Date Added: Monday 26 March, 2018
by Kevin
£21.49
Somebody kindly posted a message to me on this forum that Samuel Gawith flakes are always very moist and should be dried out before attempting to smoke them. With that in mind I took out a couple of flakes, rubbed them down to something that I thought resembled rubbed tobacco and then left them to dry for 3 hours and certainly appeared to be less moist. The dry notes of this tobacco are a very strong scent of alcohol (I dont believe this scent is near the sweetness of rum, closer to a whisky scent) and a strange, almost plastic note in there which threw me a bit. The tobacco notes were strong, I believe this may be Latakia as it is quite a bot stronger and bolder than the other tobaccos that Ive tried.
I put it in my Peterson straight pipe (with a filter) and, after a bit of difficulty on the initial light, eventually got the pipe going. The tobacco smoked really well after the initial lighting stages, although it did go out on me unexpectedly once (two thirds of the way down) and again at the end.
The smoke was quite strong, but certainly was more to my liking given my preference to darker, more full bodied cigars. The taste was a pleasant tobacco, full bodied but not harsh in any way, the alcohol didnt come through much in the taste but there was a slightly bitter note of cocoa, which I found very pleasant. The smoke was smooth and did not produce any bite at all during the smoke. The smoke output was pretty thick, I could follow it all the way up to the roof and the room scent was quite strong. Im not convinced that a non-smoking partner would tolerate this one at all.
As I said the pipe went out once unexpectedly as it smoked away very nicely with minimal amount of effort. The sign that I noticed the burn was dying straight away was that I got the plasticy/rubbery note from the pre-light scent in the taste. But after a tamping down and a relight I was back enjoying this tobacco.
I filled the bowl three quarters full and the smoke lasted 50 minutes. One final thing to note: 50 minutes after smoking and the lingering taste in my mouth is rather strong, but not bitter or unpleasant.
Overall I thoroughly enjoyed this tobacco and I could easily see it becoming my regular pipe tobacco.
