Thuoc Lao Tien Lang Vietnamese Tobacco

[PipeIT]

 

[jpberg]

At $230us after shipping I’m going to wait until I’m back home next year before taking one for the team.

@jpberg how does it compare strength/flavour wise to tambo?

Take it with a grain of salt, because this is only me;
Tambolaka hit me good and hard, nic hit hiccups, a bit of the spinners, etc.
All good stuff.
Mapacho affected my digestive system. That’s the nicest way I can say it.
I really liked it, it I don’t know if I’ll ever smoke it again.

 

[Ahi Ka]

Take it with a grain of salt, because this is only me;
Tambolaka hit me good and hard, nic hit hiccups, a bit of the spinners, etc.
All good stuff.
Mapacho affected my digestive system. That’s the nicest way I can say it.
I really liked it, it I don’t know if I’ll ever smoke it again.

Good to know. Sounds like it’s time for you to get hold of some Rapa Nui tobacco.

 

[Brendan]

@Ahi Ka - You're not trying to kill him are you?

 

[LongIslandPiper]

@MisterBadger talk about taking one for the team. I don’t think anyone will ask any more of your services for a while. You’ve earned a respite
Great review though

 

[mingc]

I am traveling with my wife (of 32 years) and she speaks Vietnamese fluently. I will be exploring all the possibilities of bulk tobacco in the region, which I will take back to the States with me and attempt to blend. Should be an adventure. On a side note, thanks to Ahi Ka's encouragement (and not so subtle pushing)... I will be growing my own tobacco in 2025.

Whoa, growing thuốc lào in California. That'll be a hoot!

 

[MisterBadger]

Right... for other members of the Pipe Forums lunatic fringe, here's an update on my adventures with the stinking Indo-Chinese sotweed...

I infused half an ounce or so three weeks ago, in a Tupperware container with a tot of Navy rum placed in the middle. This muted the awful taste and aroma but made it so damp I had to tin-dry a couple of pipefuls for a couple of days. After that, it was still awful - underneath the rum I could still taste the burnt chicken left too long on the barbecue, the boiled cabbage and the blocked drains bouquet, but not half as bad as before infusing, and it still needed several relights.

I then tried one third Thuoc Lao mixed with two thirds Tabac Manil Semois La Volute, hoping the strong cigar-like taste would vanquish it. It did, somewhat, and the easy combustability of the Semois did encourage the Thuoc Lao to stay lit - the char-light lasted for the first quarter of the bowl.

Even so, the persistent acridity of the Thuoc Lao still came through, so that the mix tasted and smelled woody, green and sharp-sour like an autumn bonfire, defeating the mellowness of the Semois Burley..

If I ever do this again, I shall only sprinkle a pinch or two, well dried, into a loading of some strongly-flavoured but nicotine-low blend I want to strengthen somewhat.

What else can one reasonably expect of an uncouth rustica that is grown only for its afficionados to get a fast nicotine rush without regard for taste or aroma? Even diluted in a mix, it made me, a fairly nicotine-tolerant smoker, stoned and temporarily unfit for anything useful for an hour or two, and the foul mouth taste just isn't worth the high.

What else to say? It pairs horribly with black coffee, and if this is the same or similar to the stuff that Gudang Garam is made with, I'm not surprised the Indonesians lace it heavily with ground cloves.

Sotweed: that's the only name for it.

 

[Ahi Ka]

In the interests of science and research with integrity, you need to at least try smoking the aforementioned sotweed through water.

How to Make a Bong: 12 Steps (with Pictures) - wikiHow

Buying a new bong can be expensive. Fortunately, you can make your own bong at home using some cheap, basic supplies! With the right tools and a little bit of time on your hands, you'll have a fully functioning bong in no time. Fill up a...

www.wikihow.com

 

[MisterBadger]

In the interests of science and research with integrity, you need to at least try smoking the aforementioned sotweed through water.

How to Make a Bong: 12 Steps (with Pictures) - wikiHow

Buying a new bong can be expensive. Fortunately, you can make your own bong at home using some cheap, basic supplies! With the right tools and a little bit of time on your hands, you'll have a fully functioning bong in no time. Fill up a...

www.wikihow.com

I learned how to manufacture those wicked things during my largely mis-spent youth. But smoking tobacco through one will be a novelty, at least

 

[Ahi Ka]

The last time I went to smoke Thuoc Lao my friend decided to fill the bamboo pipe with champagne instead of water. I have never seen someone hit the floor so fast. I decided in that moment I was content with my pipe

 

[jpberg]

Right... for other members of the Pipe Forums lunatic fringe, here's an update on my adventures with the stinking Indo-Chinese sotweed...

