Sidebar

Let’s Talk Aromatics

Log in

Forgot your password?

SmokingPipes.com Updates

Watch for Updates Twice a Week

PipesMagazine Approved Sponsor

Site Sponsors

Al Pascia
Blue Room Briars
Cigar World
Danish Pipe Shop
LePipe.it
MBSD Pipes
Missouri Meerschaum
Pipes2Smoke.com
PipeStud.com
SmokingPipes.com
Tabaccheria Corti
TinBids.com

PipesMagazine Approved Sponsor

PipesMagazine Approved Sponsor

PipesMagazine Approved Sponsor

PipesMagazine Approved Sponsor

coys

coys

Can't Leave
Feb 15, 2022
337
789
Missouri
Well, I tried some Captain Black white (regular) recently and I didn’t much care for it. In fact, I don’t know if this was the Captain Black or not but I felt unwell later that day and was quite sick for several days.

It’s not like I turned green as soon as the Captain touched my tongue, but now the association was just too strong and I can’t touch it!

Seemed I wasn’t missing much anyway. I have some Lane 1-Q I’ll try out but I won’t force myself into aros any further.

so far my favorites are Presbyterian the MyMixture 965 which are the opposite
 
  • Like
Reactions: dctune
captpat

captpat

Lifer
Dec 16, 2014
2,389
12,420
North Carolina
solideogloria86 said:
Bob's Chocolate Flake and Autumn Evening are the top 2 aro's I enjoy because they deliver on the tobacco flavor as well. My wife says autumn evening smells like charred waffles, but she says Bcf just smells like tobacco if room note matters at all.
Click to expand...
I’d echo Bob’s Chocolate Flake. The flavoring is very light, I’m enjoying it more and more which was not what I’d guess from the first bowl. Burns slow with no moisture.
 
  • Like
Reactions: cshubhra, solideogloria86 and dctune
Briar Lee

Briar Lee

Lifer
Sep 4, 2021
4,960
14,314
Humansville Missouri
dctune said:
This is probably more of a collection of general musings at this point than a thread post proper. But here goes…

(Apologize in advance for the length.)

I started smoking a pipe in the late 90s, perhaps even 2000. Can’t recall precisely. Hit it for around 9-10 years. Switched to fine-ish cigars for about 3+ years just bc I got hooked on the flavors. Plus, I was in seminary and had a TON of reading to do. When you’ve got 10,000 pages to read every 16 weeks, it helps not having to stop and relight and tamp and fiddle every 10 minutes or so.

Then, sometime around 2012/13, I guess I just gradually quit smoking. I didn’t plan to. It just happened. I remember popping the lid on my humidor one day and realizing I had a box full of $20 sticks drying out. Ashton ESG. Loved those and the VSGs.

This past summer, the pipe started singing its siren song again. And, happily, I succumbed. (Interestingly, during my smoking hiatus, I never stopped considering myself a pipe smoker.)

But this time has been different. For many reasons. But I’ll stick to the topic at hand.

In my prior pipe life, I exclusively smoked aros. No cherries. Nothing fruity/floral. More chocolate, nutty, and black cavendish-infused blends from two local tobacconists in Lexington, KY: Schwab’s Pipes N’ Stuff, and Strauss Tobacconist. My go to blends were two from Schwab’s; Ideal and Ebonknight. And I still enjoy Ideal on rare occasion. Call them up and order some! Today, I’m generally turned off by chocolatey tobacco.

And I never even gave a second thought to what tobaccos were in those blends. I just lifted the lid off the jar, took a whiff, and bought accordingly. I was a noob, and back then had no interest in tins.

Since I’ve taken it back up, I’ve been smoking various Englishes more than anything, and dabbling in some Va and VaPers. My enthusiasm for English is waning. I go through phases.

But lately, I’m navigating toward a select few aromatics. But nothing goopy or overly sweet. Well, except for the tin of Cult Blood Red Moon dad bought me for Christmas.

This kind of brings me to the point of this thread.

The aros I’m enjoying these days, even when they have a stronger tin note of flavoring, tend to hit the palate in a way where, surprisingly, only a hint of that flavor is detected. I find I can actually taste the tobaccos quite well. Which I actually like and prefer. I’m not looking for aros where flavoring overpowers the leaf. Just the opposite, in fact

But I swear I recall being bowled over by the casings and toppings when I initially took up the gentle art.

Even the Cult cherry, while goopy and with a VERY strong tin note, smoked remarkably more tobacco-forward than I expected.

As I type, I’m smoking MacBaren’s Vanilla Cream. Same experience. If somebody handed me a blind bowl of this and asked me to label it, my first thought would not be, “Oh, clearly an aromatic.”

Btw… the aros that I’m smoking lately are 3: MacBaren’s Vanilla Cream, Cult Blood Red Moon, and Bosun Cut Plug. And despite their tin notes, they’re all more tobacco-tasting than I anticipated. And this makes me rather happy. These days, I’m a bigger fan of “tobacco sweet” than I am of “sugar sweet.” I want to taste the tobaccos.

Appreciate any thoughts on this topic. And certainly any suggestions for quality aros that fit the description.
Click to expand...
Clenched in my teeth right now is a Lee Three Star Grade small Pear loaded with Smoker's Pride Vanilla Cavendish, which if it's not the best selling bagged value brand aromatic for the last thirty years it's a contender.

In the shops nowadays this sells for about two dollars an ounce, but online it can often be bought for just over a dollar an ounce, tax paid and delivered.

