Hearth & Home Classic Burley Kake

(3.11)
Classic Burley Kake is a new blend that pays homage to old time burley flakes and cakes. Using Tennessee and Kentucky burleys, ranging from lighter white to darker mahogany, and a bit of matured red Virginia, this sliced cake tobacco is a traditional American style blend. We start with four different types of burley, the aforementioned Tennessee and Kentucky, plus two different premium white burleys. Then we add a red Virginia for a maple-like sweetness. Then we use all natural flavors: cocoa, rum and anise and steam the tobaccos with the flavorings and firmly press and slice it. The aroma is mellow and pleasant, and the taste is lightly sweet with a large volume of smoke. Hearken back to a simpler time when the sight of a pipe in someone's mouth while walking down the street was common, and the scent of pipe tobacco was everywhere.

Details

Brand Hearth & Home
Series Signature Series
Blended By Russ Ouellette
Manufactured By Sutliff Tobacco Company
Blend Type Aromatic
Contents Burley, Kentucky, Virginia
Flavoring Anisette, Cocoa / Chocolate, Rum
Cut Krumble Kake
Packaging 1.5 ounce tin, bulk
Country United States
Production Currently available

Profile

Strength
Mild to Medium
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Extremely Mild -> Overwhelming
Flavoring
Mild to Medium
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
None Detected -> Extra Strong
Room Note
Pleasant
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Unnoticeable -> Overwhelming
Taste
Medium
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Extremely Mild (Flat) -> Overwhelming

Average Rating

3.11 / 4
44

34

13

10

Reviews

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Displaying 1 - 10 of 101 Reviews
Reviewed By Date Rating Strength Flavoring Taste Room Note
Jan 01, 2014 Medium Medium Medium Very Pleasant
It's a little stronger than your average burley blend. Lots of tangy dark fruit sweetness and a little earth from the red Virginia, which is a tad more than a background player. The toppings include light rum, a bit of anise, maple (barely obvious), and lots of rich cocoa. The dry, woody white burleys add a mild sharpness to the mix, contrasting the molasses, earth and deep cocoa from the other burleys, though all them are downplayed a little because of the toppings, and some PG. The nic-hit is mild to medium. Won't bite or get harsh. The cake breaks apart easily, and may require a little drying time. Burns at a moderate pace, clean and cool with a very consistent flavor, and has a nice after taste and room note. Needs a few relights and leaves little moisture in the bowl. I found the cocoa to be overwhelming in a meer, but not so much in a cob or briar. Can be an all day smoke for more experienced smokers.

-JimInks
45 people found this review helpful.
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Reviewed By Date Rating Strength Flavoring Taste Room Note
Apr 10, 2014 Mild to Medium Mild to Medium Mild to Medium Pleasant to Tolerable
Smells good enough to eat in the bag, so a very pleasant tin note. Physical quality of the tobaccos is OK but there are a few woody stemy bits hiding in the kake. Lights easily and immediately delivers a sweet wow in the form of a simple pancake syrup sweetness. Mid bowl a hint of chocolate is noticeable. Towards the last third of the bowl I can taste a sweet liquor taste, especially if I draw the smoke under my tongue. Although this is an aromatic, I think you can get away with smoking it in a pipe used for burleys and virginias; Old Gowrie leaves the pipe smelling sweeter than this stuff. This is a mild to medium strength tobacco and may only be mild. I think H&H deserves a compliment because of how well the complex flavorings are carried out here. If I were rating the quality of the tobaccos alone, I could never give CB Kake four stars, but for the flavor experience I feel it deserves four. I recommend smoking this kake in a larger pipe so that you have time to enjoy the nuances. Also, if you're wanting some N you'll need to smoke a big bowl of it. If there was ever a tobacco made to go with Coke or Pepsi, this would be the one. Finally, if H&H could improve their burley and make some stronger tobacco I'd love this stuff.
Pipe Used: MM Great Dane Egg COB
PurchasedFrom: given as a gift
Age When Smoked: fresh bulk
20 people found this review helpful.
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Reviewed By Date Rating Strength Flavoring Taste Room Note
May 14, 2009 Mild Mild to Medium Mild to Medium Pleasant
My problems with aromatics (and I would consider this an aromatic) is that they tend to be too gooey in the pipe, too mild in taste and too overdone on the aroma. This one is guilty of none of those things. The only thing this one does that I don't appreciate is it has a short burst of foul taste on first lighting. It's a soapy flavor that is very disagreeable, but it goes away within a few seconds.

