Name a tobacco blend that while others may love, you dont care for...

[RazorbackFan]

Astley’s #44 for me. Tastes like a middle of the road straight Virginia with nothing much going on.

Some old timers whose tastes I trust insist that K&K changed the recipe for the worse sometime around 2016. I’ve had some old samples that were awesome, but the current production is not my thing.

Others seem to love it, so it’s probably just me.

 

[luvmysuper]

Has anyone got some feedback on Rattrays 40 Virginia? Can't find anything here.
It looks interesting, but I'm a bit worried it may be too light.

 

[AimlessWanderer]

Some old timers whose tastes I trust insist that K&K changed the recipe for the worse sometime around 2016. I’ve had some old samples that were awesome, but the current production is not my thing.

I do wonder at times, when people write about recipes changing, how intentional it actually was. Maybe crop variations from year to year, mean that sometimes a specific taste just can't be recreated, no matter how much they shuffle around the ingredient percentages to compensate. Or even, Competitors X, Y and Z nabbed so much of a certain crop/leaf, there simply wasn't enough left in the harvest/market that year to keep the blend as it was the year previous, and they didn't have the buying power or farm influence, to win that unobtanium product back.

Of course there are some examples like Three Nuns ditching the Perique from the recipe, that may very well be a purely economic decision by the blending company, but others may be more like the Syrian Latakia, and whatever Virginia (?) McClelland used, which became unavailable through no fault of the blender.

There was a bit of a kerfuffle in the snuff world a few years back, when Grand Cairo got discontinued... or was it Royal George? Either way, Wilson's of Sharrow came clean and said a key ingredient was no longer available, and they simply could no longer offer the product to the same recipe, nor recreate it closely enough without the missing component. They released a "similar" snuff with slight name change. As close as they could possibly get to the original recipe with available ingredients, but with the name change to acknowledge and differentiate new recipe from old.

Maybe it would be better if pipe tobacco blenders did something similar, but how many smokers would turn their noses up at the new versions, just because "it's not like it was, when I was a lad", irrespective of how good the new version was (on it's own merit, when NOT compared to the original)?

For instance, I like some of the Peterson's "Dunhill" blends. I have no idea how the originals tasted. I just have to decide whether or not I like THIS version, without measuring it against something else.

I'm waffling... but hopefully you all get my gist It wasn't meamt as a rebuttal of Razorback's post, just my rambling thoughts on recipe change grumbles generally.

 

[5whiskey]

Orlik golden is a weird one for me as well. But i only had one pipe. So on my try again list.
Erinmore flake is not for me. Althou on paper, the tabacco is something for me. But nope.
Same with troost, not bad, but not my first choice (or second).

I have some Erinmore mixture I bought a few months ago. I'm not a fan so far. It tastes like peach cobbler with pineapples mixed in. Too fruity sweet for me. I'm aging it to see if the flue cured leaf will get digest some of that casing without it being overpowering.

I didn't have an issue with strength, but it tasted like someone tinned up the contents from a wet ashtray outside the 7-11

I laughed my arse off at reading this. Just wanted you to know

 

[brandaves]

I haven't had any in awhile, but I have quite a bit in the cellar...Seattle Pipe Club blends. Plum Pudding, Mississippi River and the Reserve editions.

I was never able to get a really good smoke with them. Hopefully when I return to them I will have figured them out. We shall see.

 

[gewoon ik]

I have some Erinmore mixture I bought a few months ago. I'm not a fan so far. It tastes like peach cobbler with pineapples mixed in. Too fruity sweet for me. I'm aging it to see if the flue cured leaf will get digest some of that casing without it being overpowering.

I laughed my arse off at reading this. Just wanted you to know

The mixture and the flake are not the same. Or that is what they tell me. Never smoked the mixture

 

[Kentos]

Despite my previous comments, I really don’t “hate” any blend yet. If that’s all I had to smoke, I would smoke it.

 

[Bill Wood]

I could never get used to the Lakeland flavour. Loved the old, old recipe for Erinmore. But the Lakelands couldn’t get used to.

 

[Tim_McD]

I didn't have an issue with strength, but it tasted like someone tinned up the contents from a wet ashtray outside the 7-11

Oh…now I get it - it tastes like Laphroaig Scotch (which I dig)

 

[Tim_McD]

I don’t get the love for Squadron Leader…meh

 

[Benzadmiral]

Also Peterson's Sherlock Holmes. Either I'm not puffing it right, or it's too strong for me. Almost every time of the 3-4 I've smoked it, it has produced a little harshness in my throat. This past Sunday for some reason it made me actively ill. I'm fine with Va flake and the mild codger burley blends, but not this.

 

[Mr. Shavington]

Frog Morton Cellar. I love the other Frog Morton variants, but Cellar just doesn't do it for me. Peterson Perfect Plug & University Flake were also underwhelming.

Edit: Solani Aged Burley Flake was another disappointment for me.

I detested Frog Morton Cellar too. The whisky topping on an already sweetened tobacco made it nasty. It reminded me of a drink order gone wrong that I had in a restaurant in France - I asked for a “malt whisky” and the waiter believed I wanted “menthe whisky” so what I got was half crème de menthe and half whisky. Was even worse than it sounds.

 

[luvmysuper]

I detested Frog Morton Cellar too. The whisky topping on an already sweetened tobacco made it nasty. It reminded me of a drink order gone wrong that I had in a restaurant in France - I asked for a “malt whisky” and the waiter believed I wanted “menthe whisky” so what I got was half crème de menthe and half whisky. Was even worse than it sounds.

I don't know... that sounds pretty awful!