I have had the enjoyment of sampling a new flue-cured Virginia that WLT may soon offer. I don't know the specific designation that it will carry (e.g. Lemon, Bright, etc.) at this point, so I'll just refer to it as VFC (Virginia flue-cured). The labels within my images use "VA Bright" in its categorical context, that is, all flue-cured tobacco is considered "bright tobacco".
I can provide only my opinion of it in comparison to previous VFC from several sources, as well as my own bright-cured Virginia, and only in the context of pipe blending.
This is beautiful leaf. Some of it is a bright lemon, some a little richer yellow. None appeared to be mid or upper leaf from the plants (e.g. red). After first opening the sealed bag, I allowed it to air for several hours.
In the image below, I've stemmed a number of leaves, and set aside several pieces to use as "wrappers" for shredding.
The close-up below shows the quality of the leaf.
In order to shred the leaf manually, I tightly roll it into fairly narrow gauge "cigars".
I slice each cigar into coins, using my 6" Kuhn-Rikon Kulu blade, held by the riser opposite the handle,
...then split the coins, in order to limit shred length.
This is then rubbed-out between my palms.
I made up two different Latakia-potency English/Balkan style blends, as well as a Stacked-Basma-dominant Virginia-Perique-Oriental blend. (These will be exclusive to the WLT site, so I'm not presenting them here.)
The leaf offers a gentle sour note (as it should), burns well, blends smoothly with Perique, and compliments both a heavy Balkan blend as well as lighter one. The VA-Perique-Oriental blend was mild, flavorful and delightful. I have not smoked the new VFC straight.
My blending intuition is getting pretty good at predicting and avoiding the potential tongue-bite of Virginias. The three blends I created were totally bite-free, and as silky as a VFC can get. So I'm taking this as an indication that the VFC's sugar content is comparable to most other VFC shipments.
I have no idea when this leaf will appear on the WLT site, or even how it will be identified. Hopefully Don will post a note in this thread when it appears, so we'll know it by its name.
Bob
I can provide only my opinion of it in comparison to previous VFC from several sources, as well as my own bright-cured Virginia, and only in the context of pipe blending.
This is beautiful leaf. Some of it is a bright lemon, some a little richer yellow. None appeared to be mid or upper leaf from the plants (e.g. red). After first opening the sealed bag, I allowed it to air for several hours.
In the image below, I've stemmed a number of leaves, and set aside several pieces to use as "wrappers" for shredding.
The close-up below shows the quality of the leaf.
In order to shred the leaf manually, I tightly roll it into fairly narrow gauge "cigars".
I slice each cigar into coins, using my 6" Kuhn-Rikon Kulu blade, held by the riser opposite the handle,
...then split the coins, in order to limit shred length.
This is then rubbed-out between my palms.
I made up two different Latakia-potency English/Balkan style blends, as well as a Stacked-Basma-dominant Virginia-Perique-Oriental blend. (These will be exclusive to the WLT site, so I'm not presenting them here.)
The leaf offers a gentle sour note (as it should), burns well, blends smoothly with Perique, and compliments both a heavy Balkan blend as well as lighter one. The VA-Perique-Oriental blend was mild, flavorful and delightful. I have not smoked the new VFC straight.
My blending intuition is getting pretty good at predicting and avoiding the potential tongue-bite of Virginias. The three blends I created were totally bite-free, and as silky as a VFC can get. So I'm taking this as an indication that the VFC's sugar content is comparable to most other VFC shipments.
I have no idea when this leaf will appear on the WLT site, or even how it will be identified. Hopefully Don will post a note in this thread when it appears, so we'll know it by its name.
Bob
