Are Balkan Blends Actually Balkan?

[rakovsky]

On my thread about Soviet Kapitanskiy blend, Nookers asked a good question:

Super interesting find!

This also brings up another interesting question I've wondered before... are Balkan blends actually Balkan? lol
I mean if we had gone to that area of the world would the people who live and smoke there actually be smoking this type of tobacco? Probably not if I had to guess.

Made harder by the fact that most of us can't even define what a Balkan is ourselves... lol. (The definition that always suited me was a particularly Oriental-heavy English style blend) ... But I have the distinct suspicion that if you went to any of the Baltic states (whether now or 50 years ago) and handed them a tin of Sobranie they would have no idea what it even is... I suspect that the name came about by tobacco merchants in the West as a way to differentiate their products by attempting to illustrate the exotic geographies that some of the blends component tobaccos happened to be sourced from... rather than an actual representation of what the natives of those areas actually created or consumed themselves.

Heck, from what anecdotal evidence I know of, it seems those who live in the Eastern world more often than not coveted western Virginia type tobaccos, especially for their cigarettes. Alas, perhaps we just always desire that which is most difficult for us to attain haha

Dear Nookers,
"Balkan blends" as a term in the pipe blend market are like "English blends" in that they technically refer to a mix type of leaf varieties rather than to a place of growing or processing.

However, I have seen at least one "Balkan blend" whose ingredient list included Macedonian leaf, which would be leaf from Macedonia.

In contrast, a friend sent me D & R's "Bulgarian Blend" that was from leaves grown and processed in Bulgaria. It had no Latakia. Did you ever have a pure Oriental blend with no Latakia, or a pure Oriental leaf like Katerini? You can get them online. They were what Bulgarian Blend was like. Kapitanskiy reminded me of that too, although people get more of a VA note from that.

The word "Sobranie" means "gathering" in Slavic languages. "Balkan Sobranie" is a brand name from about a century ago. It had Latakia, VA, and Yenidje, which is the name of the town in the region of Thrace, nowadays Genisea, Greece. A lot of Turkish and Oriental leaf varieties match some place in the former Ottoman empire, "Herzegovina Flor" for instance referring to Herzegovina in southern Bosnia.

I'm familiar with classic major US and Soviet blends and smoking trends, and not so much with what everyday people were smoking 100 years ago in the Balkans and Near East. Many Americans smoked burleys like Edgeworth RR and PA. The Soviets continued the Russian empire's pipe smoking traditions. They grew Oriental and VA-Oriental, but not Latakia, and I didn't find Latakia in the description for in any of their blends. My Kapitanskiy had no black Lat specks, and nor does Golden Fleece.

Wikipedia says:

English pipe mixtures became famous for the distinct flavor of Latakia, due to its rarity outside of the Middle East. Because the British Empire had interests within Syria and the surrounding areas, the import of Latakia as well as other Oriental tobaccos to the British Isles were commonplace, but not much elsewhere in Western Europe and the Americas.

I agree with your point Nookers at the end of your message.
Since the 1970's, Marlboro has been prized in the former USSR. American cigarettes have been prized as having high quality leaf. Their burley makes them nice and soft.
However, the Soviets and Russian empire did have Oriental leaf. Herzegovina Flor filterless cigarettes made in the Soviet time were soft, not harsh on the throat, top grade leaf quality. Maybe production was more difficult for this brand than it was to grow and product US-style burley blends, or else simply US cigarettes had more product awareness.
IMO Turkish leaf cigarettes are good quality because they are mellow, so I agree with your point. Take Cherokee RYO. It's harsh on the lungs when inhaled and on the nose, so IMO it only works in a pipe. But Cherokee Black Turkish is mellowed and aged in a way that makes it soft and it scores as high as comparable solid brand products like Kendal's and Stokkebye's.
I get the impression that burleys like Marlboro get the main attention within the US cigarette market, but Camels and Turkish leaf still have a secondary solid interest among consumers.

 

[cosmicfolklore]

I've always heard that Balkan blends were blends that are trying to mimic the original Balkan Sobrane. Calling latakia blends English blends rubs me wrong. So, I don't use that term. But, all in all, there are terms used by different manufacturers, and doesn't have every much thought put into them.

 

[rakovsky]

I always assumed that it was either because the Orientals were grown in that region or shipped through there. Either that or it's actually named after Balky from Perfect Strangers.

I find it helpful to think less what does it say about the blend and what does it say about how the blender want us to think about it.

Oh yeah I agree as I've stated already. Well going to push through this comment anyways. It does pay to sometimes lean into the exotic image of your products.

