Hearth & Home Frenchy's Sunza Bitches

First off.. the name says a lot...so be ready for a good ole fashioned S.O.B. blend. As the description says.. this is VA with your Perique... so instead of a Va/Per.. its more of a Per/Va ... hmmm maybe a new blend description. The bourbon is a light addition to a very strong and straight forward blend.. but it rounds out the experience quite well. I would like to give this four stars.. it really is a great blend.. but it was just a bit harsh for me..... but as a morning pipe with a strong cup of coffee.. you will not be lacking for any flavor from this blend.

I'm a non-aromatic smoker. I like VaPers, English blends, stuff with Latakia, perique. I like the sweet grassiness of VA blends. I thought I'd tried FSB some few years ago, but hadn't any on hand. A friend who didn't like the spiciness of the peri que in this gave me his freshly opened tin. My surprise when I opened the tin was the rather large golden and brown and black 'leaves', no small flakes at all. What the heck, I didn't try to mulch them up, I began to pack a Ropp Cherrywood Churchwarden with it. Several attempts at relighting didn't help so I gave the bowl a bit of a stir, some prodding and relit? Success! There was the grassy tasting Virginia out front, and followed by a pretty good bit of perique upon the tongue. Then the burley nuttiness came in as a nice balance to the VA. A good bit of creamy white smoke, the bowl settled in to an even seesaw of VA and burley with enough tasty perique for character. To me, the green tea VA tastes slightly dominated. This would be a good morning pipe with a strong coffee. It won't make my my Must Have All the Time list, I'll enjoy the tin and move on to the better VaPer blends to be found.

A lot of Hearth & Homes blends seem to disappoint me. This is one of the few I find myself reaching for now and then.

It has good strength and a very full taste I enjoyed. It bit, like every other blend they do.

The room note was nice and the cut was very easy to light, and flavorful.

I don't think I would buy it again, but its cool for a starter smoker trying out different casings.

I have a lot of respect for Russ Ouellette as a person and as I fine blender, but Frenchy’s simply misses the mark for me. Like many of Russ’ blends, FSB arrives quite dry. Normally this is a good thing as I prefer my tobaccos on the dry side. But with that said, in this case, it added a bit of harshness to the smoke. FSB isn’t limp wristed, but won’t knock out most pipe smokers. I like the bourbon flavor and it isn’t overdone, but it isn’t enough to save this blend. To steal a comment from another reviewer, I too found this to be a bit “cigaretteish” for my taste. I jarred about an ounce of this two years ago and opened it for the first time this past month. While not a long time in the jar, it didn’t improve things for me at all. There still wasn’t much sweetness from the Virginias. FSB and other blends that arrive so dry have begun to make me wonder about the possible important role some moisture may play in aging a blend. In the end, I don’t hate it and it isn’t terrible. It just isn’t for me.

Although not very strong the bourbon topping kind of ruined this blend for me. I think I would have liked it without it.

Mostly burley at the match. Very dry. Don't notice perique in tin or first light. Midbowl, a bit of sweetness. By end of bowl, perique still well in the background. Burley dominates throughout, with fairly high Nick level. No bite. My impression is of an OTC burley with a little black pepper sprinkled in. I'd rather smoke Classic Burley Kake.

I smoked a bowl, then let this sit for nearly a year, then smoked about half of my two once plus sample. I'm going to leave the balance another year, maybe more, as the Virginias continue to mature.

The bourbon adds a super pouch aroma, but upon lighting, the perique fig smell dominates. As for taste, the Virginias dominate the light, but the perique flavor and aroma dominate after the first third of the bowl. It burns extremely well with little or no dottle.

Burley bites me big time, but I got no bite from this. Fair warning, though - it can get hot.

I am a big fan of Russ' Sweet and Savory, and although it looks similar, I don't taste the comparison. I prefer Sweet and Savory. For VA/PER lovers, I think this ranks right up there with Greg Pease's Haddo's Delight, but Haddo's is richer and heavier.

One thing to add - those in the know can immediately spot a Russ Ouellette blend. For the uninitiated, Frenchy's Sunza Bitches is the best example I've seen. No other blender uses this cut or delivers tobacco with this immediately-smokable humidity. Too bad we can't add photos. Tons of Russ' blends are cellaring worldwide because this guy is a master.

Son of a...Oops! SUNZA BITCHES! Yessir that's what I feel about this blend. Them Sunza Bitches are right on with this one. Perique is up there nice and spicy without being hot. I think the litle bit of burley may cut it back just a little. Actually just enough to smoke it hard if ya want to and if ya smoke 'er very slowly she's sweet as a spicy nut. The Virginia in the blend makes it smooth and slightly sweet in my opinion. A rather pleasant room note too. Let me tell ya if it wasn't I'd have heard about it buy now.

There's nothing overpowering here but a great smoke in a large bowl, two in a row if you have time. I'm rating it at FOUR stars but you have to like perique to appreciate it.

Of the samples from pipesandcigars.com this one is, so far, the only one that I can say was pretty decent. And when I say pretty decent, I mean that it's worth finishing the two ounce sample. I'm not so sure I would order more, however.

The cut is very coarse, looking almost like the broken up flakes in the bottom of a box of Wheaties. I wasn't sure how this would pack and light,, but it really didn't give me any trouble. It lit quickly, and stayed lit with no problem. The initial burn did bite my nostrils pretty good, but once it got going it settled down. It burned clean down to the bottom of the bowl. The flavor was nowhere near as "in your face" as I've seen others describe. It was far less spicy than I had expected, and the fruitiness of the perique was pretty subdued.

This is a tobacco that may appeal to those wanting something with more flavor than the standard OTC burley blends, but don't want to have too much of an adventure. The nicotine level was pretty good, but nothing to ring my bell. And the flavor, while nowhere near blowing my socks off, was good; nothing off about it. However, I'm just not sure I would buy it again given the price. Yes, I understand that this is hand blended. But, I can easily name four or five va/per blends that would blow my socks off that cost less.

** Threw the rest out in the garbage today. Whatever small enjoyment there might have been in this, it has gone. My initial impression was that the flavor was decent, but the more I smoked this, it just got bland and boring.