Fribourg & Treyer Vintage

Nice fruity flavors with a touch of grass in the first half. Nice bit of tang as well. Second half adds the toasty notes of stoved Virginias. After the bowl gets going it seems as if there is no topping, but upon first light I seem to detect an extremely mild fruit topping. Could be my imagination, been fooled before. Nice smoke all the way around.

Mild to medium in body. Medium in taste. Gonna go with extremely mild on flavoring. Burns very well.

I've been really going through this tin. I have to say, that while I have enjoyed it, it is a pretty ordinary Virginia flake. Interesting aftertaste sometimes, and nothing to really set it apart. There is absolulely nothing wrong with it (besides the occasional strange aftertaste). I have gotten the best results from spicing it up with a little Perique. I would buy it again if it were $6.50 a tin, but not for $11.00. That's all I really have to say: it's a decent Virginia flake, but one of many, and there are better.

The various Virginias provide a fair amount of tart and tangy citrus, grass, plenty of bread, some sugar, mild vegetation, tangy ripe dark fruit, earth, wood, light floralness, and a hint of vinegar, smoke, and a couple pinches of spice. The mildly honey-ish, citrusy, slight vanilla toppings moderately sublimates the tobaccos. The strength is a step past the mild mark. The nic-hit is very mild as the toppings negate its potency. The taste level is a slot short of the center of mild to medium. There’s no chance of bite or harshness, and barely has a hint of a rough edge. The flakes easily break apart to suit your preference, and need no dry time. It’s monochromatic, but it burns cool, clean, and a tad slow with a very consistent, sugary, fruity Virginia flavor that extends to the very pleasant, lightly lingering after taste. Leaves little dampness in the bowl, and requires a couple more than an average number of relights. Has a very pleasing room note. An easy going all day smoke. Three stars.

-JimInks

Straight Virginia tobacco. Folded into a flake. Laid in sheets in the tin. Comes in a 50g tin. Has a lid.

This stuff is good. It's not great, it's not bad. It's good. It's a great "go to" virginia if you are tired of ready rubbed, plugs, or coins, and want something that you can decide how big you want your tobacco chunks to be. Me? I rub it out (hee hee) until it's a fine flake and then gravity fill as normal - I haven't mastered the whole "fold and stuff" method, so maybe my review would be higher for this F&T mix. As it stands, it's a firm 3 out of 4 stars. I like it, I make sure I always have an unopened tin on hand, but it's not something that blows me away.

NOTE: I hear that this blend really improves itself with age. I've not tried it, but I have heard that it crystalizes itself nicely and really can sway your opinion. Take that for what it is - if I ever get my hand on something that is more than a year old I'll definitely come back and update this.

Flat tin and nice, wide flakes, perfect for folding. This is a darker shade of VA and doesn't have that overly citrusy tin nose. Kind of a non-descript, slightly hay-ish quality.

The flavor is middle-of-the-road and unassuming straight virginia. I don't taste any flavoring, so apparently the Navy designation is in the cut only. This one is not at the high level of F&T's Blackjack, but it's a decent smoke. The lighter notes are present and some mid-level as well but this one is firmly in the light camp. The Dunhill Flake I smoked recently had the bass notes as well, which I appreciated, as well as this company's Blackjack. The lightness of this one makes it good for a straight VA newbie, something to get the feet wet while he moves toward headier fare. This is certainly a good smoke with nice hay-like qualities - it just doesn't distinguish itself in the genre as some others do. I finished the tin but won't buy any more. Blackjack owns that part of my cellar that is F&T's.

I've been slowly working my way through a tin of this for some time now-- picking it up off and on for a few months. I must admit that I prefer Cut Virginia Plug to Vintage and they are relatively similar straight Virginia blends.

The tobacco is very pretty-- various shades of tan and brown Virginias intermingle in this pressed flake. The smallish tin holds perhaps fourteen thin slices that break apart easily for full rubbing out or partially breaking the flake for packing. I personally prefer the latter with large pieces over fully rubbing it out.

The tin aroma is pleasant, but unexceptional. Slight sweetness is evident plus a tartness from the acidity of the lighter Virginias.

The blend smokes much as one would expect given the tin aroma. This is superficially a very simple Virginia blend with a basic 'tobacco' taste and little else. As the bowl progresses, the sweetness becomes more evident as does a slightly tart taste (probably stemming from the lighter Virginias). All in all, it is a pretty decent, if unexceptional, smoke. Definitely worth a try for the lover of straight Virginias, but not interesting enough to differentiate it from other similar blends in my mind.

Another sample of Virginia tobaccos I bought from my local tobacco specialist, the aroma of the leaves is dark and sweet, reminiscent of leather.

The darker colours are inviting, of perfect moisture, and lights easily. Delivering more leather on the palate than other, more fruity, virginias, this was a pleasant surprise, despite being not what I was looking for at the very moment. It has a sweet tobacco taste, but is not overly strong and no more than medium bodied, making it a truly pleasant smoke.

Vintage is a good tasting if somewhat unremarkable straight Virginia flake. It is precisely what I would recommend to a newbie who wanted to sample a benchmark, or representative member of the Va. flake genre. There’s lots of quality here, but nothing distinctive – no pizzazz. However it does have good balance between taste, strength and body (mouth feel). What you get is a rock solid Va. taste that is at least as fruity as it is grassy, and perhaps even a little wine-like. The flavor rides on a good volume of chewy smoke, but there is little in the way of complexity. Sometimes that's a good thing, like when you want to reset your palate.

Lest I seem dismissive or imply that this is a mediocre blend – let me emphasize that this is a high quality smoke. But it resides at the less complex end of the Va. flake spectrum. I get the impression that this is exactly what the folks at F&T had in mind for Vintage because their product line is populated by the likes of Cut Virginia Plug and Blackjack, both of which possess the mosaic of flavors and nuances of which the genre is capable. So if you’re interested in sampling your first Virginia flake, or in exploring the entire F&T product line, then Vintage is a good starting place.

The tin note has sweetness tinged by the sour of fermentation, and the grassy aroma you would expect of a Va. flake, but there’s nothing particularly alluring about it. There are no lighting or burning issues (at least if you rub it out as I do); and it smokes coolly and dryly to the bottom of the bowl without a hint of bite. I experienced delicate hints of citrus tanginess, and a gentle sweetness that becomes increasingly caramel-like as the smoke progresses, but don’t expect it to rise to the level of a confectionary treat. To me, the bottommost portion of the smoke feels a bit ashier than I would like, but at that point it’s “lights-out” anyway, so it shouldn’t dissuade one from trying this blend.

I recommend Vintage, if for no other reason than “what’s not to like?” I wanted to rate this at a strong 2-stars, but that would appear to be excessively negative. For 20% less money you can get the same “plain Jane” goodness from Mac Baren’s Virginia Flake, which is very similar, albeit a bit brighter in flavor.

Vintage Flake: A straightforward medium-bodied Virginia Flake

This flake is composed of mostly dark Virginias with some bright leaf scattered throughout the flake. The smoke has a nice medium body with mostly earthy flavors with some grassy-bright undertones, though I would not consider it to be complex.

Similar Blends: I find Vintage Flake to be similar to F & T, Special Brown Flake and Capstan Blue without the rum topping. Vintage Flake also has a bit more body and is a tad less sweet than its rum cased compatriots.

It is a good middle ground between Capstan Blue and Sam Gawith FVF.