Pirates of the Pipe Tobacco

(Note to my blog staff: “For the next post on The Pipe Bit, I want a picture of my humble self decked out as a pirate. I can bring the peg leg and eye patch from home, but I need a cutlass and a parrot. The parrot can be the stuffed kind, if necessary.

What I’m gonna do is tie in blend cuts like rope and coin with pirates. Get it? Like Jack Sparrow and shit like that? No? Well it’s because, you know, pirates use like, rope, and they have treasure with gold coins--Ooh! I’ll need some gold coins too, real gold, for the picture. I’m sure you can take these from the store’s register. And I also want like an audio file of me growling “Aaarrgh, matey,” and a video clip of me waving the cutlass! So that’s all pretty cool, right?”

Chris--sorry, not in the budget.  Sorry--Your Blog Staff)
--


Oh, the bitter injustices we bloggers suffer. Anyway, in a continuing attempt at clarity:

Most pipe tobacco blends come neatly packaged and all ready to smoke, just open the pouch or tin and fill your briar. Some blends, though, require a touch of effort before you can smoke them.

A very old-school type of blend is rope cut. This does indeed look, and feel, like a thick, corded rope. The tobacco is twisted and bound into this shape; and since fine cuts of tobacco would not hold the shape, rope cut blends consist of uncut tobacco leaves--a true rarity in pipe tobacco blends. Sometimes called navy Gawith makes rope cut blends, like their Black XX.

Two other styles of pipe tobacco blends require not cutting, but “rubbing out” (a pause for jokes)…Okay, this term means the smoker takes the tobacco and “rubs” it “out,” between the hands, making a villain’s “heh-heh-heh” gesture, breaking the blend into smaller pieces. Once a blend is rubbed out, the pipe can be filled. Most commonly, this type of pipe mixture is called flake. A flake blend--not the blend component, see the “Basics” post below--is pressed into a “cake,” a small, thin tablet of tobacco. This is then rubbed out. Coin cut, also called birdseye, blend styles are pressed too, but cut into discs. Both flake and coin styles extract the oils in tobacco leaves by pressing; but once rubbed out, can dry quickly. Peter Stokkebye makes a coin cut blend, called Curly Cut, and Sam Gawith offers the legendary Full Virginia Flake. Also, Cornell and Diehl makes a brick-style flake called Pirate Kake (sigh).

These cuts provide a change of pace for the pipe smoker, and are a reminder of the long history and evolution of pipe tobacco blends--for pirates, and everyone else.

Twitter:  @thepipebit

Big Brother: Something on Cigars

I am one of the few people, in our current times, to work in a tobacco store. Or cigar store. Or smoke shop. Or Den of Sin. Call it what you will (just buy something!)

In particular, I work with pipe tobacco, a tiny and arcane area even in the context of a retail tobacconist. For, you see, the product that keeps smoke shops in business is not pipe tobacco. It’s cigars.

True, the image of the wizened, avuncular, corner-store tobacconist whittling away the days thinking up pipe blends is Romantic-capital-R. And it’s also true I am getting wizened and even avuncular (though my employer, Uhle Tobacco, is not on a corner). Alas, though, business does not care for things as they should be, but rather for things as they are, and the way things are regarding retail tobacconists is: MMMMmmmmoney. This means cigars. Cigarettes, too, but that’s for another time.

Blending pipe tobacco is not my only duty at Uhle’s. I also do the receiving of wholesale deliveries, which consist mostly of cigars. These deliveries are unpacked, boxes of cigars laid out on a table like huge dominos, and I then check the contents against a packing slip or invoice. If all is accounted for, I put the cigars in a walk-in humidor, take the paperwork to the office, and go back to pipe tobacco.

I can do that because of those cigars; I would not, frankly, have my job without them. I know this, and appreciate it (and enjoy smoking cigars). Still, there remains a bit of jealousy--the fact is, most customers come in to buy a product I have nothing, directly, to do with. Yes, I know that cigars are less complicated to smoke than pipes. Yes, I know very few people, by comparison with cigars, smoke a pipe. Yes, I know there is a built-in aura of…say, elegance and celebration with cigars.

All true. In the end, I am grateful that one part of the tobacco industry, cigars, can, in essence, support another part, pipe tobacco. Simply--at the retail level--no cigars means no pipe tobacco.

I enjoy and respect cigars, pipe tobacco’s big brother. Hell, there’s even pipe tobacco blends made from cigar leaves (notably by McClelland). A sign of respect--and sales. I hope all tobacco stores can have both, towards all of their products.

Twitter:  @thepipebit

Basics: Pipe Tobaccos and Pipe Tobacco Cuts

“They speak English in What?”

