New Pipe Smoker With A Question? Ask an Old Fart

[Curly Cut]

Originally Posted by spectrrr

I picked up a two cobs in Albany last month and have been smoking just those two almost exclusively so that I can get a better feel for the tobacco and smoking techniques, without wondering if it was "the pipe" that didn't work that night.

Anyway, last night I had one that didn't work, but I'm not sure why.

SYMPTOMS: STEAMY tasting smoke, still had "most" of the flavor, but it seemed a little watery and very steamy. It was NOT blisteringly hot (maybe a tad warm), just steamy, which made the flavors go all to hell.

FACTS: strait cob pipe, aromatic tobacco blend, held in sample baggy and tupperware for 2 months. Tobacco left out on the desk for 15-20 minutes to dry out a little bit before loading the pipe (been doing that with most bowls lately). Pipe load was decent quality, I feel that i have at least gotten fairly consistent with my loads (they're not the best, but they are reproducible).

So basically I'm trying to figure out if that tobacco doesn't like that pipe, if that tobacco is just bad, if it was over/under humidified, etc.

if it's one of those really gooey, "cherries jubilee" type aromatics you get from a large jar at the local shop, then you could leave it out to dry for 15-20 days and it'll still be too moist.
no lie, i had about 8oz of stuff called "peach cobbler" that i had bought my dad way back in '00 or '01. i had some as well, kept it in a very poor sealing ceramic jar that never kept anything moist before... 6 years later, that stuff was still too moist to smoke.

it's got a good amount of "PG" added to it, like the stuff they tell you to add to the foam humidfying things in a cigar humidor. the stuff never goes dry.