From Dutchess County to the Loire Valley
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Kevin Godbee - Jan 13, 2015
- 5 min read
E. Roberts
The Kaywoodie Christmas Dinner and Northeast Regional Slow Smoke Championship was the highlight of my holidays this year. There aren’t enough pipe parties these days, and this combination pipe show-swap-sale, gabfest, dinner, and competitive event is the perfect mid-winter reunion for old pipe buddies and new. Since I was unable to attend the Chicago show or any others this year due to a hectic schedule, Kaywoodie was the one place I’d be seeing many of these folks in 2014. Amid all the stress and obligation of the holidays, this was sure to be the anodyne I needed.
NYPC Prez Lou Carbone & the renowned ebuyer1932 himself, Hank Saatchi
(Photo: Matthew Meidt / Hank Saatchi)
I probably shouldn’t even be telling you about this—the party has gotten bigger every year, outgrowing the venue. This season’s fest was held at the Southern Dutchess & Putnam Sportsmen’s Association in order to accommodate the fifty-plus attendees. The club is a stone’s throw from Kaywoodie’s new digs in New Windsor, New York. Their prior address, an old converted hat factory in Peekskill, was a wonderful relic of a building—more a sprawling complex, really—and will be missed for its anachronistic charm. Kaywoodie’s current site is quite a bit smaller, but thanks to the Hudson Valley Pipe Club’s own Dennis McMahon and Howie Rothstein, both members of the SDPSA gun club, we lunters were generously welcomed to come fumigate their den for the day. On behalf of all the guests, I’d like to extend another "thank you" to them for the warm fireplace and all-around hospitality they offered to make this year’s event better than ever.
A thing of beauty is a joy forever …
(Photo: Matthew Meidt / Hank Saatchi)
Joe Skoda’s ever-evolving oeuvre.
Pipe shows are the best place to meet pipe makers out in the wild. Displaying their latest works were the likes of Joe Skoda, Rolando Negoita, Paul Bonacquisti, Tim Hynick and, of course, the Kaywoodie marque and its helmsman, Bill Feuerbach. Vendors also included Neil Flancbaum and his Smokin’ Holsters, Neal Yarm’s exotic pipe stands, and a slew of estate pipes from the usual suspects.
The New York Pipe Club table.
(Photo: Matthew Meidt / Hank Saatchi)
Fumigation services provided to the gun club.
(Photo: Matthew Meidt / Hank Saatchi)
Andy Camire’s (docwatson on the forums) unbelievable pristine 1940s tin of Erinmore.
The event culminated in perhaps the world’s most counterintuitive sport: a slow smoking competition. Contrary to most contests of skill, wherein participants race toward their goal against the clock, pipers prefer their sport to just … take … its … time. Armed with three grams of tobacco, two matches and a tamper, and the same contest pipe for all provided by Kaywoodie, competitors are allowed five minutes in which to pack and light their pipes … and then see who can keep them successfully producing smoke for the longest time. Last year I took home the booby prize for my official time of less than five minutes—a bag of matches with which I am still proudly lighting pipes. This year, determined to vindicate that performance, I posted a personal best and coasted into seventh place with forty-four minutes; still not enough to rival the winner, Les Young (‘lestrout‘ to you forum lurkers), whose nearly hour-and-a-half smoke won him a gorgeous Rolando Negoita creation as his prize. I’m gunning for you next year, Les.
Les and his Negoita trophy.
Les’s winning time. Next stop: Chicago for the US Championship!
(Photo: Matthew Meidt / Hank Saatchi)
That’s all great … but where does the Loire Valley fit into all of this? As Rick Newcombe eloquently described in his recent article here, it takes a village to raise a pipe show. Without the selfless efforts of the organizers, particularly Bill Feuerbach (who makes every one of the contest pipes by hand for the event!), there would be no event. Further, the generosity of donors like Sutliff Tobacco prop up the event and ensure that everyone walks away with a gift of a tin or three to help recount their memories. In addition to my coveted Christmas Shellcraft, my prize for seventh place was another Shellcraft, a #10 bent billiard in a natural finish. A surprisingly capacious bowl for such a delicate pipe, it begged for an aromatic to break it in.
My pair of Kaywoodie Shellcrafts for 2014.
