Wilke Pipe Tobacco Balkan

(2.00)
The Balkan is the perfect blend of Turkish and burley with a touch of latakia and perique to add a full smoked taste.

Details

Brand Wilke Pipe Tobacco
Blended By John Brandt
Manufactured By Wilke Pipe Tobacco
Blend Type American
Contents Burley, Latakia, Oriental/Turkish, Perique, Virginia
Flavoring
Cut Ribbon
Packaging various bulk packages
Country United States
Production Currently available

Profile

Strength
Mild to Medium
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Extremely Mild -> Overwhelming
Flavoring
None Detected
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
None Detected -> Extra Strong
Room Note
Pleasant to Tolerable
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Unnoticeable -> Overwhelming
Taste
Medium
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Extremely Mild (Flat) -> Overwhelming

Average Rating

2.00 / 4
1

0

2

2

Reviews

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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 Reviews
Reviewed By Date Rating Strength Flavoring Taste Room Note
Dec 02, 2020 Mild to Medium None Detected Medium Tolerable
since its called BALKAN , I have to try it out. this one is decent , nothing really that special , a bit spicy and sharp tasting . would say its more on the generic side for WILKE . they have so many blends that I really like this one is on the back burner . good quality components , as with all there blends.
Pipe Used: paul perri
PurchasedFrom: wilke webstie
Age When Smoked: new
3 people found this review helpful.
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Reviewed By Date Rating Strength Flavoring Taste Room Note
Mar 23, 2023 Mild to Medium Mild to Medium Medium Tolerable
One whiff of the jar note with its sweet creamy aroma tells you that this is not what anybody would expect of a traditional Balkan, no matter how you define that. For the most part this sweetness does not intrude on the flavor, and without it I fear this blend would be even more bitter than it already is. I’ve tasted at least a dozen different types of raw unprocessed leaf that were all less bitter, which tells me that the underlying issue here is not tobacco related. There is something chemical here that I’ve not encountered in any of the other quality blends I’ve tried from Wilke. I therefore understand and sympathize with the more recent 1-star reviews which seem indicate something has changed since that first enthusiastic 4-star review over three years ago.

Using a filtered pipe seems to mitigate against the worst of the nasties. I had one smoke in particular, in a Savinelli 673 using the new 6mm charcoal filter (not the old balsa filter), that I might have rated at 2.5 stars. That was a generally smooth smoke, not at all complex, but with some sunflower seed nuttiness, very, very light Latakia, and with some of that pleasant creamy sweet flavoring. In non-filtered pipes, even meers, I mostly get bitter herbal notes like dandelion weed, some sourdough bread from the Turkish, tart grapefruit, a little sunflower seed. Worst of all is if you sit the pipe down to go do something for fifteen or twenty minutes and then return to light it up again. Beware the blast of bitter walnut shell and acrid bitterness. So yeah, one-star awful, or as one reviewer said: “flat out nasty.” I give two stars simply because the blend is salvageable if you use a filter.

The issue of product consistency is hardly a far-fetched idea. Ernie Q over at WCC has said that small operations are often harried to meet sudden peak demand of product, and that he sometimes has to go into manic mode in order to maintain a consistent product. I wonder if other small one-man operations are at times simply overwhelmed to the point of making mistakes? Ernie also says that with the growing paucity of quality tobaccos blenders are more and more having to rely on alchemy to put forth a pleasing product. That means changes in components or processing. And that means that the Wilke Balkan of the glowing 4-star review may not be what you get in the mail. I know I’ve raised more questions than answers, but, for now, a provisional two-star rating only for those who use filtered pipes.
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