I infused half an ounce or so three weeks ago, in a Tupperware container with a tot of Navy rum placed in the middle. This muted the awful taste and aroma but made it so damp I had to tin-dry a couple of pipefuls for a couple of days. After that, it was still awful - underneath the rum I could still taste the burnt chicken left too long on the barbecue, the boiled cabbage and the blocked drains bouquet, but not half as bad as before infusing, and it still needed several relights.

I then tried one third Thuoc Lao mixed with two thirds Tabac Manil Semois La Volute, hoping the strong cigar-like taste would vanquish it. It did, somewhat, and the easy combustability of the Semois did encourage the Thuoc Lao to stay lit - the char-light lasted for the first quarter of the bowl.

Even so, the persistent acridity of the Thuoc Lao still came through, so that the mix tasted and smelled woody, green and sharp-sour like an autumn bonfire, defeating the mellowness of the Semois Burley..

If I ever do this again, I shall only sprinkle a pinch or two, well dried, into a loading of some strongly-flavoured but nicotine-low blend I want to strengthen somewhat.

What else can one reasonably expect of an uncouth rustica that is grown only for its afficionados to get a fast nicotine rush without regard for taste or aroma? Even diluted in a mix, it made me, a fairly nicotine-tolerant smoker, stoned and temporarily unfit for anything useful for an hour or two, and the foul mouth taste just isn't worth the high.

What else to say? It pairs horribly with black coffee, and if this is the same or similar to the stuff that Gudang Garam is made with, I'm not surprised the Indonesians lace it heavily with ground cloves.

Sotweed: that's the only name for it.

That is a great review. Well done.

 

[Harsh_Smoke]

This is the infamous, almost legendary Vietnamese weed, supposedly a Rusticana variety packing three times the nicotine punch of US and African tobaccos, and of which not very much information that's useful to a pipe smoker is available on the internet. It's sold in the UK by a very small number of speciality East Asian grocery stores, in 100-gram ziplock packs, attractively priced at about one-third of any regular pipe tobacco.

An initial disappointment on seeing the bag when delivered, is that it is a fine cut shag, like a hand rolling cigarette tobacco. The leaf is a more or less uniform dark brown, the colour of dark, plain chocolate. The bag note that greets the nose on opening is grassy but like old barn hay that's about to moulder.

Bearing in mind the warnings from many sources about just how strong this weed is, I selected a small-bowled Meerschaum for a test smoke. It was too easy to pack it too tightly, the fine cut compacting easily in the bowl - and I did use more pressure than I normally would, fearing that, because of its fine cut, it would burn hot. I needn't have worried about that: even to char, it needed several lights, which not even the soggiest Gawith and Hoggarth blends straight out of the tin require.

The first few puffs - never more than about three, in between relights - offered first a taste of mouldy hay, quickly developing into a discord of acrid notes like a chicken leg that's been burned on the barbecue.

Despite several interventions with the Czech pipe multitool, at no time did the bowl stay lit long enough for me to establish a regular smoking cadence, but even so, there was no detectable tongue bite. That was almost unfortunate, because my taste buds continued able to savour that burned chicken-skin taste without any desensitisation.

The nicotine hit was there all right. I've never crumbled a cigarette butt and an old cigar stub into a pipe to smoke, but when I did manage to taste the tobacco it suggested strongly that the experience would be very similar. It reminded me of a really nasty, cheap Virginia. This weed has clearly neither been cased nor topped with anything at all, and If ever a tobacco deserved to be flavoured with Tonquin bean or Deer Tongue - this would be it.

Two thirds of the way down the bowl, the burnt chicken-skin miasma was joined by a hint of cabbage and the fleeting notion that the old, cheap cigar stub had been mixed with a little rose petal pot-pourri - but the chicken that had been forgotten and left on the grill too long, predominated.

I can confidently say that, of all the tobaccos I have ever smoked, this was the most unsatisfying yet nicotine-high smoke I've ever had, but with Gawith's 1792 Flake coming a close second. If there were no other tobaccos left in the world, and with a choice of only these two, the 1792 would be the tobacco of choice every time.

