Gallaher Limited Special Virginia Rubbed Out

This is basically Mellow Virginia with a name change and it's pretty much the same tobacco as it always was. So here's a pasting of my original review - This is damn decent tobacco. Some people always give bad reviews to tobaccos easily found in supermarkets but they are talking through their rear ends. Out of all the easily available blends this comes third in my list behind St. Bruno and my all time fave, The Mighty Condor. Mellow Virginia is in my rotation because it offers a welcome change of pace for me since I usually smoke the more powerful Lakeland style blends. Mellow Virginia offers a nice caramel taste...rich and smooth and I do like it.

Update 27th March 2018.

Having smoked a few ounces of this I find I get on well with the bready, doughy flavour. If this were the only tobacco left in the world, I'd smoke.

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All dogs have four legs. My cat has four legs. Therefore my cat is a dog.

Something must be done. This something. This is what must be done.

The name change from Mellow to Special Virginia proves this logic.

I recall this as moist and dark. Now it's dry and light. It's ok. It can be smoked.

I haven't smoked this for many years, it was still very much Mellow Virginia then. Back then it had a very distinctive room note, very sweet and reminiscent of caramel. If anyone was smoking this within a few yards of you there was no mistaking exactly which blend they had fired up. I quite enjoyed it back then until I developed a taste for Condor. These days it's still Condor as first choice for me although I like to try many different blends but I keep coming back to the darker. "meatier" blends. Today, on a whim, I thought I'd try something completely different and picked up a pouch of Special Virginia. Packed it using the Frank method and couldn't get any sort of ignition going at all, much too tight. Emptied it out and tried again with a fresh batch taking care to pack it as lightly as I could and Bingo! At first I thought it tasted the same as all those years ago but the room note wasn't just as sweet and appealing but after a few minutes I got it back, exactly the aroma I remembered from decades ago. It's a very good and very distinctive tobacco and a welcome and flavorful break from the darker Lakeland blends. There may be better tobaccos out there but there are a lot more which are worse. For my taste, it will never beat the Lakeland blends but it offers a great contrast if you ever want to mix up the rotation a bit. I'll be buying another pouch when this one is done.

A classic British otc that has stood the test of time. I tried this a number of years ago under its old name of mellow virginia. I have a sneaking suspicion that along with condor, its production has moved to Poland.

Whereas condor has infamously declined, from what I remember, mellow virginia hasn't changed much if it all. It is still the same stellar smoke, virginia burley and kentucky, cased with vanilla, cocoa, and caramel. Packing is a doddle, as is the lighting, the casings are pretty strong on this, but they don't sublimated the tobaccos too much.

Cool slow burning and very satisfying. Has a decent kick of nic behind it, room note I find very pleasant and it shouldn't offend the masses so a perfect company smoke as well.

All in all a stellar smoke, which is classic British otc, kind of steps into the realm of gawith hoggarth in the way their aromatic tobaccos are. Well worth a try.

3 and a half stars and one I'd be happy to keep in semi regular rotation.

Gallaher Ltd - Special Virginia Rubbed Out.

It's been rubbed to the appearance of a broken flake. The colour's quite dark and the moisture's faultless. I find there's little aroma from the pouch, apart from a slight sweetness.

Just like Mellow Virginia, which is basically what this is, it gives a fairly uncomplicated smoke. I find it's a VaBur with a touch of honey. The Virginia and Burley seem equal; slightly sweet and a little coarse. The Kentucky offers a little 'power', but isn't a formidable ingredient. Because of the chunky cut it burns slow and cool. It also gives me no tongue bite.

Nicotine: medium. Room-note: pleasant.

Special Virginia? Like I said with Mellow Virginia, although it's readily available in the UK, it's still damn good! Highly recommended:

Four stars.