Not in this case! I lit it up and it was as fine a tobacco as I have ever smoked. The taste was incredible and the pipe stayed lit easily burning to a easy to remove white ash. There is NO bite and the puffing is easy.

I usually relight my tobacco about 2/3 down but I smoked this right to the bottom without stoping. Just slow and easy. Wow what a smoke! This tobacco with my 1776Tavern and Pease Odyssey I have my rotation.

The tobacco came in an almost perfect state of moisture. It arrived in a heavy duty ziplock bag that I will likely end up reusing, as I'm not even sure where you get ziplock bags this high quality, seemingly even thicker than the freezer bags I've bought. The presentation of the tobacco is nice. The logo of the company is an eagle with a shield of stars and stripes oddly reminiscient of the presidential seal with a few slight differences, such as the aming of the wings and the fact that the feet are not visible.

The package arrived in an envelope, which surprised me. I am not sure how much tobacco exactly has been sent to me. My guess is 4oz of tobacco, but upon looking at the envelope I had suspected it to be less. The ziplock bags seems to have had the air sucked out of them and had been flattened so they were very thin, and stacked in the envelope almost like card stock. Included were a few advertisements for their shop, including some tobaccos I do not believe are listed on their website, and some rather interesting pipes and pipe accessories.

A light aromatic consisting of all black Virginia leaf. Its look, feel, and smell are rather nice, and unique. As I type this, I have just spread a bit out for drying, though this was likely unnecessary. It has a very natural tobacco smell to it I have come to associate with drug store blends, though it does not look like a drug store blend. It reminds me of my grandfather a bit, but I was too young when he smoked to know exactly what tobacco that was. I've gotten about 40 blends so far, and this one doesn't smell like any of them. It has the smell of tobacco with the fig element I've come to associate with Virginias. It is cut into rather large pieces, and while I'm not very experienced with cuts, I think this is a rough cut.

Overall, the pipe tobacco seems very appealing, and I am looking forward to packing my first bowl.

Packing and Lighting

I packed this tobacco into a Savinelli Punto Oro gifted to me by David M. I had been smoking other light aromatics out of it so it seemed like a good fit. It packs easily, and quickly. The cut makes it uncessary to tamp it down as hard when packing. It lights easily, and catches fast. It seems to be burning to a white ash. After the charring light, the tobacco seems to burn very, very well, requiring almost no maintenance whatsoever.

Flavor and Burn On the charring light, my first thought is that its sweetness is alot like sugar tipped cigars. The sugar hits you first, and then the flavor follows, and the sugar lingers in the aftertaste, almost like they are a bit separate. It is a very unique sort of sweetness, like syrup or molasses. Not fruity at all, but rather tasty. Mild and mellow are the key notes to this tobacco.

As I work my way past the charring light, the flavor profile remains the same, but the experience changes. I'm getting more sweetness on the exhale, and less on the inhale. Its nice. When you inhale, its almost entirely tobacco, but as you exhale, you get this nice blast of sweetness. The flavor is definitely mellow. As I tamp, however, the flavor gets a little stronger, and sweeter. It is definitely a very sweet smoke, almost like candy, but not with any particular flavoring noticable.

Bottomline

It made good accompaniment to the Star Trek TOS epiode I was watching while smoking it and typing this review, for a few reasons. Firstly, it tastes the same throughout the entire bowl, no matter what I seem to do. Secondly, it requires next to no maintenance. However, I would highly advise having a pipe cleaner handy because the mixture of saliva and tobacco has a very bitter sweet taste to it that flavors the bit if you do not watch out.

It is extremely sweet, but not extremely artificual. Sweetened tobacco without any sign of fruit of alcoholc that I can notice. Though they are very different, I find it in this way like Anny Kake, though, this is much sweeter to my taste and less complex. It is nice and relaxing. The nicotine quantity seems higher than I am used to, but I do not smoke much nicotine heavy tobacco, or it could be that I've already smoked three bowls today and it is finally hitting me.

The tobacco blend is superb. Notes seem to hit it right with notes of vanilla, cream, cinnamon, coffee, and toasted nuts.

The cinnamon note is more apparent at the start of the bowl - but that slowly disapates as one progresses throught the smoke. The creaminess remains throughout as one is treated to a mild aromatic that is of medium strength.

Although described as a mild aromatic - the tobacco blend itself lends itself to a lovely medium almost full taste on the palate. And yet afterwards there is no pipe funk left in the bowl or in the mouth. Absolutely no bite whatsoever - So, one does not have to worry about "Godzilla Breath" or ugly halitosis that seems to plague so many pipe tobacco blends out there on the market.

My only faulting of this blend actually lies in the description - as I wonder if the word cigarette might be something that could turn a lot of potential buyers off. The blend is excellent and whether one is 'transitioning' to pipe from other smokables seems to be a moot point.

Black as sin and pure heaven in the bowl. This could be another tobaco blend that will become a permanent fixture in my rotation of tobaccos.

Jack really hit it out of the park on this one.

Highly recommended and 4 stars with 2 thumbs up!