Samuel Gawith Firedance Flake

I wish I knew what to make of this strange tasting, strange smelling tobacco. I've been on a bit of an aromatic binge lately for some strange reason and thought I may as well explore my feminine side with this "ladies' tobacco."

Things went awry from the getgo. I'm usually impressed with the flake quality in SG tins, but this one looked like wet flank steak slices arranged by a blind man. It looked, actually, vaguely chewed.

The disconnect between the advertised "Blackberries, Brandy & Vanilla" and the real tin aroma has been mentioned by everyone. I was looking forward to the berries and though they were there, they were buried beneath more intense smells. This tobacco is floral for sure, but it's a vaguely unhealthy smell, too, something like a rose consumed by powdery mildew. My first instinct was to sprinkle some garden sulfur on those mangy flakes and fill a bowl with something else.

Since then, I've pushed through a few bowls of this stuff and every time I smoke it, I feel like I'm doing myself potential harm. Maybe I've just learned that I don't enjoy smoking something that looks like a half-chewed flank steak and smells like a sick rose.

One might be turned off by the first smell. It has that famous SG tin smell of potpourri but just fill a bowl (after drying!!) and enjoy a fine combo of flavor. My favorite SG blend for an aromatic.

1/3 of the bowl is heavily flavorful with heavy vanilla casing.

2/3 of the bowl is still heavy in flavor with some tobacco flavor coming through.

3/3 is burnt ash, but thats aromatic for you.

If you are in to VA/PER or ENGLISH,stay away from this blend. It is to aromatic for me at times and I am an avid aromatic fan.

My tin of Fire Dance Flake came moister than any other tin I?ve ever purchased. The tin has a heavy yet still pleasant blackberry aroma and the flakes were so moist that they pulled apart when I tried to remove them from the tin. It took little effort to fully rub-out the flakes as I usually do with most SG flakes anyway. After drying out Fire Dance burned well and, unusual for an SG flake, required very little attention. Considering this tobacco?s Virginia base and added casing I was impressed that this didn?t easily bite my tongue. It also remained relatively dry. Still, Fire Dance will bite if smoked too fast, and I found it?s rich flavor best released with relatively slow smoking.

I find the natural sweet Virginian tobacco taste is well augmented by the rich berry and vanilla casing. I like Fire Dance quite a bit.

I seldom smoke aromatic tobaccos: it took me two months to finish the tin. Fire Dance was much better than many aromatics I have tried. It maintained its tobacco taste while satisfying my sweet tooth. And it didn?t flavor my pipe! If I were a regular aromatic smoker this would be in my rotation.

When I first opened the tin my first thought was Woooh! I am an aromatic smoker so I am used to sweet aromas. But you do not even have to smoke the tobacco to get a decent room note! I was afraid the taste would be way too much. But it turned out to be a very balanced blend. The quality tobaccos are still there and not at all conquered by the topping. And this tobacco actually tastes the way it smells. The tobacco needs to dry for a bit before smoking it. Accompanied with a nice glass of Tawny Port it's even better! I will definitely store some tins for ageing.

Village-baked brown bread with butter and berry jam is what Firedance Flake tastes like. No surprise it finds a perfect fit for me as a morning smoke. As most Samuel Gawith's lighter offerings, it forgives even most aggressive puffing, but when savoured slowly Firedance gratefully unveils its whole (even if not really sophisticated) taste range, providing for a satisfying but never too aromatic or too nicotine-heavy smoke. Best when dried out for about half an hour when smoking a freshly opened tin. A calm, fragrant and tasty flake.

I will start by saying that BBF , and FVF are two fo my all time favorites. So far all S.G. blends have been very good with the exception of 1792...I guess it's a Tonkin thing. I find that there is considerable berry fragance in the tin. Nice...clean, not overbearing. As with all S.G. blends drying is a must. Rubbed out lightly, stuff, and light. Nice tobacco flavor, with a hint of berry. With a little effort you can keep this blend "in the zone" through the entire bowl. Burns cool, clean and completely. It will flavor you pipe somewhat, but to me thats not a bad thing. I try to reserve **** for the very best so I guess I will rate this one ***. I just bought a new Ser Jacopo Rowlette Maxima and two pounds each of BBF,FVF, and Firedance from smokingpipes.com.... good prices,selection, and the VERY best people to deal with. By the way the first bowl in the new pipe was Firedance.

I was looking forward to tasting blackberry with brandy and vanilla. Except there isn't any.

You get a faint whiff of berry from the tin but that's about it.

I guess it's cheaper to sell water than tobacco, considering how soggy the flakes were in the tin when I opened it.

It's got a sort of floral aroma and taste, like a straight virginia with a weird top note.

Hugely better than Devil's Holiday, but that don't make it great either.

Won't be buying this again.

Merry Christmas

Although I have just taken the decision to stop the experiments (because of Bob?s Chocolate and Campanille Mixture), this amazing mix came up on 25/12/07.

Blackberry? and something more. I can surely smell the blackberry but there is a British element in it. I left a dose out in the fresh air to get dry for one hour before I try it. It is not heavy and I don?t want to discourage anybody who has addicted preferences. It has something different which I don?t know whether it is the tonquin for which I read and I don?t know what it is or a very real flavor of vanilla.

They say that Samuel Gawith uses natural flavors?.. Hmmmm? this tobacco makes me believe it. Dry and easy to be smoked till the last gram in the bowl and it does not warm it up.

Usually i smoke classic English mixture with tons of latàkia and sometimes (usually after a good coffe) a full virginia. Well a friend of mine just suggests to try once this flake and so,i've bought it. Well i really don't like aromatics in general so as soon as i opened the box the smell was quite gentle it reminds me rasp-blackberries. well the smoke is so fresh, sweet and thin,you can easily feel the virginias mixed with a mild taste of soft fruit very pleasant and tolerable.room note is similar to the FVF. i really enjoyed it it's a valuable choice and i suggest it as an alternative to the other natural-aromatic tobaccoes. you should try once!