Wessex Sovereign Curly Cut

This review about 'new' recipe of Sovereign (virginia-kentucky with a trace of perique), tinned in mid-2021.

Appearance: small (about 15 mm in diameter and a millimeter thick) "coins" of golden-colored Virginia with a dark core, consisting of dark Virginia mixed with a small amount of Kentucky, which replaced the perique, which was not so much in the original mixture. Due to the fact that the tobacco is young and the "rope" wasn't fermented for long, about half of the pennies crumbled into the usual long, very thin (almost cigarette) ribbons when sliced. The tobacco is very fresh indeed. The humidity is sufficient for smoking immediately, drying is not necessary.

Flavor: As one might expect, the abundance of light virginia with little aging gave a very bright hay note, in its diversity almost dominating all other flavors. Its brightness is supported by a note of citrus and a small amount of honey used as a sauce. The Kentucky woody and almond notes take the second role, and everything else - the light baked apple flavor, a bit of cocoa and a little spice - overlap the base quite tightly, and you have to sniff for a few minutes to feel them.

Taste: sweetly grassy and citrusy Virginia notes mixed with a nutty, woody, slightly smoky Kentucky note dominate this blend. A very small amount of spicy perique doesn't give even a hint of fig taste, giving the tobacco just a slight peppery edge. On the whole, the tobacco taste is quite simple, and as you smoke, the herbaceous and citrus notes flatten out, the tobacco takes on a sweetish, woody notes that have virtually no undertones. By the end of the pipe, the blend begins to sour a bit. The amount of Kentucky, as I mentioned, is small. The blend smokes surprisingly slowly, smoothly and coolly, forgiving even a slight overheating. However, it is not without some roughness at the beginning. The strength of the tobacco is somewhat below average. The blend burns into a dark gray ash with some coarse fractions, but leaves almost no moisture in the pipe. The aftertaste is almost the same as the flavor - sweet and woody, not persistent.

The smoke is quite plentiful, but not dense. It has a nutty, woody note and disperses quite easily.

What's the bottom line? I'm somewhat disappointed in the fact that Sovereign's recipe literally repeated the fate of Three Nuns, turning out to be rather mediocre VaKy blend. I can't call it bad, but at the same Kohlhase & Kopp you can get much more interesting in taste blends of Robert McConnell Heritage series.

Tin Note: The Blend had that same vinegar smell that va/pers usually have but this one also had an iced tea note to it.

Initial Light: Only took 2 false lights to get a nice burn going, flavor kicked off with some nice mild spicy hints from the perique.Burn was kinda fast but even none-the-less.

Mid-Smoke: The mild spice continued to the beginning of the mid-bowl, there wasn't much of a sweetness to the smoke but more like a wood tasting flavor, old cedar furniture taste. As i preceded through the mid-bowl i began to pick up slight hints of plum and fruit. The bowl was a bit hot but the smoke was even hotter i was getting a tingle on the tip of my tongue but that's all it was just a tingle, no bite.

Bottom of the Bowl: The spiciness eased down a bit and made room for more of the fruity plum flavor which increased as i smoked further down, the smoke itself was a lot cooler now but the flavor maintained its mildness.

Room Note: Not much to say wife said it just smelled like a pipe/cigar, which by the way shes not a fan of smell wise.

Dottle: It left a mixture of dark and white ash but the bottom was wet, i didn't get any gurgle or moisture through the stem during the smoke but it was really wet near the draft hole.

Smoking Duration: 35 min

Overall: This is a blend that starts off spicy, gets hot and then ends with a savory taste rather then a sweet one. I didn't find it horrible, but it was a bit annoying to smoke in between the spicy and savory, where it didn't know what it wanted to be. During that time i felt like i was sucking in hot air. So the beginning and end of this smoke was the highlights but even still i don't think it was worth a replay.

The best thing about this blend is the old style folding tin that although large due to the 100G size, is still quite convenient. Inside the foil pouch are nicely prepared disks ~ the size of a nickel, interspersed with golden to dark brown color. The individual disks varied widely in color from one to the next perhaps from the twisting process. Many had also started to unravel. This is one of very few blends that I have ever opened and been greeted by apparent white mildew on some of the tobacco even though the moisture content wasn't that high. I've done this myself when trying to rehumidify tobaccos with distilled water. Perhaps an imperfect foil seal was the cause but this is not expected from an expensive, tinned tobacco. Without rubout, packing technique was critical to an even smoke without relights and difficult to consistently duplicate. As with some other Wessex VA flakes that I've tried, I did not find the taste as inviting as the tin or room aroma. The advertised Perique was hardly detected resulting in a rather bland VA. Other VA flakes and Va/Perique blends are much more enjoyable than this one.

The presentation is coins in the style of Three Nuns or Cabbie's Mixture, to name a couple of well-known tobaccos. The smell in your tin is very surprising to me. Aromas of black pudding or chorizo ​​come to me, something that occurs to me for the first time in a tobacco, although I had heard of some other tobacco where this happened. Once lit it produces a taste that is a bit strange to me, just as the aroma in the tin suggested. It is not an unpleasant taste but neither is it one that invites me to go to it every day. I do not distinguish the components separately, rather it is an unknown flavor that is given by the fusion of its ingredients. I don't distinguish the cider cover either, but I understand that some type of cover has to have it, since it is totally different from the many virginias and vapers that I have tried to date. I usually smoke it when I'm doing something else and I'm not going to pay much attention to the pipe, but at the same time I want a full-bodied tobacco. As virtues I will comment that it burns very well and does not bite at all, but considering that the tin I am smoking is quite aged, I expected much more.

I give it two stars, although I have had a three-star smoke, but never four.

I would sum it up with one word: indescribable…

Cider flavoring, lots of perique, goes great with scotch, late at night, medium strength but the perique will light up your taste buds if you haven't killed a few of them first with some Johnny Walker Black Label.