Why, one might ask, is this unattractive, rough beast sold in the UK at all? Well, I can only imagine that there are some long-term Vietnamese expatriates who long for a taste of The Old Country, much as a Sri Lankan expat treats himself to the occasional bottle of coconut toddy, a vile concoction that looks like old washing-up water, smells like a blocked drain and kicks like a Mocow Mule.

To be fair, Thuoc Lao isn't designed to hold a light or be smoked in a pipe, of course: Vietnamese folk smoke it in a bamboo bong, filling their lungs from a single fill of a tiny bowl, in one mighty blast, burned up in a single light, and take delight in the sight of foreign tourists taking a big, long toke then falling over. But if I were going to assault my lungs withthe smoke, I'd want to cut it first with dried peppermint leaves.

I'm writing this about an hour after the smoke and I'm still stoned from the nicotine, but not in a good way: with no pleasant taste or continuity, the nicotine hit was not at all relaxing. The taste is still with me, even after drinking a pint of Rooibos tea to try and wash it away.

And the room note? Imagine an old heap of grass cuttings which has overheated and started to smoulder.

So... I still have about 98 grams of the stuff left: what am I to do with it? Would it benefit at all from an infusion of rum? I may try. Will I perhaps keep it to enliven some blends I like that are deliciously mellow and complex in taste, but are too weak on the nicotine for my liking? I may try this, too, taking care that there's not enough in the mix for the charred chicken to come through. But I shall also be happy to dispense it in 5-gram sample bags to anyone in UK who cares to PM me their mailing address and wants to be able to say they've tried it.

As Jim Inks, master of euphemism, might say: "Has a few rough edges. Not an all day smoke.".

Perhaps not even a pipe smoke at all.

I think it is smoked just for the buzz.

 

[Humblepipe]

I'm back from Southeast Asia. Alas, never stumbled upon this "good stuff" (insert sarcasm here). Of course, my wife, brother-in-law, and sister-in-law were in tow the entire trip... so I did not have as much free time to explore independently as I thought I would have. All good though! It was a blast.

 

[Singularis]

You need to create a YouTube of this experience and title it I SMOKED THIS CRAZY STRONG TOBACCO FROM VIETNAM SO YOU DIDNT HAVE TO

 

[Harsh_Smoke]

This is the infamous, almost legendary Vietnamese weed, supposedly a Rusticana variety packing three times the nicotine punch of US and African tobaccos, and of which not very much information that's useful to a pipe smoker is available on the internet. It's sold in the UK by a very small number of speciality East Asian grocery stores, in 100-gram ziplock packs, attractively priced at about one-third of any regular pipe tobacco.

An initial disappointment on seeing the bag when delivered, is that it is a fine cut shag, like a hand rolling cigarette tobacco. The leaf is a more or less uniform dark brown, the colour of dark, plain chocolate. The bag note that greets the nose on opening is grassy but like old barn hay that's about to moulder.

Bearing in mind the warnings from many sources about just how strong this weed is, I selected a small-bowled Meerschaum for a test smoke. It was too easy to pack it too tightly, the fine cut compacting easily in the bowl - and I did use more pressure than I normally would, fearing that, because of its fine cut, it would burn hot. I needn't have worried about that: even to char, it needed several lights, which not even the soggiest Gawith and Hoggarth blends straight out of the tin require.

The first few puffs - never more than about three, in between relights - offered first a taste of mouldy hay, quickly developing into a discord of acrid notes like a chicken leg that's been burned on the barbecue.

Despite several interventions with the Czech pipe multitool, at no time did the bowl stay lit long enough for me to establish a regular smoking cadence, but even so, there was no detectable tongue bite. That was almost unfortunate, because my taste buds continued able to savour that burned chicken-skin taste without any desensitisation.

The nicotine hit was there all right. I've never crumbled a cigarette butt and an old cigar stub into a pipe to smoke, but when I did manage to taste the tobacco it suggested strongly that the experience would be very similar. It reminded me of a really nasty, cheap Virginia. This weed has clearly neither been cased nor topped with anything at all, and If ever a tobacco deserved to be flavoured with Tonquin bean or Deer Tongue - this would be it.

