.
I like the Mysore just a little better, but the Chandrika sandalwood is very nice, too.
I like the Mysore just a little better, but the Chandrika sandalwood is very nice, too.
Mama Bear has a Sandalwood/Vanilla bath soap. I haven't tried that one yet, but I have used some of her other bath soaps. Great lather and really good scents.
I like Chandrika, although I didn't get much Sandalwood.
I also like the Mysore Sandalwood, as well as Caswell Massey's (I picked some up @ TJ Maxx for $7/3-pack.)
My favorite is Morny Sandalwood. I think it's mixed with some vetiver and musk, but I love it.
I also like the Mysore Sandalwood, as well as Caswell Massey's (I picked some up @ TJ Maxx for $7/3-pack.)
My favorite is Morny Sandalwood. I think it's mixed with some vetiver and musk, but I love it.
Just to make sure my comments were clear, I do not get much sandalwood from the regular "green" Chandrika, either. Although I think sw is liisted as an ingredient, it must be overwelmed by others--I am guessing there is jasmine, cedar, probably pine and imitations thereof in there, too. Pretty strong smelling soap, not that I do not like it a lot.
The "biege" oval relatively new Chandrika bar is labeled sandalwood and is very much an sw to me, and a pretty good one, to me anyway. None of these is going to be absolutely true to the original sandalwood. That stuff is too endangered. We should feel guilty for usinng anything that actually contained newly harvested real sw from, say, Mysore. As far as I know, Mysore company imports all the so-called sandalwood oil that it uses. According to luca Turin there are various species and I am sure various growing environments!
+1.
I got some EO on ebay, and while it seems pretty legit--it's definitely not the Australian species, and it seems too rich to be a fragrance oil--it's hard not to wonder if I've got the liquid version of blood diamonds.
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"Blood diamonds"! Well-said. Last time I looked around EBay for sandalwood stuff in general, someone was sellling vials of vintage (actually a mixture of several vintages if I recall) supposedly absolutely the fabled "real thing" whatever the exact definition of that is. Actually, I think he said that the oils among the variousl vintages he had were fairly distinct, themselves. Anyway, I was pretty tempted to buy some just some that I woud have some measure of the goal folks were trying for in sandalwood.
But really, even if that is best smelling thing on earth, and I am not sure that we have reason to conclude it is in any objective sense--the Mysore company was founded by the government for instance to further sales of Mysore sandalwood with which the Mysore area was overflowing with back in the day--I sure as heck do not want to further the blood diamond aspect of it.
Kind of like: I do not really care if baby seal fur is the softest and other best fur on the face of the earth. I do not need to experience it!
I believe C&E has a fantastic sandalwood soap as well...I'm having a great time with the Sienna...
Smallflower.com has a variety of sandalwood soaps. I like Mysore; and there is now a Mysore Gold with glycerine. I buy the regular Mysore at one of the several Indian stores in Omaha.
Well, when it comes to Mysore Sandal soap, since it's pretty much made by the government of the state of Karnataka, I'm sure they'll use sandal EO for the foreseeable future; they probably have reserves saved up. They have reformulated the original recipe several times and it contains less and less of the EO (and they've started using imported sandal oil too) as far as I know, but it's still the best sandal soap money can buy, dollar-by-dollar IMO.
I wish I was around to try the 1970's though....apparently the 70's version of Mysore Sandal soap used about 3x as much EO and sandalwood powder as the current version (as I understand it, the current version doesn't use the powder).
That being said, if it meant ensuring continuing survival of santalum album, I'd switch to other soaps.
I wish I was around to try the 1970's though....apparently the 70's version of Mysore Sandal soap used about 3x as much EO and sandalwood powder as the current version (as I understand it, the current version doesn't use the powder).
That being said, if it meant ensuring continuing survival of santalum album, I'd switch to other soaps.
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Man have I ever been obsessed with all things sandalwood lately, this thread is not helping!
Mysore Sandal Soap smells different on the bar than what you're probably used to with sandal. But on the skin, after the shower, it's divine. 
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