Thank you!
Head-to-head tobacco choices
- Thread starter AimlessWanderer
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Hirsute
Used to have fun with Commander Yellow Pantyhose
They’re both excellent blends and I enjoy them both. The biggest difference to me is that the McConnell tastes like a Virginia based blend heavy on a mix of orientals with a mild amount of Latakia, and the Skiff Mix really leads with the Turkish and the Latakia. They’re both in the same family and have similar components, but they’re combined in different amounts so they come off different. McConnell has more body and complexity, so it’s usually my choice.Thanks for the correction, Micah. I was under the impression that the Peterson version was identical to Escudo. That's the damn internet misleading me again
Tell me more about the McConnell Oriental please. It's the only blend on the list I don't actually have yet. How similar is it to Skiff?
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- #23
AimlessWanderer
Remember to forget me!
Thank you! That sounds exactly what I'd hoped Skiff would be
Skiff kinda needs to back off a bit for me. A very nice occasional smoke, but too tart to face down a full tin. The last time I got some, I think I ended up mixing part of it to tone those orientals down. Obviously, splitting the tins into four Mylar pouches, as I now do, will help with that. I've got some ageing to see what kind of a difference that makes, but the McConnell sounds more up my street.
I found 1820 and Penzance dissimilar; however, I sold my unopened portions of both but kept Robert McConnell Oriental.
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- #25
AimlessWanderer
Remember to forget me!
Was it the ribbon cut 1820, or the flake? I have only smoked the flake to date (which disintegrates into a rubbed form, pretty much as soon as you look at it). From what I can glean online, the "mixture" is quite different. Only the mixture is available here in tins. The flake is bought loose.
Mixture in tins.
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- #27
AimlessWanderer
Remember to forget me!
Yeah, very different beasties then, I think.
Here's two sellers pics from the same website. Big difference in colour between mix and flake.
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- #28
AimlessWanderer
Remember to forget me!
Edit: Deleted - wrong thread
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- #28
AimlessWanderer
Remember to forget me!
I've been spending a couple of days with these two tobaccos, smoked in each of these two pipes.
The Virginia Flake is a year old, and the Navy Rolls two years. This was my first time smoking either blend, of any age. In the Parker Bent Panel, I folded and stuffed the flakes and coins, but rubbed both out for smoking in the Ben Wade Reader Lightweight.
Both of these are well respected blend, and both gave a very pleasant smoke. In their current condition though, neither of them particularly wowed me.
The Navy Rolls has a distinctly more pronounced Perique content, but the Virginia tobaccos still seem young. There's kind of a gap where the Virginia should sit when they mature, but they're not there yet. Just a kind of sharpness, diluting the Perique to the correct level, but not surrounding and adding to it.
The Virginia in the Solani blend is more developed. Still mild, and suggesting that it's not fully matured yet, but this definitely tasted like a Virginia blend, rather than just diluted Perique. In this blend, the Perique is more of a whisper, than the statement in the Navy Rolls. It barely seems like a VaPer at all to me, and i thing they were right tp just call it Virginia Flake .
I tend to smoke Perique blends in different pipes to what I smoke plain Virginias in. The Solani is a blend that I might actually choose to smoke with my Virginia pipes, and my head is leaning towards classifying the blend more as a Virginia than a VaPer.
So in a head to head, which wins? For me, neither at the minute, although I'd be leaning more towards the Solani. However, right now, I would rather reach fpr Gawith Hoggarth No.27 Perique Flake than either of them it has the slightly more developed Virginia taste of the Solani, with a Perique level somewhere between these two blends.
Obviously, all three with change over time (as will the other VaPers in stock), and I wouldn't like to predict which might be the favourite in three or four years. Most of these two tins have now been transferred to Mylar bags, and there's two more tins of each in the stash too. I think that in time, I will like them, and be glad to have aged them, but for the meantime, my attentions will be elsewhere.
The Virginia Flake is a year old, and the Navy Rolls two years. This was my first time smoking either blend, of any age. In the Parker Bent Panel, I folded and stuffed the flakes and coins, but rubbed both out for smoking in the Ben Wade Reader Lightweight.
Both of these are well respected blend, and both gave a very pleasant smoke. In their current condition though, neither of them particularly wowed me.
The Navy Rolls has a distinctly more pronounced Perique content, but the Virginia tobaccos still seem young. There's kind of a gap where the Virginia should sit when they mature, but they're not there yet. Just a kind of sharpness, diluting the Perique to the correct level, but not surrounding and adding to it.
The Virginia in the Solani blend is more developed. Still mild, and suggesting that it's not fully matured yet, but this definitely tasted like a Virginia blend, rather than just diluted Perique. In this blend, the Perique is more of a whisper, than the statement in the Navy Rolls. It barely seems like a VaPer at all to me, and i thing they were right tp just call it Virginia Flake .
I tend to smoke Perique blends in different pipes to what I smoke plain Virginias in. The Solani is a blend that I might actually choose to smoke with my Virginia pipes, and my head is leaning towards classifying the blend more as a Virginia than a VaPer.
So in a head to head, which wins? For me, neither at the minute, although I'd be leaning more towards the Solani. However, right now, I would rather reach fpr Gawith Hoggarth No.27 Perique Flake than either of them it has the slightly more developed Virginia taste of the Solani, with a Perique level somewhere between these two blends.
Obviously, all three with change over time (as will the other VaPers in stock), and I wouldn't like to predict which might be the favourite in three or four years. Most of these two tins have now been transferred to Mylar bags, and there's two more tins of each in the stash too. I think that in time, I will like them, and be glad to have aged them, but for the meantime, my attentions will be elsewhere.
Hirsute
Used to have fun with Commander Yellow Pantyhose
To me, perique can take on a couple of different characteristics. In some blends, it's sharp and peppery (kind of a white pepper note) and you definitely notice it. In other blends, it give more of a savory meaty character--think beef jerky or braised lamb shanks. And with age, the pepper fades and goes toward the savory side. The Solani definitely is more of the savory character, and the Deluxe Rolls is more of the pepper.
