Borkum Riff - Ultra Light pipe tobacco reviews

Review

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Reviewed By:	Date:	Strength:	Flavoring:	Taste:	Room Note:	Recommendation:
< PREVIOUS Showing reviews 21 through 40 of 40 reviews of this tobacco
tonalsmoker	10/30/2008	Very Mild	Very Mild	Very Mild	Unnoticeable
This blend is very BLAND,after about 10 bowls the mild tobacco taste gets very old for the tastebuds.I broke down once and tried this from my local drugstore since this was all they carried for the past several years.The first few bowls were alright but after that,it was all downhill from there.
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Karyyk	03/24/2008	Very Mild	Mild	Very Mild	Pleasant
I bought this one at the recommendation of a co-worker (a long-time pipe smoker), and honestly, it was a mild disappointment. It's not so much that it's a bad smoke as much as the flavor is just extremely mild, which is basically what it advertises itself to be ('Ultra Light'). The room note is nice enough, not overpowering, as it does have a nice aromatic quality, and it burns fairly well, but there's just not much to it aside from that.
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pop-pop's pipe	01/16/2008	Mild	Very Mild	Extremely Mild (Flat)	Very Pleasant
No Taste!
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Dan, Cordoba Man	01/08/2008	Very Mild	Medium	Mild to Medium	Pleasant to Tolerable
Well, this was my very first pouch I had when I bought my first pipe. Well, I've had worse. It is a mild tobacco, but with lots of aroma in the room. My wife loved it. I didn't know how to pack properly at the time, so there were many re-lights. It did taste well, and that's all I can remember.
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SmokeKing David	10/23/2007	Mild	Mild to Medium	Mild	Pleasant to Tolerable
This drug store type blend is just not for me. I didn't find much to complement here; it seems to have a wholly artificial bent to it. I have smoked several fine aromatics, both heavily cased and lightly topped. But this blend has a bitter and contrived taste and aftertaste, and I do not recommend it. Maybe total novices may try this and smoke some before moving on. But I hope that the novice seeks out this forum to make a better-informed choice.
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WillardFan	10/07/2007	Medium	Mild	Very Mild	Tolerable
Ok, so I found this one in an airtight container in my pantry. It wasn't alone either. It had some friends, Jamaican Rum, and Cherry Cavendish. It still has a price tag on it too. $2.63 + tax. Not a bad price for 2 years ago. I opened the plastic pouch and thought to myself, "Well that doesn't smell too bad!" Of course I was soon to be proven wrong. I noticed that it seemed a bit dry, but what the heck. I loaded up a bowl, and moved out onto my deck. It took two lights to get it going, and it really went downhill after that. I had a bowl of Velvet the other day that was better than this stuff. In the words I yell at Payton Manning on occasion, Pass, Pass, Pass...This one by...
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Tantric	03/07/2007	Very Strong	Medium to Strong	Mild	Very Pleasant
Some Mac Baren (none of the tinned stuff!), Gawith, Middleton, and Borkum Riff are about the only tobacco brands you can now find down here in Mexico. For some this may seem as a pretty good tobacco range; be that as it may, the fact is that every time I visit my tobacconist I invariably remember that Stephen Stills' song: ?...and if you can?t be with the one you love, love the one you?re with?. Ultra Light is indeed a very mild tobacco and, in my view, it?s also a very tasty aromatic. It has a refined chocolate/vanilla aroma, yet it also has a defined tobacco flavor. This is one of the few Borkum Riffs that doesn?t bite (Champagne being the other). Since the blending of this brand moved to Denmark, I find its tobaccos less chemical in taste and structure. I remember the old Ultra Light version as a non entity. Today, the Danish version seems to me very much alive. I can taste the Burleys quite distinctively; the Cavendish and Virginia are also there, providing support and giving it enough depth to make it an interesting smoke (at least a more interesting one than its previous German rendering). The blend is not at all goopy or excessively moist. It?s easy to pack, and after a couple of lights it gets going on pretty well. As always, the slower the rhythm of your puffing the more you?ll enjoy the flavors of this or any other tobacco. Room aroma seems to be very pleasant. I don?t know if the new Danish blenders case or top the leaf, but even when the aroma seems to be rather potent it doesn?t occlude the tobacco-smoking sensation. Although this is by no means a favorite of mine (I much more prefer Mac Baren?s Mixture Modern or BR?s Champagne or Scandinavian), I?ve learned to follow good ol? Stephen Still?s advice. Every now and then, this tobacco can be a delight.
