Gawith Hoggarth Dark Birds Eye

[coming to_falling too]

Exactly. I haven’t done any scientific comparisons, but my guess is if you weighed how I pack it it wouldn’t be more than about 2/3 of how tight I would pack most everything else. Once you get those long thin strands burning, and tamp lightly, you can easily keep it lit with a VERY slow cadence. I think most people who have trouble with it pack too tight and puff too hard.

DBE was the very first GH blend I smoked, a sample given to me by the late Tom Coldwell at a pipe show circa 1985. Once the room stopped spinning......

Thanks for this. I will try packing it lighter

 

[alaskanpiper]

One of my favorites. Loads easy, burns easy, and that little kiss of dark fired in there is sublime.

 

[logs]

I'm convinced the African leaf in strong bodied Gawith blends makes all the difference. I wish American tobacco could taste this good.

 

[alaskanpiper]

I'm convinced the African leaf in strong bodied Gawith blends makes all the difference. I wish American tobacco could taste this good.

You may be on to something there. I typically much prefer blends with a burley/DF presence from Gawith than any American producers.

Certainly a bit of a generalization, and as usual extraneous variables abound, but the profile does seem different to me.

 

[Chasing Embers]

Loading a bowl always snags me

Try loading the chamber, much easier.

 

[oldgeezersmoker]

DBE has been around forever, hasn’t changed to my taste. Whether the burley component is the same as what is now being ubiquitously marketed as DFK is something I am far from sure of.

 

[rushx9]

DBE has been around forever, hasn’t changed to my taste. Whether the burley component is the same as what is now being ubiquitously marketed as DFK is something I am far from sure of.

The way the description reads, it's a blend of fire-cured Dark Virginia with Dark Kentucky "birdseye" which I assume is, contrary to popular belief, not fire-cured.
Lotta folks read Dark Kentucky and automatically assume DFK.

 

[rushx9]

"This is a combination of dark-fired whole leaf Virginias and mid-rib fine cut Kentucky leaf rolled and sliced to make 'bird's eyes'."

 

[brian64]

Great stuff...have a bunch jarred. Only downside as I recall burns rather fast.

 

[BROBS]

"This is a combination of dark-fired whole leaf Virginias and mid-rib fine cut Kentucky leaf rolled and sliced to make 'bird's eyes'."

Exactly no DFK at all

 

[ashdigger]

I really like it in a small bowl. It’s a great just before bed blend. I love how it’s a stuff and light. Perfect.

 

[cshubhra]

I love this because it is easy to prepare and one of the strongest high nicotine blends that fall in my sweet spot
On the other hand ... I love Dark Flake (unscented and aromatic) even more

Quite deep on all three in my cellar, and plan to buy more

 

[spicy_boiii]

Haven't had it but I'm a huge fan of the dark fired that GH uses in their blends. Very nice complexity and flavor. I like it in the dark flake aromatic and Kendal Flake.

Don't plan on buying much of anything with any substantial latakia or dark fired ever again though, with my cellar and how much I smoke the stuff I have a lifetime supply.

 

[craig61a]

I like it. Sometimes I'll mix it with Virginia too. I don't really like the long stringy cut; I'll give it quick whirl in the coffee grinder...

 

[alaskanpiper]

Haven't had it but I'm a huge fan of the dark fired that GH uses in their blends. Very nice complexity and flavor. I like it in the dark flake aromatic and Kendal Flake.

Don't plan on buying much of anything with any substantial latakia or dark fired ever again though, with my cellar and how much I smoke the stuff I have a lifetime supply.

I am moving ever closer in this direction as well. The occasional bowl of either is great, but more and more I tend to prefer them both used condimentally at most.

 

[craig61a]

For a real kick in the nads I'll smoke one of the GH brown ropes...

 

[logs]

Yeah the ropes are pretty strong. I used to think they were unique until BROBS mail-bombed me with a tour of GH blends I'd never tried. Now I find that GH has a slew of super-strong but tasty blends where the lakeland essence is mostly just window dressing. I've never been a fan of nicotine blasts but GH has so many amazing blends. It's worth the danger.

 

[oldgeezersmoker]

Great stuff...have a bunch jarred. Only downside as I recall burns rather fast.

It smokes you, you don’t smoke it.

 

[BROBS]

Yeah the ropes are pretty strong. I used to think they were unique until BROBS mail-bombed me with a tour of GH blends I'd never tried. Now I find that GH has a slew of super-strong but tasty blends where the lakeland essence is mostly just window dressing. I've never been a fan of nicotine blasts but GH has so many amazing blends. It's worth the danger.

Don’t tell people that I’m nice it will skew my image on the forum with a few coots

 

[oldgeezersmoker]

Yeah the ropes are pretty strong. I used to think they were unique until BROBS mail-bombed me with a tour of GH blends I'd never tried. Now I find that GH has a slew of super-strong but tasty blends where the lakeland essence is mostly just window dressing. I've never been a fan of nicotine blasts but GH has so many amazing blends. It's worth the danger.

Cadence is everything. Tom Caldwell could smoke bowl after bowl of DBE, didn’t phase him in the least. He was the quintessential English professor, tweeds and all. Doubt he weighed 150 pounds. But the only way you would know he was smoking a pipe would be that he occasionally opened his mouth to let the smoke escape. Maybe this is what is called the breath method, maybe whoever coined the term has something else in mind, but tobacco just plain is better behaved when it is barely smoldering in the bowl. I think that translates to making the nic hit manageable as well as just plain tasting better.