What we plant in the soil of contemplation, we shall reap in the harvest of action. –Meister Eckhart
Only if you have been in the deepest valley, can you ever know how magnificent it is to be on the highest mountain.–R.M. Nixon
Sutliff’s Loire Valley was one of my takeaways from the dinner, and unfortunately didn’t last very long in that capacious bowl. A full Cavendish concoction of raspberry and mango, it presents jet-black leaf, as dark as the loamy soil of its namesake, that literally bursts with fruity aroma, yet smokes surprisingly cool and dry. After an afternoon of dry Balkan blends, this smoke made for a most excellent dessert and carried me through the rest of the weekend. I can hear some of you scoffing already—he breaks in a pipe with a heavy-handed aromatic?!?—to which I’ll reply absolutely, for this pipe’s destiny is to be an aromatic smoker, and it did the job quite thoroughly. Cavendish blends like Loire Valley benefit immensely from a good-sized bowl; it lets the moisture wick through the tobacco to the sides of the chamber and allows a flatter burn area to develop on the top, while the relatively thin walls serve to help me monitor the heat, and thus temper my cadence while smoking. Enjoying the taste of Sutliff’s smoky homage to Chambord liqueur while studying the tin’s depiction of the Châteaux de Chambord wasn’t the worst way to wind down the holidays, to be sure.
Perennial slow-smoke contender Buddy Winemiller of the Chesapeake Pipe Club.
(Photo: Matthew Meidt / Hank Saatchi)
Mike "Doc" Garr, president of the United Pipe Clubs of America. For info on the UPCA, slow smoking competitions, and more visit www.unitedpipeclubs.org (Photo: Matthew Meidt / Hank Saatchi)
Bill Feuerbach, President of S.M. Frank & Co., 4th generation pipemaker.
(Photo: Matthew Meidt / Hank Saatchi)
(Opening Photo at top: Matthew Meidt / Hank Saatchi)
Written by Kevin Godbee
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Welcome to The Pipes Magazine Radio Show Episode 635. Our featured interview on tonight’s show is with James Ravenwood. James is the boutique tobacco blender of Ravenwood Blends. His blending started out as a fun hobby, and he now has professionally packaged commercially available products with some great tin art. Part of his interest in pipe smoking goes back to fond memories of a retired Navy Veteran that lived on his street while he was growing up that would sit in his driveway smoking a pipe all day. Later, in 2011 he began smoking pipes and soon after started experimenting with mixing different tobaccos. His other hobby, that he has been doing for 30 years, is photography. He takes wonderful photos of outdoor spaces, and still life pictures of pipes and tobacco. You can see them on his Instagram @thebriarfellowship. At the top of the show we’ll have an Ask the Pipemaker segment with renowned pipe artisan Jeff Gracik.
Welcome to The Pipes Magazine Radio Show Episode 634! Our featured interview on tonight’s show is with Warren Ertle. Warren is an extremely accomplished musician with a PhD in music. He started early as a percussionist in sixth grade. Later his grandmother got him a cheap Casio keyboard which he taught himself to play. He started playing in blues bands in high school, and has been a pianist with jazz big bands for years. Even though he was already a professional musician, he took his first real piano lesson when he enrolled in college with his studies in classical music. He is of course a pipe smoker. At the top of the show we will have an Ask the Tobacco Blender segment with Jeremy Reeves. Jeremy is the Head Blender at Cornell & Diehl, which is one of the most popular boutique pipe tobacco companies in the USA.