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Mephisto	05/16/2006	Extremely Mild	Medium to Strong	Extremely Mild (Flat)	Pleasant
Ok lets imagine that you are stuck with no fine armotic such as Petersons Sunset Breeze to take out on the town with folks that dont like the smell of your Mephisto or Penzance or what ever it is you like by yourself or at the smoking lounge or lodge. Well this is about the least invasive I have tried it is light yet pleasent in room note so if someone still thinks your vanilla laden wife pleaser is too smoky or fills the air too much then go with this it is light generaly pleasent and effemeral. The trick here is you have to put up with the super light and flatness in general. Then on top of that you MUST only smoke the fist 2/3 of the bowl or horrible things will come of it. If this is done all is well and it is well behaved ( short smoke not a marathon blend ) that actualy doesn't have that pipe smelling like a cig. ashtray like some of the other drugstore blends. I say its not specialy blend and nothing to pine over but it has its niche use, so if thats what you are looling for then this is the tool you might want to use Oh and you can chain smoke this all night ( a bowl every half hour ( thats all you are gonna get out of it)) all night long and stillnot get the effects of one bowl of any of the Dunhill blend. This one couldn't puch its way out of a wet paper bag ( duh it's an Ultra Light )
Reviewed By:	Date:	Strength:	Flavoring:	Taste:	Room Note:	Recommendation:
BEN	05/05/2006	Mild	Mild	Mild	Pleasant
Let me recommend this to anyone wanting to try a Borkum Riff pipe tobacco. It is the only product this company makes that I have ever truly liked . I tried this for a while in my early days of pipe smoking and just recently tried a bowl full at a neighbors house who's late husband smoked it exclusively for years...I obliged her when she offered and it took me back. Wild Turkey and water and a bowl full of this in my younger days, fantastic!..The only one I ever liked...Borkum Riff tobacco's just plain suck, other than this one.
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DUPE.629	02/03/2006	Extremely Mild	Very Mild	Very Mild	Pleasant
February 2006. If your terrified of any tobacco with even the slightest touch of back-bone in taste,or strength,then,you may like this. It lit easy enough but,I felt like I was smoking fresh air that had been contaminated with a very weak sickly taste of faint vanilla. Ugh! Boring,and way to light for me! I'm running back to my virginia,perique,and latakia blends.
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Bezoar	10/20/2005	Mild	Mild	Very Mild	Very Pleasant
it was extremely dry in the pouch and was compressed into a brick i had to break up. very finr ribbons. almost NO fines in it unlike my pouches of cherry liqueur. very pleasent smell in the pouch. the room note was wonderful and only started to fade in the last 1/4 of the bowl. very little tongue bite until the verry end. my smoke started out with very little flavor but turned into a mild pleasant vanilla flavor, but aftera few puffs i could only taste it in my mouth, the smoke coming out of my pipes stem was just hot air, no flavor. i used mt cherry liqueur pipe. did not clean it out or anyhing. the fine ribbon cut packed very well and burned along time. and it burned away, when i dumped it out i dont think i had a 1/10 of my bowl come out as ash. And surprisingly it smoked COOL, i just puffed and puffed, sucking as hard as i could and i never got hot, must be the large amount of virginia in it maybe. slightly hard to ignite but it did NOT condense at all.
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Pipey	05/16/2005	Mild	Mild to Medium	Mild	Pleasant
This is a better tobacco than its black brother. The flavours are more subtle, but nicer IMO, and the tobacco isnt TOO cased, as Borkum often does. I was smoking this all the time until I knew better, but its not really my style anymore..... I would recommend this to someone starting out, or someone who wants to reminiss those early days, mucking about, briar in mouth... Ahhhh,. those were the days!
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Spike	05/10/2005	Very Mild	Mild	Mild to Medium	Pleasant
A very good choice for the beginning piper. In my area this stuff sells for a premium price. About $5.00 a pouch. For that price you can get some really good tobacco when you graduate to the next level.
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UncleGar	10/07/2004	Very Mild	Mild	Very Mild	Pleasant to Tolerable
I've returned to the pipe after 15 years of cigars; I wanted something I could smoke indoors. This was the first tobacco I tried. I'm not a big fan of nicotine, despite my history, and this caught my eye. I rather liked it, at least for starters. Seekers of bold, adventurous tobaccos ought to know better than to expect thrills from this one. It's a sweet gentle smoke with a nice room note. There's a time and place for this one; a good starter for nicotine-uninitiated or maybe a good half-way out for de-toxing. Not much to get excited about either way. Chill!
