McClelland - Premium Aromatic: Best of Show pipe tobacco reviews

Review

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Reviewed By:	Date:	Strength:	Flavoring:	Taste:	Room Note:	Recommendation:
Showing reviews 1 through 20 of 24 reviews of this tobacco NEXT >
mnadz	03/31/2013	Mild	Medium to Strong	Medium	Pleasant
To me, for the flavoring, I would rather smoke Captain Black. I much rather prefer Topic of Town for its maple flavoring and room note. If you like Captain Black for its flavor and room note, I say stay with it. I would normally recommend this, but since I find it same as Captain Black but a bit less, I have to just "somewhat" it.
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smoke'a'bowl	03/18/2013	Mild	Mild to Medium	Mild to Medium	Pleasant
This is my first review, so please bear with me. I haven't been smoking pipes for long. This is my first of McClelland's Premium Aromatics. It wasn't quite as aromatic as I expected, but it was tasty. However, it began to burn fairly hot especially in the second half of the bowl. It also had some bite, which I'm not a fan of. I'll give it a couple of more tries and we'll see where it takes me.
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zenflow	07/16/2012	Mild to Medium	Medium to Strong	Very Full	Pleasant to Tolerable
A great flavor and an awesome blend of tobaccos. A very good hybrid of English Blends and Aromatics.
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Trippwire	06/11/2011	Extremely Mild	Mild to Medium	Mild to Medium	Pleasant
Someone said it tastes like snickers, and it does... Very weak in regards to nicotine, but a pleasant taste overall. Town topic is better, don't buy more.
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Bradley	05/24/2011	Mild to Medium	Medium to Strong	Medium	Very Pleasant
Had a bowl of this lastnight and it was amazing. The tin didn't say what leaf was in the blend, only that it had a nougat casing. I also detected a bit of caramel in the tin aroma and smoking flavor. Tasted like a nice pastry of some sorts. The tobacco burned very evenly and to the bottom of the bowl. No tongue bite or anything. One of the other pipe club members said it was "an aromatic for non-aromatic smokers". Definitely recommend picking a tin of it up, especially if you're looking for a good aromatic to please the wife and smoke inside.
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fD Joe	03/30/2010	Mild to Medium	Medium	Medium	Pleasant
I bought this blend from a local smokeshop in Franklin, Tennessee. One of the owners of the shop said that it reminded him of Snickers in the bowl; therefore, I knew I had to try it. I purchased a tin, and was set back a few paces by the wave of scent sent out by the tobacco. It was a tad bit moist out of the tin, so i had to dry it out for a bit. Once I got the tobacco lit, it was easy to see that this was a full on aromatic. I enjoyed the smell of the smoke, and it gave off an interesting taste. Nougat was the first thing to my mind. It stays lit well when you dry it out. Not the best tobacco i've ever smoked, nor is it the best aromatic, but if you have some left over, give it a go.
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Sinister Topiary	11/08/2009	Very Mild	Medium to Strong	Medium to Full	Pleasant
The casing for Best of Show is not applied with a deft hand. It's very sweet (sure, it tastes like nougat, which is kind of nice), very thick, quite chemical, and quite gloopy. It might be a step up for aro lovers used to drugstore brands, but it was too cloying, chemical, and gurgly for me. A surprisingly subpar offering from McClelland, recommended only for aro lovers looking for something very sweet.
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Matt1977	08/14/2009	Mild	Medium to Strong	Mild	Very Pleasant
This blend is a great aromatic and has nouget flavor as described. This blend lingers on the palate like caramel or brown sugar flavor. All and all a great blend from Mclelland! This blend will be on my shelf and in my bowl always.
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DK	07/27/2009	Mild	Medium	Mild	Very Pleasant
This, along with Boswell's Christmas Cookie, has the most delectable pouch aroma of any standard aromatic pipe tobacco I have ever smoked. I found myself sniffing the opened tin very often. Absolutely wonderful aroma. Smells good enough to eat (but don't!). Taste-wise, I found this very ordinary. Unlike Tastemaster, this one did not rise above traditional flavored black cavendish based aromatics. The cut is a chunky ribbon, very black but with some flecks of lighter leaf. It burned very well and was mild to the tongue except when I puffed more vigorously - which is one way I taste test tobaccos in order to see how they behave in multiple situations. When puffed slowly and methodically, this was very mild and crossed well over into bland territory. There was an underlying sweetness (nougat, caramel, butterscotch, or some such) that was pleasant enough but too mild to really savor. When puffed a bit harder, the casing wore off too soon and the blend became harsh after about half a bowl. That's typical of aromatics. Best to smoke them slowly and not overpuff, so as not to wrongfully expand the blend's focus. Room aroma was traditional black cavendish. The nougat scent got lost in the fog. Overall, a very ordinary experience. Not bad, but not repeatable.
