it's funny tobacco is a relationship and like people you really can get more out of really knowing someone then having a million friends you see once a year at most.
Blessing or Curse?
- Thread starter Grangerous
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Interesting…. I am much like you Granger…. I have a fair number of varieties of pipe tobacco, but truth-be-told…. probably 95% of the time I indulge in the OTC’s….. Sir Walter Raleigh (Regular) or Prince Albert (Regular).
I consider myself to be on the side of the blessed. Within all genres and styles there are blends that I like. I can't recall ever tasting a new blend and being repulsed. I have preferred burley blends over the last year or so but I do mix it up from time to time. As for my cellar, it is deep on certain blends that cover all spectrums but it is wide enough to have some deep variety. I am 36 now, at my current rate of consumption I estimate my cellar will see me into my 60's. That's humbling and exciting at the same time.
Yeh, there are a few blends that I just won’t smoke at all. Mint, cherry, fruity…. Menthol. Some, I’m just not crazy about, but if I have it open, I’ll smoke it till it’s gone. Some, I liked a lot early on, bought a lot of it, but I just became cold towards as my tastes changed. But, I have it, so I’ll smoke it. And then there are blends that I just go crazy over, passionately love. It’s good to have balance. If every meal was my favorite…. Chili…. Eventually Id get tired of it. A humdrum hamburger is good to break up the in betweens.
With cigarettes, I'm a one blend person. Even with RYO tobacco, I favored a combination that mirrored my over the counter cigarettes.
With pipe tobacco, I'm all over the map. From burley to Virginia and aromatics, with the occasional English.
What I want pipe wise depends on mood. With cigarettes, it's always the same (but suspect the same is true for most cigarette smokers).
With pipe tobacco, I'm all over the map. From burley to Virginia and aromatics, with the occasional English.
What I want pipe wise depends on mood. With cigarettes, it's always the same (but suspect the same is true for most cigarette smokers).
I mostly smoked aromatics when first starting out, now I don't. I'll smoke any genre -- burley, English, VA, VA/PER, etc. -- and enjoy them all. I'm choosy about the blender though, there's one I've never been fond of so I avoid their stuff. My taste preference has been evolving, smoking more burley and fewer latakia blends now than I did a few years ago.
Most of the time I still approach pipesmoking as a challenge as much as a way to unwind.
It does not surprise me at all that traditionally the majority of pipesmokers just found one good blend and smoked nothing else (it's also perfectly logical when this is how most people treat coffee/tea as well).
Started in college with codger blends then folded in some MacBaren tins, but couldn't figure out how to smoke them without getting tongue bite. There were no internet forums back then and I didn't know any older pipe smokers to consult.
I took a couple of decades break, then resumed with Captain Black White. Now there were internet forums. I learned about Haddo's Delight and SG FVF but ,again, couldn't get the hang of smoking them without tongue bite.
In the last decade I've figured out how to smoke almost every blend (Petit Robin is an exception). Guided by reviews on TR and on YouTube (sorry guys!), I have favorites in most genres. I like Lakelands in moderation but not aros. One limitation is that I have to smoke indoors, which makes it hard to smoke English/Balkan blends.
Currently, I'm smoking a lot Stonehenge, Solani Virginia Flake, Silver Flake and ABF, Capstan Blue and Gold, Sillem's Councilor, Peterson/Dunhill DNR and Davidoff Flake Medallions.
I took a couple of decades break, then resumed with Captain Black White. Now there were internet forums. I learned about Haddo's Delight and SG FVF but ,again, couldn't get the hang of smoking them without tongue bite.
In the last decade I've figured out how to smoke almost every blend (Petit Robin is an exception). Guided by reviews on TR and on YouTube (sorry guys!), I have favorites in most genres. I like Lakelands in moderation but not aros. One limitation is that I have to smoke indoors, which makes it hard to smoke English/Balkan blends.
Currently, I'm smoking a lot Stonehenge, Solani Virginia Flake, Silver Flake and ABF, Capstan Blue and Gold, Sillem's Councilor, Peterson/Dunhill DNR and Davidoff Flake Medallions.
Cellar deep rather than wide. Is certainly a great concept
I love variety BUT my wife says NO, NO, NO
Blessed.
Took the circuitous route. Started on heavily flavored aromatics... blah, blah, blah. Yuck!
Now I enjoy blends from most every family and enjoy the variety of tins I have open at any given time. I enjoy changing styles in a single session, sometimes leaving a very large bowled pipe 1/2 full for the next day. Mmm.
Still exploring, generally hard to find anything that I truly dislike. Most I like enough to enjoy the full tin. Some regularly seem to be my instant new favorite upon the first smoke, but that doesn't always last long.
