Pure Tobacco Pipe Blends You Can Make

[deluxestogie]

While some varieties of tobacco can be enjoyable when smoked straight in a pipe, the flavor horizon can be broadened by simple blending of contrasting varieties and cure-methods. My goal in this thread is to present some pipe blends that do not use casing of any kind. [Practically all commercial pipe tobacco, even the highly regarded English-style blends of G.L. Pease, contain flavorings, humectants and mold suppressants.]

There is nothing sacred about the recipes shown here. You can regard them as a starting point for creating your own blends. All of the ingredients can be produced at home. Of the ingredients shown, nearly all of them can be purchased at www.wholeleaftobacco.com. Unfortunately, Perique that has been pressure-cured is considered by the tax folks to be a tobacco product. But you can make Perique easily at home (http://fairtradetobacco.com/threads/2873-Really-Easy-Perique-Press) with any tobacco variety.

deluxestogie's Jewel of Macedonia (an English mixture), hand-shredded from rollcake of each ingredient:
-VA Red flue-cured: ~40% [from WLT]
-Prilep 66-9/7 flue-cured: ~20% [my own] <--This specific variety, either flue-cured or sun-cured, really makes a difference.
-Cyprian Latakia: ~25% [from WLT]
-Pressure-cured Perique: ~10% [my own]
-Dark Cavendish-processed (Bolivia Criollo Black): ~5% [my own]


deluxestogie's Simplified Jewel of Macedonia:
-Virginia bright-cured: 40%
-Oriental (as aromatic as available): 20%
-Latakia: 25%
-Perique pressure-cured: 10%
-Black Cavendish: 5%

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deluxestogie's Warspur (an English Mixture)

-Virginia air-cured: 30%
-Oriental: 30%
-Latakia: 35%
-Black Cavendish or Dark Air: 5% (optional, to add body)

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deluxestogie's Rich Creek (Burley & Latakia)

-lighter burley: 20%
-darker burley: 20%
-Oriental: 30%
-Latakia: 30%

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deluxestogie's Pearl of Shibam (an English mixture)

-Virginia bright-cured: 31%
-Perique pressure-cured: 19%
-Latakia: 25%
-Oriental (typically, Izmir): 25%
[I've had this blend made up by Cornell & Diehl, and can be ordered by name (maybe: they've recently been sold to a large tobacco marketing company). It's just as easy to make at home, if you have the ingredients.]

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I usually make up a batch by rolling a crude, low-case cigar of each ingredient, judging the quantity by size of the roll-cake, then hand shred them with my kulu. The shredded ingredients are then tossed into a 1 gallon Zip Lock. I inflate the bag, seal it, then pinch one corner, while shaking the opposite corner. After blending, I expel the air, and compress the blend by rolling the bag tightly. While most of the ingredients don't change much with time, a blend that includes Latakia exhibits noticeable change after a couple of days rest. A rest period will also tend to equalize the moisture content.

I allow pipe blends to dry to low case: not crumbly-dry, but pretty dry nonetheless. If you keep it at a moisture content that "feels" like commercial pipe tobacco (the stuff with humectants, etc.), it will mold.

Bob

 

[Knucklehead]

Those recipes look yummy. Time to try some blends.

 

[jojjas]

Exellent recipes Bob , i maybe can cotribute with my Darkest hour (http://fairtradetobacco.com/threads/1771-Homegrown-pipe-tobacco-recipes/page5 ) i have made a little adjustment in this recipe and changed the name to Darkest Hour Rev1
Latakia 40%
Stoved Red Virginia 35%
Black Cavendish of maryland 609 (sweet) 20%
Fire cured 5%

I have also an recipe in development but it is not ready yet , the first test , tasted close to Dunhill My Mixture 965
i vill keep you posted on this recipe
Mikael

 

[Planter]

How fine do you shred?

 

[deluxestogie]

How fine do you shred?

Using my 6" Kuhn Rikon kulu, I shred the roll cakes as finely as I can. This usually comes out to a shred of a little under 1/8". The resulting "coins" are then sliced in half, and rubbed out. This yields a shred length in the range of 3/4 to 1".

With the Cyprian Latakia (from www.wholeleaftobacco.com), I don't stem it or roll it, but just create a cigar-sized, dense pile, and shred in the same way.

With regard to smoothness on the tongue, I've found that bright-cured leaf (acidic) benefits from the addition of pressure-cured Perique (alkaline). Air-cured leaf of a flue-cure variety is not as acidic, and the Perique does not make as much of a difference with smoothness--though Perique's rich, prune-like aroma can be a nice addition to the merged blend.

Use of Perique will increase the absorption of nicotine in any blend, so a little goes a long way.

Bob

 

[deluxestogie]

Here is a curious pipe blend made with the lightest lugs of a very mild Havana. I used Machu Picchu Havana lugs that color-cured a bronze-gold, and still retained that color after 1 month of kilning. They have no aroma of cigar. Probably any mild Havana (425 comes to mind) or Mont Calme Brun would work as well.

