Ruminations on the Perfect Cake

[Briar Lee]

I was taught by Harry Hosterman to put a cake inside the chamber the “thickness of a dime”, which is not quite five thousands of an inch (0.045” or 1.35mm). All the little brochures that used to come with drugstore pipes years ago also advised this.

For maybe ten years or so I tried that, and I will say a dime thickness cake does seem to insulate the pipe against burnout, if smoking outdoors.

I have all manner of pipe reamers designed to ream out a pipe. I don’t use them any more, because one slip and I’d gouge a chamber, or I’d remove briar instead of carbon. For years I’ve used only a sharp, sturdy pocketknife blade as a scraper.

Whether it’s a new pipe or an old one I try and get all previous carbon or built up cake completely off, down to bare briar.

Then I build a cake the thickness of a hair, or just a whisper, only enough to claim there is just a little carbon deposit inside the bowl.



Briar is rather a miraculous wood in that the burning ember of tobacco reaches nearly a thousand degrees Fahrenheit, most woods ignite at half that temperature, yet briar pipes build up carbon, instead.

And your charcoal briquettes, are pure carbon. Yet somehow the carbon in a pipe doesn’t burn away, it keeps growing until reamed or, as I prefer, I keep it down using an Everclear soaked, twisted paper towel.



So why do I contradict everything I was ever taught or read about caking a pipe?

I’m convinced a briar pipe breaks in from the extreme heat of the ember fully curing the briar, removing all the foul tasting tannins or whatever resins make a brand new pipe smoke hot and taste like burning briar. When I scrape an old pipe down to bare briar it doesn’t need another break in, unless the previous owner didn’t smoke it all the way down, which seems to be most of them. Once fully broken in, all the way to the draft hole, the pipe doesn’t require a thick cake to provide flavor.

I think leaving a thick cake does two bad things.

The worst is that cake is formed from tobacco residue that often goes rank and sour, and it’s liable to foul the smoke. A lesser evil is that cake cuts down on capacity, and I want all the tobacco it can hold,

When my time for being the custodian of my hoard of old pipes is through, the next man will be free to build up as much cake as he likes.

I do admit a razor thin cake is not advisable for smoking outdoors in the wind.

Which is a good excuse to dig out the Missouri Meerschaums.

 

[didimauw]

I believe the cake helps keep the bowl from getting too hot, and keeps the tobacco from going out. Wether or not the last part is try I'm not really sure. Honestly I'm just lazy most of the time. But I do like me some cake. With my Grabow that I only smoked for a whole year, I reamed it when it started looking like this, which was about every 3 months.



Once it starts, it grows like a weed.

 

[Rockyrepose]

This thread will go down the water hole, ack it already did. I water flush and paper towel twizzel after I smoke so I maintain a minimal cake. Pipes smoke cool and fresh.

 

[HawkeyeLinus]

I clean out the chambers after each use. Don’t use my pipes with enough regularity to even contemplate worrying about building cake and I like them “clean”. One of the things I adopted reading all things “Harris” - find myself going back and reading more. When I first got on here I didn’t “get” him, haha, now I miss the entertainment.

 

[prairiedruid]

Thickness of a dime isn't 5 thousandths of an inch but 5 hundredths of an inch which is equal to 50 thousandths of an inch.

 

[telescopes]

Cake. It is important. I have come to believe that a dime's thickness is too much. Too much cake can lead to gluteny. That leads to bad things.

 

[mso489]

For me, the perfect cake is no cake at all, just the carbon coating. After I scoop out the ash, I wipe out the bowl with an abrasive paper towel. This maintains the diameter of the chamber, reduces ghosting almost to nil, and eliminates the wear and tear of reaming. I don't own a reamer. Over many years, it has kept my first pipe and all the rest in good shape and they all smoke well. I recommend it. However, if you love to build cake, carry on. Each to his or her own; the majority like their cake, I think.

 

[Briar Lee]

Thickness of a dime isn't 5 thousandths of an inch but 5 hundredths of an inch which is equal to 50 thousandths of an inch.

I stand corrected.

That’s why they recommended a dime’s thickness instead of so many thousands, folks like me messing up their fractional inches.

But while Harry Hosterman kept his lGrabows clean and slick as a whistle in the pocket of his Big Smith bib overalls, each one carefully reamed to the thickness of a dime, most other men I saw smoke a pipe were kinda slothful and let the cake build up to where they were essentially smoking a hand rolled cigarette in a pipe.

