Old Dublin by Peterson - Pipe Tobacco

This traditional mixture of the finest Latakia, Turkish oriental, and Virginia Leaf is slowburning, cool and still blended by hand.

Two thoughts struck me as I lit up my first bowl Old Dublin. The first was "wow, this is so middle of the road, but in a good way." The second thought was "where you been all my life!" Further bowls have revealed a most pleasant English that is perfectly tolerable in every way. I think this is what I noticed when I was seeing Old Dublin in the middle. There wasn't anything extraordinary that I had to interpret, it just tastes good - it tastes like an English blend rather than an English blend but only little more this, or like and English blend, but with a lot of that. Like the tin description says - traditional English. Old Dublin was not an attempt to reinvent the wheel.

If anything stands out it is the Orientals. They are absolutely heavenly to my taste, much like a dry white wine. I love Old Dublin after a meal whether it is breakfast, lunch, or dinner. It has this dry fragrant character. Of course, when I say dry I don't mean the moisture content, but the taste. So, the Turkish is right up there with everything else. Latakia fanatics may be underwhelmed, but those of us who would rather the Latakia leave room for others will find the proportions a wise choice on the blender's part. There is more tang than sweetness from the Virginias. You have to pay attention or you may miss it.

The cut is ribbon, fine to medium. Moisture was perfect from a fresh tin. The burn is perfect and a good fill is near effortless. I had no problem with tongue bite and the strength is suitable and satisfying any time of the day. If you like English and Balkans, especially in the medium range, you'll want to try this if you haven't already. If you have tried it, or even if you haven't, please comment below.

This is from the excellent "Hearth & Home" series distributed by PipesAndCigars.com.  The manufacturer's description reads as follows:

"Larry Loerzel, one of our regular store customers, and connoisseur of English/Balkan blends had tried Ten to Midnight, and although he liked it, he was looking for something a little fuller and different. Based on his preference, we blended a full, traditional Balkan using Orientals that were more “buttery” and amped-up the Latakia. This blend is now a big hit among our full-bodied English fans; a cool-smoking, very rich mixture."

This mixture is a classic medium cut, rather dark in color although by looking closer, there is some variety in there.  But when you look at this tobacco, the main thing that strikes you is the incredible aroma of spice, leather and molasses.

The tobacco is on the dry side to the touch, similar to C&D's usual hydrometry.  15 to 30 minutes "drying" time is all it needs.

Lighting is easy, nothing fights back or stands up.  The burn is very good and even and the pipe stays lit easily.

Initially, the main flavor is similar to that of a campfire.  The smoke is cool, salty, savory, and then becomes spicy.  The tobacco tastes lightly woody and earthy but is dominated by the spice.  There is a definite fruit element in there that reminds me of juicy cherries.  As the bowl progresses, the spice intensifies, becomes deeper and triggers the heat receptors like a habanero pepper would. 

After roughly half the pipe, the taste becomes very deep and dark, the fruity character fades and the spicy character takes over.  The earthy side of the blend really comes forward now and gives the smoke a leathery taste that intensifies towards the end of the bowl.

Larry's Blend is my favorite Balkan blend.  It is medium in nicotine but full in flavor! 

Tin Description: A mild easy smoking blend of fine Virginia and Burley tobaccos, made the traditional way.

A light berry essence melds nicely with the Virginia and what I believe is likely some dark fired Kentucky Burley. Whether you crumble Peterson University Flake out or fold and stuff, I find it burns evenly enough even fresh from the tin. The Burley makes it a fairly hearty blend with a few robust moments coming throughout the smoke. I experience no tongue bite from University Flake.

Peterson University Flake has become somewhat of a classic pipe tobacco. While being unique, it also sets a standard for Virginia and Burley Flake pipe tobacco. Try smoking Peterson University Flake with the air pocket method.

Blender's description:

A pure Virginia blend from the best fields of Zimbabwe and the Eastern United States. Rolled Twist Flake, then Cavendish pressed and cut.

These square flakes have leaf ranging in bright to medium brown. They are easy to rub out or burn well stuffed in the bowl. I prefer wadding one into a ball, rolling it a little, the stuffing the whole works in the top of a narrow-chambered pipe leaving an air pocket underneath.

The overall flavor includes a lot of high notes, considerable citrus-like tang, much like lemon or orange peel with bright Virginia's characteristic grassy flavors. The darker leaf provides an appropriate amount of balance with body and a clean sweetness. Any added flavors are very subtle and not readily apparent during the smoke.

