Virginia/Perique (VaPer) Showdown

Great review on the Waccamaw! I have one sealed tin from '07 I bought a couple weeks back, and just bought the rest of Buckeye Jack's open tin from '07! I've been wanting to try it out since the opportunity came up a few weeks back to buy the sealed tin from the other site. Well that and this showdown thread, and many honorable mentions of it in other threads!

When the opened tin comes I'll get the chance to try it out, and I get to keep my sealed tin sealed up! Win win!

I've also got a deal working with another member here that will get us both some Anniversary Kake and AJ's VaPer to try out also due to this thread..

The more I think about it, your really starting to cost me some $$$ Slow_Triathlete!! All in good fun!

[Nick]

Wow man you sure are making it hard for me to not open my tin of Waccamaw. I think after class I might do something foolish or wise.

I live Izmir it is my favorite coupled with a nice Virginia, so I am pretty much buying any tobacco that has Izmir in it.

Maybe I'll do an Izmir showdown to couple with this.

Great reviews, I always like to go back and re-read.

[Slow Triathlete]

Glad I can help with your corruption!!

[Nick]

Not corruption, you are adding to my confliction.

[Curly Cut]

hey scott, Izmir is an "Oriental" tobacco.

I move to strike this from your Showdown on the technicality that it's not a true Va/Per!!!

i do believe you need to try Peter Heinrichs Curly Cut. lemme know if you need some.

[Nick]

Originally Posted by Curly Cut

hey scott, Izmir is an "Oriental" tobacco.

Yes but it's delicious.

[Slow Triathlete]

Originally Posted by Curly Cut

i do believe you need to try Peter Heinrichs Curly Cut. lemme know if you need some.

Trying to find it online but no one seems to have it. Any help?

[Curly Cut]

Originally Posted by Slow Triathlete

Trying to find it online but no one seems to have it. Any help?

i can send you a sample. haven't found it online either. someone said something about on another board, dangit, but i can't find it right now.

[Slow Triathlete]

Found this on another site but everyone is sold out:


It can be found at:

http://www.paylesspipes.com/items.ph...=4&styleid=126

http://www.marscigars.com/peterheinrichs-curly.aspx

http://www.tobaccomkt.com/mm5/mercha...ETER_HEINRICHS

http://www.pipesandpleasures.com/pipes/

[BigFrank]

yes the showdown continues!!! love the reviews bro. gonna have to let a few of us in on what you are going to review so we can ride along!!!

[Slow Triathlete]

Let me head home and see what else I have in the collection left to review and I'll post a list.

[Slow Triathlete]

Just scored a tin of Heinrich's Curly Cut. It will be in the showdown as soon as it gets here.

[Nick]

I'm getting impatient, I think I've read all of these reviews at least 3 times.

[Curly Cut]

Originally Posted by Slow Triathlete

Heinrich's Curly Cut.

scott, it's still fairly young stuff. it may take a month of breathing time for some of the flavors to come out. my first couple bowls, the flavors were muted. i'll have some more tomorrow at the KC herf though.

i love that can, like a mini-paint can.

[Slow Triathlete]

Here we go with a discontinued Dunhill brand, Elizabethan Mixture. I have been lucky enough to put a few tins of this away and have had some loose in a mason jar for sometime. However, I have not smoked this in probably a year. I thought that it was time to bring this out and enter it into the VaPer Showdown.

Here is the tin description:

A distinctive flavorful blend pressed, darkened tobaccos with Perique added for character.

Not very descriptive, is it?!?! Well, let me elaborate on that. The blend comes in the traditional round tin with paper folded over the top of the blend. Upon first opening this tin you are greeted with a wonderfully sweet aroma paired with a bit of spiciness. This blend comes ribbon cut with colors ranging from bright yellow to dark brown with the brownish/black perique littered here and there.

Now I will let you know that when I first smoked a few bowls of this blend I could not figure out what all the hub-bub was with this blend. I found it to be a good Virginia blend, kind of boring with some perique mixed in. It wasn’t until I got around to about the 10th bowl that I noticed subtle characters and flavors coming in and out. There are several different Virginia tobaccos present in this blend and they all play a role in the finished product.

A lot of people have stated that this blend has a lot of perique in it and it isn’t for the faint of heart. I think that those people are wrong. While this does not have a minute amount of perique in it, it isn’t a perique bomb either.

The first 1/3 of the bowl was dominated by the flavors and sweetness of the Virginias. They came in and out with a hint of the perique in the background.

The middle 1/3 seemed a bit stronger with the peppery/spiciness of the perique,

The last 1/3 of the bowl everything seemed to come together and play off of each other. Towards the end the Virginias soured a bit but it added another flavor to the profile.

