Mac Baren Stockton

This is a tobacco of the highest quality.On opening the attractive looking dark green tin one is aquaintted with a lovely mid and dark brown tobacco in the form of small discs If smoked slowly Stocton does not give any tongue bite I find it one of those blends that smokes better as you go doun the bowl A top notch va This tobacco does not seem to be as popular as either Rollcake,or Dark Twist but I find it better by far.One of my favourites

I had a feeling I would like this blend, so I jumped in hard buying 3 100 g tins 9 years ago and in the cellar they sat. A couple of months ago I decided it was time to try this blend out. Having finished the first half of the 100g tin, I can say I am very happy I bought three tins of this.

This is a wonderful VaBur blend and one that could enchant even those normally averse to DFK. I admit that I have been growing less and less into DFK as it is too heavy and too smoky at times. The Dark firing seems to cover up a lot of the inherent nutty sweetness that lies within the natural burley. The cavendish treatment of the DFK in Stockton mellows it out substantially.

Like almost every DFK blend I have smoked there is a bit of Molasses which I am convinced all of this leaf is cased in. It is light like the leaf itself and the Virginia carries it well adding sugar along the way. The virginia is not as prominent and doesn't need to be, the taste is perfect to my palate.

This is a Mac Baren product and the quality and presentation are as expected, top of the line. I have yet to come across a Mac Baren Product that was anything less. Some do bite quite easily, I found Stockton to be more forgiving than most.

I have nothing bad to say about this blend and as an added bonus it is sliced up into coins (Ok Birdseyes, Potato/potahdo). Coins are just plain fun. Four stars all the way.

Mac Baren’s Stockton seems to be popular amongst those who have reviewed it, and I suppose it would be more popular if it were more widely distributed. It presents in its large, round tin as a compacted mosh of “coins”, which is to say, round slices cut from a rope of twisted tobacco leaves, sticky rather than wet. In this case, the varietals range from gold and light red-brown on the outside of the coins to the dark brown centers, reflecting, I suppose, flue cured llemon and air cured orange VAs and KY that is said to include KY Cavendish, which is an unusual offering. Initial tin note is pecan pie with earthy tobacco and maple condiments. It looks and smells like the topping is maple, sugar, and treacle, with a trace of vanilla, heavy application. After a good deal of messing around with this tobacco, I settled on gently rubbing it out and re-blending it, then stuffing it loosely into a #5 KY briar. It burns better, with less stirring when treated this way, and it also works better a week after the tin is popped. It tastes better if it’s kept cool. Combusting scents and tastes well reflect the tin note. Stockton is very sweet, also sour, and there are bitters, as well. It’s an easy smoke, pretty much a no-brainer for me, to the point where I found it hard to take mental notes as I smoked it. No matter how I’ve prepared it, I wind up stirring it at the end, and I always wind up with some black dottle. Strength is medium, with not much in the way of nicotine. Tastes are medium. Room note is pleasant. Aftertaste is a trailing off of the best of a fine, satisfying smoke.

Not going to fault a blend because it’s sweet and simple, and Stockon does offer some muted, smoky KY notes beyond the nuts. Though it might not sound like much, my tin won’t last very long at this rate, which says all that needs to be said. 4 stars.

Mac Baren released this in the US in July 2020 as a limited edition release which was a nice summer surprise. I purchased a couple of tins to cellar, but one was dented up in transit (thanks UPS) so I decided to open that one to jar to prevent any future issues.

The large tin (3.5oz) is jammed full of the small twists. The tin note to me was a little spicy and similar note to Three Nuns Green. As mentioned the tobacco is a little moist so I let it air about 2 hours before smoking. The coins were broken up and loaded in a smaller Canadian.

Lighting takes a couple of tries ot get going but once burning it provides a flavorful smoke. It required a couple of relights and produced quite a bit of moisture (nothing a pipe cleaner can't fix). The smoke to me was a little spicy from the dark fired and very consistent throughout the bowls. The Nic to my taste was mild. It burns a little warm to me but not enough to produce tongue bite.

I think this will age well and I hope that Mac Baren decides to introduce this to the US market in non-limited release so that more smokers can enjoy it.

I like it too much, sadly it has two problems: the lack of nicotine strenght (that frankly is expected in this kind of old traditional tobaccos), and little tongue bit even if slowly puffed.

Maybe this is a little rash, but after only one bowl I'm already in love with this tobacco! The Virginia sweetness and the earthiness and meaty-smoky piquancy (for lack of a better description) of the Kentucky --> Cavendish are spot on and extremely well balanced. There is no topping, only a very subdued casing, which is hardly noticeable. It has a certain amount of MacBaren's typical bitingness but nothing that couldn't be handled. It's a dry smoke with fine ash and when you notice that the bowl might come to an end now, it's already finished. The only drawback is very personal opinion and therefore no star is withdrawn: I wish it would pack a bit more punch.

Edit: Re-visiting my ratings I have to downgrade this one to 3 stars. Otherwise you could get the wrong impression, e.g. because I gave Dunhill's 965 "only" 3 stars also. Stockton is not better than 965, but I don't want to give 965 the full 4 stars because there are better Latakia Blends imo. So, I still highly recommend Stockton, the downgrading is only for clarity and plausibility.

If you like Mac Baren's Roll Cake, you'll probably like Stockton. In fact these two attractive roll cake tobaccos look and taste almost identical. Again, my complaint with Mac Baren is most of their tobaccos are a little mild and one dimensional - flavorwise - and smoke too hot. Then again, with their long history and the remarkable variety of tobaccos Mac Baren provide, who am I to complain?

I must say I am disappointed in this one.

It's not just pure tobacco flavor, it's pure "no flavor" at all.

Same as Dark Twist, Roll Cake and the others. As least, Dark Twist tastes something with the casing. This one, nothing.

Too bad.

I tried 2 bowls in 2 different pipes of this at a pipe club meeting. I was pleastly suprised at this. Tin aroma is nothing to talk about, has a faint sweetened/sour ketchup smell in the tin. The small coins(just larger than a nickel, smaller than a quarter) are easy to rub out or place over the bowl and shove in. I think the tin needed some more drying, but it stays lit fairly well. As for the taste, I was rewarded with a nice white raisin taste from the start. You get hints of woodiness on the back of the tounge half way thru, and finish with a clean pruny taste. I wanted another bowl right after so that's how the 2 pipes happened. I got some dottle and mixed ashes in the end, but I think the blend just needed some drying before smoking to help this out. This is one I'll be recommending to people.