Pistachio Paradise

A green nut, lightly salted, roasted just short of caramel.

Lebanese roasters pick the nuts and prepare them for exactly this. The bowl goes at the centre of the table, and what happens around it is the crack of a shell, then another, then the endless back-and-forth of a long conversation. In a café or a tea house they arrive instead as a handful, beside white coffee or coffee spiced with cardamom.

Tonka absolute holds it warm against the skin. Guaiac wood dries it out underneath and vanilla rounds the sugar syrup off. Honey goes over the roast and nutmeg cuts back through it, and the reach comes with it, the hand going into the bowl once more than it meant to.

Ideo Parfumeurs was established in Lebanon in 2016 to make fragrances that were elegant and reachable at once, built out of memory and given a daring turn. It found its audience quickly, with wide press and a presence in some of Europe's most prestigious stores. Then the explosion at the Beirut port stopped the house, and its activity stayed frozen for about three years.

It opened again in 2025 under new owners in France, with a new visual identity, new noses and an emphasis on its Lebanese heritage. The Delicacies came out of that, drawn from what Lebanon eats and pours, composed by French noses and made in France. What drew the house to Beirut was the melting pot and the contradictions in it. Ancient craft traditions run through a modern, tech-friendly city, and strict social rules hold alongside a sense of exhilarating freedom.