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When I was asked to take the Mystery Review for October, I racked my brain trying to think of a tobacco obscure enough to stump our reviewers, but not so unknown as to be impossible. Then Greg Pease released his new American blend, The Virginia Cream, and I thought it might be fun to explore some of the more fully aromatic Vanilla blends.
I've smelled this mystery tobacco probably 50 times, and I cannot discern what I smell. It is obviously an Aromatic and has a lot of, from what I can tell, black Cavendish. The top notes I get are like a sweet coffee or toffee, maybe caramel, but I can't really place it. Maybe from getting over a slight cold from last week my senses are still off. Looking at the tobacco, it seems to have some Virginias, probably brights with some darker bits.
On the initial light, the sweet black Cavendish shined through and continued through the entire bowl with those subtle, sweet notes, which I still cannot identify, lingering in the background. This tobacco burned cool, and I only needed one relight. As i puffed, all I could think of was "what is this flavoring?"
This tobacco is definitely different than my usual VA blends, but I can see myself smoking more of this as a change of pace in my rotation. I like to have some Aromatic and English blends to smoke once in a while.
I am really curious to know what this is. I have absolutely no idea.
Upon opening my sample baggie, I could tell it was definitely an Aromatic. The tobacco had a delightful, sweet scent. Maybe rum? The ribbon-cut tobacco was a mix of both dark and light, golden hued ribbons. I grabbed my Peterson Belgique and packed a bowl. On lighting it, I did notice a nice room note, sweet as well, but not very overpowering. Throughout my bowl, I noticed the natural flavors of the tobacco getting stronger, with that initial sweetness and flavoring giving way to the more subtle notes of the leaf itself. A guess to what this mystery may be, well, I have none. My palate is not that experienced....yet. That being said, I think I can bet the farm on two things: that it is certainly an Aromatic, and it's got to have some kind of rum casing...
Judging by the look and taste, this blend seems to have a base of sweetened black Cavendish, with maybe some bright Virginias and Burleys for added strength and dimension. That base, of course, translates into a nice underlying sweetness, with hints of vanilla and maybe chocolate in the mix. In the baggie, I thought I noticed some sort of fruit topping, but it's not present in the flavor palette when smoked — just the sweetness from the black Cav with some zesty, toasted notes and a nice vanilla flavoring. The room note's quite nice, and I noticed very little bite despite the seemingly high sugar content of the blend. Not one I'd smoke everyday, but for the occasional dessert aromatic, this isn't bad.
So, while Mike guessed right on the black Cavendish, and Andy guessed right on the vanilla and most of the components, no one guessed the blend. The answer was, by the way, Stanwell Vanilla, which was probably a little sneaky of me, because I think it may have been the Samsun that threw both Andy and Mike. Still, I found myself a new after dinner tobacco, so it wasn't a complete loss.
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