Being a PA native it always shocks me to see Yuengling lager (pronounced lag-erh by the way not log-er) for premium prices. That's the shit high school kids get drunk on in PA.

Dear Another bob,

The Redstone family came from Eastern Europe and moved to England in the mid-19th century and produced Balkan Sobranie. One of the ingredients is Yenidje, a leaf variety whose name matches Yenidje in the Balkan northern region of Thrace in Greece.

Here is part of the Wikipedia article on Balkan Sobranie:

The Balkan Sobranie tobacco business was established in London in 1879 by Albert Weinberg (born in Romania in 1849), whose naturalization papers dated in 1886 [2] confirm his nationality and show that he had emigrated to England in the 1870s at a time when hand-made cigarettes in the Eastern European and Russian tradition were becoming fashionable in Europe.[3] It is one of the oldest cigarette brands in the world.[4] Albert's young cousin Isaiah Redstone (1884–1963) joined him in the business and registered the "Balkan Sobranie" trademark, later shortened to Sobranie.

Sobranie - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

GLP's website says:

It seems fairly clear that the term "Balkan" as a blend descriptor derives from the legendary Balkan Sobranie, and came into common usage as a way to describe tobaccos that are similar in character. That's not really a problem, but, subsequent discussion of what this term might mean has led us down an entirely wrong path.
...
Though there are plenty of references to "Balkan tobaccosâ" in various catalogues and pamphlets, both British and American, the term has always been used to describe a component, not the mixture itself. Returning to Voges, we find, "Balkan - Bulgarian term for Djebel[1] tobaccos, i.e. those oriental tobaccos coming from mountain areas." (25)

In fact, it wasn't until some time in the 1990s when the neologism, “Balkan blend,” rose up from the murky waters as pipesters sought to differentiate Latakia blends that seemed more oriental-forward than English mixtures, but produced from similar components. The earliest uses of the term were found in on-line forums and chat groups on the internet. Up to that point, we had Balkan tobaccos, and we had Balkan Sobranie, a specific blend containing these tobaccos, and somewhere along the way, the name was abducted and held for ransom.

The Briar & Leaf Chronicles » Blog Archive » What is a Balkan Blend?

So, basically "Balkan Blends" in modern pipe blend parlance is from the 1990's and based on the "Balkan" name line of products: Balkan Sobranie, Balkan Sasieni, etc.

The article goes on to say that Balkan is a confusing term because it's often used to mean English blends with a lot of Oriental leaf and less VA, whereas in fact Balkan Sobranie had a low amount of Oriental leaf, such as when compared to that of London Mixture.

FWIW, I recall reading that Balkan blends have less Oriental leaf and more VA leaf than more typical English blends.

I am from PA too. When I was college aged, there were a lot of bars in my region that had things like Coors, Bud, and Miller, and one more thing: Yuengling. Yuengling was a cut above the other brands, but the bars had them at about the same low prices. It might still be like that. But Yuengling does a good job selling nationally. I'm guessing that it varies among out of state bars how much more they want to charge for Yuengling than the old mass produced brands like Bud.

In my part of PA west of Philly, the pronunciation sounds the same for Yuengling "Lager" as for the lumberjack's job, "logger".

Getting back to the thread topic, in effect the question is asking how common it was for people in the Balkans to mix Latakia, Oriental, and VA. Just looking at the list of the three, the decisive one to answer the question would be Latakia, because certainly Oriental was used, whereas Oriental leaf in Eastern Europe commonly was based on VA leaf in a sense, "Virginia Tobacco," N. Tabacum" The Soviets grew a hybrid leaf that they called "American", and people think that Kapitanskiy smells partly like VA. Latakia is very much a specialty product worldwide.

 

[rakovsky]

Since I've seen a "Balkan" blend online as having Macedonian leaf (ie from Macedonia), I'm thinking that this might be the "Balkan" part of Balkan blends and Balkan Sobranie. "Sobranie" is a Slavic word and Macedonia's main language is Slavic, the Macedonian language being Slavic.

What Makes Balkan Tobacco Unique?

Its uniqueness lies in its profound, earthy flavor and distinctive aroma a blend enriched with Greek, Macedonian, or Turkish ingredients, and occasionally laced with Latakia, known for its smoky essence.

SOURCE:

Balkan Tobacco: A Legacy Wrapped in Smoke

In the realm of smoke and ash, Balkan tobacco stands as a monument to complexity and tradition. Born of the rich, loamy soils kissed by the Southeast European sun, these leaves whisper tales of yore…

bogsuriname.com

 

[Oddball]

I decided long ago to classify blends myself after seeing the ingredients, then smoking them. Balkan for me is one of the easiest. Typically an English(Va and Latakia) It just needs some non-Latakia Oriental leaf grown between Rome and Riyadh and I roll it Balkan.

