VCPÖ Selection Nr. 5 Aromatic Mixture

The closed pouch already smells like blueberries. When you open it you will find almost only Black Cavendish, the Virginia in the blend serves no purpose other than adding some bright specks in the otherwise dark mixture. This is pretty much standard for German made heavy aromatics and normally a reason to be suspicious. But since the pouch aroma is halfway natural and only very slightly artificial the suspicion was uncalled for. It smells like something made from blueberries, maybe like a yoghurt, and not like the berries itself would. In any case this blend *needs* airtime. Not for moisture purposes (its perfectly moist right out of the pouch) but to get it good smelling and tasting. That slight artificiality that so many heavy aromatics have will ruin your experience for sure if you don't let this blend breath for a couple of days.

The cut is what i would describe as loose tiny-flakes cut. It is tiny flakes as in Corn Flakes rather then in flake cut tobacco. Which means that packing is a breeze ... let drizzle in, "tamp" until it is still spongy and its ready to be lit. And lighting as well as keeping it lit is no hassle either. Very beginner friendly ... *but* it has a slight tendency to nip a bit if not smoked slow enough. It is far from a real tongue bite, but it is still there. However, if smoked correctly then this is no issue.

The taste itself is as advertised: blueberries. And that's all there is really. It is just blueberries and it does not develop at all. From sucking on the unlit pipe to emptying out it is blueberries all the way. I can notice the Black Cavendish through the flavouring but naturally this does not offer anything much in the taste department. But it is very high quality tobacco, very silky and just smooth. It has some sweetness to it but it is far from being candy. It also has a very clearly defined "sour" note to it which plays along nicely with the sweet tones. Of course it is not really "sour" but it is fruit acid you would expect in, well, fruit or berries. If you have a bad tongue day and the sweet notes are lost to you then the taste of fruit acid is too much as it has no other counterpart than those sweet notes.

Aftertaste is like blueberries, does not last overly long and is actually nice to have. The room note and you may have guessed it, is that of blueberries. Not too obtrusive but very sadly also not as nice as expected. It has some artificiality to it that just is not good to smell.

So do i recommend this blend? Well somewhat. For me, strictly personally, this blend just didn't do much. It was too monochromatic and too predictable and i really wanted to like this blend more than i could. Even when just now i had the first pipe after three weeks not smoking (the flue, that evil witch) and everything should taste like heaven, this blend just did not do much for me. *BUT*: it *is* an excellent heavy aromatic and if you do like those and you do like blueberries then this might just be what you where looking for. So seen objectively this is a solid three star blend even tho i only am giving it two stars.