Cornell & Diehl Old Joe Krantz

Be careful with this one, because it can pack a wallop. I might go so far as to call it a gollyflopper, but I think that's a word I just now made up. This blend sneaks up on a body. The initial taste is the sort of high quality burley excellence that we have all come to expect from the Tarler/Runowski duo. But where Pegasus had sweetness, and Haunted Book Shop had musty oriental character, Old Joe has the bassy depth of stoved Virginia. Nice, very nice.

But then, all of a sudden there is a BAM, followed a SLAM, a BOP, a BIFF, and...a CRASH. Perique has entered the premises. From where, you don't know, but it is there, all right, and it has taken control. From then on this is a heady, exotic, Crowley-style blend that takes you to weird, mystic places and does not bring you home until it is damn good and ready. I'm not even sure if I have gotten back yet. All the same, Old Joe Krantz treats you cruel in a decent way. Regards,

A. Morley Jaques

The bold burleys are toasty, mildly nutty sweet, woody with a slight dry bitterness and hint of spice. The perique is plumy, raisiny and figgy with a strong hit of pepper and spice. These two components work well together and are the stars. The red Virginia is a secondary addition, but an important part of the blend because it provides a necessary tangy dark fruit sweetness (and a little earth and wood) to keep OJK from being harsh. If you puff fast, you can experience some harsh notes along with a minute cigarette taste, and I recommend puffing at a slow to moderate rate. Won't bite, but it may tingle the tongue a tad. The strength is quite potent with a filling taste level. The nic-hit is near the center of medium to strong. Burns clean and fairly cool at a reasonable rate with a very consistent, deeply rich, mildly sweet, rugged, spicy flavor that translates to the lasting after taste. Leaves little dampness in the bowl, and requires an average number of relights. Not an all day smoke. I would rate this at four stars, but GQ's Askwith Kake does what OJK does a little better. Three and half stars for this mixture.

-JimInks

Nearly a year ago I tried my first OJK with some trepidation given the reputation it has of being a powerhouse burley. I packed my first bowl at the B&M without exploring the unlit aroma, just lighting up and driving away. About half way down the bowl I had to slow myself down, both vehicle velocity and puffing cadence. Wow! I did like this blend.

Being a normally English smoker with C&D Engine 99 as my favorite this was a complete surprise for me. While I did like the C&D Burley Flakes that I've tried, this was divine. Simply put, this is a 'tribute' blend to American smoking tobacco tradition - with the big three American varieties - Burley, Perique and Red Virginia. The unlit aroma is alluring, delicious-smelling without added topping or casing. Clean burn, the pipe cleaner emerges barely soiled and no tongue bite or rasped palates. Natural sweetness, nutty notes. It performs as one might expect from the burleys and perique with the Red Va being applied as a condiment. One might not pick it out in the smoke but most likely would miss it were it not in there.

I smoke this daily now. Several time a day and it has nearly replaced my VaPers. Another thing: this is the blend that finally kicked the cigarette monkey off my back - dead cold.

A classic in the making. Bob Runowski will be missed.

An unabashedly given and well earned FOUR Stars

Old Joe is a great smoke! I really enjoyed my recently gifted tin of this blend as its presentation was unique, tasty and not overwhelming in the Perique department. In fact, OJK is laced with just the right amount of that Louisiana product for me to tolerate. Some C&D blends overpower my taste buds with Perique, but not this one.

Although not busting at the seams with nicotine, there was enough of of that drug in this tobacco to perk me up.

Easy to load, light and keep lit; Old Joe Kranz offers a pleasant Burley taste with just enough Virginia to mellow out the flavor. Personally, I think OJK would be even better with no Perique at all, but as it is, I'll sure take a free tin anytime!

A few preceding notes. The blend was named in honor of my grandfather, who was also my pipesmoking mentor and role model. He primarily smoked burleys, like Union Jack and Edgeworth Sliced. I cannot think of a time when I didn't see him w/o one of his beat-up pipes and the aroma of pipesmoke around him. In any case, I was reading the reviews of Haunted Bookshop and Norm Musicant indicated that he liked more red virginia in his blends. Norm is someone whose opinion I respect. I was still looking for a simple hearty burley blend that could hold my interest all day. So, a new blend.