 

[NookersTheCat]

I decided long ago to classify blends myself after seeing the ingredients, then smoking them. Balkan for me is one of the easiest. Typically an English(Va and Latakia) It just needs some non-Latakia Oriental leaf grown between Rome and Riyadh and I roll it Balkan.

Yeah again, we tend to get into highly subjective areas with this kinda thing but my understanding based off blending components is essentially a Balkan as being "An English blend with more Latakia and Orientals than Virginia" (at least in flavor profile)

I'm sure it came about simply as a declaration of the area of tobaccos contained/trademark but by today's age has inevitably come to encapsulate a blend "type" or "style".
Balkans are some of my favorite blends and it tracks because I always enjoyed Oriental/Turkish Tobacco flavor profiles.

Bottom line, personally, when I hear "English" I think "Virginia tobacco with Latakia & Oriental toppings" whereas when I hear "Balkan" I think "Latakia and Oriental tobacco with Virginia toppings" lol

 

[rakovsky]

Yeah again, we tend to get into highly subjective areas with this kinda thing but my understanding based off blending components is essentially a Balkan as being "An English blend with more Latakia and Orientals than Virginia" (at least in flavor profile)

I'm sure it came about simply as a declaration of the area of tobaccos contained/trademark but by today's age has inevitably come to encapsulate a blend "type" or "style".
Balkans are some of my favorite blends and it tracks because I always enjoyed Oriental/Turkish Tobacco flavor profiles.

Bottom line, personally, when I hear "English" I think "Virginia tobacco with Latakia & Oriental toppings" whereas when I hear "Balkan" I think "Latakia and Oriental tobacco with Virginia toppings" lol

Nookers, I remember months ago reading that Balkans had a higher VA to Oriental ration than Englishes, and the way that I kept this in my head was that the Balkans were farther west than the Orient, and thus less "Oriental" than the Orient. But I could be misremembering this, since the GLP article says, like you do, that Balkans have a greater Oriental ratio.

 

[Oddball]

I go like this big three Latakia blend types:

VA+LA: English
VA+LA+OR: Balkan
VA+LA+Perique: Scottish

Additions of Burley or Cavendish don't alter the big three. However, Cavendish is traditionally thought of as a component in Scottish Mixes..

This is randomly just a way I like to do it.

 

[Searock Fan]

I haven't read all the responses to this thread... too much. But, from what I understand, a "Balkan" blend just refers to an English blend with some Oriental tobaccos added. That's it....

 

[anthonyrosenthal74]

I go like this big three Latakia blend types:

VA+LA: English
VA+LA+OR: Balkan
VA+LA+Perique: Scottish

Additions of Burley or Cavendish don't alter the big three. However, Cavendish is traditionally thought of as a component in Scottish Mixes..

This is randomly just a way I like to do it.

Keep in mind there are also VA+LA+OR+Per.

 

[Chasing Embers]

I've always heard that Balkan blends were blends that are trying to mimic the original Balkan Sobrane.

Less about mimicry more about capitalizing on the name.

 

[9mmpuffer]

Less about mimicry more about capitalizing on the name.

This seems like the most logical idea.

 

[judcole]

I go like this big three Latakia blend types:

VA+LA: English
VA+LA+OR: Balkan
VA+LA+Perique: Scottish

Additions of Burley or Cavendish don't alter the big three. However, Cavendish is traditionally thought of as a component in Scottish Mixes..

This is randomly just a way I like to do it.

It was always my understanding that a "Scottish" blend had unflavored black cavendish, along with Virginias,orientals, and latakia, as opposed to perique. Rattray was a Scottish blender, originally, and I think that is where that came from - Red Raparee, Black Mallory, 3 Noggins, and so on, all have black cavendish, and no perique.
The late Joe Harb once observed that, on a trip to Scotland years ago, he asked various tobacconists for an ounce of what they considered their most "Scottish" blend. What he got was more like Mac Baren Mixture (Scottish Blend) than anything else.
But I have to agree that it is all marketing, and the term "Balkan" was used to indicate that the blend was like Balkan Sobranie OSM (white) - not 759 (black) - of the 1960s. Hearth and Home White Knight is closest to the BSOSM I smoked in the early 1970s.