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elpheasant	04/06/2004	Mild	Medium to Strong	Mild to Medium	Very Strong
Well, we all make mistakes. Burkum Riff was a big one. I was lured by the exotic sound of Swedish tobacco and thought that this stuff would be prime. Boy, was I wrong. I really couldn't tell what kind of tobacco it was, since it was green in color. The pouch smelled and felt like wet newspaper. It was very sticky and gummy. It was so damp that a whole bunch of steam was gathered on the inside of the bag. I threw it out after I saw that, suspecting that mold was soon to follow! I guess what bothered me about this was that the taste never changed or improved the entire time. It just stayed the same, and that wasn't good. Perhaps giving it only one smoke is not enough to sufficiently rate it, but my experience was so terrible that I wasn't willing to give it a second chance. I'm pleasantly surprised that it didn't sour the taste of my pipe. I've read that some tobaccos can give you a shot of "pipe juice" if you're not careful. This is the only tobacco that's ever juiced on me.
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	04/05/2004	Mild to Medium	Mild	Mild to Medium	Pleasant
If you live in a small town in the mountains, this may be the best tobacco you can find unless you fancy Carter Hall. We've fallen on hard times. After a 25 year hiatus, I returned to pipe smoking only to discover that once common Amphora and Flying Dutchman no longer exist on the shelves at the corner grocery, and tobacco shops are an endangered species. The drugstore doesn't sell tobacco. It isn't healthy, dontcha know. So, back to the subject at hand, Borkum Riff Ultralight. The blend is touted as a Virginia-Burley mix. It has a pleasant vanilla smell which improves after the pouch has been open for awhile, and it's not too wet. My wife likes the smell. Ultralight packs easily and burns well all the way to the bottom of the bowl. A peculiar, almond like smell wafts up about 1/3 to 1/2 way down, but this is momentary and improves immediately. There is a bit of tongue bite, but if smoked slowly, it's not too bad. It seems to do well in a medium sized bowl. If you have been smoking cheap cigars and are just switching to a pipe, try this. It isn't a real satisfying smoke. For some reason I always wonder about additives when I smoke this. To you accomplished connoisseurs - hey, I'm a desperate man! But help is near at hand...my email order of Frog Morton On The Town and MacBaren's Golden Extra is on its way!
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PipeNeophyte	01/21/2004	Mild to Medium	Mild to Medium	Mild to Medium	Tolerable
This is the first tobacco I've ever tried and my first review on Tobaccoreviews.com I bought this because I've tried a number of tobaccos that my friends have offered, and, upon purchasing my first pipe, I wanted to try a smooth, light smoke. This is fairly smooth and also rather light, but the tongue bite is just aweful. My friends, who are a bit more experienced than I, have commented that I am a rather slow smoker for a beginner, but I still got mad tongue bite from this blend. The flavor wasn't bad, but the tongue bite was enough to convince me that I won't be trying it again for a loooong time.
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WNDE	07/07/2003	Mild to Medium	Medium	Medium	Pleasant
I think just about every tobacco company has a blend with vanilla in it. Some are better than others, mostly they are pretty similar. Borkum-Riff?s version is quite different however but the end result is that it isn?t bad but it isn?t great either. The pouch has a mild vanilla aroma combined with the usual sour Borkum-Riff odor. It?s a bizarre recipe, kind of a sweet and sour mix. I was a little off put when I first opened the pouch and I wasn?t sure if I would like it. Upon smoking I decided that it was okay. The vanilla itself isn?t overwhelming but this blend tasted really sweet. This blend could supplement dessert after a meal. It smokes a little hot so smoke slowly. The tobacco quality was pretty poor; it had numerous stems and was rather brittle to the touch. Overall, I enjoyed this as a change of pace and I will probably smoke this on the rare occasion. This is mostly for those who enjoy that unique taste and smell that is found in all Borkum-Riff tobaccos. If all you are looking for is a vanilla blend you should try elsewhere. Update: I've downgraded my review because I doubt that I will buy this again unless desperate. There is just too much good tobacco out there to waste money on this unless you can't get to your tobacconist.
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Nimrod	06/29/2003	Extremely Mild	Medium to Strong	Mild to Medium
A friend of mine had some of this, so I tried a bowl. It seems to have less casing than many aromatics (judging by feel anyway), but plenty of flavoring. This tastes like (in order of prevalence): sweet, vanilla, and a hint of tobacco flavor in the background. If I really wanted this I think I'd just buy a cream soda instead. Even if I were completely out of tobacco and could only get to a drugstore, I'd almost certainly find something there that's superior to this.
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Pipestud	04/03/2003	Extremely Mild	Mild	Extremely Mild (Flat)	Pleasant
Too bad they banned smoking on airplanes. After trying a bowl of this stuff, you wouldn't have to go far for a barf bag.
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