My First Impressions of Altadis Maple Street
The 1.5 oz tin doesn't say Altadis but rather Sutliff Private Stock. It reads "Quality Mixture with Flavorful Maple & Old Rum" on the front. When I cracked it open and took a whiff, I caught a light maple and golden rum scent. After several more whiffs, I also detected a hint of walnut. I packed my brand new Missouri Meerschaum "General" cob about 3/4 full, put the leash on my dog and took a walk to the park to my favorite west-facing hill just before sunset where I plopped down in the grass. I lit my pipe with a charring light and then a second light and puffed about every 5 seconds. The tobacco smoke in the first third of the smoke smelled pleasant, like a lighter version of what I experienced earlier, with a decent amount of tobacco flavor coming through. The sun was setting and the sky was pink fading into purple with battalions of clouds marching into the distance. The smoke from the cob were white and
and remained so until the end. In the middle of the smoke, the tobacco taste and smell, which was quite mild, took a more prominent role with only a hint of maple. It was a nice cool summer night to enjoy a pipe - there was a bit of a breeze and the leaves on the trees were dancing. In the last part of the smoke after around 15 minutes, I was picking up a faint taste of cake. I decided it was somewhere between a chocolate brownie and a pancake. In the final few puffs, I noticed that the smoke clouds turned into more of a steam and smelled like corn, which was from the stem of the cob that protrudes into the bowl on new cobs until it burns off. After I let it cool down, I saw a little bit of dottle, hiding under the stem, but most of the tobacco burned off into black flaky ash and white powdery ash.
Conclusions: A fine aromatic for those who enjoy a mild tobacco and don't want a sweet mixture. The description on the can was accurate. Smelled and tasted wonderful. Burned evenly. I would recommend it and I will buy this again.