Cornell & Diehl Black Frigate

An early review of a blend I have not quite decided on…..

I love the taste, mouth feel is pretty good and it has not bitten me yet.

The Latakia is not overpowering and the components gel pretty well. The rum casing is a little overpowering and I hope it will take a back seat with some cellaring.

Going to have to give this one some time before I can fairly give an opinion.

Worth a smoke, yes.

Smells great from the tin, contents promise a lot: light application of Latakia, Oriental, Virginia, rum. What's not to like?

The lack of taste is not to like, sadly. The higher you rise the harder you fall, and what fell hard were my overblown expectations.

I smoked it almost back to back with another great disappointment from C&D/GLP: Haddo's Delight.

This one has more flavour for sure, on account of the Orientals and Latakia. The Latakia is very well done, exactly condimental. You may not taste it, but you'll get an aftertaste, and there's a hint of it from the tin. Other than that, not a lot there sadly. I don't know what C&D do to their tobaccos, I am genuinely puzzled. I've only liked two blends from C&D/GLP, all the rest I found tasteless so I put the issue with the blending technique, and how it may differ from European blenders, not faulting the leaf they use. Clearly my tastebuds are more receptive to European blending. To be sure, I've had my share of European tobaccos I didn't like for one reason or other, but NO TASTE only hit me with Capstan blue.

The weird thing is, the room note is pretty bad.

I get rum and latakia upon opening the tin. Both are evident upon lighting, as well as a mild floral from the oriental in the background. The Cavendish and rum, with the latakia give this a sweet English quality and the rum flavor is there throughout the smoke. The oriental seems to come and go as I smoke (might have more to do with how I broke apart the kake). Occasionally I would get a little harshness towards the latter half of the bowl, but overall it's really enjoyable. Recommended for any English pipers, or for aromatic fans looking to try some English blends.

This and its cousin GLP'S sextant are both wonderful blends. I find that greg's handling of the rum better than on this blend by C&D. The first half of the bowl is a wonderful navy rum smoke and than it turns into a sweet english blend. I prefer sextant but dont get me wrong, this genre buster is quite tasty and one i will buy again at some point.

This is what I thought I was getting when I bought some Skiff from Samuel Gawith when I was looking for an older sibling to Squadron Leader. Not to crazy about the tin as it leaves s sharp edge with the pop top on it. Nor is it a pocket shaped tin but I've other ways to carry it. The tin scent was something like soy sauce or BBQ in there. One of the 5th taste flavors that involve complex amino acids.

Felt a little dry in the tin versus what I'm used to but crumbled the cake and packet right out of the tin and after a charring light it was a little tamper now and then to the bottom of the bowl. Ash was light and little to no wattle.

Some aftertaste lingering with it that I'm unaccustomed to from my regular Squadron Leader.

Pipe used was meerschaum, bent.

I'm a once or twice a week type pipe guy, I don't have an all day smoke. It's my treat to sit and read the weekly paper and enjoy my pipe on a weekend morning. If this is your style and you like a heavier uncased flavor give it a crack, you'll enjoy. Seems a bit much for more regular consumption, and in that case I'd stay with something lighter.

This was a fun tin to open, what awaits you is a large chunk of pressed tobacco with a strangely sweet tin aroma. The tobacco lights with a fair bit of care, and did require a relight which is not a huge deal. The tobacco did start out a bit sweet which is not always the best thing with latakia. About one third of the way down the bowl after relight, it got more smoky and smooth more the way I like my tobacco. Why I will not give this unique tobacco more stars is the fact that it just was not anything special, it had good flavor but nothing that I would call great. And the whole idea of it not being for the faint of heart, is a sales gimmick. Glad I tried it but if I in the future want to try something not for the faint of heart i will stick with 1792 flake.

While this is not one of my favorites, it is still a pretty yummy blend. My tin was dated 1-03 so it has some age to it. Upon opening the tin, you are greeted by a small dark brick. The tin aroma is of a navy cavendish with rum , of course, but you can also smell latakia and a wee bit o' turkish. Moisture is pretty dry for this type of blend. Packing must be done with care to get the most of this blend. I have found that you must crumble well (I use the tin lid for this) and then lightly sprinkle in the bowl (bigger bowls are better for this blend), then lightly tamp. If you do that, lighting is a breeze and you probably can smoke it to the bottom with a few gentle tamps along the way. Initial flavor is sweet and rummy. It changes to a sweet, smoky, and mellow flavor about mid-bowl. The turkish raises its head at the last third of the bowl. This blend is really not that complex, but it gives you a predictable smooth ride to the end, good for when putterring around the garage or backyard. With that in mind, you may enjoy this blend (I sure do).Also, keep in mind that the nic is a little higher in this blend, but it doesn't kick you all of a sudden, rather, it creeps up on you (eat first!).Rating 3 out of 5 points. Enjoy...

I'm still new to pipe smoking, I can't necessarily taste all of the things other folks taste, yet; but, this is one tasty blend. The tin note is pure rum, and you can taste the rum throughout the smoke, but it isn't intrusive. It almost seems to act as an agent to meld and smooth the tobaccos.

The latakia is there, but, again, it seems smoother than most other latakia blends. This is a smooth, smoky, dark (can dark be a flavor? Sure, lets run with it). There are a slew of flavors that I'm not nuanced enough to identify...but its pleasantly complex.

It also seems to smoke very cool. As I said, I'm new and I still have a terrible tendency to smoke fast and hot. This did not seem to get hot at all, despite my puffing away.

This has immediately jumped to one of my top three blends to smoke.

First impression popping this open is a very boozy tin note. The cake crumbles easily and I pack my first bowl. As I puff I notice the latakia in this blend is tempered by the sweetness of the cavendish and rum allowing me to appreciate the complexity of the herbal notes that are usually masked by an intense smokiness. Black Frigate has opened up a new world of latakia for me. As I near the end of my smoke, I notice that this blend tastes better as it gets to the bottom of the bowl, the herbal notes in the latakia really start to standout even more. This is a perfect harmony of sweet and smoky with a wonderful complexity, although I recommend giving the blend time to air out before packing your first bowl. It was a little too wet straight out of the tin.

4/4 - This deserves a high rating unless I find another royal navy blend that dethrones it. This is my first of the genre, but this really stands out to me as something unique and necessary to try.