New Way to Enjoy Frog Morton's Cellar

I think Frog Morton's Cellar is a good blend and using the barrel stave to infuse bourbon flavor is just brilliant. However, I'm not a big fan of blends that bulk up on unflavored Cavendish/toasted VA the way the Frog Mortons all do. While there is some latakia in the Cellar, most of the black tobaccos you see are bits of VA that have been steamed and/or toasted to smithereens. It smokes cool, sure, but to me it just tastes bland and sooty.
So...a couple of nights ago I added a bit of rubbed out McClelland Christmas Cheer (a nice red/mahogany VA) to my tin of Frog Morton's Cellar, plus I added some bulk Carolina ribbon (a mild, bright VA, also from McClelland). I didn't add a ton, but just enough to give the blend a bit more brown/tan tobaccos in the mix. The difference (for me) was amazing. It still has that wonderful, sweet whiskey smell and flavor, but the added VA's give it a much brighter, cleaner flavor profile. I really like it this way. YMMV, etc.

Yeah, I left the stave in. It's the stave chunk that actually flavors the tobacco, not any sort of topping. That's why it tastes so smooth and doesn't have that nasty aftertaste that some blends flavored with alcohol have.
The bit of VA's I added took on the bourbon flavor of the blend literally overnight. The sample I tried was freshly mixed, so I wonder if there will be any difference now that the flavors have melded more. Having tried this little variation I'm curious to try the Stave-Aged VA blend as well.
HOnestly, I thought this whole stave chunk thing was just a gimmick, but then I got a tin of Cellar as a gift and later found out how they flavored the tobaccos. Truly ingenious. It is the first aromatic I've had that actually tastes as good as it smells -- and no chemical aftertaste.

bob, glad to hear your experiment turned out well. That's quite a bit more VA's than I had added to mine. I may have to try that.
Also, I call FM Cellar an aromatic because it's scented/flavored. Clearly it's not an aromatic in the sense that some sort of cherry or vanilla essence has been used as a casing and/or topping. It's not an aromatic in that sense at all. Then again, there are whiskey flavored blends that qualify as aromatics in that sense.
Whatever, it's good stuff and I bet we'll see other kinds of "stave aged" tobaccos in the coming years.