Soon now, supposedly, our neighborhoods will shift from grinning pumpkins, skeletons in various assortments, and zombies dashing about to pretty reindeer, angels, and flashing lights illuminating homes with sparkling stars and laughing, scurrying Santas. But, lest we forget, there is the turkey season, fancy pie aromas wafting from kitchens, and a national pardon of a big Tom Turkey. Remember, now, that only one of these holiday personalities is a pipe smoker. And that is the hefty, bearded fellow in a bright red suit sitting in a sleigh with a herd of deer hitched up and ready to streak across the globe, bringing tidings of joy and many presents. Ok, the scene is set for the next couple of months, right? So, before we get too far off the beaten path, let’s just take a deep breath of fresh autumn air, shall we? Ahh. That’s better, isn’t it? What’s got the Pundit in a snit is not all the Halloween spooks who came a-jostling for candy. Or the wild turkeys gobbling in the backwoods or all the fuss and feathers over the big one—Christmas. No, it is that we might need to take note of all the little things that mean so much to us. Like a good sunrise (seriously, Pundit has not gone all Pollyanna.) Mayhaps we need to appreciate more of what we have than what we have not. Or something like that. Like, a good pipe in the morning with coffee as the dawn brings us coolish weather now that we have flipped the calendar to autumn. But it also brings beautiful leaves that have become a spectacle of technicolor in the wind. It is the little things. The rereading of an enjoyable book and finding something you did not see or learn in the first go-round. Or a stunning phrase you commit to memory with the re-read, while smoking that favorite pipe. And you notice a superior puff that just seems to be different. It’s in the air and the seasons of meaningful little things. It’s aromatic! 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Maybe especially with the help of their pipes in the art of thinking and philosophy. Recall the words of Mr. E=MC2 when he said, “I believe that pipe smoking contributes to a somewhat calm and objective judgment in all human affairs.” Amen and amen! Dealing with world-rattling events takes a calm and objective view of things, to the Pundit’s way of summing it up. You just don’t go messing around with quantum physics without a calm and objective approach, methinks. Or as the extraordinary physicist Robert Oppenheimer said after he and a team in the Manhattan Project at Los Alamos Labs developed a way to split atoms into bombs during World War II. “I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds,” said Oppenheimer referring to the development of the first nuclear bombs dropped on Japan. It must be pointed out that Oppenheimer was more of a cigarette smoker than a pipe smoker. Nonetheless, pipes were part of his personality. 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A fact is not a truth until you love it—Shelby Foote. A parting thought: It is said that famed Southern author William Faulkner carried a packed pipe in a coat pocket wherever he went. That’s one effective way to deal with workday conflicts and confusion. A calm and objective judgment in our everyday human affairs, as the quantum man said.
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Well there’s nothing like a touch of the plague to usher in the changing season. Leaving the airport just when the first advertisements for all things pumpkin spice began to appear—lattes, muffins, shampoos, trash bags, and myriad other concoctions—so, too, my ability to breathe freely disappeared. The unfortunate side effect of losing one’s sense of taste and smell for weeks is the utter inability to enjoy tobacco. Not that I consider myself an expert on anything but my own tastes, but be forewarned that this review was made with mildly impugned sensory equipment. Just when a comforting pipe was most needed, its comfort was denied. Be that as it may, the road to recovery found me limping along on one lung this past month, trying to wrest the particulars of two blends on offer from Sutliff: the latest 175th Anniversary blend, Silver Quarter, as well as their spooky seasonal Maple Shadows II. Silver Quarter is a new style on offer from Sutliff, their first coin-cut blend. Naturally a Virginia-Perique, it is enhanced with a traditional core of black Cavendish. In the tin it holds much promise, with a lightly bready and very woody, if ever-so-slightly sour, aroma. After some time acclimating to air, the bouquet softens further and offers hints of the burley with some chocolaty notes wafting through the more dominant dry grassy aspect. The tin art is of a coin-style bas-relief bust, presumably of a founding Sutliff brother, à la The Old Boss On the reverse of the tin we find the blend’s description: Reflecting on Sutliffs 175 years of tobacco excellence, we came across a brand that embodies true value, SILVER QUARTER. This name pays homage to Sutliffs roots, the legacy of two brothers who popularized pipe smoking in the burgeoning mining society of San Francisco. We celebrate this heritage with a coin cut composed of the finest African Virginias, complemented by a core of Perique and Black Cavendish. The tin notes are, forgive the pun, on the nose for a good VaPer blend: mild tart sweetness peeking out from behind dried hay and slight chocolate undertones, with a lightly tannic finish of weathered oak. It is always a joy to prepare a coin cut, my preference being to put a few in my palm and vigorously warm my hands together to fully break them apart. These well-formed discs pack and light easily, and smoke with little prodding to the end of the bowl. For technical points it scores