I really liked this blend and I find it hard to believe that Dunhill discontinued this blend. Oh well, that is just how it goes sometime. I do know that Altadis has come out with an “Elizabethan” substitute although I have not yet tried it. I think that this blend can take over the 11th place spot without any argument.

1) McConnell Scottish Cake
2) Samuel Gawith’s St. James Flake
3) Escudo
4) GL Pease Filmore
5) H & H AJ’s VaPer
6) Low Country’s Waccamaw
7) Peretti’s Park Square
8) H & H Rolando’s Own
9) H & H Anniversary Kake
10) G & H Louisiana Flake
11) Dunhill Elizabethan Mixture
12) C & D Night Train
13) H & H Louisiana Red
14) Reiner’s Long Golden Flake
15) Treasures of Ireland - Limerick
16) Dorchester
17) Luxury Bullseye Flake
18) McClelland Bulk 2015
19) GL Pease Telegraph Hill
20) Kajun Kake
21) Luxury Navy Flake

[Nick]

Yes another VaPer review and a good one at that. Good on ya SlowT.

[Nick]

Hey SlowT lets have some more reviews. Are you dead?

[Slow Triathlete]

Ha-Ha, no I'm not dead. Triathlon/Ironman training has cranked up for the year. I'll have a review up in the next few days. It will be for a blend that I can't believe that I haven't reviewed for this yet, Solani #633.

Thanks for the reminder Nick!

[Nick]

I thought you did review that blend, I guess I'm just going crazy. I know what you mean though school, work, and the gym; I hardly ever have time to have a bowl anymore. I went 2 weeks with out a smoke, it was terrible.

[Slow Triathlete]

Solani 633

Now here is a blend that I cannot believe that I forgot to put into the Showdown before now. In truth, I purchased a 100g tin of this and smoked over half of the tin and put it into a mason jar for a little longer term storage. Well I just found it the other day and the label on top says 14Mar2008. So this blend has a little age on it so it should be even better than I remember it.

Here’s what the tin description states:

A matured virginia, pressed flake, with premium perique.

Pre-Light
The tin aroma is very nice. I reminds me a lot of Robert McConnell’s Scottish Cake in that I has a very heavy and sweet dried prune/fig aroma to it. And of course with just a hint of spice from the Perique. Very good. This comes in flake form in the tin but it looks like I rubbed the whole tin out before I put it into the jar. Whoops I don’t usually do that but oh well. I will say that when rubbed out it resembles Hal O The Wynd as far as shape and length of the strands.

Since these are pretty long strands I chose a pipe with a deeper chamber. I picked a Kurt Huhn Zulu shape.

First ½
For the first 15 puffs or so this blend bit my tongue a bit. Not sure if my tongue was ragged out already from another blend or not but the biting eventually went away. The taste of this blend is almost purely Virginia. There is a bit of Perique whisping about in the background but it is certainly not a major player as of yet.

Second ½
The blend really hasn’t changed much throughout. The Virginias are still very dominant. The strength slowly builds in this blend topping out at about a medium strength.

Summary
Well I know that I am going to make some people mad with this summary but I did not particularly care for this blend all that much. Let me explain as there are several factors involved. First off, the blend to me was kind of ho-hum. Yes, the Virginias were very tasty but I think that I was expecting something more. The Perique amount in this blend is very low. It really doesn’t add much to the blend and it certainly was not enough to keep the blend from biting in the beginning. I know that this blend is some people’s cup of tea but it is not mine. Second, for most of the Solani line you can only buy 100g tins. I really never like not having the option of trying a smaller amount of a blend before I commit to buying a larger tin. For this blend, that decision is pretty much taken out of your hands. Occasionally you can find 633 in a 50g tin but you have to look. Also the price for this blend is pretty high. The 100g tin hovers somewhere around $20. This puts it in my eyes as more of a boutique blend or something that I would reward myself with every once in a while. For it to be like that for me, it would have to be a much better blend. I feel that there are much better VaPer blends out there for a better price.


1)McConnell Scottish Cake
2)Samuel Gawith’s St. James Flake
3)Escudo
4)GL Pease Filmore
5)H & H AJ’s VaPer
6)Low Country’s Waccamaw
7)Peretti’s Park Square
8)H & H Rolando’s Own
9)H & H Anniversary Kake
10)G & H Louisiana Flake
11)Dunhill Elizabethan Mixture
12)C & D Night Train
13)H & H Louisiana Red
14)Reiner’s Long Golden Flake
15)Treasures of Ireland - Limerick
16)Dorchester
17)Solani #633
18)Luxury Bullseye Flake
19)McClelland Bulk 2015
20)GL Pease Telegraph Hill
21)Kajun Kake
22)Luxury Navy Flake