What's The Next Extinct Or Impossible Blend To FInd?

[lucky695]

I get the emails from Esoterica, but even if I set an alert and IMMEDIATELY go to whichever website emailed, Panzance or Stonehaven is already sold out... EVERY DAMN TIME. Not worth my trouble anymore really. So my question is, given the current tobacco climate, what is the blend we should be stocking up on while it's still avail. Any insider info welcome.

 

[mso489]

I take it with a twist of humor here. With the lavish numbers of available blends, longstanding and newly emerging or revived, these longings for what is scarce seem a little forlorn. I think it is the pleasure of attaining the scarce and rare here. I think ten percent of pipe smokers really savor that, so I take it as a sport and not as a neurosis. But for those of us who feel we should be running around after the unavailable blend of the month but don't want to do that, I'd say we should just relax and enjoy all of the many totally available excellent blends from G.L. Pease, Cornell & Diehl, McClelland, Russ, Mac Baren, Nat Sherman, Lane, Peter Stokkebye, Low Country, and so on.

 

[frozenchurchwarden]

All of them...
(I'm sitting here laughing as I type this. It's probably true, but still humorous given the context.)

 

[mso489]

frozen', I guess I meant our choices among all of the available blends, but I like ambition of thinking in terms of all of them. A few Forums members seem to be close to enjoying all of them. I ain't among them.

 

[warren]

Most likely whichever blends you really want to try will be the ones you can't get.
My suggestion is to try a few blends, find one you really like and then do not, under any circumstances, extol the virtues of the blend to other pipe smokers. Keep it to yourself and enjoy, that is until some schmuck stumbles on to it and touts its virtues on the forum.

 

[frozenchurchwarden]

Warren, it depends, sharing my love of Ennerdale and Frosty Mint with the world probably won't affect supplies.

Which probably has something to do with why I like it so much (the contrarian nature runs strong in my family).

 

[newbroom]

Mixture 79. Stock up NOW. How it is still available beats me.

 

[Chasing Embers]

Anything with Syrian latakia in it.

 

[iamn8]

Good call CM! I keep forgetting about that fact. There can't possibly be that much left.

 

[Chasing Embers]

Vintage Syrian, and Mcclelland's Syrian blends are all excellent choices for cellaring.

 

[lostandfound]

I for one, am getting extremely tired of hearing about Esoterica, and other nearly impossible to find tobaccos. I swear- the people who are this infatuated with Esoterica, are hobbyist pipers, who just bought their first pipe, and will end up selling it off a year from now, because they couldn't find any Penzance, and piping just ain't that great if you can't obtain hard to acquire tobaccos.
This might be a foreign fucking concept to some of you, but how about we find some tobaccos we actually like, and start smoking them BECAUSE we like them? Not because some wordsmith on the internet convinced us that we're missing out on some kind of holy tobacco or something.
I'm going to start hoarding ODF now, so I can sell it at 300% market value later. Screw you if you're living on a fixed income, and ODF is your favorite smoke.
Rant over. Please pardon my French.

 

[iamn8]

Dang L&F, bitter much? I for one love the stuff. What's with all the rage?

 

[stickframer]

I think I know where you're coming from LF. The reason I like to cellar stuff is because prices will only go up, and it will taste good in x years. There are endless good tobaccos readily available. I'd like to cellar with the thought of consuming what I buy rather than selling it later. It would be cool to maybe trade tin for tin with some fellow Canucks.
Anyway +1 on syrian. There are a few tasty blends with that leaf around.

 

[beezer]

Stock up on the blends that periodically are out of stock and that you never ever see on sale. So in essence go for the heralded blends put out by the smaller dogs. In my opinion the little guys will be the first to disappear once the times get tough(er) for pipe tobacco manufacturers.
If you like any of the popular blends produced by Fribourg & Treyer and Wessex that might be a decent place to start.
I like the comments about syrian not being available down the road and I've stockpiled a ton of HH Vintage Syrian, but I do wonder whether the stuff will fade excessively years from now and lose the qualities I love about it now. Just something to consider when hoarding latakia heavy blends I suppose.

 

[mranglophile]

I stockpile what I like...I am sure people thought Edgeworth would be around forever, and Balkan Sobranie or even Dunhill but the old timers have seen them all come and go. If you want to be like Beefeater with all that wonderful Dunhill then stock what you like now and wont be disapointed in years future. I bet you will never see a post from Foggymountain about running out of Bombay Court even if McClelland closed today
As for the Syrian...I would rather have it in 5 years and be a little mellowed than not have it at all...just my 2 cents.

 

[stickframer]

Beezer I think about syrian fading as well. And it's already pretty well aged at blending from what I gather. I've heard of latakia blends being okay anywhere from 5 to nearly 20 years from online reading. But I can't speak from experience. I've also read that a heavier amount of lat will be more noticeable after x years than a smaller amount, which makes sense.
Edit: patiently waiting for 2020

 

[sablebrush52]

If you particularly like the taste of Syrian Latakia, put some away. Mac Baren estimates that they have about a 4 year supply left. When it's gone, it's gone.
As for the two star Esoterica blends, it is what it is. People hoard the stuff. I don't like Penzance, which accounts for my having some 8 year old stock. A few bowls convinced me that it wasn't a flavor profile that I liked. Others love it. I have a few pounds of it for trading, sharing at my pipe club, and for sharing with others who never seem to get a break due to the obsessive hoarders. It's my quaint way of giving the finger to hoarders who have more than they've going to live long enough to smoke, and can't stop adding to the pile. I don't smoke it myself. Which reminds me that I have a few promises to keep that I haven't gotten around to fulfilling.
I like Stonehaven, but it's not the end all, be all, and I share that one as well when I happen upon more. I also find that I enjoy it much more when I smoke it only occasionally. Too much familiarity breeds boredom.
I'll take St Bruno, which is an OTC in England, over any of this other stuff.
For me there's nothing out there that's worth obsessing over because there are so many excellent blends.
I do agree with the notion that people are competitive and bring that characteristic to hoarding cellaring. So we see the result of competition cellaring in the scarcity of certain blends.
We all look for something to value in our lives. And if there's nothing more meaningful else, then a cellar stocked with hard to find tobacco blends will do.

 

[derfatdutchman]

Newbroom you beat me to it!

 

[dmcmtk]

Stock up on what you like...It's kind of simple, no?

 

[scrooge]

John Aylesbury luxury flake. I can't get it. would pay premium I think.