Old Gowrie composition dilemma

[tonibaruch]

Hello everybody.
Many years ago, before Rattray's production would pass to K&K in germany I used to smoke a lot of Old Gowrie and also happened to discuss of it on forums like a.s.p. At those times Old Gowrie was known as a straight virginia, a quite mild one, and still seems it to me. The K&K website and all the material comung from it (descriptions of tobaccoreviews but also sale material in different countries) says it is VIRGINIA, KENTUCKY, PERIQUE. Which is puzzling. I am inclined to think it is a mistake, reproduced hundreds of times everywhere. I tried to stimulate the Italian distributor to go deeper into it and speak with somebody at the production of K&K and clarify this issue. After a couple of weeks he was able to send me the usual sale pdf (of course with the same description printed everywhere).
So my question to the more experienced smokers and everybody who may know is
1) Did you consider Old Gowrie a straight mild virginia and still think it is? (just to check my memory)
2) Have you any idea on how this could be clarified? Maybe some of you in the business may have a contact inside K&K... I really don't know
Hello from Italy

 

[tonibaruch]

Yes, I know and smoked HALO as well. And HALO is, definitely, what it states it is.
I cannot detect any perique or kentucky in Old Gowrie (somebody does?). My big question mark is: nobody has ever thought to Old Gowrie as "halo light" before K&K would start to describe it with the same composition of HALO. No reference in labels to anything else than Virginia, never ever. Nor today. So maybe we all smoked something else thinking to smoke straight mild virginia, for decades.
Or maybe K&K botched this description, and this mistake is self reproducing from then. Which is my guess. But I have no certainities. That's why I ask the opinion of people who knows what he smokes...

 

[jarit]

Haven't had OG for a long time but I do taste Kentucky quite clearly in HOTW. Perique? Can't say that I'm sure of that.
Several years back K&K's website started to list all kinds of odd ingredients in their VAs, and there was a lot of talk if that was a mistake or did K&K actually changed the Rattray's recipes. I first thought it was a case of "misprint" but now I'm more inclined to think they do actually contain the leaf they list at their website. I have no idea at point the change happened.
Apparently Rattray's original Perth made VA blends didn't any condimental leaf -- just Virginias. At least their old brochure (.pdf, 4MB)s o states. On Old Gowrie (page 22) it says: "There is nothing here but pure virginia leaf."
My uneducated guess is that at some point(s) the manufacturer changed the recipe becuse they couldn't source the stouter Empire Tobaccos anymore, or their prices went up too much.
Jari

 

[jgriff]

More importantly, from Jarit's link, I have learned that all our English members must consider Old Gowrie their vade mecum. I must say that I love that old catalog. I need to start using some of those descriptions, especially the Red Rapparee for the Bohemian or Vagabond... "It is of no use whatever to those who merely puff".

 

[jah76]

Thank you very much for posting that pdf.

 

[tonibaruch]

Thanks for the .pfd It is a great sourch, which confirms my foggy memories.

Old Gowrie was clearly presented as pure virginia and so it tasted.
While changed, I continue to not discern any kentucky or perique in it and while it is well known that tobacco quality changed in time, adding both kentucky and perique to balance a shift in quality of virginias in a pure, mild, virginia blend seems to me a bit overkilling...
Of course it is possible but the other changes in recipes (the appearance of cavendish in every english mixture) are customary in industrial tobacco mixtures to seek for consistency. The one which the contemporary booklet describes for Old Gowrie isn't, in my opinion. And I don't trust too much in big tobacco industry booklets which often seems to live a separate life from the tobaccos they describe.
This gives me some fuel to further research and try to approach somebody at K&K *production*, not marketing & communication, to see how things are in reality for this tobacco.
Thanks a lot