Let's start with first impressions upon opening: 1) wax paper 2) the blind smell talks of unscented virginia, not sweet 3) beautiful contrasted large flakes, very supple. Encouraging announcements !

One whole flake, if you are able to get it straight from the tin since it easily fall apart, is enough to fill a group 4 bowl, a BBB canadian.

BF lights easily and smokes cool and steadily. The first combination coming to my mind is Virginia/Kentucky, the cigarish note is quite evident. Dry/earthy/woody/musty/salty are my words, with just a wee-bit of sweetness in the far background. Of the good British companions being my December pipe-meal, the only possible comparison I can offer is with Walnut Flake. But WF is way much smoother, and again - as I happened in the past - I do agree with Hagen that BF is a bit hard on the throat, and is not something to leave and relight, it turns bitter.

My stomach says that BF is just better to smoke as an after dinner. As a matter of fact we are well above the medium side.

I don't see any reason to believe there is any artificial casing, to me BF is something in the pure-tobacco territory, perfectly burning and leaving extra-dry-light-gray ashes.

A very nice product, indeed. It deserves some cellaring.

*** UPDATE 2010/03/23 Well some half tin of this was left aging into a small sealed glass jar. I did hope that some more Dark Flake coming from UK, but still waiting… Oh My ! Time has improved this flake by large. What at the first time was the roughness of a dark Virginia seasoned by some dark fired leaf, has become a soft, winey, and again: cigarish smoke. A delicious smoke, seems to me it’s bit milder, burns like heaven till the very bottom. I would like the bowl never ending. I frankly hope to put my hands on a good number of tins, before it’s too late. It goes straight to my heart, four full stars!

Wet, well-packed flakes separate easily and rub out instantly. After a twenty minute dry, packing a pipe loosely is best. A couple of charring lights to build a good head of ash and then settle in for a long, cool, bight free, and flavorful smoke of the highest quality possible. J. F. Germain and Son?s Brown Flake, is another wonderful blend by this exceptional house. Buy some.

A year in the cellar did (predictable) wonders for this weed. It became much mellower, the taste intensified at the same time, and the beast is now but a humble pet. Currently the only tobacco I can (and do) smoke on a regular basis. It's indeed an outstanding offering, and a real keeper.

Original review 05/06/2008: When I opened the tin and inhaled the smell coming from it, I thought about Perfection. About the tin artwork of Samuel Gawith's Perfection, to be precise. Because the dog actually belongs here, on the beautiful small tin of Germain's Brown Flake which when opened smells of nothing less than an old Sammy, Maxie, or Chelsie shaking water off the back. Or Lassie saving a drowning child, if you'd prefer a more sentimental version. But it happened so that I bought this weed with serious intentions to smoke it and not just to stick my nose into the tin. So I took one flake off the bunch (this is only possible with a freshly open tin as mentioned by other reviewers, later on you'll have to make efforts to separate the flakes as they magically turn into a brick), rubbed it out and carefully loaded my 40 year old Comoy Guildhall. When the flame hit the weed, all doubts were gone. A strong, full tobacco taste was what was hiding beneath that smell, cigar-like sometimes, yes, reminded me of cheap El Guajiro Trompetas Natural I smoked in Spain - rough, musty, leathery, but with clearly pronounced woodsy undertones. A raw and honest tobacco. 'Sophisticated' comes from a language Brown Flake does not speak. It's an animal, and does not pretend to be anything else.

Brown Flake does not evolve much as the bowl progresses, it's as rough at the heel as it was on the charring light, but it incorporates such a powerful and peculiar taste that it's never a boring smoke. Not an everyday choice, but a delight from time to time is what I see Brown Flake can guarantee. A dedicated pipe would be appreciated by this beast. It's a domestic one, by the way, so not really inclined to bite.

