Kobold Barista

[Seajewel]

Dungeoneering is exhausting, and sometimes the watered-down ale at the local tavern just slows you down. Before you head out on your next adventure, slather yourself in this fiery brew: freshly brewed coffee with ginger, nutmeg, cardamom, black pepper, cloves, cinnamon, and cream.

[Estamets]

This is zero sweet, 100% spice with a beautiful underpinning of dark coffee. On me, this is yummy, earthy, perfectly-blended holiday spices, and the coffee plays a background role, adding a unifying acidity that brings this out of gourmand-land (oddly). 
 

It’s what I want to drink if I can’t be with my family on Thanksgiving. It’s Christmas coffee without venturing into craft store territory.
 

Really nice! I recommend for lovers of baking spices and/or coffee, and folks who want the hominess of spice cake without venturing into sweet. 

[hhelix]

I agree with @estamets, this is non-gourmand coffee, spices, and cream with a holiday vibe. I could see wearing it a lot this fall and winter. Average throw and wear length.

[groovyrooby]

Yes! Not what I was expecting to get from these notes! This read to me as something more like a chai latte - which risked going horribly wrong for me! But, no - this is a dry, scratchy woolly spice. I can pick up the coffee if I try, and it's a really dark, almost burnt but not at all unpleasant, coffee. Maybe milk dumped in to light beige? But very little cream for me - for which I am thankful, as it tends to give me burnt plastic. The cardamom and black pepper are the most distinct of the spices for me - a great thing! But these spices are like just-ground, freshly cracked, and so a little bit astringent. Not sweet and not-at-all gourmand. It's warm woody spice - scratchy wool from the cardamom and dry bitter from the black pepper. Really wonderful stuff.

[Casablanca]

Warm spices, black coffee, and black coffee grounds with hints of earth. Sparse cream, but what I find of it reminds me of the cream from the little plastic cups at diners. Dry and unsweetened.

 

On me, the spices are up front at first, but soon take a back seat to the black coffee. And mounds and mounds of coffee grounds -- this is a busy diner morning.

 

This is a blend for a bleary-eyed winter holiday morning at a local diner.

[doomsday_disco]

I get creamy (but not sweet) coffee from this swirled with a melange of spices. I have sensitive skin, but this isn't as spice-heavy as I thought it would be, and the scent didn't burn my skin. It is NOT a cinnabomb for those worried about the cinnamon; the black pepper note is actually the spice that is the strongest on me, but this is pretty well-blended.

 

This could be really nice during the cold months. I'll be hanging onto my imp to see if I reach for this scent on a rare chilly day.

[Lunashayde]

On me at first i do get the dry, spice and coffee scent, but after a bit it goes sweet. The cream really comes out on me after a bit, with a hint cinnamon and pepper. At times it almost smells buttery, which i am now curious to pair with Halfling. On my other arm i tried this w/ Fuzzy Peach Sweater, omg it's like having some warm peach cobbler and chai. This scent is definitely layerable for fall themed scents. Also, i just love reading everything that people say, it's so fun to see how scents react to different people.

[Soupy Twist]

American coffee with cinnamon in the bottle. Well, that’s already a disappointment, but pressing on. Cinnamon-heavy black coffee on application. Nutmeg and clove appear quickly. The black pepper makes an appearance as it dries, pushing out the coffee, but it’s American coffee so I don’t care. Finishes as a generic off-brand spice which turns my stomach, and I had to wash it off.

 

Reviewing my notes, I see that the Lab's "black coffee" works on me but "coffee" doesn't. "Coffee absolute" disappears. "Fresh-brewed coffee" was fine on me in Cola di Mono, but here it didn't work at all.

 

Alas, my quest must continue; no rest for me at this tavern.

[zankoku_zen]

This smells like deliciously spiced coffee with cream. If you've ever had Ethiopian coffee, this is what it reminds me of. Take some chai + coffee, and this is delicious. Medium throw and wear length.

[wolf_truffles]

Black pepper and ginger all the way! Cloves in the background sexing it up. Definitely "masculine" and perfectly weird. I love this. I get no coffee or cream, maybe a little tiny bit of cinnamon. It's just hot, hot spicy and strangely sexy. 

[torischroeder9]

In the imp: Trader Joe's Pumpkin Spice Coffee pods, minus the boozy tinge those sometimes get. 

 

On my skin:

 

Yup, ground pumpkin spice coffee -- the grounds themselves rather than the brewed beverage. It's concentrated. As it dries, I can pick up some of the spices that are different from most pumpkin spice stuff -- ginger and dry, airy cardamom. As it develops, the ginger fades, the cream smooths out the coffee note, and the black pepper amps just a touch. The spices are reminiscent of Bengal on me, but where Bengal can be overly sweet, there's no sweetness to Kobold Barista. 

 

I'm a little torn on this. The early stage is glorious on me, but the longer drydown leaves a little bit to be desired. I'd love the airy cardamom to reappear and for the clove to make a stronger appearance overall (anyone want to guess how many times I've said that in a BPAL review, though? so that might just be that my note preference is skewed). I get a little more ginger and a little more black pepper than I think would be ideal for me. 

 

But it is a uniquely spicy GC, and I don't have all that many spicy GCs. 

[roseus]

Yum! In the bottle I get a low, roasty coffee with spices and a hint of syrupy sweetness. On my skin the coffee blooms a bit as well as the spices. I can pick out ginger, cardamom, and cinnamon specifically but I think they are all working their magic. On my skin the spices are definitely sweetened and made a little softer by the cream as well, not a dry/hot spice scent. It's not cloying by any means, just a pleasantly sweet coffee. 

