McC 5100

[oldgeezersmoker]

Its lightly sweet, and a pleasant smoke, but I'm not getting a ton of flavor like I'd expect

A good description of 5100. A great base for blends, and because it doesn't overwhelm your taste buds, a good candidate for an all day smoke. Apparently, the world was full of people who had this as their favorite blend.

 

[briarbuck]

Yea, Cosmic kinda scared the crap out of me in that thread. lol

 

[coyja]

Yea, Cosmic kinda scared the crap out of me in that thread. lol

I know, right?

LOL "shitdust"

A great base for blends, and because it doesn't overwhelm your taste buds, a good candidate for an all day smoke.

I'm kind of landing there as well... more of a good blender than anything.

We'll see if I warm up to it, but I'd rather have Deep Hollow, personally.

 

[briarbuck]

You're cellar of shitdust...is now all gone.

 

[cosmicfolklore]

the world was full of people who had this as their favorite blend.

Not actually, if you go through the archives of this forum, you will find that most people hated it for its ketchup taste or hated it for having no taste. It wasn't till they announced that they were closing down 5100 that everyone all of a sudden piled on the bandwagon and announced their lifelong love of this blend. Then, of course, they were the biggest fans of the slowest selling tobacco company, after McClellands announced their closing. Now that they're gone, they are billed as the best company in the world. Funny how that shit works, ha ha.
I can laugh, because I was one of the few McClelland fanboys that got slapped with the ketchup jokes for years.
Yeh, 5100 is a very subtle Virginia. It has tons of appealing and interesting flavors, but they are all very, very subtle. Some will say that pipe size doen't matter, but I suggest (as was suggested to me) to take a pipe that has a diameter of less than .6" and smoke it as slow as possible, paying attention to very subtle flavors underneath the heat and body of the tobacco flavor. A small pipe makes this easier. And, once you've found those flavors, try it again in a wider pipe, there is more bold tobacco flavor, but you will know more what to look for in what you tasted in the smaller pipe. It helped me anyways. I still will try a new Virginia in a small pipe, to get an idea of how to approach it with a wider pipe. It focuses the flavor down more.

Also, notice how there is a similarity to those flavors found in a Marlboro Red, without the harshness of the cigarette. Someone pointed that out to me, and I even tried a Red cigarette back to back with a bowl of 5100 and found many of the subtle nuances were in both. They are very similar, except the cigarette has more harshness and nicotine.
And, as far as scaring you with the quick degeneration of the leaf... Sorry. I have this friend who I will smoke with occasionally, and he carries this large bag of jars and aged tins. He'll hand me one of these every now and then and ask me if I want to try 'ten year old Dunbar' or something like that, and I run my fingers through this rotten crap, and taste it in my pipe, to get a smokey dirt flavor, while he is setting there going... "MMMMMMmmmm, this is so sublime." I'm like wondering if the worms are all dried up in this worm dirt also.

And, I'll ask him to find out that indeed, the jar was open and being smoked out of for months, because he keeps like 30 tins and jars open, and he only occasionally smokes a pipe. Super nice guy, but he obviously can't even taste the stuff that he spends a ton of money getting.
I think that if your smart with it, you'll figure it out.

 

[coyja]

So I had a very enjoyable smoke of 5100 this evening. (And, no, it wasn’t just the tequila)

I can tell I’m going to need more time with this, but I’m coming around.
Sometimes, when you hear “all day smoke” I think that tends to mean smoke it however you feel and as fast as you like.

I’d agree that you need to give this leaf space and time (i.e. a slow pace) to enjoy it properly.

Also, the variation in pipe makes a big difference, as always.
Tonight I had a fantastic bowl of 5100 in a Savinelli 305 Roma.

It varied enough from my Tortuga 305 that I investigated and discovered that the Roma has a 9/64 vs 11/64 opening difference.

IDK how that fine tunes what makes 5100 better in the (essentially) same sized bowl other than it required an even slower smoke.

Whatever the meaning, it was an ideal environment and I’d say the experience was somewhere between 40th and Deep Hollow for me.
Take it all w a grain of salt, as I am a 5100 newbie, way too late in the day, but still an intesting experiment getting to know this aged smoke nonetheless.

I’ll keep smoking and see where this goes...

 

[seacaptain]

I've had half a dozen McClelland VA blends, and 5100 was never one of them, so nothing for me to miss.

 

[hoosierpipeguy]

I have a zip lock of almost black 15 year old 5100 that was opened from the jar 3 to 4 months ago. Smoked 3 bowls of it in fresh pipes at the show as it is my habit of smoking 5100 for the first bowl in a new pipe. The 5100 was superb so either the theory is flawed or I just love shitdust. Since I've smoked over 10 lb of relatively fresh 5100 over the years, I think the theory may be flawed or isn't a 100% thing. I'm not totally dismissing the possibility that I like shitdust either.

 

[tinsel]

if you go through the archives of this forum, you will find that most people hated it for its ketchup taste

Haha, I guess I was one of the few who liked the ketchup smell. Never got it from the smoke, only from the tin (jar).
I always thought Blackwoods Flake smelled like a tin of baked beans when it was opened! LOVED that blend. Wish I had cellared more of it.
I do have 6 tins of Christmas Cheer, though. 3 from 2016 and 3 from 2017. Gonna be tough to not crack them open before they have time to mature!!!

 

[cosmicfolklore]

Hoosier, I'm really glad that it turned out great. More research is required. For the name of piracy science, I require about one pound to sell on ebay for further study. Ha ha!
It's all about whether you enjoy it or not, and if you enjoy it, so what. Besides, with all the marvels of modern science, and they still are hit and miss on weather reports. I'm going back to just tossing chicken bones. Ha ha. ::