Flavour Art Cookie
ConcreteRiver
Setup: Recoil w/ flavor barrel, Dual 15 wrap 26g 3mm Nifethal 70 coils @.17 ohms. 60w power, 450F temp limit. Full Cotton Wicks.
Testing: FA Cookie @ 2%, 60/40 VG/PG, Steeped 9 days.
Flavor Description: A homemade drop cookie base bordering on a butter/crisp cookie. Moderately fluffy with a really nice cooked vanilla extract note and some well balanced, reasonably authentic butter. Some darker crunchy notes in there, like where your cookies spread a bit thin and overcook toward the edges. Richer taste than mouthfeel, overall effect reads just a bit dry.
Inhale is fluffy and light. Not much actual flavor but a really light tangy kind of butter vibe. Exhale has that lightly baked cookie up front, with a really warm aromatic vanilla tinge. Again, has some volume, but not a lot of density. Back half of the exhale is a bit more interesting with some darker cookie notes and a strangely realistic butter tang in there. Pretty clean on the exhale with a light lingering butter finish, with a little bit of a greasy mouthfeel. Sweetness overall is damn near perfect, still very much a dessert but doesn't have a thick, cloying, or artificial sweetness. Mouthfeel just doesn't keep up with some the richness you taste. I know Flavourart is cool for no diacetyl thing, but I just want a little more richness out of this to match how full the taste is.
Off-flavors: Nah, man. Pretty spot on.
Throat Hit: Light, mostly due to the dryness. I get some harsher hits as that dryness builds.
Uses & Pairings: So, this is a great base for a cookie. Add in whatever the hell you want, maybe some extra richness, and there's a cookie. Sky's the limit here. I'd stick with relatively dry fruits and nothing particulary green, but otherwise go for it. Dryer nuts can give you a bit of a shortbread thing which is cool.
I don't feel like this mixes particularly well outside of that cookie application. It has a tendency to just sit at the bottom of your mixes. I actually wouldn't end up using this as a more generic bakery additive as it's just too distinctive and there are usually other ways to get there. If you want a crunchier, buttery cookie texture, use INW Biscuit. If you want some cookie volume use CAP Sugar Cookie. I'm sure you can make it work somehow, but it seems like a lot of effort when there are better tools for the job. You might get some play in bakery crusts specifically. It does a decent job of emulating something like a crushed nilla wafer crust but you'd have bump up the vanilla a bit.
Notes:
S&V Concentration testing, .5% is a little thin and astringent. You get mostly rich butter and roasted part of the cookie. 1% is better, but this really starts to flesh out at 1.5%. It reads as distinctly cookie, and that butter and roast is balanced with the lighter fluffy part of the cookie. At 3%, the the entire thing just starts to taste raw and weird. It may settle down a bit in time, but it reads as weird, tangy, and heavily disjointed. I'd mix with at 1.5%-2.5% depending on how fluffy you want your cookie base.
Terrible confession time, I prefer this over CAP Sugar Cookie as an actual cookie by a pretty wide margin. The difference in taste is pretty stark, at least solo. This ends up tasting more like a cookie somebody actually touched at some point. It's a bit of a messy flavor, but in the best possible way. It tastes home-baked. You get a good amount of nuance and it even tastes a little unevenly cooked and greasy. CAP Sugar Cookie has always tasted like one of the disappointing sugar cookies you find in an open plastic clamshell in a break room. You then eat like 3 and regret it, and most of the choices that brought you to that point (just me?). You can counteract that with a good amount of diacetyl (shout to CAP Vanilla Custard v1, the real mvp) but it just tastes too homogeneous and plain for an actual cookie. I'm not huge on CAP bakeries in general, and I've had excellent applications of Sugar Cookie so YMMV. I like FA Cookie though, it seems to have just a tiny bit of soul and that's pretty impressive.
Second Opinions:
"Very versatile flavoring!This cookie flavoring has no diketone ingredients, which sets it apart from others. This is a very neutral, mildly sweet cookie base. There are no spices, vanilla, or other flavors to interfere with your additions. It can be used standalone (some like it that way), as a cookie base, or to add bakery effects to recipes. It adds rich, warm, mildly sweet, baked flavor. If you're making a cookie recipe with bold flavors, start with 1.5 - 2% Cookie. Add Anise, Almond, perhaps a little Marzipan for a very traditional, crunchy Italian cookie flavor. Or add your favorite nuts and fruits flavor to that for biscotti variations (Cherry-Almond, Orange-Nut Mix, Lemon-Almond, etc.). Try with two widely-contrasting flavors, like Coconut-Bilberry. Including a hint of Anise in biscotti always adds an authentic Italian touch.For smooth, sweet, rich cookies, begin with 1-1.5% Cookie and 0.5% Vienna Cream, then add your flavors. For an even sweeter start, include a little Butterscotch - even (under) 0.25% will sweeten enough to stand up to the boldest flavor additions (like Espresso, Hazelnut, Brandy, or strong spices)."
Reddit sez: Love it or hate it apparently. Good general discussion of what it is and how it works.
ELR Notes here, mostly HIC but some original notes about usage.