Core Four

[Cloozoe]

Trying (and having) lots of different blends is a great part of the fun, but I was thinking of how many I would actually need to not feel deprived. I came up with four; two specific and two general:

Haddo's
1792
Any one of a number of VaPers
Any one of a number of straight Va flakes

How about you?

 

[mso489]

I seem to enjoy different blends over time, variety being part of the joy. My dad smoked for fifty years, owning one pipe at a time until burn-out, and smoking only Granger from the foil pouch. The single blend seemed to be a plus for him, dependable and entirely enjoyable. He sort of looked down his nose at fancier blends.

 

[yanoJL]

Trying (and having) lots of different blends is a great part of the fun, but I was thinking of how many I would actually need to not feel deprived. I came up with four; two specific and two general:

Haddo's
1792
Any one of a number of VaPers
Any one of a number of straight Va flakes

How about you?

I'm right there with you when it comes to:
Any one of a number of VaPers
Any one of a number of straight Va flakes

But I have come to accept that I'm always going to want SOME Bob Runowski blend in my life (OJK, Pegasus, Haunted Bookshop, etc). I get "pre-happy" some evenings just knowing I'm going to wake up to one of those blends and a cup of coffee ️

 

[bluegrassbrian]

If it were ONLY four I suppose it would have to be:
A straight Virginia.
A Virginia with minimal condiments and/or flavor enhancements.
An oriental dominant blend.
A Virginia based blend with dark fired Ky.

To be specific, as of today..
Gawith FVF.
C&D Steamworks.
HU Soraya.
HU Edward G.

 

[sardonicus87]

For me, having 4 core blends would be very hard to choose.

I need some burley as a core, between OJK and HH Burley Flake, I can't decide which would be in my core.

One VA based blend I suppose I would at this point pick Savinelli Brunello flake.

I also need an English in my core and I could make GLP Quiet Nights one of my core blends.

And finally my fourth blend as a core blend might be Mac Baren Navy Flake at the moment.

But it's a tough call. I don't think I could stay limited to that, but OJK or HH Burley Flake or both would always been in my core have to have, and some kind of English. But there's a lot I haven't tried yet, but of the many that I have, OJK and HH Burley are the only ones I could really point to and say "no question, this always has to be available to me, and I doubt any similar blend would supplant them as 'necessary'."

 

[Chasing Embers]

I primarily only smoke one blend. If it were all that was available I'd still be happy.

 

[anotherbob]

Trying (and having) lots of different blends is a great part of the fun, but I was thinking of how many I would actually need to not feel deprived. I came up with four; two specific and two general:

Haddo's
1792
Any one of a number of VaPers
Any one of a number of straight Va flakes

How about you?

i got a few core blends Yorktown, EGR, Five Bros. A few core styles have to have something in that style. A Coin, some English, and a decent aromatic. Then there a are quite a few sometimes blends and many more I am slowly trying. But if all I could get are my three core ones I'd be a happy smoker.

 

[AcesAndEights]

Boy, I don’t think I could pick specific blends, but I would need a Va, a VaPer, an English, and probably a nice vanilla aro.

 

[shanez]

I would need an aro for sure.

 

[AroEnglish]

-English aromatic, not sure which one specifically
-Aromatic English by Sutliff
-Aromatic
-English

 

[futureman]

I could live on just three:

WCC Flake 558
Carter Hall
GH Brown Flake U/S

 

[Uruss]

I think maybe 4:
OGS
Sun Bear Tupelo
Germain's Brown Flake
Smokers Haven In-b-tween mixture.

 

[tmcg81]

I could live with:

MacBaren HH Burley Flake
GL Pease Westminster
Watch City Rouxgaroux
1Q

 

[urbanpiper]

Fun thought exercise, but don't think I could live it I like variety too much. But if forced to, I could live with the following
- a VaPer, if I have to pick one, let's go with 2020 cringle flake
- an English, Pembroke or SG Perfection would do me fine
- Something with DFK, maybe ODF as I could sprinkle it into other blends when I wanted a boost
- an Aromatic, there are several good ones that make for a nice change of pace, but I'd probably land on MB vanilla roll cake and be happy

 

[proteus]

The process of selecting a tobacco from myriads tobacco and an appropriate pipe from the collection is as much a part of the experience as enjoying the aroma in the container, packing and prepping and then of course lighting it up and that first few puffs of goodness. It's all part of the process. Otherwise I could just grab a cigar from the chest.

 

[Cloozoe]

Huh, funny; for me walking into my temperature/humidity controlled cigar room, selecting a size, shape, brand from the countless boxes lining the walls, examining the veins in the wrapper, sniffing it, rolling it gently between my palms, oh-so-carefully snipping off the end, is crucial to the cigar experience. Otherwise I could just stuff some Prince Albert into a pipe.

 

[rsshreck32]

I've been on the pipe journey for 11 months now. I don't think I could pick four blends because there are so many that I haven't tried. But four that I would be sad if they weren't available anymore:
1. C&D Haunted Bookshop
2. C&D Pegasus
3. Watch City Rouxgaroux
4. LJ Peretti Tashkent

 

[romaso]

1 Mac Baren Vanilla Creme
2 Sutliff 507 Virginia Slices
3 Sutliff Ready Rubbed Match (in summer) and Stokkebye 301 Dutch Cav (in winter)

 

[woodsroad]

 

[bullet08]

Why feel deprived? It's your smoke, it's your tobacco. Smoke as many blends as you want, or not. No need to measure by other's standards. It's all comes out to more or less same coins. Only question is, is it imperial or metric?