--Jules, Pulp Fiction

To the beginning pipe smoker (and many experienced ones), pipe tobacco terminology can be more confusing than the ret-conning done by Saw V. In a continuing effort at clarity, here are the basics of pipe tobacco and pipe tobacco cuts:

Burley is used in most blends. It has a nutty and subtle flavor. In aromatic blends, it is sometimes pressed and flavored, making it a Cavendish, as in Captain Black. It’s used in English blends to give balance and a hint of natural tobacco taste. When smoked as it‘s unflavored self, burley doesn’t smell too memorable, but this wonderfully adaptive blend component forms the base of many tobacco blends.

Black Cavendish is a catch-all name for burley that has been pressed and flavored with a sweet, sort-of-vanilla topping. Every (decent) tobacconist has at least one Black Cavendish blend; it’s very easy to smoke, flavorful but not overwhelming, and the room aroma is pleasant. All tobaccos in this category are black and flavored, but differ by manufacturer in moisture content (how “wet” a blend feels) and taste. A Black Cavendish may feel dry and smell of raisins (Toasted Black Cavendish from Altadis) or may be moist enough to stick to your hand and have the scent of French vanilla icing (Vanilla Black Cavendish from McClelland). In a blend, this can be used as a primary ingredient in an aromatic, or to give just a hint of sweetness to a primarily English mixture.

Virginia tobaccos have dedicated fans that insist Virginia is The One True Pipe Tobacco To Rule Them All. In it’s most common form, this pale-yellow leaf tastes woody and slightly sweet. Virginia can be “stoved”--exposed to very high heat in processing. This darkens the tobacco, and brings out even more of Virginia’s natural sweetness. They are used to add a bit of body and sugar to English blends, and are used in aromatics to compliment and enhance the blend’s flavors.

Latakia (“Latta-keya“) smells like the smoke from a campfire. That is how it was traditionally produced--leaves were hung from a barn’s rafters, and a fire was lit well under them, so the leaves absorbed the smoky goodness. Today, many large producers might take shortcuts like latakia “flavoring“--but hopefully not. The ultimate English tobacco, latakia is a hallmark of “serious” non-aromatic blends. It lends an earthy, meaty, savory richness when used in moderation in a mixture; but if too much is used, all other flavors are blotted out. Think of latakia as fresh-ground black pepper--a dash good, a handful too much.

And then there’s Perique (“Per-eek”), a true oddball tobacco. Ask your local (real) tobacconist to let you smell this stuff right from the bulk bag--it’s something every pipe smoker should try once. Because perique is the only tobacco that is fermented--yes, as in fermenting a pickle! Genuine perique is made by pressing the tobacco (a special strain grown correctly only in St. James’ Parish, Louisiana) and letting it stew in its oils and juices for a long length of time. Perique is used in tiny amounts in English blends for a bit of a spicy kick. Do not smoke perique by itself--doing this has been compared to, only half-jokingly, having a lobotomy. I shit you not.

And on the subject of having your brain cut out (“Isn‘t that what your blog does?”), the cut of a pipe tobacco is important due to how it affects the burning qualities and aesthetics of a blend.

The most common cut in pipe tobacco is the ribbon cut, also called long cut and sometimes shag cut. Ribbon cut is the narrow, thin, shoelace-width cut that you’ll find in some respect in nearly all mixtures, and in cigarette tobacco. It burns very easily due to its thinness and length, but can burn a bit too quickly for some smokers. The ribbon cut is also very common in Cavendish blends for easy puffing. Most popular blends, like Apple and Captain Black, are ribbon cut.

Flake cut tobacco looks a bit like a thin chip of wood (flake is also a type of pressed blend, which is another post). A very light, flat cut, it slows burning and gives a blend the visual appeal of a dash of color, for example with Virginia tobacco cut into flakes. The broader plane of this cut also adds more flavor than a ribbon cut, as there is more surface area to burn. McClelland uses Virginia flake in several mixtures.

Like a flake cut, cube cut slows burning but has even more surface area than a flake. So, it adds even more flavor and provides a leisurely smoke. The flavor and subtleties of burley are truly brought out in this cut. This is also the most difficult cut to produce of the three cuts, needing special pressing and cutting equipment, and several layers of burley, to produce a quality cube. This cut is somewhat rare, but is in Uhle’s Perfection Plug Burley and Blend 300.

There’s always more to know about pipe tobacco, and reviewing basic tobaccos and cuts is a good starting point. Now you can even try mixing your own blend--but easy on the perique.

Okay, so Detective Hoffman was really with Jigsaw the whole time….

Twitter: @thepipebit