I'm surprised to find so little propensity to bite the tongue. I expect a little tingle and irritation from leaf of this sort, but this leaves my tongue ready for another bowl. This is one of the rare Virginia-only blends I could smoke bowl after bowl all day. The burn is cool and clean. No unpleasant aftertastes. It arrived in bulk with perfect moisture content ready to smoke as-is.

This is not the most complex Virginia blend I've smoked, but it does grow deeper and the sharper tastes yield to richer, earthier, sweeter flavors as the bowl progresses. There is a nice interplay between the brighter and deeper sides of the smoke with the later gaining ground as the ember floats to the bottom.

Virginia lovers will likely find this a very agreeable companion and it makes a great introduction to those new to Virginia blends.

Blended with just the right prportion of Golden Virginia and Burley`s, the basic blend of Toasted Cavendish tobaccos takes on a zesty dimension. This mixture gets better as you smoke it all day long

This ubiquitous industrial bulk aromatic goes by almost as many names as there are shops selling pipe tobacco across North America. Pipe smokers who dislike bulk aromatics of this sort may find they dislike this one the least.

RLP-6 packs and smokes very nicely, has a clean flavor and finish, and I can't get it to bite my tongue. Many compare it to its over-the-counter cousin, Captain Black White. It has been a while since I've sampled Captain Black, but I can say my memories of it are not as fond as my appreciation for the bowl of RLP-6 I smoke as I write this. I'm pretty sure there are differences between the two.

This is no boutique blend by any stretch of the imagination, but it never pretended to be. There is a reason this has been around for ages upon ages and outsells more refined pipe tobaccos pound for pound.

I make out a good deal of the underlying heavily processed tobacco flavor and its not in the least unpleasant, nor is the top flavor applied more subtly to this blend than most other aromatics of this caliber. Its pleasantly sweet but won't make you worry about cavities as you smoke it.

You've likely smoked this before. What were your thoughts on it? Please add them to the comments below. Just for fun, if you know, I'd be interested to know what your local B&M names this blend.

After receiving some calls and emails from members of the New York Pipe Club lamenting the loss of Dunhill's Early Morning Pipe, we wanted to develop a blend with similar characteristics to EMP. After a number of "tweaks", we sent a sample to the club, and the feedback was overwhelmingly positive. We're now making it available to the general public. Try this traditional English mixture of sweet Virginias, fragrant Orientals and rich, smoky Latakia.

While Dunhill's Early Morning Pipe was the very first tobacco I purchased and smoked back in 1994, and I have fond memories of it, it has been too long since I smoked it (over a year) to comment on how similar in taste Daybreak is, but like the description says, it has characteristics like those of Early Morning Pipe.

By its own right, Daybreak is a fantastic blend. I'm not an expert at the art of blending, but I believe it is a fair guess that making a lighter bodied English like Daybreak "work" is more of a challenge than dumping generous quantities of Latakia atop some Virginia and Oriental leaf and thinking up a name for a new blend for Latakia lovers. Not that Latakia bombs can't be done well too, of course.

Hearth and Home's Daybreak balances a mild sweetness and gentle tang from the Virginias with a range of intermingling flavors from the Oriental and Latakia. Oullette has kept each of these flavors from dominating or drowning out the others leaving a pleasantly complex smoke. This may be a fantastic "early morning" smoke, but I'm sure English lovers will appreciate it throughout the day for its easy burning characteristics. No doubt this will also age very well.

If you are mourning the loss of "Early Morning Pipe" do give this one a try and let me know how well it matches up in your opinion.

Blender's description:

In the tradition of the mysterious Mississippi riverboat gamblin' men, a flavorful blend of the South's tobaccos—Burleys, Virginias, and Perique—with the exotic taste of Turkish leaf. The odds are with you when you smoke this blend.

My "quick review" for RG as seen on SF:

This is a big-flavor blend. Burley, Virginia, and Perique with a healthy topping of Turkish. I taste very little, if any, sweetness. This one has the same sort of flavors you get in a spicey bowl of hot and sour soup.

Sound unappealing? I thought so too. I ordered some anyway. I grimaced my way through the first bowl, and hiccuped and stuttered through every one since, and I vowed I'd plop the contents of the rest of the tin in a mason jar, encase it in lead, and forget about it, but for some reason I keep finding myself reaching for more of it.

Its the oddest thing. I guess this means I like it, but every time I smoke it I can't figure out why. I guess its the BIG flavor, more-that-satisfying nicotine content, and the originality of it.

I often am not struck utterly enthusiastic with a new blend in the first few bowls and begin liking it more as I proceed through a couple ounces. This one it was like my senses were throwing me into fight or flight mode, but something keeps saying "go back for more." And I do. Never had an experience quite like this with a blend.

