Spicing Up Boring Candles

As I write this, I’ve got the candle above flickering and even though the sun hasn’t set yet, there’s nothing like burning a fragrant candle just for your house to smell like divine goodness!

Usually I’ll buy cheap candles and then add a few drops of fragrant oils (also known as attar in Arabic). In my culture, both men and women will use this to perfume their skin but you can also pour it on top of coal to produce a fragrant smoke or you can also mix it with bakhoor. I’ve found that adding those drops to my candles really switches things up and creates a subtle yet powerful scent. I always get vanilla scented candles so if I use a musk oil, then you’ve got the vanilla and musk blending together perfectly.

Another way I’ve spiced up a regular candle is to sprinkle some bakhoor onto it thanks to this amazing idea. Ever since I came across the ingenious idea, I’ve been burning my candles with a bit of bakhoor and the day my mother came to stay in London last week, she thought I had used bakhoor with the usual coal. That’s how amazing it was.

All of these pretty bottles contain my most treasured attars that myself and my mother have collected from markets in Dubai, Cairo and Damascus and even malls in Saudi Arabia. Not only do you get a luxury oil but a gorgeous bottle to display in your living room!