Harry Hosterman lit his pipes with a Zippo. He’d cut a tamper for them from an hickory sapling and he had a few real pipe tampers Wilda Mae and Nona Fern had given him. He’d relight and tamp his pipe, sometimes. He loved his pipes.

The other men used one little wooden match to light their smokes from a little penny box of matches. That was all they needed. They got their nicotine in a pipe.

Harry was a little older than my father, but his wife Wilda Mae was about my mother’s age and their daughter Nona Fern was about ten years older than me. My, did I like watching Nona Fern help my Mama and her Mama in the kitchen. When I was about two our mothers decided maybe I’d be easier potty trained if Wilda Mae lent Mama Nona Fern’s potty chair, and I was very happy to go sit on anything, that belonged to Nona Fern, I surely was.

Harry used to claim Wilda Mae bought him one can of Prince Albert a week.

But when I visited Wilda Mae’s house I noticed the women that loved Harry kept him well stocked with lots of big cans of Prince Albert, Velvet, Middleton’s Cherry Blend, Sir Walter Raleigh, Half and Half, and anything else they liked the smell of.

During wartime shortages Prince Albert advertised fifty pipes to a can, and seventy cigarretes.

And lots of ladies around to smell the aroma.



Sometimes I thought Harry only reamed his pipes, because the women who worshipped him liked watching him do it, you know?

 

[telescopes]

In the words of Marie, "Let them eat cake."

These words could have been amended to, "Let them smoke with cake."

Cake... it so peasant. Don't you think?

 

[FurCoat]

For me, the perfect cake is no cake at all, just the carbon coating. After I scoop out the ash, I wipe out the bowl with an abrasive paper towel. This maintains the diameter of the chamber, reduces ghosting almost to nil, and eliminates the wear and tear of reaming. I don't own a reamer. Over many years, it has kept my first pipe and all the rest in good shape and they all smoke well. I recommend it. However, if you love to build cake, carry on. Each to his or her own; the majority like their cake, I think.

This is exactly what I do.

 

[Briar Lee]

This thread will go down the water hole, ack it already did. I water flush and paper towel twizzel after I smoke so I maintain a minimal cake. Pipes smoke cool and fresh.

Water would serve to clean out the carbon residue as well as booze does.

The great advantage of water is that water is free, and available at your sink.

The advantage of using booze is that alcohol evaporates quicker than water, and I think it sweetens the pipe just a bit.

The great disadvantage of using booze is the tellers in the drive up liquor stores must think an old gray haired man is a heavy drinker, to buy Everclear by the fifth.

 

[Zeno Marx]

I only really mess with/worry about cake when I notice it getting uneven as I tamp or when the airhole becomes restricted or closed off. My days of fastidiousness are long gone. I'm grateful for that too, because I can take things too far and rob myself of the ease and joy of something. And when I do cut the cake, I use a Savinelli tri-knife, or whatever those things are called. I've never harmed a bowl wall with it. To be honest, I don't notice a flavor difference between cake and no cake. The only time I would swear to a flavor upbeat is when I get out the tube brush and dishwashing soap and scrub the airway clean, and I don't do that every time I cut a cake down to bare wall. Again, I'm too lazy to do that every time. When it fancies me, I do the scrub. For me, the scrub is the gamechanger, but if I did that every time I smoked, I'd stop smoking. I know for some, maintenance is fun or meditative or rewarding or something, but for me, it's straight hassle.

 

[Piping Abe]

I stand corrected.

That’s why they recommended a dime’s thickness instead of so many thousands, folks like me messing up their fractional inches.

But while Harry Hosterman kept his lGrabows clean and slick as a whistle in the pocket of his Big Smith bib overalls, each one carefully reamed to the thickness of a dime, most other men I saw smoke a pipe were kinda slothful and let the cake build up to where they were essentially smoking a hand rolled cigarette in a pipe.

Harry Hosterman lit his pipes with a Zippo. He’d cut a tamper for them from an hickory sapling and he had a few real pipe tampers Wilda Mae and Nona Fern had given him. He’d relight and tamp his pipe, sometimes. He loved his pipes.

The other men used one little wooden match to light their smokes from a little penny box of matches. That was all they needed. They got their nicotine in a pipe.

Harry was a little older than my father, but his wife Wilda Mae was about my mother’s age and their daughter Nona Fern was about ten years older than me. My, did I like watching Nona Fern help my Mama and her Mama in the kitchen. When I was about two our mothers decided maybe I’d be easier potty trained if Wilda Mae lent Mama Nona Fern’s potty chair, and I was very happy to go sit on anything, that belonged to Nona Fern, I surely was.