Good stuff? I gotta say heck yeah if you like fairly strong tobacco and you aren't afraid of Perique.

A light, naturally sweet blend created for renowned pipemaker, Lannes Johnson, who selected this mixture to send as a sample to his pipe customers. Two diff- erent types of nutty Burley are laced with an unusual cube cut Virginia and a Burley-based natural toasted Black Cavendish for a splash of non-flavored sweetness. Now available to the general public for the very first time. If you're looking for an all-day blend that isn't wet or overly sugary, give this one a try.

Expect this tobacco to arrive well on the dry side. I recommend leaving it as is before smoking. The overall taste is slightly sweet with a healthy tang. Maybe its my imagination but I'd swear I taste a little Perique, but the blend description doesn't mention it.

The base of burley is easy on the tongue but deserves a careful smoking cadence to keep off any bitterness. This is a clean medium bodied that won't win any rewards for complexity and likely never sought any. The blend was created for an all-day pipe smoker, and an all-day blend it is if you share LJ's preference for a straightforward tangy smoke.

Blender's description:

Classic Burley Kake is a new blend that pays homage to old-time Burley flakes and cakes. Using Tennessee and Kentucky Burleys, ranging from lighter white to darker mahogany, and a bit of matured red Virginia, this sliced cake tobacco is a traditional American-style blend.

We start with four different types of Burley, the aforementioned Tennessee and Kentucky, plus two different premium white Burleys. Then we add a red Virginia for a maple-like sweetness. Then we use all-natural flavors- cocoa, rum and anise and steam the tobaccos with the flavorings and firmly press and slice it. The aroma is mellow and pleasant, and the taste is lightly sweet with a large volume of smoke.

Hearken back to a simpler time when the sight of a pipe in someone’s mouth while walking down the street was common, and the scent of pipe tobacco was everywhere. Give Classic Burley Kake a try and go back in time.

The new Classic Burley Kake is a similar type of tobacco to Edgeworth Sliced. We're not attempting to to copy Edgeworth, but rather provide smokers with a blend that is similar to yet still unique.

I try to maintain a certain objectivity when I review tobaccos - it shouldn't be important to you how much I like this or that blend, you probably just want to know what's in it and whatever other facts I can relay to you.

That said, I'm going to have to make an exception with Hearth and Home's Classic Burley Kake. I'm very excited about this blend. For starters, it fits exactly what I've been looking for in a Burley blend - just a little sweetness, a little flavor, and I wanted all the rough edges knocked off. That is exactly what Russ Oullette has done with Classic Burley Kake.

In the pouch, the smell is cocoa and a little black licorice. The cakes rub out to medium semi-course cut at the ideal moisture level that makes gravity filling a pipe very easy. I fill this blend rather loose.

First light kicks off the rum, anise, and cocoa flavors. The first quarter of the bowl they seem to mingle back and forth allowing me to easily make out each separate flavor. By the 1/3 mark, they seem to meld together and do a perfect job of accompanying the clean base tobacco flavor from the burleys.

The mellow natural-tasting sweetness and soft flavors remain throughout the bowl. The tobacco is as well behaved and easy to smoke as any aromatic, but has the mouth-feel, flavor, fullness, and strength of a regular non-aromatic blend.

I'm not one to make a point out of smoking to the bottom on one light, but it seems to almost come natural with this blend. It is full enough I'm not tempted to puff greedily, but easy going without causing fatigue so I can easily maintain a steady and gentle smoking cadence that keeps the ember hot and me in heaven on earth.

This blend will likely appeal to aromatic smokers wishing to explore their boundaries, definitely the Burley lover, and any other pipe smoker looking for a change of pace with a quality blend.

If you have tried this blend too, let me know what you thought about it in the comments below.

Tin description:

"Dark with Latakia and black Virginias, deeply seasoned with Orientals, this is the classic Full Scottish Mixture."

Latakia-rich blends can be monochromatic when there aren't enough Orientals. McClelland's doesn't make that mistake with Oriental 14. McClelland Virginias have a special tang and that's not lost under all the Latakia and Oriental leaf in this blend. Latakia comes in at the medium to full range and I believe its the Orientals lending not only spice but a little sweetness alongside the deep, bassy sweetness of the Virginias.

The cut makes for easy filling, and the burning characteristics are adequate to enjoy a bowl without extra fuss. Those susceptible to tongue bite from McClelland products should get away with a bowl or two a day of 14 but may not find it suited for all day smoking.

Overall this is a rich and delicious blend that will likely be enjoyed by most English and Balkan blend lovers.