Rather than saying obvious things like petrichor, coffee, bookstores, and baby heads (It’s the heads that smell good, right? In my experience babies aren’t purveyors of appealing scents), I think I’ll be more specific.
One
I love the smell that is released from my laptop bag after I’ve been at a coffee shop for several hours. That intense espresso aroma means one of two things: Either I’ve been writing, or I’ve been hanging out with friends (or both). Either of those is a lovely thing, so it’s a lovely smell.
Two
I like the smell of gloss Mod Podge. Most people seem to think I’m insane for this, but weird smells tend to please me, like hot tar and asparagus pee.
Three
I love vanilla extract. I use it in baking the way many people use garlic in cooking – with reckless abandon and contempt for the accepted standard. The smell just makes me happy; the idea that people use the term “vanilla” to mean “boring” mystifies me. Why?
The vanilla orchid is a climbing vine that only grows in certain climates and on certain trees. The plants don’t start sprouting beans until they’re 3 years old; and then they bloom for ONE DAY and have to be pollinated either carefully by hand or naturally by one type of bee, within 12 hours. In the wild only about 1% of flowers are ever pollinated. They can’t be 100% sure which bees do it because no one has ever seen a vanilla flower being pollinated in the wild. (These bees are very tiny.)
To get vanilla beans that are usable you have to lay them out in the sun to “kill” them (so the pod doesn’t keep growing), which also gives them their brown color. They’re then bundled up in wool or other fabric and sweated in the heat of the day; this ferments them and brings out the flavor and scent, but then they have to be dried so they won’t rot in transit. Then they’re stored for six months in the dark to fully develop the scent and flavor.
There are several major varieties of vanilla based on location that each smell and taste a little different. (Bourbon vanilla, which you may have heard of, has nothing to do with booze; it was named after Bourbon island, now called Reunion) Mexican vanilla is my very very favorite though you have to be careful where you get it – some of the less legit producers don’t use real vanilla beans, but tonka beans, which can kind of kill you in large doses. That scent of old books? Vanillin, which plays a major part in making vanilla smell like vanilla, is found in wood; most imitation vanilla is made with paper pulp.
I have yet to find a baked good that is not improved with a little vanilla, even if you can’t fully taste it…it’s there, and it’s making things more awesome. Sorry, but chocolate, while a wonderful thing, does not have that kind of mojo.
(I went to culinary school and also memorized entire seasons of Alton Brown’s Good Eats.)