 

[sablebrush52]

This has been a very enlightening discussion. Perhaps it would all be simpler if we returned to the earlier definition of these blends, "aromatics", since they all employ aromatic leaves of some description. They we could find a new name for the current "aromatic" blends, like maybe "flavored" or "gooper" blends.

More the most part, I've given up Latakia blends, having burned out on Latakia about a decade ago. But I still like "Oriental" leaf, like Macedonian, Yenidje, Basma, etc.

Mel Feldman, proprietor of The Smoker Ltd., created a number of very popular English/Oriental/Balkan blends, and when he closed up shop, Pipes and Cigars bought the recipes and continued production of several of them under Russ Oullette.

There were a couple of Mel's blends I really liked that weren't resurrected, one in particular, Easy Chair, which relied on a goodly amount of Macedonian leaf and a bit of St James Perique in the mix. Russ kindly mixed up five pounds of it for me. I still have some left and I should dig through the boxes to find it. A decade or so would have mellowed it a bit.

 

[Pypkė]

This discussion reminds me of the American Home Brewers Association (AHBA) style guides for various beers. There is no exact equivalent in the pipe tobacco world where classes of blends are narrowly defined like the way AHBA defines various styles of beer - English Mild and American Pale Ale for example.

 

[anotherbob]

Dear Another bob,

The Redstone family came from Eastern Europe and moved to England in the mid-19th century and produced Balkan Sobranie. One of the ingredients is Yenidje, a leaf variety whose name matches Yenidje in the Balkan northern region of Thrace in Greece.

Here is part of the Wikipedia article on Balkan Sobranie:


GLP's website says:

The Briar & Leaf Chronicles » Blog Archive » What is a Balkan Blend?

So, basically "Balkan Blends" in modern pipe blend parlance is from the 1990's and based on the "Balkan" name line of products: Balkan Sobranie, Balkan Sasieni, etc.

The article goes on to say that Balkan is a confusing term because it's often used to mean English blends with a lot of Oriental leaf and less VA, whereas in fact Balkan Sobranie had a low amount of Oriental leaf, such as when compared to that of London Mixture.

FWIW, I recall reading that Balkan blends have less Oriental leaf and more VA leaf than more typical English blends.

I bet blenders have had similar conversations about what constitutes a style but with the rabbit hole going deeper and branching out more. Or in other words if they don't agree on the specifics then we might be s.o.l.. At least I've never thought a fist fight was going to break out in one of these what's Balkan/Scottish/English discussion like I have with musical subgenres.

I am from PA too. When I was college aged, there were a lot of bars in my region that had things like Coors, Bud, and Miller, and one more thing: Yuengling. Yuengling was a cut above the other brands, but the bars had them at about the same low prices. It might still be like that.

Sounds like around here too. Not sure if it's still like that since I don't really drink beer these days. Don't drink much but when I do I prefer having to go to the State store.

But Yuengling does a good job selling nationally. I'm guessing that it varies among out of state bars how much more they want to charge for Yuengling than the old mass produced brands like Bud.

So you'll probably feel a bit off the first time you see Yuengling at a bottle shop in the west coast. It's like going to a smoke shop and seeing a great deal on tins and a pouch of Capin Black going for 70 bucks.

In my part of PA west of Philly, the pronunciation sounds the same for Yuengling "Lager" as for the lumberjack's job, "logger".

The part of PA I am in we are a nexus of different PA accents. So I've heard logger and Yuengling pronounced so many different ways. I say go with the one that sounds funniest.

Getting back to the thread topic, in effect the question is asking how common it was for people in the Balkans to mix Latakia, Oriental, and VA. Just looking at the list of the three, the decisive one to answer the question would be Latakia, because certainly Oriental was used, whereas Oriental leaf in Eastern Europe commonly was based on VA leaf in a sense, "Virginia Tobacco," N. Tabacum" The Soviets grew a hybrid leaf that they called "American", and people think that Kapitanskiy smells partly like VA. Latakia is very much a specialty product worldwide.

So many Americans seem to think Brits smoked mostly Presbyterian and never even heard of Clan.

 

[rakovsky]

So you'll probably feel a bit off the first time you see Yuengling at a bottle shop in the west coast. It's like going to a smoke shop and seeing a great deal on tins and a pouch of Capin Black going for 70 bucks.

If they charge Yuengling at normal craft beer prices in the West Coast like ~$8, I would mentally chaulk it up to transportation costs.
Besides that, Yuengling really does have special varieties, and is a good brand.
I like that they have so much variety:

That is a cool photo.

If they were charging a bottle of Yuengling at $15 as if it were a European specialty beer, it would feel very overpriced.