Harry used to claim Wilda Mae bought him one can of Prince Albert a week.

But when I visited Wilda Mae’s house I noticed the women that loved Harry kept him well stocked with lots of big cans of Prince Albert, Velvet, Middleton’s Cherry Blend, Sir Walter Raleigh, Half and Half, and anything else they liked the smell of.

During wartime shortages Prince Albert advertised fifty pipes to a can, and seventy cigarretes.

And lots of ladies around to smell the aroma.

View attachment 200163View attachment 200164View attachment 200165

Sometimes I thought Harry only reamed his pipes, because the women who worshipped him liked watching him do it, you know?

Mr. Hosterman sounds like a true Dr. Grabow man. I would buy a book if one was written about him.

 

[didimauw]

I stand corrected.

That’s why they recommended a dime’s thickness instead of so many thousands, folks like me messing up their fractional inches.

But while Harry Hosterman kept his lGrabows clean and slick as a whistle in the pocket of his Big Smith bib overalls, each one carefully reamed to the thickness of a dime, most other men I saw smoke a pipe were kinda slothful and let the cake build up to where they were essentially smoking a hand rolled cigarette in a pipe.

Harry Hosterman lit his pipes with a Zippo. He’d cut a tamper for them from an hickory sapling and he had a few real pipe tampers Wilda Mae and Nona Fern had given him. He’d relight and tamp his pipe, sometimes. He loved his pipes.

The other men used one little wooden match to light their smokes from a little penny box of matches. That was all they needed. They got their nicotine in a pipe.

Harry was a little older than my father, but his wife Wilda Mae was about my mother’s age and their daughter Nona Fern was about ten years older than me. My, did I like watching Nona Fern help my Mama and her Mama in the kitchen. When I was about two our mothers decided maybe I’d be easier potty trained if Wilda Mae lent Mama Nona Fern’s potty chair, and I was very happy to go sit on anything, that belonged to Nona Fern, I surely was.

Harry used to claim Wilda Mae bought him one can of Prince Albert a week.

But when I visited Wilda Mae’s house I noticed the women that loved Harry kept him well stocked with lots of big cans of Prince Albert, Velvet, Middleton’s Cherry Blend, Sir Walter Raleigh, Half and Half, and anything else they liked the smell of.

During wartime shortages Prince Albert advertised fifty pipes to a can, and seventy cigarretes.

And lots of ladies around to smell the aroma.

View attachment 200163View attachment 200164View attachment 200165

Sometimes I thought Harry only reamed his pipes, because the women who worshipped him liked watching him do it, you know?

Why did Harry, wilda and Nona all have different last names?

 

[bullet08]

I prefer pie or muffins.

 

[Briar Lee]

Why did Harry, wilda and Nona all have different last names?

If Harry had a middle name I never heard it.

He had a son named Alva that I never heard his middle name.

But his wife was Wilda Mae Hosterman and his daughter Nona Fern Hosterman.

All these scenes took place in sight of Bug Tussle, about a half mile to the north.

Home of Ella Mae Clampett.

My mother was the inspiration for Ella Mae Clampett, in the weekly series in The Index written by my grandmother Ma Agee.

It made Mama sort of angry they used a cheap generic blonde like Donna Douglas to play the part.

None of those women needed, to dye their hair blonde.

 

[AppalachianPipe92]

I tend to keep mine pretty dadgum clean. I wouldn't really consider it a cake, more of a thick bowl coating. Maybe I'm in the wrong, but this has been my method for a couple years now.

 

[sablebrush52]

To me, the perfect cake is a thin hard layer of carbon.

 

[Briar Lee]

To me, the perfect cake is a thin hard layer of carbon.

That is essentially what I leave, myself.

Just a whisper of cake, as little as possible.

When you ponder the mystery, the carbon in the cake on a pipe is the same as a piece of pure coal. It’s flammable, yet it doesn’t burn.

A thicker cake must act as a heat sink.

But the carbon cake is more porous than the briar. It scrapes off easier, leaving just the briar.

Yet just a trace, smooths the smoke.

Why, is beyond my reasoning.

 

[OzPiper]

The perfect cake ?
A light buttery madelaine straight out of the oven
Simple and unadorned
Heavenly with a glass of Mosel auslese at afternoon tea