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Coltrane	01/17/2009	Very Mild	Medium	Medium	Very Pleasant
I just bought this tobacco today from Grant's in San Francisco and I must say it is a very high quality tobacco. I loaded the tobacco in my Tonni Nielsen Ebony and Boxwood Calabash pipe. The first bowl had a problem with staying lit but burned with several relights just the same and had a nice flavor and aroma. I let the pipe cool off for a while and decided to repack it again and then just let it sit for about 30-minutes. I lit up the pipe and bingo, the flavor was very mild, sweet and creamy with a sweet tobacco foundation that burned very smoothly and did not bite one bit. The aroma was absolutely wonderful! As I walked around the city today I had several people walk behind me sniffing the wonderful aroma and whisperring of how good it smelled. For the immature wankers who knock this blend stating how it is terrible and smells bad, slow down and try to enjoy the smoking experience. Don't drag like a Hoover or huff and puff like the big bad wolf looking for a strong nicotine hit. It will burn lousy, taste awful and smell terrible. And again for the wankers who state it is full of humectants? Humectants are in cheap drug store tobaccos NOT quality blends such as this. And brsides, pipe smoking is not about the nicotine; it's about the pleasure derived in the flavor and aroma of the tobacco in times of leisure and relaxation. For those who have insipid expectations of a nicotine fix and smoke to exasperate all those around them, they should simply stick to cigarettes. I highly recommend this blend to new smokers looking for a high quality aromatic and for people who know how to smoke and enjoy the pipe experience.
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LtMac	07/26/2008	Very Mild	Mild	Very Mild	Pleasant
McClelland Best of Show was a tobacco that I ordered with high hopes. In my opinion it didn't live up to its name. It does have a nougat flavor. To me, Best of Show tastes like a Pecan Log made of white divinity candy covered by pecans that I remember the family purchasing from Stuckey's stores while on vacation during my childhood. That is where the good part ends for this tobacco. Best of Show was too light and non-existant as a smoke for me. Everything about it is mild and light. It has virtually no nicotine content as far as I can tell. I don't plan to purchase it again. Although limited to three varieties, McClelland's Townsman Cavendish series is better than their tinned premium aromatic series of pipe tobaccos at a better price. One star for Best of Show.
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SlowToke	12/26/2007	Very Mild	Medium to Strong	Mild	Very Pleasant
Best of Show is a fine tobacco blend as far as aromatics go. The tin aroma smells to me like butterscotch. The taste is sweet and that of nougat or butterscotch true to the tin aroma. It lights and burns well and smoked down to a fine ash for me with only a little dottle and moisture. It's a very mild, smooth smoke. The only time it bit me was on relights no matter how gentle I puffed. It did require a lot of attention and care to prevent overheating and moisture build-up. It was pretty unidimensional throughout the bowl with no changes in taste but no bitterness either. All in all a nice tasting and smoking quality aromatic but a bit on the boring side.
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emmbee	04/17/2007	Mild	Mild	Mild to Medium	Very Pleasant
Like most pipe smokers, I started many years ago with aromatics. Luckily, I found my English mainstays and moved on, never looking back. I found an open tin of BOS at Cigar King, Skokie, IL, and was immediately overcome with the sweet but reserved tin aroma. I fired some up and was not disappointed. This is a premium aromatic, a bit on the sugary side, with flavors of chocolate and nougat. McClelland does aromatics well. The casing is a bit on the heavy side, but the mild flavor and inviting room note make up for it. This is a blend I can turn to from time to time when I?m not in the mood for a heavy English. Good stuff! Pleasing, fragrant and delicious. --------update great room note but simply too greasy and mucky for my taste. i've attained grown up tastes and i don't care for twinkies anymore. try fader's or wilke for more adult aromatics that won't leave your mouth coated and waxy. Two and a half of five stars
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LondoMollari	03/10/2007	Mild	Mild to Medium	Mild to Medium	Pleasant
McCelland, in my opinion, is a maker of some of the most mellow aromatics around. This is no execption. Best of Show seems to be missing the vanilla notes common in other aromatics like Captain Black, Blue Note, etc. but makes up for it with the nougat flavoring, and it does taste like nougat. A smooth, cool smoke all around that is not much different than Town Topic (same base tobacco?) when the casing is taken out of consideration. Overall it's cool, smooth like velvet, and rich - definately not something that is hot, bites, or pierces the tongue. I like this particular blend much better than Town Topic's uneventful Maple flavor.