Four stars, and five more tins ordered. Bow-wow!

really, this is no ordinary virginia blend. the tin aroma is rather musty, with almost cigarish notes along with the more typical sweet, stoved virginias. the blend is described as " air and flue cured". wonder if the "air cured" is really cigar?

it is darkish brown. the flakes tend to fall apart, but still reasonably easy to load. two matches, and i'm off.

cigar indeed. or if not cigar, then perhaps over-cured or over-ripe virginia? air cured virginia? burley? anyway, it's a very dry taste, slightly bitter, and almost no sweetness. it is rather hard on the throat (even though i don't inhale), and medium to medium-strong. dgt'ing is not reccommended, as it becomes quite harsh.

this is not the first germain's i've experienced having this strange and very uncommon taste. it's in their royal jersey perique, too. i find this taste rather mystifying - but as long as one doesn't dgt, it's got a lot of fine cigarish nuances. no bad tobacco, this. still, it's not one i'll be getting more of anytime soon.

I have to give this a mixed review. First, as to packing, lighting, and burning qualities, it's first rate. The flakes are very thin and stuck together. It is more like a brittle plug than a regular flake. I found it impossible to pull one flake off the stack without pulling it apart. This will be an annoyance to those who prefer the fold and stuff method for flakes. For me, however, this packed and smoked with ease when rubbed out into very fine, horsehair-like strands. So for "mechanics," I'd give it four stars for sure.

Especially when I had just popped the tin, the smoke aroma had a kind of molasses (sp?), brown sugar note with perhaps a touch of vanilla. This tended to fade as the tin had been opened longer, giving way to a kind of grassy smell with the sweet smell only coming through occasionally. Aroma gets three stars.

But unfortunately, I never tasted anything in the smoke except a grassy, peaty, bitter cigar or black coffee flavor. None of the sweetness smelled in the tin or the smoke came through in the flavor at all. Some people, I know, like grassy virginias more than I do (for instance, Orlik Golden Slices). But this really needed something, like a bit of sweetness, in the flavor to balance that. So the flavor gets 2 stars for being monotone and only slightly pleasant.

Therefore, overall it deserves 3 stars.

One more note which does not affect the rating is the nicotene content. I found it quite strong. Perhaps it will not compare to ropes or other famous Lakeland heavy-hitters like 1792, though that will remain to be seen for me. I am a 1 or 2 pipe a day guy and something this strong really hits me hard, at least until I got more used to it. But that is a matter of personal preference.

I would recommend this to seasoned smokers who like grassy virginias and don't mind lots of nicotene and some bitterness in their smoke. Otherwise, there are tons of better choices. For me, this mostly has whetted my appetite for Germain's Latakia Flake, which I will be reviewing later in the year.

What I'm having a tough time with is the mild yet very present flavor that comes and goes as the bowl is smoked. I've smoked two tins of this over the past 3 weeks and I have wrestled with what/where the taste and aroma comes from. Actually, sometimes it taste like a very mild cheviot type flavoring which I abhor, yet not the way this tobacco presents itself.

Smoking this in group 5 straight billiard.

I will continue this review later...

...a pipe is to be savored.

The smell right from the tin showed me that this was not your average Virginia, but one probably "over-cured" into a more cigar-like leaf. I'm almost certain that there is also a small dose of burley, but I might be wrong.

After reading through another review of this I decided to try it again, in an environment where I could pay a little more attention to it, and smoke it slightly slower. The second time through I let this dry for a while before packing it into a billiard. This tobacco is definitely much better with a slower, more even cadence to the smoke. The cigar note sits in the background lending a slight kick to the almost mocha Virginia sweetness. Again I set this pipe down for a little while, and when I came back to it I found the sweet tangy taste had crept back in, something that really serves this blend well. Additionally this tobacco has quite a nicotine kick; a bit more then I usually care for.

This is a good blend, but just not something I could smoke on a regular basis.

You see, my pipe background is steeped in Burley tobacco. Historically, VA?s have clashed with my personal chemistry and my mouth suffered. I typically have found VA?s nasty, ashy and brutal. Add to this that I have a sense of smell that would make a bloodhound blush and a very precise palate and it creates a very finicky pipe smoker.

My first real adventure in Lakeland tobaccos came last Spring (06) from Grouse-moor. Much to my surprise, here was a VA tobac that I could smoke with out the French-kiss-volcano-lick. Doing my research, I discovered that Grouse-moor is made with steamed/stoved/flue cured tobacco. Umm?so I searched about tobbacoreview.com and came across Brown Flake. Thank God for sort options!

