Seattle Pipe Club Plum Pudding Special Reserve

I just received this today and no time like the present. It is one solid black and brown block that smelled very earthy and somewhat spicy. I sliced some off with a razor blade, crumbled it and went to town. It is smooth, creamy and spicy and very well blended. The perique must have kicked in because my nostrils even tingled. I have never had the original Plum Pudding but I am definitely going to buy some of that also in the future. It is a tobacco that makes me wonder why am I smoking the other stuff with this around. Not an all day'er but top notch for me. While smoking this I felt like I should be on some British outpost in India a hundred years ago with the sun setting in the background, that exotic.

Seattle Pipe Club Plum Pudding Special Reserve:

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways . . .

This stuff makes me want to blast Macklemore from my rooftop at 2 a.m., move to Seattle and root for the Seahawks.

Plum Pudding: What’s in a name?

To most pipe smokers (especially those partial to English or aromatic blends), just the name “Plum Pudding” sounds like something that needs to be smoked (even for those of us who have no idea what genuine plum pudding actually is). So why would Joe Lankford choose to give this blend such a tantalizing, mouthwatering name? Clearly it was a reference to authentic plum pudding, as described here below in this post from Wikipedia:

“Despite the name ‘plum pudding’, the pudding contains no actual plums due to the pre-Victorian use of the word ‘plums’ as a term for raisins. The pudding is composed of many dried fruits held together by egg and suet, sometimes moistened by treacle or molasses and flavoured with cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, ginger, and other spices. The pudding is usually aged for a month or more, or even a year; the high alcohol content of the pudding prevents it from spoiling during this time.”

“Raisins,” “dried fruits,” “treacle,” “molasses” – get it? Just those words alone are enough to kick up a fuss of teasing and tempestuous torment to the taste-buds of we who are conversant in a certain class of combustibles. With no cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves or ginger readily detectable in Plum Pudding or its first cousin, the Special Reserve blend, both versions are quite pleasantly spiced with excellent Orientals and Perique.

Presentation: Big, beautiful, deep-dark (very) brown plug/crumble.

Tin note: Wonderfully sublime bouquet of dark earth and spice, indicative of a masterful mélange of high-quality leaf.

Taste: Extraordinarily remarkable. The Black Cavendish, Latakia, Oriental/Turkish, Perique, and Virginias all come together, perfectly arranged to create a symphony for the senses. Rich, sweet, creamy-smooth smoke; woody, zesty, tangy, piquant, with dark fruit essence, raisins (as the appellation implies) with brown sugar and fig.

In all honesty, I must confess – if everyone will permit me this bit of blasphemy -- I actually enjoy Plum Pudding Special Reserve as much (or even a tad more) than I do Penzance, and Penzance is pricier than PPSR, even at the retail level (28¢-per-gram for Penzance; 22¢-per-gram for PPSR).

With the fairly recent passing of McClelland and Dunhill tobaccos, and with the exorbitant prices being charged for those hard to find blends, where demand exceeds the existing supply, I have become something of an inveterate, degenerate -- and shamelessly unrepentant -- hoarder of all things exceptional when it comes to the best vegetation to be found in the bowl of a briar. Consequently, I have a sufficient supply of Plum Pudding Special Reserve on hand to last a lifetime (even should I live a few years past my projected expiration date).

Fabulous Balkan blend.

Seattle Pipe Club’s Plum Pudding Special Reserve is a work of art, presented in a 4 oz. cake, it’s richness is evident. Versatile in how you choose to slice or break apart, it may need some drying time. The velvety smooth Cyprian Latakia is the major component bringing smokey wood to the foreground. Red and stoved Virginias support the Latakia with sweet stewed fruit and a light vegetal nuance. The choice sun dried Orientals add a sour, dry resinous and nutty quality on the palate with a pleasant fragrance on top. Perique adds it’s spicy dark fruit dimension and is perfectly balanced by the malty rich Black Cavendish. The result of all these components working together is a wonderfuly smooth, complex and full bodied smoke, requiring above average relights as it burns clean and somewhat slowly leaving a bit of moisture behind. Won’t bite the tounge. Strength is a solid medium. Leaves a pleasant sweet lingering finish on the palate.

OMG ! Just one big 4 oz hunk of flavor Hope nobody buys any of this because it is a limited quantity and I am fixin to stock up.

I once asked the question, "what's the difference between Special Reserve and the regular Plum Pudding" and the answer was "it's like regular Plum Pudding only moreso flavourwise." While this description was accurate it wasn't very illuminating, so I will attempt to explicate on it a bit more.

Plum Pudding has this "chocolate brownie" like depth as you smoke down the bowl. That flavour appears in the latter half. The first half is a smokey flavour with hints of chocolate.

So how does Special Reserve compare? The best way I can describe it is by analogy: it is to regular PP what dark chocolate is to regular chocolate. Regular chocolate has its flavour and Dark Chocolate takes that flavour, amps it up in strength two fold. This is how I'd describe Special Reserve. Take regular PP flavour and double it like you'd expect if you took your favourite chocolate bar and put it into a dark chocolate version.

What really comes out in Special Reserve are the orientals. If you ever wondered what people mean by "spicy orientals" this blend will finally give you the answer. It is spicy, not in the way people talk about perique, but in flavour -- and I am not a fan of perique please note, but this was extremely pleasant.

I would also say that Special Reserve goes the opposite direction as you go down the bowl from most blends. It starts out strong but as you go down the bowl, your palette adapts to the strong flavours and in the latter half to third of the bowl, it will start to taste a bit more like regular Plum Pudding, but with that extra oriental spice.

Really quite a fine blend -- and I would daresay much better than the Bourbon Barrel Aged version which I've personally found 'meh' despite usually preferring those crossover type blends. I'd trade every bit of it in my cellar for Special Reserve.

Tin note: Smokey beef jerky. Smoke: slow cool. A little difficult to start but then the ember stays lit very well. Extremely smooth. First impression is strong incense. Minty orientals. Surprisingly sweet. Medium nicotine (noticeable but definitely not going to knock you down). Umami. Less heavy than I expected. You need like 2 hours to smoke a bowl. Also smoother and more complex. Downside: makes you smell like a smoker.

Another well balanced blend. Has a combination of sweet, spicy, robust and smokiness, that as I mentioned is very well balanced. If you are into English blends, you should like this one. If you are not into English blends, you should try this one as the latakia there, but not in an overwhelming manner. I won't say this is a gateway English, but it would be a great introduction.

All that I will add to the body of praise for this blend is that after five years of aging, I find it far more satisfying than similarly aged Penzance — so much so that my stock of the latter will gather dust so long as I can reach for this instead!

One of my regulars, but this is actually a review of the Bourbon Barrel aged. The Plum Pudding Reserve is great. The Bourbon variety is too. The virtue of the Bourbon Barrel is that there aint nothing else I am aware of that has this combo. It is an excellent change of pace and I love it. Be aware that the Bourbon flavor is not subtle. At first it can dominate. I tend to smoke this sort of thing in a big pipe. I find that as I work down that the Bourbon moves into the background. This will never be a daily smoke, but I like it so much as a change that I recently stocked up.