Seattle Pipe Club Hogshead

Seattle Pipe Club
Hogshead

Blend notes: “ Pure Virginia Plug, 10 year old aged & rare Orange and Red Virginias. In Colonial days, Virginia was the source for finest tobaccos. Traditionally shipped in giant barrels called ‘hogsheads’, farmers packed their precious leaf. Our Hogshead is a blend of very old Virginias cultivated in Africa, Brazil and the United States. Pressed into an easy to use plug, Hogshead harkens back to the heritage of the greatest Virginia tobaccos.”

Hogshead is indeed an earthy, rich, deep Virginia that crumbles easily. Even with drying time it requires more lights than normal. Give it more drying time.

The tangy fruit is present and almost fermented. Grassy. Citrus maybe not. Probably some casing here. It’s a lighter or milder smoke than some straight Virginias but pleasant and steady. It is mild in the sense of Hamborger Veermaster. Not as much strength as with Old Gowrie or Opening Night or Royal Yacht.

Nonetheless, this is an excellent straight Virginia.

4 out of 4 stars.

Everyone’s tastes are different but I can’t help but feel angst when I hear about people getting all these wonderful flavors out of this one. Smells heavenly but that’s where it ends for me sadly. I detected a nearly aromatic level of casing on this one and that spicy mouthfeel is all I got. I’ve loved nearly any Virginia blend and straight virgina (as long as there isn’t any black cavendish) but this one was very disappointing to me. I just revisited the first tin I bought upon release and some of that spicy mouthfeel has gone away and just a tiny bit of grassy/bread flavoring is detectable to me. I always save a blend even if I’m not impressed with and give it some time. But at this price point I can’t justify buying this again in hopes that (to me) it will be tolerable one day.

Very tasty dark VA. I find this plug tobacco breaks apart easily and smokes especially well in a small bowl pipe ( mine was a 5/8" dia. Bowl) Excellent taste, and mouth feel. Considering it's been aged ten years prior being tinned its an excellent value at $33+/- usd for the four Oz tin. I just bought a couple more tins, love this stuff!

Delicious, closest thing I’ve found to Christmas cheer! Make sure to stock up to cellar a few tins! Could burn a little better though. I highly recommend this!

Tin note: deeply aromatic dark fruits. Smoke: First a disclaimer, I'm feeling a little under the weather and I'm not sure my taste/sense of smell is entirely accurate. That said, I'm getting hardly any fruit in the smoke, but I am getting a ton of toasted bready, grassy, what I might describe as quintessential tobacco essence. Maybe leather. The second hand smoke is fairly harsh and unpleasant, might say cigar-like. The taste is very good, outstanding even for what it is, and if I were smoking outside I think the experience may have been greatly improved. That said, to my taste, I'd like to see more fruit or floral essence in the flavor profile at the very least. There's no sweetness either, which may be preferable considering what this is, but I do prefer some sweetness in my tobacco generally speaking. I get many similar flavors out of late-bowl G&H dark aromatic, Kendal flake, and Warhorse Bar for example, and I think overall I'd prefer to smoke those instead. As-is, this is easily a solid 3+ stars. I'll have to revisit this in the future to see if I detect any differences, and update accordingly.