[PancakesRaichu]

This has done something weird for my nose. This is genuinely my experience listed below and it should prehaps be mentioned that I have a weaker-than-normal sense of smell which is commonly hypersensitive or hyposensitive for someone on the spectrum. Hyposensitive in my case. 

 

 

In the bottle, it smells like chicken.

 

On my skin, it smells like herbal cooked roast chicken. 

[Little Bird]

Kobold Barista is a dark, dry scent, more like smelling a hint of roasted coffee beans and lots of dried spices rather than smelling like an actual drink.  The spices are also a lot stronger than the coffee, especially on my skin that amps spices.  It reminds me of mixing together spices to make gingerbread cookies, so mostly dried ginger, nutmeg and cinnamon.  I think I can smell the cream after about a half hour, something like a hint of buttermilk in a bowl of spices with the toasty warmth of coffee beans.  I actually really enjoy this layered with vanilla scents, though it isn't my favorite spice or coffee scent overall.

[a_bear]

BPAL's coffee scents tend to smell sweet and creamy to me, but this doesn't smell like the others I've tried. When I first got it, the coffee was weirdly perfumey smelling, but it's mellowed to smell more like actual coffee. The combination of cream and certain spices is reminding me of cereal. I can smell the cream, but the scent overall is less creamy/smooth to me than some other BPAL coffee scents, and it's not sweet at all. Smells like breakfast for grown-ups?

[dancingchair]

Opens with a lot of ginger and pepper. Settles into a great spice blend, but I don't get very much cream or coffee. @Little Bird mentioned that it smells like gingerbread spices and I agree, it's gingerbread spices without any of the sweetness. My skin amps cinnamon usually but the cinnamon in this is a supporting player. It's there but it doesn't smother everything else. I like this and I think it would be great for layering!

[LavenderCoffee]

Going on a coffee note journey today, starting with a re-test of Kobold Barista because it was a resounding fail when I first tried it.

When I first wore this, I got a vaguely burnt and somehow perfumey coffee aroma from it, and not much spice. 

 

Now that it is properly rested, it is noticeably spice forward and the coffee is perfectly nice, without much cream to speak of. I love to order dirty chais when I go to coffeeshops, and this is a milder version of that scent to me - and mild is probably good if you want to layer, as the RPGs are intended. Skin tingles just a tad with this one. 

 

YMMV, but I get more clove scent and less coffee from Café Mille et une Nuits (although that one almost strays into clove cigarette territory), and more of a spiced coffee from Kobold.

[VayaFox]

I'm having a very similar experience to @dancingchair this is all dry spice to my nose; i get the pepper and cardamom and the ginger is more ginger powder than fresh ginger. i usually amp cinnamon but don't smell it much here and i might be getting a bit of cream but not a lot of coffee. It's an interesting un-sweet scent and I'm glad I got a gift imp though it would not be one I'll purchase. 

 

Edit to add: this lasted through several hand washings and almost refused to die on me. 

Edited May 21, 2022 by VayaFox
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[Lucchesa]

I'm finding lately that I absolutely need to avoid any scent with "cream" in the description.  My skin will curdle it.  This one starts off lovely, a nutty coffee with cardamom and  baking spices.  But as soon as the cream note starts to make itself felt, it's game over.  Spicy coffee and sour milk.  It's not a new phenomenon; Young Pine Saplings was a disaster on me.  But some cream notes used to work on me, and more recently the percentage is tiny. 

[asoursweetsixteen]

got this in an imp and I was really excited as both a D&D player and chai lover. on my skin, I really can't smell much other than those christmassy scented pinecones you get at like Michaels. you can identify a lot of the spices used for chai, such as cloves, cardamom, and cinnamon (which are really apparent), but I can't seem to pick up the cream or coffee. it started to really fade after about 30 minutes and i'm having a hard time picking up the scent as I write this. not exactly what I was expecting, but I do like it and will be wearing it in the fall and winter for a bit of needed warmth.

 

edit 10/30/23: guess this really needed a moment to come out of its shell, I'm really excited to report that it has changed for the better! it's a lot more spicy but still dry. I can now identify coffee beans bringing a dark and earthy aspect to it. it seems the cream is holding back all the spices from going a bit too spicy, and I can definitely identify the creamy sweetness coming through which is pleasant. it's VERY very nice, like extremely. I will definitely have to pick up a full bottle when I'm done with the imp if it's not too similar. definitely smells like what a piping hot and warming winter drink from a cold-blooded bartender should be.

Edited October 30, 2023 by asoursweetsixteen

[crow-toes]

Oh my god, I love this. Delicious warm blended spices. Not sweet - just rich and cozy and decadent.

[Laughing Seagull]

Sampling an approx 2 year old imp

 

On application I am reminded why I am wary of cardamom in perfume. I am body slammed by buckets of pure cardamom smell, which I don't even like that much. From there I am trapped in a game of "wait for any other note to appear."

 

It takes about half an hour for an unsweetened medium roast milk coffee to be ejected from Cardamom Hell. Cardamom Hell is still there, mind you. It's inescapable.

 

I give it a cardamom out of 10.

[sudenmorsian]

This is my first coffee scent and I'm in love. I have a fresh imp and I guess it's only getting better with age. 

 

Wet this is hit-you-in-face strong coffee, freshly brewed. After a while the coffee calms down and the spices show up with the cream. Dry this is warming, cozy and spicy, very lovely and smooth. Actually Kobold Barista is what I hoped Bengal would be. 

 

I'm gonna need a full bottle.