Pipers on Discord were telling me how amazingly good Trappist and Trappist-like ales were. I got 3-4 of the recommended ones. They were good, but not so amazing for my palate to justify me buying them more than a few times.

I like the flavor of craft apple cider, and in the early 2000's, the US craft cider market was weaker than today. People recommended French cider a lot. I visited Denmark and got French "Brut" "cidre" at a store. I don't remember the brand name, except that "brut" (brewed) could have been the brand or just a label description. I recall it being medium brown color like Yuengling lager, and thicker than apple juice. It had great quality and taste. I found that the Trappist ales recommended to me were like French Brut Cidre and good. But they didn't have a sweet fruit taste, which cidre had.

The part of PA I am in we are a nexus of different PA accents. So I've heard logger and Yuengling pronounced so many different ways. I say go with the one that sounds funniest.

I am from Yuengling's home region.
If I pronounce it humorously in the bars that I told you about, old timers might think I'm being disrespectful to their working class heritage.
If I were hanging out with you in Philly, I could call it "Yingalinger Lumberjack."
It really is a great brand by US everyday beer standards. I often pick it over higher priced craft brands. Some of those brands overdo the hoppyness I think.

So many Americans seem to think Brits smoked mostly Presbyterian and never even heard of Clan.

Dunhills are a great brand, they do a great job with their Lats for my palatte. But it's also alittle pricey for me, and must classically have been for everyday British too. Common iconic blends for them turned out to be Clan like you said, plus Condor, St. Bruno. Capstan and OGS were also iconic. I never tried any of the last 5 brands that I just mentioned, although a friend traded me a sample of his Capstan.

 

[anotherbob]

If they charge Yuengling at normal craft beer prices in the West Coast like ~$8, I would mentally chaulk it up to transportation costs.
Besides that, Yuengling really does have special varieties, and is a good brand.
I like that they have so much variety:

On the not a coast is where I've seen it go for 8.

That is a cool photo.

If they were charging a bottle of Yuengling at $15 as if it were a European specialty beer, it would feel very overpriced.

That's about it.

Pipers on Discord were telling me how amazingly good Trappist and Trappist-like ales were. I got 3-4 of the recommended ones. They were good, but not so amazing for my palate to justify me buying them more than a few times.

I don't really remember those too well to be honest. I remember liking them but just not that much.

I like the flavor of craft apple cider, and in the early 2000's, the US craft cider market was weaker than today. People recommended French cider a lot. I visited Denmark and got French "Brut" "cidre" at a store. I don't remember the brand name, except that "brut" (brewed) could have been the brand or just a label description. I recall it being medium brown color like Yuengling lager, and thicker than apple juice. It had great quality and taste. I found that the Trappist ales recommended to me were like French Brut Cidre and good. But they didn't have a sweet fruit taste, which cidre had.




I am from Yuengling's home region.

Saint Mary's?

If I pronounce it humorously in the bars that I told you about, old timers might think I'm being disrespectful to their working class heritage.

Makes sense.

If I were hanging out with you in Philly, I could call it "Yingalinger Lumberjack."

Though Philly isn't my favorite city to hang out in by a long shot. And also hate paying city prices for drinks.

It really is a great brand by US everyday beer standards. I often pick it over higher priced craft brands. Some of those brands overdo the hoppyness I think.

True. I like hops a lot so not going to complain about that personally. But as a typical beer it's certainly not bad. And for an affordable beer it's amazing.

Dunhills are a great brand, they do a great job with their Lats for my palatte. But it's also alittle pricey for me, and must classically have been for everyday British too. Common iconic blends for them turned out to be Clan like you said, plus Condor, St. Bruno. Capstan and OGS were also iconic. I never tried any of the last 5 brands that I just mentioned, although a friend traded me a sample of his Capstan.

Capstan is the only one of those I have tried and it didn't really wow me at all. Like it was good but liked other similar blends a lot more.

 

[Briar Lee]

For anyone that might know, I used to love these extremely expensive imported cigarettes about fifty years ago to maybe thirty or so years ago when they disappeared.


Are they still made?

 

[lukasstrifeson]

I go like this big three Latakia blend types:

VA+LA: English
VA+LA+OR: Balkan
VA+LA+Perique: Scottish

Additions of Burley or Cavendish don't alter the big three. However, Cavendish is traditionally thought of as a component in Scottish Mixes..

This is randomly just a way I like to do it.

+1 This has always been my impression as well.

- - -

Less about mimicry more about capitalizing on the name.

I was also going to suggest it probably came down to marketing and advertising their products.