Did You Lose Your Taste for Aromatics Over Time?

[boston]

Mostly Latakia blends from GLP and Dunhill, and concoctions from Craig Tarler (night train, ojk, old Hollywood, Mississippi mud etc) for a long time. Then got into aromatic lakelands like 1792 and Emmerdale. Never had another aromatic I enjoyed until I had a few from KBV. Then I started to enjoy straight VA.

I've not had any new 1792 or Ennerdale for about a decade; had plenty in the cellar and I'm an infrequent smoker. Heard they are not the same from a few folks... dunno. KBV has good aromatic blends, Burley morning pipe for example is hard not to like...

 

[Architeuthis]

I used to enjoy coffee and tea flavored with all sorts of confections or fruit essences and gravitated to those things in tobacco as well. Time passes and tastes change. I no longer have coffee or tea flavored with anything. The sugar in the sugar bowl has solidified into a hockey puck from lack of use. Generally the same has happened for tobaccos. I still have a variety of aros but rarely choose to smoke them. At least the ones flavored with sweet dessert flavorings. Come to think of it, I don't eat those desserts anymore either.

 

[demian_dec]

I was quite curious about aromatics at the time I began smoking pipe seriously, as they are what I associated pipe tobacco with in my late childhood. So I tried a few (five, to be precise), but they all turned out not to be something I prefer - they were light and lacked flavour, being somewhat bland and characterless even.

I then - relatively early, after three or four months of smoking - dipped my pinky into the pond of non-aromatics - day and night difference, everything I could ever desire from pipe tobacco was in it for me. Ever since then I steer clear of aromatics and am very monogamous about the blends I smoke.

 

[beargreasediet]

My experience has been opposite to the question put in the OP; I first began with English and Balkan mixtures. I suppose this was in part out of some sort of assumed snobbery on my part but I truly just enjoyed the heavier flavors of Latakia and ortientals. I’ve only recently (within the last couple of years) come to appreciate VAs and VaPers, and for a hot minute those were all I wanted to smoke! I was a little worried, in part because Latakia blends were what I had cellared!

And that brings us to aros…. I thought I would love Sillem’s black. And I did, for a bowl or two. Same with Molto Dolce, and the McB’s Vanilla Roll Cake which briefly captured my fancy is still mostly intact. However, I have fond memories of, and some attraction yet to, those blends, at least the Sillem’s and Roll Cake which are carfullly preserved. And having recently developed a hankering, will likely order some others to try in the near future.

Like so many other things, the mountain evidently comes and goes. Which is just fine, who knows, maybe when I finally grow up my desert island tobacco will be capt black grape…. I kinda hope not but whatever.

 

[solideogloria86]

Other way around for me. Smoked non aromatics for decades then realized I could taste aromatics the way they smelled. Now I primarily smoke aromatics and straight orientals.

Very similar story here. I can finally actually taste aromatics after years of finding them bland and unsatisfying.

 

[Bassman65]

First aro’s I started with were vanilla or cherry based. They were just ok. Then I tried one with anise and thought this is awful. I consequently moved to non-aros and found my groove with an occasional aro mixed in for giggles. Then I found Lane’s Black Raspberry. God it’s good. Unabashed aro lover now! And I smoke with a filter. lol. The shame

 

[filmguerilla]

I'm mainly an English/latakia blend guy, but I started in the late 80's with aromatics from my local pipe shop in Missouri. They were store blends that I can confidently say were rebrands of classic Lane stuff. At this point I only occasionally smoke an aro--and I'm very picky about them. There a couple by Boswell that I enjoy, as well as Country Squire, but to be honest the only aro's I circle back to regularly are Sillem's Black, GLP Virginia Cream, and C&D John Marr. Of course, I'm not including Lakeland blends here, even though they do have that topping/sauce; I absolutely adore Gawith tobaccos.