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Russell	02/14/2007	Mild	Extra Strong	Overwhelming	Strong
This was so sickly sweet out of the tin I had to let it air out (it wouldn't dry) for several hours before I gingerly put some into a savinelli I dedicated to aromatics- which took two dozen bowls of stokkebye's chocolate to get the nasty taste out. This should have gone into a nearly worn-out cob. Absolutely under no circumstance do you want to put this sort of tobacco into a dunhill or ashton. I had a hell of a time getting this one lit since it was so wet. The sickly sweet smell of artificial vanilla and chocolate liquor immediately came back and I gagged. It began gurgling after about ten puffs so I threw out the balsa filter and ran a cleaner through the stem, and then it started gurgling after 4 more puffs. I left the pipe to air after swinging the fluid out for a week and a half, and also left the lid of the tin off, for a week and a half. I loaded up another bowl... and got the same result after about 15 puffs. I promptly threw away the tin. This is not one I'd recommend. The flavor is bad, the smoke produces quite a stench and it refuses to dry out. Whomever decided to put humectants on tobacco ought to be run out of town on a rail. I'm not sure if this is tobacco or fancy plastic flakes scraped off the floor of a candy factory. Yuck!
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Tantric	12/21/2005	Mild	Strong	Mild to Medium	Pleasant
Best of Show was the other McClelland blend I got as an early Christmas gift. Similar to Taste Master in composition and structure, Best of the Show has a sweeter taste due to the nougat flavoring, which my daughter compared to Krispy Kreme donoughts. Though initially it?s difficult to set both blends apart, in the long run the after taste of Best of the Show does become actually cloying. Steam-cased Burley, shiny black in color with some golden strands thrown in, Best of Show is very sweet and tasty. A quality aromatic, it appeals to the almost infantile sweet tooth one still has. It?s yummy and rich in flavor (perhaps too rich), but unlike Taste Master I found this one tiring and eventually bloated. Still, if you are strong aromatic fan, this one is a quality smoke.
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Spike	06/12/2005	Mild to Medium	Mild	Mild to Medium	Strong
I haven't deliberately smoked many "Aromatics" since my first encounters with a pipe in the 1960's and early 70's. This was highly recommended by many reviewers I have often agreed with and am very impressed also. However, be aware that the aroma is somewhat overwhelming to one not used to flavored tobaccos. It is kind of like being hungry and coming indoors and smelling fresh-baked sticky buns or pecan rolls. The aroma is really out there. If you are a person with a moustache, you will remember this blend for a good long while! Updated 6/12/2005: For newer pipers wanting a very nice smelling tobacco with very little strength. Really smells teriffic!
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Pipestud	03/03/2005	Extremely Mild	Mild	Mild	Pleasant
This one didn't win any awards in my pipe, much less Best of Show. Now, that isn't to say this isn't a quality aromatic. I don't like most aromatics (even quality ones) because they fail (like this one did) to sock it to me with some nicotine. This tobacco is light and airy. This tobacco is sweet. This tobacco does not have a tendency to bite. This tobacco burns rather dry, (all things considered.) This tobacco was created by a quality blender. But, this tobacco doesn't taste like tobacco.
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Professor	03/02/2005	Extremely Mild	Strong	Mild	Tolerable
In writing the 1000th review of a McClelland blend here at tobaccoreviews.com, it would be wonderful to give praise to Best of Show. As you can gather, I cannot. This is slightly uncharacteristic of many of McClelland's work in that the "nougat" flavouring overpowers the traditional McClelland tin aroma. This is a charming-looking course cut blend--a range of colours from the Cavendish and Virginia tobacco. This is too mild for my tastes, though, and typical of aromatics artificial-tasting. However, this is not quite as artificial-tasting as some aromatics I have had and the quality of the tobacco is much higher than most aromatics that seem to think it is okay to add low quality tobacco as the casing is so often very strong. I will not keep this around and this is the first McClelland product that I will not try again. With that said, if you like mild high-quality aromatics, you will probably like this.
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thedstnguishdgntlmn	01/02/2005	Mild	Medium to Strong	Mild to Medium	Very Pleasant
I just bought a tin of this at Cigar King in Illinois.This is an incredible blend.This is a chunky, and most delicious blend.It says nougat on the can and guess what it tastes like nougat!I normally smoke aromatic English blends and this is a great switch to the sweeter side. Another recommendation would be Dark English which I also picked up at Cigar King.If you like quality aromatics that are rich with no tongue bit give this a try.
Showing reviews 1 through 20 of 24 reviews of this tobacco NEXT >