D & R Tobacco Ryback

The Virginia is grassy, tart and tangy citrus sweet, and slightly floral and sugary in a strong competitive role. The burley is toasty, woody, earthy and nutty sweet as an important supporting player. The dark fired Kentucky is earthy, spicy, woody, floral, dry and a tad sweet. It competes with the burley for the lead. Dry as a bone, and being a shag cut, it burns quickly, but not harsh unless you puff it fast. I prefer to hydrate it. Won't bite, but does sport a few small rough edges. The spiciness almost dominates the flavor, though the sweetness of the tobaccos is right there to compliment and contrast it. No casing or toppings. The strength is in the center of medium to strong, and the nicotine level is right on its heels. The taste is a step past that center. Burns fairly cool and very clean with a mostly consistent, mildly sweet, spicy, rather savory flavor from top to bottom. Requires very few relights. Virtually leaves no moisture in the bowl. Has a long lingering after taste, and stronger room note. Not an all day smoke.

-JimInks

This medium-strong shag is a must have for folks who want something sweet, strong and easy to smoke. The shag comes quite dry and a couple of ounces fills a pint jar. Bag note: coffee and molasses. Like other dry shags, it smokes best when firmly packed, just to the point of a tight but open draw. Great for stormy weather and quick breaks as it packs easily and stays put. Initial flavor is super sweet, dark caramelized tobacco. Mid bowl, sweetness fades and I start to feel just how strong this stuff is. Can be smoked to oblivion, but gentle tamping and puffs are needed to prevent a hot ashy tongue. I think this would be a great tobacco for someone who's transitioning away from cigarettes, as it is powerful and extremely easy to smoke. Leaves my cobs dry and easy to clean. Just my opinion, but if you're trying to decide between Ryback and Ryback Gold, stick with the Ryback as it's more flavorful and smokes cooler. Available in bulk at an excellent price from pipesandcigars. Hope this review is helpful. Happy smoking!

As I sit puffing a bowl from a fresh bag sent over by pipesandcigars I find the questions a little difficult. How do rate a blend of the finest leaves cured and flavored by a time honored tradition of flue curing. No sprays of casing to cover up sub par tobacco. Mr Ryan single handedly saved a struggling industry of top shelf tobacco farms including Perique and brings simple tobacco to wonderful flavors. I like it natural and the moment you open the bag you are greeted with a heady aroma of wood smoke in a pure danish tradition smoking very smooth in a full mouth of bittersweet and complex tast. Each puff begs for another to pick out the different flavors. Wonderful stuff!

I first tried this blend as a replacement for Drum RYO as Ryback was half the price while offering, in my mind, a higher quality DFK blend. It didn’t occur to me to try it in a pipe until much later when I realized that D&R actually takes it’s new pipe tobacco designation seriously. I’m pretty glad I did. D&R is a serious tobacco company and their products are high-quality and affordable.

Ryback in a pipe gives me that nicotine blast in an easy to smoke, no nonsense cut. As a sucker for DFK, Ryback delivers that woody, musty-sweet taste, with a healthy sweet VA component to back things up and tame the DFK which can be overwhelming. I’m guessing that there is a straight air-cured portion of burley in here, too, as there is a rather dry, classic nutty taste as well.

If anyone out there is a 5Brothers fan, give this stuff a try. A similar smoking shag, but with more depth of flavor and a little more “controlled.” Ryback burns like hellfire due to the shag cut, so an easy puff is in order...however you’ll still get plenty of flavor out of this no nonsense blend. One of my favorites and at a pound for less than $30, you’re looking at a winner in my book!

Ryback has a medium strength nicotine hit and medium taste with a slight added sweetness, I think. More complex than Two Timer, not as strong as Don Giovanni Sigaro or as Picayune. As with all D & R blends you may wish to hydrate it to slow down the experience. I smoked it as it came from the bag, found it to have a slight tendency to bite me, and some hydration lessened that. As with Two Timer this could be an all day smoke in my opinion.

These D & R blends are a great value and so far have exceeded my expectations for tobaccos in this price range.

A nice no nonsense blend. For a Dark Fired blend it stays in the med. range with okay nic. It is also rather sweet, too sweet not to be cased. It took several bowls but I now think that that it is licorice flavoring that I am picking up. I would not call this a cross over aromatic but the flavoring is definitely there. It runs along side the tobacco not overpowering it. I do get an ashy taste here and there but the earthy slightly nuttiness of the tobacco is also there. It is a one dimensional smoke, however. What you start with is what you end with and there is no change in flavor profile. Still, nothing wrong with it and worth exploring if you like a case burley/KY. In many ways it reminds me of a milder Five Brothers that is sweeter due to that stronger casing. It will bite a little. Best results for me was group 3 or smaller bowls. I could smoke several of them without too much difficulty but moving toward larger bowls resulted in a little bite.