I can identify at least six different textures and colors of tobaccos blended into this, probably mostly burley and some Virginias. It's made in Denmark for Lane, by the Scandinavian Tobacco Group, and it's excellent, delicious, cool burning, sweet smoking tobacco that tastes like vanilla flavored tobacco and it smells like heaven.


Next month I turn 64 and there is no further pretending that I'm not an old codger. But, I refuse to be a cantankerous, grouchy old codger before my due and given time comes. In this old sin cussed world here we toil in, it will always be true you get what you pay for, and I have no doubt that the higher priced tobaccos on the market are worth more.

But I maintain that all the mass market bagged aromatics are wonderful smoking, sweet smelling, good tobacco blends. There is no bad pipe tobacco sold today, none to be bought at any price.

But all the aromatics sold are blended to taste and smell just a bit different. You can chose cherry, peach, vanilla, chocolate, black cavendish, rum, whiskey, blackberry, raspberry, apple, and many other artificially flavored tobacco blends to smoke. They are all good. Which one, do think is the goodest?

Basically it's all just artfully flavored burley, with a little yellow colored Virginia in the mix.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Bbailey324, rick3wood, Lumbridge and 1 other person
jiminy

jiminy

Starting to Get Obsessed
Apr 27, 2017
266
510
Saskatchewan, Canada
louisvillepiper said:
I would say to give The County Squire aros a whirl. They have a Middle Earth themed series with some non-aros in there but check out Rivendell, Old Toby, and Second Breakfast. Definitely not your typical goopy mess!
View attachment 122726
Click to expand...
I second this! TCS has to have the best tasting aromatics in my (limited) experience. I haven't had more than a bowl of Rivendell so I can't give a proper overview, but Old Toby has been growing on me every time I smoke it. Really a wonderful smoke. Also, their "Hunter's Creek" is arguably my favorite tobacco. Wonderful English/Aro.

As a side note: I see you snagged some Mirkwood. I had every intention of of buying some, but when I went to order that evening it was out. Can you tell me how it is?
 
  • Like
Reactions: dctune
Tabacco

Tabacco

Part of the Furniture Now
May 1, 2020
572
10,122
GA - USA
In all my pipe smoking career, I have never liked aromatics. Not that I have tried many, because I have never liked the few ones I tried. Let's say that I had given up on trying them. Same as Latakia.
And now that for the first time, for the very first and only time that I am enjoying an aromatic, it is the one blend that is actually not even available?!
Yep. I am talking about C&D St. Patrick's Day 2022 Reserve. I have been smoking one bowl every morning while going to work since I received the only tin I have. and I actually like it a lot.

:(
 
  • Sad
Reactions: dctune
Chasing Embers

Chasing Embers

Captain of the Black Frigate
Nov 12, 2014
44,780
116,415
Tabacco said:
In all my pipe smoking career, I have never liked aromatics. Not that I have tried many, because I have never liked the few ones I tried. Let's say that I had given up on trying them. Same as Latakia.
And now that for the first time, for the very first and only time that I am enjoying an aromatic, it is the one blend that is actually not even available?!
Yep. I am talking about C&D St. Patrick's Day 2022 Reserve. I have been smoking one bowl every morning while going to work since I received the only tin I have. and I actually like it a lot.

:(
Click to expand...
Sounds an awful lot like a rebranding of C&D Nutty Irishman.
 
  • Love
Reactions: anotherbob
anotherbob

anotherbob

Lifer
Mar 30, 2019
16,634
31,177
46
In the semi-rural NorthEastern USA
Tabacco said:
In all my pipe smoking career, I have never liked aromatics. Not that I have tried many, because I have never liked the few ones I tried. Let's say that I had given up on trying them. Same as Latakia.
And now that for the first time, for the very first and only time that I am enjoying an aromatic, it is the one blend that is actually not even available?!
Yep. I am talking about C&D St. Patrick's Day 2022 Reserve. I have been smoking one bowl every morning while going to work since I received the only tin I have. and I actually like it a lot.

:(
Click to expand...
if you like that there are going to probably be other aromatics you'll like. I don't know if they've gotten better in recent years or I just have gotten better at finding good ones.
 
AppalachianPipe92

AppalachianPipe92

Lifer
Feb 12, 2022
3,574
50,415
32
North Georgia mountains.
Chasing Embers said:
Most I've read here despise it and I've heard some say that it left their pipes smelling like an electrical fire. All I get from it is well done beef. Even have a pipe dedicated to it.
Click to expand...
I'm still undecided on Black XX. Sometimes it's an enjoyable smoke for me, other times I can barely make it past a few puffs. Not sure if this is due to my drink choice or food choice prior, or what it's due to. Definitely a unique tobacco.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Chasing Embers
Singularis

Singularis

Part of the Furniture Now
Sep 11, 2019
618
3,039
Wausau, Wis
Simmerdown☕️ said:
I enjoy these…
John Aylesbury’s ? Flake
MacBaren Vanilla Roll Cake
Esoterica Ramsgate
Rattray’s Exotic ?
SG 1792 Flake
G&H Dark Plug/Flake Scented

I’m sure there are others, but I’m a bit ? ☠️ right now. ☕️
Click to expand...
+1 for ? flake. A rather spendy aromatic, but really good. It’s a classic Danish approach to aromatics. I haven’t tried the others in this. But I do like MB Scottish Mixture, which I think hardly counts as an aromatic. Someone described it as having that classic MB “house flavor”: toast with butter and honey!
 
  • Like
Reactions: Servant King
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top Bottom