Samuel Gawith Cannon Plug

First and probably last purchase , I have been searching for new tastes chanced upon this , I enjoy plugs for their full bodied and robust flavours , I was surprised by the scent from the first opening its unlike anything I have tried before , I avoid Latika etc I find them over smoked as for Canon its in the same box for me the overiding scent which permeates is what I would imagine smoking Earl Grey tea would taste like , an almost soapy floral smell and taste way to perfumed for mu taste , some might well enjoy its such a subjective thing as with all plugs their is preparation of the tobacco required , and the choice of pipe affected the smoke the good old corn cob with a filter coped as did the meers but the briar no and same for the falcon , I dont feel I would recommend but each to their own , as for me back to the search .

My first review, and the first to review this extraordinary tobacco.

The Cannon was my first experience with a plug; curiosity conquered trepidation. My first two bowls of this blend lead me to put this aside as a lost cause. The reasons being that it was too difficult to prepare, and so staggeringly aromatic that I was in shock. There is little to prepare one for the intense honeydew flavour that this product exudes.

And yet.

It is a jealous tobacco. Having smoked one bowl in a nice Stanwell apple, I found that the Cannon plug had left a scent that would never go away: fair warning! So I gave it another go. Having tried the tobacco again, I would say that it has very much won me over. The flavouring has me hooked, and as strong as the honeydew oils are, the tobacco keeps pace to provide a very singular smoking experience.

It is absolutely not an all-day, every-day smoke, but if pipe smoking could ever be described as adventurous, it would be because of Cannon Plug!

I rated this as somewhat recommended. If you like aromatics then you should try it at least once, if you don't then I would steer well clear! I adore Ennerdale for its barber shop cologne, this one for its slightly overripe cantaloupe fruitiness. The piece I got is quite hard and I use a very sharp knife to slice 3mm wide slices that I lightly rub out. Jar note is pungent and lively, I don't get any "patchouli" and I know patchouli well as I used it liberally in the 70's, and neither is it honeydew, rather a cloying cantaloupe which I absolutely love! Mine required very little drying time and in my opinion very little rubbing out to appreciate the flavours. Takes a few lights to get it going well, but it's quite pokey with nic so I tend to smoke a bowl in a series of rests anyway. The fruit comes through strongly on the char and initial light but settles down and I find this one has a white pepper on the tongue on the in pull, and a light fresh floral, slightly fruity smell as I exhale. Burns down at a steady pace leaving a grey /white Ash and a pleasant aftertaste on the tongue. Not an all day smoke by a long shot but I really enjoy the occasional bowl as a palate cleanser after smoking fuller blends. I wish this came in a flake form as I would then smoke more of it. 8/10

I didn't care for this at all. Occasionally I like to induge myself with all the fuss and foreplay that goes with smoking a plug or twist tobacco; but this one is an unusual member of that family in that it is very aromatic. It seems to be, if you see what I mean, everything that an old-fashioned plug of tobacco shouldn't be; but perhaps that's just me. Suffice it to say that people who like Ennerdale Flake will like this too. It isn't all that difficult to prepare, and it smokes easily all the way down, with a good, cool even burn. Not for me, but I recommend it to lakeland lovers.

It's pretty strong and, as others have said, beware of the ghost.

When opening the tin, this tobacco tells the entire room of its arrival with a strong and sweet smell of flowers. This smell stays in the room for more than an hour after opening the tin. The tobacco is, as a plug, tightly packed, but after having dug into it, I can conclude that the tobacco has not been cut before being pressed. I even succeeded in folding out piece of a tobacco leaf about 2 x 3 centimeters wide. This results in having to rip each piece to shreds before putting it in the pipe, and even then, the tobacco is hard to light. The tobacco is sticky and leaves a residue on the fingers.

As soon as I’ve taken my first puff of the pipe, I can taste the same overpowering flowers. After having smoked about half of the tobacco, I have to give up and smoke something else. It is simply too pervasive and overpowering, and doesn’t taste of anything else than flowers. So if you long for the taste of flowers, and don’t like putting them straight into your mouth, then the SG Cannon Plug might be something for you. If not, keep it far away from yourself! And if you absolutely must try it, do yourself the favor of using a pipe you don’t mind cleaning thoroughly, as the tobacco lingers in the pipe for a long time.

As a final note, I can only wonder, who might have taken a whiff of this flower-tobacco and thought, “This reminds me of a large gunpowder weapon!”

Just plain weird. It doesn't look like the picture; it's much more dense. From a distance, it looks like a brick. In fact, it looks like that close up. And even before I took it out of the pouch I smelled a strong scent of patchouli. To break it up, I tried two techniques: First, i tried to cut a flake two ways: with the layered leaf and against it. Neither works as the density is uneven and the flake falls apart into individual leaves. Secondly, I just cut some off and pulled the leaves apart, which is time consuming. It's impossible to 'rub out' like you can a flake as the individual tobacco leaves are entirely intact and cannot be broken by friction, only torn apart.

One thing about this tobacco is that you can actually pull out individual tobacco leaves. They have all been coated in the topping and folded around in various ways and pressed into this plug. However, I noticed that when you pull the leaves apart, your fingertips become covered in a brownish oil, apparently the topping. However, the tobacco does not seem to have been packed wet. The only wetness I find is the oiliness of the topping. I also left this sealed in my car and the smell quickly spread around the car, but it didn't soak into the upholstry or ruin the smell of the car, despite what others have said.

The only way I've been able to pack this is seperate the leaves and drop them into the pipe. Lighting is extremely difficult; I had to light 3-4 times to get it going, and once I did, I tasted no difference than what I had smelled when I recieved it in the mail. It tastes and smells like patchouli. In fact, even though the topping doesn't seem to be sickeningly strong, it completely overtakes the tobacco taste; I taste no tobacco in this blend at all. After I smoked it, I was sure I would be on some kind of drug trip, it tastes and smells so much like a hookah shop. However, despite the strong flavor, it does not seem to have a noticible amount of chemicals that soak the cake in the pipe; it smoked dry and with a white ash.

One thing that I did not find in this blend was an extremely strong or sickening taste. I was even told by others around me that the aroma was pleasant. The tobacco seems to be relatively mild. The flavoring is not sickeningly strong either, but omnipresent. This blend is one-dimensional and tastes like patchouli. If you like patchouli, buy this. However, you will not find any natural or tobacco related taste here at all.

Dan