Calabash pipe tobacco
- Thread starter calsic
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I like any blend in my Calabashes. Some people claim that they mute the flavor so I would suggest any the have a very strong flavor. Latakia ?
They will mute any blend smoked in them until the gourd is saturated with tobacco oils. The plus of a gourd is that it has that huge chamber for the smoke to circulate in and cool. They can be great for any blend but I was always let down by the shallow tobacco chamber.
I have 5 bashes and I've found stronger blends generally work best although it depends on the size of the gourd.
I have two big Strambachs that are perfect for Old Dark Fired, Revor Plug, PPP etc. and a very small Baki that I use for straight Virginias like Full Virginia Plug and Carolina Red Flake.
People say that they don't ghost but I definitely noticed it, not bad ghosting but there was definitely a hangover of flavour if I smoked a few bowls of a Vabur then went to a straight Virginia. It makes sense as the gourd absorbes moisture so why not the flavour of the tobacco? Again just my experience.
I now dedicate the various bashes to different food groups. Vabur, Vaper, Aro etc.
I think we need to see some photos of yours.
Here's some pics of mine (any excuse to show them off?). Please excuse my rubbish photography skills, I really don't do the pipes justice, must work on that.
Strambach
Strambach
Northern Briars
Fikri Baki
No name wooden
Attachments
I've heard others say that about small chambers but that hasn't been my experience. All mine have decent sized chambers and the Strambachs are GINORMOUS! If I cube cut some PPP the smoke lasts for hours.
I was wondering if it was a feature of the Pioneer ones? I haven't got one of them but I know they were very popular at one time in America.
A lot of the pioneer ones have small chambers. I have a pioneer gourd with block Meer bowl and it’s normal size. It’s shallow but really wide so it evens out.
.80"x1.75" is as small as I like. Couldn't even get my thumb in a Pioneer calabash I used to have.
Well on the Strambachs both. Here's a pic to give you an idea of size, of the gourd and bowl. That's a Peterson b10 next to them to give you an idea of scale.
Oh I forgot to mention to be careful if your bowl is big. I smoked some Germain's Medium Flake in one of mine that has a particularly large chamber and the grapefruit/citrus topping became overwhelming, sort of sickly sweet. I actually went off Medium Flake for a few months because of this.
I now use my wooden bash for heavily topped blends and aromatics as that has a smaller bowl and they seem to work well in it.
Nah, all well drilled pipes smoke the same to me and calabash upkeep is a pain especially when the base of the meerschaum softens it and you have to set it on fire to reharden it. Plus there's my less than $50/pipe rule.
I guess mine’s never got soft but has become goopy with oils I’ve burned off.
When they get like that you have to be careful running a pipe cleaner through the hole as it can widen it.
Yeah mine have never gone soft either although I have done the setting alight of the oils at the base thing, it's supposed to harden it.
They do take a bit more cleaning if you want to keep them nice but it isn't excessive. I just wipe out the gourd 3 or 4 times with some kitchen roll then leave the bowl out overnight so the gourd can dry out.
The bowl I just wipe out with tissue paper and if a bit of cake builds up I use a cotton bud and 88% Balkan vodka to clean it which works a treat.
A warning though! Don't use spirits or anything wet to clean your meerschaum bowl if it isn't block as from what I've read it can destroy the meerschaum.
BTW this is just my experience, I have no idea if alcohol can damage block meerschaum. From what I've read it is fine and I personally clean all my calabash bowls this way (and my regular meerschaum pipe) and have found it works very well, but I'm no expert and YMMV.