Two thirds of the way down the bowl, the burnt chicken-skin miasma was joined by a hint of cabbage and the fleeting notion that the old, cheap cigar stub had been mixed with a little rose petal pot-pourri - but the chicken that had been forgotten and left on the grill too long, predominated.

I can confidently say that, of all the tobaccos I have ever smoked, this was the most unsatisfying yet nicotine-high smoke I've ever had, but with Gawith's 1792 Flake coming a close second. If there were no other tobaccos left in the world, and with a choice of only these two, the 1792 would be the tobacco of choice every time.

Why, one might ask, is this unattractive, rough beast sold in the UK at all? Well, I can only imagine that there are some long-term Vietnamese expatriates who long for a taste of The Old Country, much as a Sri Lankan expat treats himself to the occasional bottle of coconut toddy, a vile concoction that looks like old washing-up water, smells like a blocked drain and kicks like a Mocow Mule.

To be fair, Thuoc Lao isn't designed to hold a light or be smoked in a pipe, of course: Vietnamese folk smoke it in a bamboo bong, filling their lungs from a single fill of a tiny bowl, in one mighty blast, burned up in a single light, and take delight in the sight of foreign tourists taking a big, long toke then falling over. But if I were going to assault my lungs withthe smoke, I'd want to cut it first with dried peppermint leaves.

I'm writing this about an hour after the smoke and I'm still stoned from the nicotine, but not in a good way: with no pleasant taste or continuity, the nicotine hit was not at all relaxing. The taste is still with me, even after drinking a pint of Rooibos tea to try and wash it away.

And the room note? Imagine an old heap of grass cuttings which has overheated and started to smoulder.
very
So... I still have about 98 grams of the stuff left: what am I to do with it? Would it benefit at all from an infusion of rum? I may try. Will I perhaps keep it to enliven some blends I like that are deliciously mellow and complex in taste, but are too weak on the nicotine for my liking? I may try this, too, taking care that there's not enough in the mix for the charred chicken to come through. But I shall also be happy to dispense it in 5-gram sample bags to anyone in UK who cares to PM me their mailing address and wants to be able to say they've tried it.

As Jim Inks, master of euphemism, might say: "Has a few rough edges. Not an all day smoke.".

Perhaps not even a pipe smoke at all.

I would not smoke this stuff. However it will make a very powerful and possibly dangerous insecticide. Soak about an ounce in a gallon of water for a few days. Strain and put in a sprayer. DISCLAIMER: This stuff is extremely toxic. Kills everything, not just bugs, but birds, fish and you if you ingest it. Best just left alone. If you want to get high, just some strong Burley.

 

[woodsroad]

You need to create a YouTube of this experience and title it I SMOKED THIS CRAZY STRONG TOBACCO FROM VIETNAM SO YOU DIDNT HAVE TO

I FOUND THIS RARE HAND-MADE ABANDONED TOBACCO! WHAT HAPPENED NEXT WILL HORRIFY YOU!

or

VIETNAM’S REVENGE! FAFO TOBACCO IN FOR THE K*LL! “WORSE THAN PUNJI STICKS” VET SAYS!

 

[georged]

I FOUND THIS RARE HAND-MADE ABANDONED TOBACCO! WHAT HAPPENED NEXT WILL HORRIFY YOU!

or

VIETNAM’S REVENGE! FAFO TOBACCO IN FOR THE K*LL! “WORSE THAN PUNJI STICKS” VET SAYS!

You missed your calling.

Should have been a supermarket tabloid headline writer until the Interweb came along, then a social media clickbait headline writer.

You'd be a billionaire by now.

 

[woodsroad]

“Head Had AIDS”

Story in The Trentonian (NJ) about dismembered body.

 

[BingBong]

The BBC won, for me, with a 2004 headline "Lightning man's trousers ruined".

 

[JoburgB2]

I would not smoke this stuff. However it will make a very powerful and possibly dangerous insecticide. Soak about an ounce in a gallon of water for a few days. Strain and put in a sprayer. DISCLAIMER: This stuff is extremely toxic. Kills everything, not just bugs, but birds, fish and you if you ingest it. Best just left alone. If you want to get high, just some strong Burley.

Yes I believe you.
Post in thread 'Your Own "Worst" Tobacco'
Your Own "Worst" Tobacco :: Pipe Tobacco Reviews - https://pipesmagazine.com/forums/threads/your-own-worst-tobacco.105380/post-37102019