Gawith Best Brown Flake

[sjfine]

I am disappointed to report that I am currently smoking the last bowl of my first tin of BBF.
Great stuff. Gonna get more today.

 

[msandoval858]

Great stuff indeed. Best Brown is one of those I'll be buying a bigger quantity of when I restock.

 

[bluesmoke]

I've got lots of BBF in reserve. I've said it before, but sometimes it's like sucking on brownies right out of the oven.

 

[sjfine]

Can you elaborate, please, on "Great stuff"?

I'm afraid that I can't. I am wholly inarticulate when it comes to describing tobacco. Or food, for that matter. All I can say is that I am now hard-pressed to enjoy some of my aromatics, and may shortly be looking to trade.

 

[brdavidson]

My #2 favourite tobacco. I just bought 1.5 lbs of the stuff along with the 6 tins I had already in the cellar. I plan on continuing to buy more and cellaring several more pounds of it.

 

[brdavidson]

I'm not great at it either, however as I've passed my first year as a pipe smoker I'm beginning to pick out the nuances of the tobacco and can describe them a bit better. I think a lot of that comes from better technique allowing the true flavour to come through. Not saying your technique is bad, but mine sure was!

 

[judcole]

I smoke a lot of BBF. I have been doing so long enough that, now, I am only smoking 5 year old tins. I just popped one yesterday that I set aside in the fall of 2008. I have a tin in the cellar from 2005 I expect to tap next year.
BBF is a smooth, mellow smoke with a slightly sweet,grassy taste to it. Smooth Virginia sweet - not stoved sweet, or aromatic sweet. Just good, solid Virginia tobacco sweet.

 

[sjfine]

I fear, and am likewise confident, that I will never be able to smoke 5-year-old tobacco, except by accident.
Then again, I have some older Cuban cigars. And they are amazing.
By the way, is bulk BBF as good as tinned? I have read that some tins (like Erinore Flake) are much better than their bulked counterparts.

 

[rmbittner]

I've got some tins of BBF in the cellar, but I haven't tried it yet. I am a big fan, though, of SG's Brown Flake. Apparently, it's not the "Best" but it's a really enjoyable VA/burley flake, available in both scented and unscented versions. (The "un" will still have a tiny bit of scent in the first puffs, though, since both versions are produced on the same equipment.)
sjfine: My personal take is that tins are always better than bulk. Sometimes the blends are identical, but that's not always the case. And even when they are exactly the same, I think the tinning process really helps pull a blend together better. And, of course, tins are easy to cellar for long-term storage. BUT, I notice from your Profile page that all of your favorite blends are aromatics. Aromatics typically exhibit very little change with age; if you never have the chance to smoke a 5-year-old aromatic, you're really not missing out on any of the flavor that you would get from a fresh tin of the same blend. It's also possible -- and I'm not primarily an aromatic smoker, so YMMV -- that you'd notice very little difference between a bulk aromatic and a tinned version of the same blend. But more experienced aro smokers here would know better than I.
Bob

 

[salewis]

I love Gawith's BBF. There was a question on another pipe forum about what tobaccos do you always come back to when trying other blends. My response was:
Gawith's BBF

McClelland's Blackwood Flake

Gawith's Squadron Leader

 

[drrock]

I agree - Best Brown Flake is indeed "great stuff"!

 

[sjfine]

BUT, I notice from your Profile page that all of your favorite blends are aromatics. Aromatics typically exhibit very little change with age; if you never have the chance to smoke a 5-year-old aromatic, you're really not missing out on any of the flavor that you would get from a fresh tin of the same blend.

I have read that aromatics do not benefit from cellaring. And, the improbability of my being able to smoke aged tobacco is a result of several factors: lack of money to get the collection started; the lack of space to keep it; and the frequency of my smoking (all day, almost every day - I am addicted to anything that I do twice, and like) - to name a few.
Right now, I have a few pounds of MacBaren London Blend (because it is being discontinued), but I smoke it often, so my supply will not likely last very long. I also am only now expanding my horizons into virginias and burleys, so I'm still experimenting with new blends.
And, I will be changing my profile to reflect my evolving preferences.
The search for my (other and new) favorites continues.
Wheeeeeeee.