This is a ribbon and coarse cut blend of four basic American tobaccos: dark and cubecut burleys, red virginia and perique. It lacks the sophisticated nature of many contemporary blends. The pouch aroma is typical of C&D's great burleys, warm and earthy with a strong note of perique's mustiness. There's a springy quality to the packing, and it required two charring lights before the tobacco lit. The first few minutes was all burleys, the dark cigar tones and the natural sweetness of the cubecut. But, because the red virginia and perique are in ample quantity, their presence is noted and welcomed. The nose tingled but no bite through the smoke. It was a full-bodied smoke of fairly consistent quality to the bottom of the bowl. A large bowl Ben Wade Brogue was a great complement to the tobaccos. Very little moisture through the smoke as well. The pipe drew easily with light tamping.

I like this blend a great deal, because of its straightforward quality and its fullness of smoke. Since it doesn't bite the tongue at all, it can be an all day smoke. But, because of the hefty portion of perique (25%), the blend may not appeal to everyone.

If Dr. Who ever visits, I'm going to toss him a Barling pipe and 2 oz sack of Old Joe Krantz and ask him to go back in time and find my 18-year-old self and instruct him in their usage. Old Joe Krantz is exactly what tobacco should be: rich natural flavors, a subtle blend, high power for people who think their way through life as opposed to simply munching cheeseburgers, and enough variety to be tasty if smoked fast, slow or in-between. The predominant flavor here is C&D's savory dark burley, with added red Virginias to calm and sweeten it, with Perique scattered throughout to add texture and dimension.

Our nickname for this is "O.D. Joe Krantz" because of its relatively high nicotine content. This makes it a perfect "work tobacco" when a solid problem needs to be reduced to a quivering mass, and I can imagine Sherlock Holmes crouched on his armchair burning three pipes of OJK before leaping up with the name of the murderer. However, the strength is overstated. If you are new to pipe smoking, start with half a bowl. The speed at which you smoke it depends on how much nicotine accumulates in your person. If you have never smoked before and blaze a full bowl of OJK in ten minutes, you might find yourself on the floor with the spins. If you have smoked cigarettes, this is a dose similar to Dunhill cigarettes: a solid blast of nicotine, stimulating those synapses and nudging the neurons.

Liking natural tobaccos is both a strange and extremely normal thing. The many flavors that can be coaxed from tobacco render almost infinite interesting blends, and the drenching of sugary flavoring that makes aromatics resemble so much of the other insincere plastic mass-conformist junk out there pales in comparison. With OJK, I think it is time to demystify this one: it is a quality Burley blend and one of my favorites, but a simple blend, which means (paradoxically) that it holds the interest longer because its appeal is a few fundamental ingredients in contrast. In contrast, highly-detailed tobacco constructions have too many contradictory impulses and end up in that chaos losing depth and complexity. OJK reveals its many possibilities with repeated smokes where you have the time to appreciate it, much like a summer day with a fast breeze and high cloud cover will always be a calming experience. It may not be as mature as the Dunhill blends, and it has a slight bitterness reminiscent of fresh-cut plants, but its depth of essential flavors makes this one a perennial favorite.

2017 update: some time during this year, Old Joe Krantz changed, and it is a mixed bag. The original blend used giant fistfuls of the dark Burley that C&D also sells as a blending ingredient, slightly mediated by the white Burley that is available a catalog page over. As a result, it produced radically different estimates of its strength. Burley people like myself did not find it particularly heady, but those who are sensitive to Burley reported it as a hefty dose of Nicotine. The truth is probably in the middle... there is something in dark Burley which is like eating green fruit in that it makes you feel a bit queasy and gives you the spins if you have too much as a Burley susceptible person. The new Old Joe Krantz is ribbon cut instead of rough cut, uses more of the white Burley by my taste, has more moisture, and is a true medium strength tobacco thanks to the lower count of dark Burley. On the plus side, this burns a lot better than the original; on the downside, it lacks some of the delicious Nicotine of the older blend, and is heavier due to moisture that does not really enhance the flavor. Looking at the bright side, it really feels like the "best OTC you have ever smoked" now, and seeing how C&D are following the Sir Walter Raleigh and Captain Black model with now three total variants of Old Joe Krantz, it would not surprise me if this started showing up in drugstores as "Old Joe" in a few years. I miss the stronger original blend, but this is still a fine smoke and now is even easier to puff it all day; I shore up mine with some thin-sliced "Brown No. 4" hidden among the golden-brown shreds.