Once I'm past that initial soap taste, I'm treated to a wonderfully clever combo of tastes that somehow meld into a harmonious whole. Rum, anise and chocolate sounds like a recipe for disaster but this is a lightly flavored and lightly scented blend that allows the true taste of high quality burleys to come through with that speck of virginia sweetness. I needed to find a good aromatic for when people are around but something that I don't smoke just because I'm trying to please others. It's gotta be personally satisfying; otherwise why bother? This is the finest aromatic I've ever smoked. I gotta try some more of this guy's blends - if his other stuff is this high quality, I may be missing out!
19 people found this review helpful.
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Reviewed By Date Rating Strength Flavoring Taste Room Note
Dec 09, 2014 Mild to Medium Mild to Medium Medium Very Pleasant
Lord knows this blend has already been well reviewed, so let's just hit the high points. As a reference I like burley nuttiness, but also enjoy lightly aromatic English or American. Think HGL or Sutliff Aromatic English. What pleases me most in any blend is its harmonious qualities and its balance, with no one component dominating.

This one does exactly that. Yes, it is indeed a burley, but the touch of Virginia and the chocolate/cacao/rum tones balance it beautifully to provide a lovely rich, creamy, thick burley-forward (but not dominant) smoke. If this were a food, it would be a rich smooth pudding. All you read about rubbing out, a bit of drying (if any) and a gentle cadence will all pay off pleasureably for you.

This is not an expensive blend (purchased bulk, a test ounce), but I would absolutely order this one again, perhaps after I also test the Solani ABF that so many have spoken of here. One other very important note:

In an interview with Russ Ouellette, he noted that CBK is one of his personal favorites, but also that it was one of the hardest blends he'd ever made. His reason? That it was his goal that an aromatic blend's taste should closely match its tin aroma, which is rarely the case with most other aromatics. To achieve his goal, he states that it took him nearly two years before he finally developed the method to cause the flavors (cocoa, etc.) to permeate the tobacco. He clearly succeeded.

Addenda (3 mos later): Lovely, lovely, lovely - even better, add another 1/2 star. Couple more observations. Call this a modern, fit grandpa tobacco. Please - pack it light and tamp lightly, if at all (it will burn much better and avoid those relights you may read about), and smoke it sloooow. Tamp lightly. No, not because of bite, but for me because it is so warm and rewarding that if you're like me, it's too tempting to forge ahead. Please don't - a little restraint will result in a LOT of pleasure. And modern memories of your dear Grandpa who loved you unconditionally...

Pipe Used: Big Ben nosewarmer
PurchasedFrom: P&C bulk
Age When Smoked: 3 months
16 people found this review helpful.
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Reviewed By Date Rating Strength Flavoring Taste Room Note
May 24, 2013 Medium Mild Medium Pleasant
If you like burley blends, I would give this a try. The Virginia is a light touch. The Kentucky gives it a little more strength and flavor than the average burley blend. I like this enough to have pipe dedicated to it, and I enjoy it. I do not like it enough to smoke it every day when I have other options.

There is a whiff of rum or something, but it is really tobacco flavored. The taste is not what I would call delicate or nuanced. It is a basic smoke that satisfies.
14 people found this review helpful.
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Reviewed By Date Rating Strength Flavoring Taste Room Note
Jul 27, 2010 Mild to Medium Strong Medium Pleasant to Tolerable
I don't know why, but I've had an especially hard time warming up to the Burley-based tobaccos from P&C. I gather it must be because of their choice of Burley, which strikes me as an especially obtrusive and woody tasting leaf. That's unfortunate, because I think that some of these tobaccos have potential. I genuinely disliked the LJ Heart Burley, haven't much enjoyed Beverwyck, and I haven't been much impressed with the Classic Burley Kake either.

CBK arrives as an abused looking reddish to dark brown pressed block with lots of broken chunks floating about the bag. Though I understand that this tobacco is designed partly as an homage to the OTC tradition, I find this much more heavily flavored than most of the familiar OTCs. Bag notes are strong and a combination of chocolate, licorice, and sawdust. Rubbing out is easy, though it does tend to stick to the fingers. For me, at any rate, the flavorings used here are just too strong and too overdone. The smoke itself is dry and pleasant, but the aggressive flavoring made the first dozen bowls a chore to get through. And the chocolate and licorice flavors tended to be overmatched by that sawdusty Burley.

I do, however, find this to be an admirable blender. I'm a big fan of lightly flavored Burley and I find a small quantity of CBK (about 10%) can add interest to more neutral Burleys like MacBaren's Symphony, Peter Stokkebye's Cube Cut, even Carter Hall and Five Brothers.

As for rumors of its relationship to anything Edgeworth…nada, niente, nil. And given that some reviewers have described as "tasteless" a blend I find overwhelmingly aromatic...well, I wonder about product consistency. It'll take me a good 5 years to go through the pound I foolishly ordered.
12 people found this review helpful.
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Reviewed By Date Rating Strength Flavoring Taste Room Note
May 29, 2015 Mild Medium Mild to Medium Very Pleasant
This blend really surprised me. I didn't think I liked burley's/burley blends (based upon my previous experience with them) and I don't typically like aromatics, though they are nice when the mood strikes once in awhile. Anyhow....

