After lighting it bascially tasted like if you where to build a tiny campfire out of brown contruction paper and having a lego man cook a swedish fish over said tiny campfire.

Not recommended in the least.

Reef, Capt, and others were there, but Paladin I had never seen before. As a Early Morning Smoke, 965, Royal Yacht, Nightcap rotational (throughout the day)smoker I wanted to throw somthing differant in the mix. I spent the $1.50 and got home. Truth be told I was a bit excited. I hoped I had found the "dimond in the rough". A good base aromatic that I could enjoy. But that was all a Pipe dream.

I got home jumped on here and read what my fellow pipazoids thought. I was dicouraged. But y'all were NOT going to ruin my fun!

I opend the bag and WHAP! Smelled like melted swedish fish and cherry coke syrup. Ugh!

There is no way in hell I'm smokin this stuff alone.

I looked in my baccy drawer and found some Mecclend Perique. mixed em 60-40 and prayed for the best.

Not bad at all. Blended with a stronger spice tobacco to tone down the synthetic casing proved quite satisfying. FOr about 15 minutes then it started to taste like the sole of a landfill workers boot.

This tobacco sucks.

-JJ

Paladin is the strongest cherry aromatic I've seen, and I appreciate it mainly for that reason. People that are into natural or english blends won't care for this one, because pretty much the only flavor that comes out is the cherry casing. But you know what, you guys aren't buying this stuff to get the natural taste of its drugstore-y mass production tobacco..... right???

The last blend like this I tried was the Middleton Cherry Blend, and I have to say I've enjoyed this much more so far. I never really got into Middleton's, and I think the reason is that the cherry casing was actually kindof dull. I've always hoped for a REALLY STRONG FLAVORED aromatic, and Paladin delivered. If I buy a blend that promises to taste like black cherries, I want somebody to take that flavor and smash it into my mouth with a sludgehammer compared to some of the stuff I've had so far. I don't want a half-assed tobacco -and- a half-assed casing - drop the nuke on me!

To be fair, the flavor does start to go a little bleh halfway through the smoke. The cherry flavor seems to die down a bit, coming back occasionally but never to the strength or consistency of the first half of the bowl.

Paladin also has some applicative positives. It stays lit very well for me, despite being a tad moist. A bowl of this smokes a really long time for some reason, and as a natural result gave me a fair amount of nicotine (maybe I'm just out of practice). It was pretty goopy, but I smoked it in a filter pipe so it wasn't a huge issue. Bowl aftertaste/smell isn't any better/worse than all the other stuff I throw into it. Didn't bite at all.

It's not the "Paladin" of all pipe tobaccos, but it's no loser either. There are things far more worthy of a trash bin. Then again, a lot of the people with the worst words for Paladin also had some of the best words for those hardcore Latakia blends, so maybe there's a bit of partisanship leaking into these reviews. ;-)

Just don't smoke it. If you look up the term "tongue bite" you find that this blend is synonymous with the term.

I wanted to like it. It smelled so good in the pouch. It tasted foul.

Don't waste $1.99. If you must just give the clerk your 2 dollars and leave.

Not goopy in the pouch, but the Shasta taste does get old after a bowlful or two. Good for being out in public, and a nice potpurri on my desk thats about it.

Learning to pack a pipe and use proper drawing techniques with this blend seems to have given me an advantage when I began to explore other tobaccos.

Within a month of starting to smoke a pipe, I had found a whole world of brands and blends and settled in on primarily full bodied English blends.

Consequently, not wanting to waste what I had of the Paladin, I experimented with blending.

This is my favorite aromatic to take out in public: Blend 3-2-1 Paladin Black Cherry, Blending Latakia, Blending Perique.

The Lane or Consolidated Cherry's work well also, but the topping in Paladin so overpowers the aroma of the latakia and perique that the non-smoking public still turn their noses toward you, while you get a flavorfull smokiness and spiciness from the blend.

No mater what, or how much, I have blended into this however has aleviated the dottle left over.

(I am just resigned to have a Cherry blend of somekind on hand. As a child I was facinated by pipes and the cherry aroma was usually what I encountered when I met a pipe smoker in public.)

It is gooey and sticky. It smokes hot. I detected very little tobacco essance. Pure unadulterated cherry.

Paladin- ....Have Cherry will travel.

It is extremely mild and cool. The stoving keeps this from biting the tongue, even with the casing. I found a pouch at a drug store a few months ago, and had to revisit this classic old blend. Yes, it is of drug store quality, but should be given a fair shake. If you want a really sweet, light tobacco taste, and don't want to purchase a goop laden aromatic, then take up with Paladin for a nostalgic ride. I smoked it in my 20's, 30's and 40's...and one pouch every ten years seems to be enough for me. Uh oh, I'm getting worried. I turn 50 later this year. Gulp!