This is a sofisticated Burley Mixture....I note much more the Burley (bitter taste) and the Perique (peppery taste) than the Virginias. I also note some spicy taste. I dont consider it very strong (is strong, but not very strong) in Nicotine, but in flavour and taste, yes! Full flavour and taste. Excelent mixture, I recommend for Burley and Perique fans. I atributed 4 Stars. Further evaluation: With dry weather, as in my City, after open the bag with this tobacco, it dries something and gains "body", the Burley is just more combined with the Perique. The result is even better!

C&D OJK was a treat. I found the blend to have a pleasant slightly bitter/sour taste that was pretty constant through the bowl. There is more of the bitter to me. The perique is there and I can taste it, but it is just another flavor in the mix and not the main attraction. There is enough of the Virginia to provide a little sweet to go with the bitter/sour. This one had a lot of flavor, and anyone who wants a tobacco that is "not bland" should try this if there is not a burley or perique aversion.

This one has a little more nicotine than most things I smoke, but like the perique presence, it is enough to notice and not so much that I am swimming in it. OJK was very good and a tasty diversion. I will probably buy some of this to keep it around.

This is a solid 3.5...

Edit: I have since smoked up another 4 oz. of this, and I am liking this a lot. The next order will be a pound.

Edit2: I am maybe 5 pounds into the OJK experience. I find this very satisfying and have a few pipes that really perform with OJK. I have found that a half bowl of Haunted Bookshop topped with a half bowl of OJK is a combo that really works well for me.

Edit3 8/31/19: The price of OJK is suddenly higher in bulk compared to Big-n-Burley and the other C&D standards. I had two pounds of it in the last order but took them out and added two pounds to the Big-n-Burley purchase.

One of the worst parts about living in Hungary is being unable to purchase American blends such as Cornell & Diehl, G.L. Pease, etc. The government nationalized the sale of tobacco, a state-wide monopoly on profits and distribution of tobacco. The end result: Excessive taxes on imported tobacco, corrupt Hungarian politicians earning a fortune, and me being forced to smoke Borkum Riff and the mediocre Hungarian blends before I started ordering online from other EU countries. Long story short, I ordered 5 tins (including this one) from smokingpipes.com, and was hit with a $100 shipping tax a few weeks ago. And you think your government is corrupt?

Anyway, enough with my sob story; I have been waiting A VERY LONG TIME to try Old Joe and was quite excited to open the tin. After paying the ridiculous shipping tax and waiting months for it to arrive, this blend better be good! And yes, it was damn good!

Upon opening the tin, my first breath was filled with sweet molasses, with fig and dried fruit overtones. It has a very refreshing, sweet, and fresh natural aroma. This is just what I was hoping for.

Perfect to smoke the second you open the tin, no need to dry out. After my first smoke, an immediate, molasses/ maple taste, followed by wood and nut-like flavor hit my taste buds. The Burley’s take center-stage here and I must say: Cornell and Diehl have some of the best burley’s I have ever tasted. Absolutely magnificent! Mid-way through the bowl, the taste then suddenly changes into a smooth, cigar-like flavor. Old Joe satisfies your sweet tooth in the beginning, and then settles you in with a very smooth, balanced cigar taste to finish. Really nice.

The Perique is noticeable, but not overwhelming and is balanced with the Virginias. And boy, is this a strong one! I usually smoke 2-3 times a day, but the nicotine strength in this one forces me to smoke just once, and wanting a large glass of water after.

Smoking this blend was quite bittersweet: definitely a great blend and something I would love to add to my regular rotation, but difficult to acquire in Europe unless I want to cough up another $100 shipping tax and not have money to eat during the week. At least I will starve to death happy, while smoking this excellent blend from Cornel and Diehl!

It's a shame I can't give this one five stars. This is the closest thing to a "perfect" blend I've come across. This is, as others have pointed out, perhaps the best American-style blend on the market today, which is high praise indeed.

Another reviewer described this as a "kaleidoscope of naturals," and I agree. The burley used here is delicious, and it basically serves as the canvas on which the virginia and perique get to show their stuff. As a perique lover, I can't get enough of this blend-- it's supposedly composed of something like 25% of that spicy leaf, and as the bowl progresses it shifts back and forth between a fruity/sweet flavor and a more spicy/sour one.

But this blend's smokability is what really pushes this to the top of my cellar. It smokes with all the ease of a drugstore burley and almost never bites, even when puffing like mad on a large bowl.

Like most C&D blends, I do recommend letting it age a few months and then letting it dry out a little before smoking it. I prefer to buy mine pressed, but it's great either way. I've also found that adding about 10-15% latakia makes for a very enjoyable American English blend, if you're so inclined.