True to its name, Atacama, this blend is cool, brisk, slightly edgy, with moderate nicotine.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atacama_Desert


deluxestogie's Atacama (Havana & Latakia)

-Machu Picchu Havana lug: 33%
-Prilep suckers (sun-cured): 33%
-Latakia: 33%
-Dark Cavendish-cured: a pinch, crumbled

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deluxestogie's simplified Atacama (Havana & Latakia)

-Mild Havana lug: 33%
-Oriental: 33%
-Latakia: 33%

***********************************

Bob

 

[deluxestogie]

Blech!

Years ago (decades ago, actually), Rattray's Black Mallory was among my favorite English-style pipe tobacco blends. It contained a base of unflavored black Cavendish, with flue-cured Virginia, Turkish and plenty of Latakia. It contained no additives. It was made in Perth, Scotland, by Charles Rattray.

A few days ago, I ordered a 100g can of Rattray's Black Mallory from JRcigar.com, for $13.50 (retail $22). My plan was to refresh my memory, and see if there was some minor constituent that I might detect. The hope was to improve my home blending.

Worrisome signs:

1. Blended for Charles Rattray
2. Made in Germany
3. Appearance: moist
4. Pouch aroma: prunes and maybe mild anise

I was stunned. I may be old, but I'm not stupid. And the nose knows. Remember the smell of freshly brewing coffee in grandmother's house? Olfactory memories are among the most reliable, and are the memories least subject to fading with time. Well...this ain't Black Mallory...not even in the ballpark. It's a cased, aromatic mess. Boo!

I did smoke a bowl of it. It was truly awful. It reminds me of the horrid, jelly donut-flavored coffee sold by Dunkin' Donuts. It smells like food, irritates the edge of my tongue with chemicals, and generally tastes foul.

My first inclination was to toss my new can of Rattray's Black Mallory into the trash. Then I thought of perhaps sending it to one of the FTT pipe smokers. But it's so bad, that I would be embarrassed to send it to anyone. It really is that bad. My plan is to allow it to remain open, to dry out completely--if that's even possible, with all the goop that's been added to it. Then I'll bring it back into case, and decide if the garbage is its true destiny.

It's just hard to believe that such a respected company (since 1903!) would allow this trash to be sold under their trademark. I regret that I won't be reporting on the state of any of Rattray's other renowned blends--ever. (Red Rapparee was also one of my favorites.)

I cleansed my "palate" by taking a deep inhalation from my bag of Jewel of Macedonia.

Bob

 

[Knucklehead]

It may be their "New Coke" version. Lack of sales may force them to go back to the original.

 

[jojjas]

I do agree , in my opinion germans and danish tobacco company has destroyed all of the old english tobacco varieties , the only who is keeping up the good quality are those firms still active in GB like Sam Gawith and Gawith Hoggarth

 

[Planter]

My plan is to allow it to remain open, to dry out completely
Bob

Unfortunately, I don´t know what Black Mallory used to be like decades ago. Just a few days ago a had a sample and quite liked it. It was forgotten in a small Ziploc bag for almost a year and relatively dry (as I prefer my pipe tobacco). The Red Rapparee I tried before from an older wooden sample box was in a similar condition, and good too. So perhaps don´t toss yet.

 

[Planter]

Sam Gawith and Gawith Hoggarth

I have a great fancy for things from Kendal, but, personally, need to let them dry, too. Actually, so far the only one I prefer slightly on the moist side is Samuel Gawith´s Grousemoor Mixture.

 

[deluxestogie]

What has become obvious is that most, if not all, manufacturers of factory blends of pipe tobacco are now using casings of some sort. Many used no casing in the past. That used to be the law in the UK. Casing dramatically increases the weight of a given quantity of tobacco, and was considered to be an adulterant designed to rip off the consumer, as well as to lower the import tax paid on the raw leaf that would produce a given weight of final product.

If you like the food flavors that now go into English-style blends, and the squishiness produced by added humectants, then you may enjoy today's versions of old standard blends. If, instead, you would prefer actual tobacco, you'll simply have to blend it yourself.

Bob

 

[Planter]

According to Rattray´s booklet on tobacco blending (http://www.fumeursdepipe.net/telecha/rattraysbooklet.pdf) he evidently even did not add water and packaging was not vacuum sealed unless for export to tropical countries. Red Rapparee was prepared from "Red Virginia and heavily flavoured with Orientals". I wonder if there was anything done to deal with potential mold.
These days it is Latakia, Virginia, dark Cavendish and Orientals + Sugar (inverted): 51,59066 mg + Propylene glycol: 16,76785 mg + Glycerol: 15,27311 mg + Flavour: 11,77794 mg (all per 1000mg tobacco).