Cake.....that word best describes what this tobacco looks like and smells like. A big chunk of tobacco. Smells of sweet caramel, vanilla, rum with hints of chocolate come from the bag. Smoking it is easy and effortless. The smoke smells and tastes sweet. Caramel Rum flavors with hints of light tobacco here and there as well as chocolate making an appearance now and again. It's a very delightful and enjoyable tobacco to smoke. I've been so impressed by it that I'm sending off a few ounces to my smoking buddies that enjoy aromatics a lot.

It also has almost no tongue bite and leaves the room smelling amazing. Another great job P&C!!
Pipe Used: Billard, Corn-Cob
PurchasedFrom: Pipesandcigars.com
Age When Smoked: New from store
10 people found this review helpful.
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Reviewed By Date Rating Strength Flavoring Taste Room Note
Aug 16, 2014 Mild to Medium Mild to Medium Mild to Medium Pleasant
Wonderful sweet but not overpowering aroma when opening tin. This is a sliced cake mixture, but soft enough to be a true "crumble cake." Physically feels like Penzance, although not like it at all to smoke. Quality of the tobacco is good, light and medium Tennessee and Kentucky Burleys and some Mature Virginia. Lightly cased with cocoa, rum and maybe a little anise overtones. An aromatic, but not much lingering effect on the bowl. Bone dry bowl at the end, no wet heel. Good all the way down, gets more complex throughout the smoke. No perceptible tongue bite. Nice slow smoke. Mild to medium strength tobacco and suitable for an all day smoke. Heath and Home delivers again. I love this tobacco, as I do most H & H Mixtures. Just a note that I like it better in the tin than bulk, seems to preserve the soft crumble cake slices better. Bravo to Mr. Russ Ouellette, the blender.
Pipe Used: James Upshall "P" FH Straight Grain
PurchasedFrom: Pipes and Cigars
Age When Smoked: New 8oz Tin
9 people found this review helpful.
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Reviewed By Date Rating Strength Flavoring Taste Room Note
Jun 23, 2014 Medium to Strong Mild to Medium Medium Pleasant
While I am fairly new to pipe smoking, I have tried a variety of kinds of tobacco blends, and I have enjoyed much of what I have tried. Having said that, for me, Classic Burley Kake is the closest thing I have found to date that puts the best of pipe tobacco in a single bowl (with the exception of Latakia, of which I am fond).

While this is, in a way, a simple blend, there is a lot going on here for me. To clarify, there are many components here that work together to produce one simply wonderful product. There is some bold burley flavor that is balanced with the mellow sweet tang of the Virginias. There are hints of chocolate and licorice, but they do not strike my pallet as flavoring (like in a typical aromatic) but more like seasonings that make the natural character of the tobaccos shine. The effect is not unlike adding a pinch of salt to a recipe-- not to make it salty, but to bring out the natural flavors of the food.

In short, all the components of this tobacco blend work together in harmony to produce a smooth tobacco flavor that is at once earthy, nutty, tangy, and sweet without being too much of any one of the four. At times, the flavor reminds me of dried fruit. At times, it reminds me of maple and nuts. At all times, it is delicious.

Finally, it burns well and leaves essentially no tongue bite (at least in my experience). And it, like many of the Hearth and Home blends, is quite affordable and available in bulk.

All in all, I would say Classic Burley Kake just about perfect for me (as long as I also have a great English blend around for my Latakia fix).

Pipe Used: Missouri Meerschaum Great Dane Cob
PurchasedFrom: pipesandcigars.com
Age When Smoked: 6 months
8 people found this review helpful.
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Reviewed By Date Rating Strength Flavoring Taste Room Note
Apr 17, 2013 Medium Mild Medium Very Pleasant
Absolutely delicious, right now my #1 favorite Burley. I'm smoking lots of Burley these days and this tops them all. Smooth, full flavored, slightly sweet, with that full round, nutty, cereal, classic Burley flavor. Pressed into fragrant chunks that crumble easily CBK has the perfect moisture content. It packs and lights up and continues to burn easily. I'm happily puffing away on it now. CBK seems to work out well in any pipe from a 9mm filtered Design Berlin to a unfiltered Stanwell to the old funky Magic Inch I'm smoking as I write this. The flavorings are mild and harmonize with the delicious blend of tobaccos. I wouldn't call this an aromatic. You can merrily puff away without fear of any tongue bite. If you love Burley don't pass this up. Highly recommended.
7 people found this review helpful.
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