I love how every thread, where someone asks for opinions on pipe tobacco, ends in a full-blown demonstration that everyone’s sense of taste is unique.
Every pipe is unique as well. I've tried blends I thought were garbage until I tried them in a different pipe that suited them.
In my early days of pipe smoking I only had the one pipe and I tried various things until I found something I liked. This time round, a born-again pipe smoker, I've rapidly built up a collection of pipes and I wasn't prepared for just how radically different pipes effect the smoking experience of the same tobacco, even when they're clean and rested with no hint of ghosting. Even when new come to that.
My first pipe this time round was a Barling Trafalgar and it seemed to cope with most blends well. But when I tried my favourite GH Coffee and Caramel in it, it tasted of nothing at all. In my Rattray's Distillery and Savinelli Miele it's lovely stuff.
It's like rifles and factory ammo. You can have two rifles of the same make, model and chambering and one will for example, tack-drive Federal but spray Winchester all over the place and the other does the opposite. I'm finding pipes the same. Not surprising perhaps. Each rifle barrel is a one-off and so is each pipe bowl.
So when I try a new blend I buy at least two ounces and make sure I try it in several pipes before passing judgement.