Anyway, two sentences from the booklet which are right in line with my own observations:

"Tobacco is a vegetable that lives and breathes"

"All good mixtures are dry"

 

[jojjas]

What has become obvious is that most, if not all, manufacturers of factory blends of pipe tobacco are now using casings of some sort. Many used no casing in the past. That used to be the law in the UK. Casing dramatically increases the weight of a given quantity of tobacco, and was considered to be an adulterant designed to rip off the consumer, as well as to lower the import tax paid on the raw leaf that would produce a given weight of final product.

If you like the food flavors that now go into English-style blends, and the squishiness produced by added humectants, then you may enjoy today's versions of old standard blends. If, instead, you would prefer actual tobacco, you'll simply have to blend it yourself.

Bob

Just another fine example how Big Tobacco fiddle with ther products to make more profit and selling us a bad product instead of make there products better with higher quality , when it comes to my preferences i think like this , "i get what i paid for"
thats why i buy WLT products and i have not find any better anywhere

 

[jojjas]

I think this thread became a little of track , so i am trying to get it back in the right one
Here is another recepi i made a while ago
I was trying to blend some that taste like Dunhill My Mixture 965 , this is not the one but i think its beeing good enough to share this with you all
I called it NB , you could try to guess what it means

25% Latakia WLT
25% Izmir WLT
16,5% Red Virginia (toasted) WLT
3,5% Semi oriental 465 From Pure leaf
20% "Stovendish" (Stoved Lemon virginia http://fairtradetobacco.com/threads/3903-Toasted-or-cavendish)
10% Brown unsweetened Cavendish (made of Burley) my own grown

 

[deluxestogie]

Interesting.

In terms of strength, the burley Cavendish seems to be the pivot. My burley Cavendish ranged from very mild to quite strong, depending on the stalk position and specific variety. I suppose one could make half a dozen noticeably different blends from the same recipe, by just varying the burley Cavendish selection.

My current stock of Cavendish was made from Bolivia Criollo Black, and is potent. I add it to blends in quantities of a tablespoon to a 1/2 pound batch.

Bob

 

[jojjas]

It would be wery interesting to try cavendish of cigar leafs in a blend , or couple of cigarleafs in an virginia and cavendish flake
A couple of weeks ago i smoked a sample of a 3 year old Robert Mcconnell scottish flake as spiced among other , with a small part of cigarleafs and i liked it a lot, this should be tried out further with my own blends

I am green and red colour blind in that sense that i see colours but i dont wich colour it is ( i got great help from my woman to solved this in the right way) ,but this is what i do , have sort my leafs in size and colour , bigger and more brown coloured leafs for smoking purposes and smaller and a little reddish like colour for snus making
Maybe the burley i use for smoking are low in strenght becouse of this sorting , at least i think it is that way , and that suits me perfect because i like my snus a bit more potent whitout using to much potash

I also made a batch of brown cavendish of maryland 609 leafs but i sweetened that batch with 0,5% glucos . I have not done so much testsmoking with it yet , but the first tests make me thought that only 2-3% in the blend is quite enough , i dont like it to sweet, but a tiny sweet taste is good
Mikael

 

[Planter]

It would be wery interesting to try cavendish of cigar leafs in a blend , or couple of cigarleafs in an virginia and cavendish flake
A couple of weeks ago i smoked a sample of a 3 year old Robert Mcconnell scottish flake as spiced among other , with a small part of cigarleafs and i liked it a lot, this should be tried out further with my own blends

When the ladies demand a "pipe smell", I found up to 25% cigar leaf greatly improves the flavour base and smokability of modern aromatics, while still pleasing their noses.

 

[jojjas]

What has become obvious is that most, if not all, manufacturers of factory blends of pipe tobacco are now using casings of some sort. Many used no casing in the past. That used to be the law in the UK. Casing dramatically increases the weight of a given quantity of tobacco, and was considered to be an adulterant designed to rip off the consumer, as well as to lower the import tax paid on the raw leaf that would produce a given weight of final product.

If you like the food flavors that now go into English-style blends, and the squishiness produced by added humectants, then you may enjoy today's versions of old standard blends. If, instead, you would prefer actual tobacco, you'll simply have to blend it yourself.

Bob

Dunhill`s pipetobacco is now produced by STG factory Orlik in Denmark and a friend here in sweden linked this to me , as we discused this mather in the swedish smoking forum

http://www.bat-ingredients.com/serv...avel2011ENGLISH/$file/BS5610.html?openelement

When the ladies demand a "pipe smell", I found up to 25% cigar leaf greatly improves the flavour base and smokability of modern aromatics, while still pleasing their noses.

I am not usually smoke aromatic blends , i prefer balkan blends or vapers , but a friend does and it should definitely be tested when its suitble

 

[deluxestogie]

Dunhill`s pipetobacco...http://www.bat-ingredients.com/serv...avel2011ENGLISH/$file/BS5610.html?openelement

That is a useful link. By changing one of the dropdown selections, you can view the ingredients of each of the Dunhill pipe tobaccos. Many (e.g. Early Morning Pipe and Nightcap) have no added sweeteners or flavorings. But all of them are still only about 80% tobacco!

Bob