well—it smokes light, and it’s easy to tend the ember. While it gets sharp after a few quick bowls, pacing should be heeded to easily smoke down to the heel without inviting bite. Of the flavor, though, I am left a bit wanting. There are tart and high notes aplenty, but very little of the lemony citrus I would anticipate, as well as scant midtones; they tend more toward the red wine-vinegary and sour. The flavors are muted, also, lacking the sweetness and piquancy of other marques—the small measure of Perique tickles the nose now and again with peppery hints, and there is a smidge of a deeper sweetness to be found in the Cavendish from puff to puff, but overall it lacks some dynamism. The Virginias, to my palate, come off a bit on the dry side, and here they dominate the blend. The aftertaste and mouthfeel are neutral, again evincing more of the dry, woody, tartly tannic end of the spectrum. The blend has plenty of polish, but not enough depth or richness (*yet) to make it a standout. Here, comparisons are inevitable: Luxury Bullseye Flake has more sweetness, both from its Virginia as well as its Cavendish, and a better finish; Davidoff is similar but with a pronounced umami that is absent here; as for Escudo, I haven’t had any fresh tins lately so it would be unfair to compare. While it rates as a solid, fairly mild smoke, particularly to lovers of the genre, it does not surprise with any exceptional flavors. To be fair, all the boxes have been checked for the blend to benefit from some real aging, and it would be worth checking in on this after a couple of years sealed away. I’ve set half my tin aside to sample again in a month or two, in case I’m merely suffering from the lingering effects of parosmia, and will amend this review in that case. Maple Shadows II, on the other hand, made up for the weeks of sniffling and sneezing I’d endured. Offered in a full 8 ounce tin with delightfully spooky Halloween art, it’s (hopefully) enough to last through the season. Somehow I had missed this last year, so it’s a real pleasure to get some in my candy bucket this year. As the chilling winds of autumn draw eerie prattle from contorted, deciduous limbs, we find ourselves possessed by the spirit of the season. Bewitched by a dissonant charm, we’ve created Maple Shadows. In a season that is defined by the unlikely harmony of treats and frights, we’ve joined the enchanting sweetness of maple with the earthy spice of Dark Fired Kentucky for a smoking experience that captures the senses with an otherworldly fusion of flavor. This may be the best aromatic blend Sutliff’s ever made—and they make a ton of them. First off, it’s not overbearing in the least—quite the opposite, it is also one of the more restrained aromatics they’ve ever made, with a clear but very light topping that melds oh-so-well with their choice Kentucky added to the mix. Opening the tin, the sweet maple is up front and center, but so too is the must of fallen leaves, bready pie crusts, and a crackling fire in the hearth—a perfect invocation of Herbstdüfte in a can. Packing best in an open and capacious bowl, the flavoring is subtle, and recedes to the background while puffing. With a sweet coffee or tea to accompany, the aftertaste of the maple is reinvigorated on the palate […]
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Nice Review, Bill. I had a great time, and placed 5th in my first slow smoke!
An excellent review of the event with some terrific photos. Congrats to forum member Les Young for his victory. And to Sam as well, 5th place in that group is pretty respectable. One day, I’ll make this event. The holiday date always makes it tough for me to travel out of town.
I chatted with Buddy W at the Richmond show, but we never got around to discovering we were both from Maryland. I have to check out the Chesapeake Club.
Very good post to read! From just a wee bit downstate, in Westchester.
Excellent article, Bill I enjoyed reading that very much! I hope I am not to bold in saying that I linked the article on the club’s Facebook page!
Thanks for another great review and allowing me to relive the event through your descriptions and photos. Like you, I consider this the Pipe Event of the Year. And the weather cooperated for us this year. Ashamed but grateful for the massive bag o’ matches this year. LOL
Andy
@Sam–Congrats again, good sir! The NYPC showed up strong for the competition, for sure; I think we occupied 5 of the top 10 spots. And please send me some pics of that amazing Dr. Grabow salesman’s roll you had–I’m horrible at taking pics. And remembering to take pics. :S
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@Al–we’ll save a seat for you, sir.
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@dmcmtk–you should look into attending the Newark show, coming up in March!
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@Lou–please, sir, by all means!–I am devoid of the Book of Face.
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@Andy–And thank you, sir, for bringing that amazing collection of tins. Always good to dream of ancient leaf. And consider the bag o’ matches a proud crown passed from year to year “:)
This was my second year attending and hopefully not the last. It was a great time with great food and even better people. Thanks for the write up!
Thanks for a great recap of the event. The pix are fantastic!
Thank you for the article
Selfish question – i once traded a Radice for a Shellcraft Kaywoodie…the shellcraft has become one of my favorite pipes ever. I have been looking for more – but can’t seem to find any online, nor do any of my local tobacconists carry Kaywoodie pipes. Where the heck can i find these pipes? I NEED NEED another!
thank you
Thom