My biggest question is what will I think of those favorite blends in 5, 10 or 15 years? Don't know but I hope I'm smoking them to find out.
Cheers
Took the circuitous route. Started on heavily flavored aromatics... blah, blah, blah. Yuck!
Now I enjoy blends from most every family and enjoy the variety of tins I have open at any given time. I enjoy changing styles in a single session, sometimes leaving a very large bowled pipe 1/2 full for the next day. Mmm.
Still exploring, generally hard to find anything that I truly dislike. Most I like enough to enjoy the full tin. Some regularly seem to be my instant new favorite upon the first smoke, but that doesn't always last long.
My biggest question is what will I think of those favorite blends in 5, 10 or 15 years? Don't know but I hope I'm smoking them to find out.
Cheers
I am only 4 years into my pipe journey.
When I first started, I told my self I would do an in depth exploration of each of the main genres of tobacco. In those 4 years, I have only gotten halfway (or less) through the Burley blends! It's been quite enjoyable so far and I have a lot to look forward to...
When I first started, I told my self I would do an in depth exploration of each of the main genres of tobacco. In those 4 years, I have only gotten halfway (or less) through the Burley blends! It's been quite enjoyable so far and I have a lot to look forward to...
Your cellar seems lacking. Life expendancy is about 85 now
Been smoking a pipe for precisely three years. My first two tins were Mac Baren aromatics, first Original Choice then Vanilla Cream. I continued that theme with my next purchase, CAO Moontrance. Had it not been for buying someone's cellar purge about a year and a half ago, this pattern might have just continued indefinitely. The cellar itself that I bought was weighted toward aromatics (perhaps 70/30), but the little bit of variety present in it allowed me to expand my tastes once I turned off the aro autopilot (three PG-laden P&C blends from the "Out Of Office" series were the straw that broke the camel's back). My first non-aromatic blend was Peterson Sherlock Holmes, and it just went from there--I tried something from every category after that. Initially I became fond of burleys, but then my tastes suddenly shifted toward straight VAs, once I learned how to smoke them properly. I eventually got over the aforementioned PG-trauma of the early days, and Mac Baren Vanilla Roll Cake was instrumental in reminding me that aromatics can actually be done right. Currently, my tastes are largely split between light aromatics and VaBur blends, with the bronze going to VA flakes in the vein of Capstan Blue. I never went through an obsessive English blend phase like I did with aromatics, even in the coldest winter, and I do enjoy them immensely, but I have to be in the mood, and the setting has to be right. After some extensive retooling of the cellar, it now features 30 open blends in Ball jars, about 35 sealed tins, and perhaps 40 samples (I'm a slow smoker, so I'm still making my way through these), all of the above featuring blends from all over the spectrum. Being a slow smoker, I value variety more so than quantity, but even the latter I have covered, and I know it.
The only thing I don't know is....is anyone still awake?
The only thing I don't know is....is anyone still awake?
Well my mother is 95 so I also need to step it up
The only thing I don't know is....is anyone still awake?
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Wide awake! Thanks for sharing this. I’m enjoying reading the stories. Confirms I’m an odd duck. I tried a bowl of Presbyterian today, I feel I could enjoy the orientals, I just get turned off by the Latakia—and I know it’s light in Latakia.
Just finished a bowl of Haunted Bookshop, which in the past I know I’ve described as bland. I guess burley is just my thing. I’m quite the fan of C&D Burleys all.
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Wide awake! Thanks for sharing this. I’m enjoying reading the stories. Confirms I’m an odd duck. I tried a bowl of Presbyterian today, I feel I could enjoy the orientals, I just get turned off by the Latakia—and I know it’s light in Latakia.
Just finished a bowl of Haunted Bookshop, which in the past I know I’ve described as bland. I guess burley is just my thing. I’m quite the fan of C&D Burleys all.
I enjoy a multitude of tobacco’s in every genre. Currently, I have been smoking several Lakeland’s from my cellar and having a great time. I’m eagerly waiting on a small sample of Coniston Cut Plug for this Friday’s smoke. If I like it, I will buy a box. Resistance seems futile. The TAD is strong..
A Lakeland is something I have never tried. I’ve heard people say that Crooner points in that direction with the floral notes of deer tongue which I do like.
I smoke exactly 4 tobaccos: C & D's Crooner, C & D's Visions of Celephais, Paladin Black Cherry, and Mixture 79. Visions took me by surprise, because it is not a codger blend, but aside from that, I really have no interest in trying any others, beyond a little curiosity for Lakeland. I have been debating for weeks whether or not to sample EGR and St. Bruno ~ but I always find a reason not to pull the trigger.