I usually can tell after the char light if I?ve got something interesting in the pipe. I?m certain my eyes grew and my eyebrows shot up when I took my first puff of Germain?s Brown Flake. I?m quite certain I let out an ?Oh my!?

Two days and seven pipes later, I ordered five tins?.

On with the review:

For me, it?s all about taste. Brown Flake offers the most sublime, magic carpet ride to ever pass through any of my briar. This is far from a monochromatic smoke; I?ve experienced flavours ranging from soft ginger wood and cigar to chocolate and caramel; from musty books to spring flowers, from cardamon and cinnamon to vanilla and pine and from Good N? Plenty to leather. To me, there?s something in Brown Flake that dips into the pleasure zone and triggers off all kinds of food memories. It?s akin to eating all the comfort foods in your personal library and wrapping yourself in flavour. But rather than ending up with chop-suey, a singular flavour comes up with every sip?they simply don?t fight for control. Instead, there?s a surprise with every draw. Letting the smoke trickle from my lips and I?m surrounded in a smokersborg of bliss. I simply control these flavours by puffing cadence and the quality of the draw (go slow) and the size of the bowl (I?ll use everything from a large Charatan to a little ?coffee-break? Masta with great success. Medium sized pipes bring out the flavour spectrum). Brown Flake offers a wonderfully nuanced experience. In fact, Brown Flake will take you out of absentminded puffs and garner your full attention with the quality of this smoke.

The tobacco burns nice and slow. A size three pipe can go on for well over ninety minutes. The tobacco DGT?s wonderfully?it becomes another tobacco all together, unleashing more flavours and even greater softness.

Later, when you hit mid bowl, there?s another flavour evolution. What a surprise! It?s a whole new pipe.

I?m far beyond enthralled with Germain?s Brown Flake. I?d marry this tobacco if my wife would let me. But since she won?t, I?ll have to settle on buying a few tins every month to add to the cellar.

I give Germain?s Brown Flake the highest endorsement of any tobacco I have reviewed. And good news?I wrote the folks at Germain and was assured the tobacco isn?t going anywhere ala Dunhill. Thank-you Germain!

O.k. dear readers, you point me to that desert island now?.

This truely taste like a nice mild cigar. Upon intense investigation- you can detect -earthy brown sugar, sweet potatoe like, but the mild cigar like quality definately predominates in every way and is fairly unilateral.

IF YOU LOVE A NICE CIGAR- This is so much like that how could you not like it? A little sweeter than most cigars, less caustic, SMOOTH and milder- is the only difference.

I bought an ancient unopened tin stored in a humidor at a pipe shop that discontinued it. It was 30 % off as it had some rust. I cannot age it, But there was no tax stamp if that tells you something.

Therefore- Mine may have been milder and smoother than some. And man- was it mild and smooth.

I did like the way in which the leaf had been cut before being pressed. It would rub out into the finest hair-like filaments. This is not often found with flakes. Even this, though was not all for the good as those strands would knit together as the pipe was tamped, making for a near solid mass at the heal of the bowl that I had a devil of a time smoking all the way. Not a good thing with a new pipe.

Regards, A. Morley Jaques

Germain Brown comes in well prepared slices - they seem neither too thick nor too thin. The flakes are a medium brown. The "sugar crystals" did not appear to me to be the kind naturally found in some VA flakes but actually appears to me to be similar to table (cane) sugar. Is it possible that cane sugar was applied to the tobacco?

I found that this tobacco works best in medium to large bowled pipes. It burns fairly well and leaves nothing on the walls of the tobacco chamber of your pipe. The remaining ash is a sandy white/grey with black specks. For me, Germain's burned rather hot and I found it tough to truly enjoy. The flavor is a typical grassy citrusy kind of sweetness that was not unappealing and some body did develope toward the end of the bowl.

However, this flake just doesn't do it for me when compared to so many other tobaccos in this genre. If Germain is going to try to make it in the VA flake market, they will need to come up with something that will make a better impression so as to carve its our "niche." This doesn't do it. It is just so-so.