Last week I was watching a video where a pipe smoker was discussing D&R and how they were originally a RYO company and changed their tobacco classification to “pipe tobacco” when cigarette tobacco taxes went through the roof many years ago. He also mentioned this blend was a fairly good substitute for DRUM rolling tobacco. I have never been a cigarette smoker but decades ago I dabbled in RYO with Bugler and DRUM and though my experiment did not last long I do remember liking the taste of DRUM. I bought a pound of this and also Ryback Gold as it was economically cheaper since they were on sale. I also got a pound of Picayune previously as it is no longer in production. A friend of mine told me there were some manufacturing changes going on. I received my two huge pounds of tobacco; you really get a lot if the tobacco is shag and light weight which this was as it had little to no moisture. I got a really nice smell out of the bag but I just can’t put my finger on it. This one does have a mild casing or topping from the description. It smokes nice and cool with no bite for me and was equally good in a corn cob and meerschaum. Not sure if it is some weird nostalgia but I really liked the natural taste of the tobacco and I guess the nicotine was around medium but I built up a strong tolerance over the years. For a cig tobacco in a pipe I will give this a 3 star. Be minded this somewhat dry shag does burn fast, maybe that is why I smoked about a dozen bowls over several days because though good does not last long. In about a week I will try the Ryback Gold.

D & R Tobacco - Ryback.

Just like it's sibling Ryback Gold which I reviewed a few days ago the cut is fine. Exorbitantly fine! The unlit aroma's very similar and the moisture's good; note, this was supplied from bulk.

It doesn't seem as headstrong with Kentucky as 'Gold. Sure, it gives a definite flavour, conjoined in an equal measure with the plain Burley, but I don't get as much acrid, fire-cured nuances from it as I did in 'Gold. The Virginia has a laconic, dulcet character, and gives the smoke it's 'backbone'. Sounds like a half decent smoke? Well no, it isn't; now come the mechanics! It burns ridiculously quick, becomes hot even under the most tentative of techniques, and the bite....... ow, ow, ow!

Nicotine: quite strong. Room-note: tolerable.

Ryback? Just like it's counterpart, Ryback Gold, the flavour saves it from a thrashing. Two stars:

Somewhat recommended.

Finally, I’ve got a blend I can smoke in public! I, for the first time, smoked a bowl of Ryback. This blend is perfect for me because it has a nice tobacco flavor, smokes cool, and the room notes are similar to those of cigarettes. It would not surprise me to see the average cigarette smoker smoking Ryback in a pipe because it has more flavor and inhaling is not necessary to taste this blend. This is another wonderful blend by D & R. Tobacco.

I've been trying D&R tobaccos of late and I have yet to find one I don't like. All the ones I've tried have been flavorful and easy to smoke. They come rather dry, so I hydrate them. I moistened a pound of Ryback with two tablespoons of distilled water and let it sit for about ten days. That gave it a perfect moisture content for a pipe and slowed down the burn rate of the shag considerably. Please note that I don't smoke very often any more, so my tolerance for nicotine is lower than it once was. So what seems like a fairly strong tobacco to me may not to someone who smokes regularly.

Ryback reminds me a lot of GH Kendal Dark, both in flavor and strength. Aroma-wise, it is smokey with hint of the sweet ketchup scent that McClelland is famous (infamous?) for. The taste of dark fired leaf is prevalent throughout the smoke, a bit more so at the beginning than at the end. The Virginia tobacco is in the background, lending just enough sweetness to be noticeable. TBH, I don't taste the burley very much, but what I do get is a lot of spiciness and occasionally a bit of a floral taste, as if it contained some oriental tobacco. All in all, the taste is complex enough to hold the interest of a pipe tobacco aficionado. There is no bite and it burns to a dark ash, leaving no dottle in the bowl.

I think anybody who enjoys the pure taste of tobacco and especially dark fired leaf would enjoy Ryback. I also imagine it would make a fine RYO tobacco, as the shag cut would make it easy to roll and smoke in a cigarette paper. I agree with the reviewer who said it reminded him of Gauloises (which was always one of my favorite cigarettes, too).

I highly recommend D&R products. Not only are they made from obviously high quality tobacco, they deliver a lot of flavor at a modest price.