Cornell & Diehl Kajun Kake

In a nutshell: Bayou Morning Flake with no sweetness.

Damn this is a hit and miss blend for me. On paper I should love it, in the bowl I don’t. It is not bad, it’s far better than most C&D I tried, it’s honest, i just don’t like it much.

The smell from the tin is sour, cheesy almost, peaty. The brick of crumble cake is uniformly dark brown, with some black strands and some lighter browns. As this is an American cake it breaks apart very easily, and comes ready to smoke in terms of moisture. That’s something at least!

Taste wise, it is sour, earthy, a bit vinegary and tangy, with a bucketload of Perique. Some wood here and there, very little to no sweetness. Pretty heavy on the nicotine, so it’s relaxing, and the room note is pretty strong. JimInks’s review is spot on as usual, but somehow with this I really do pick out almost everything he mentions.

I don’t dislike it, I just don’t like it much, or crave it. I feel this blend is very honest, it is not sweet and doesn’t try to be, yet that’s what is missing for me. Thankfully there’s the excellent Bayou Morning Flake.

This is a standard C&D crumble cake. A nice black brownie that comes at perfect humidity for smoking. Smells like spoiled milk. There must be some Perique in here.

It's hard to call this blend a VaPer. When compared to all the classic blends this one is very different. I feel like the Virginias are there to compliment the Perique rather than the opposite. Also with all the virginias being stoved (I think) the range of flavors are very different. This one apparently contains less perique than bayou morning (which is 25%), however to me I feel like I taste much more spice, and get even more of a buzz.

Charry, toasted grain (not unlike a stout, but more like a black lager, or schwarzbier) earthy, bready, woodsy, creamy, lots of black pepper spice, tangy pickley/fuity notes, & savory finish that builds up. Also a bit of a licorice/anise note. A darker VA experience without much bright/citrus notes and overall a very dry smoke despite the addition of Cavendish. Pretty strong nicotine content. burns dry and at an average pace.

Although it's pretty decent, I feel like this one is just lacking a little something to bring it all together. Maybe it's sweetness, or some brighter, citrusy notes? I'm not sure. It's still not a bad smoke and despite my small disappointments I will probably still be buying an 8oz can for aging purposes, I'm just too curious how this would be in 5 years or so. I feel like it has all the makings of a great sleeper blend. Pretty interesting smoke, and can't think of much exactly like it.

Those who read my reviews know I'm a lush when it comes to VaPer blends. I never seem to have enough of that Louisiana spice. I love the range of complexity to simpleness, the plummy to spicey, sweet to bready taste you can get from a good VaPer. So when I saw C&D had a VaPer in a cake format I knew I wanted to try it.

As is often the case, the tin art on this can is fun and interesting enough to make me pull one off of the shelf. Opening up you will find a typical C&D crumble cake mostly shades of dark brown in color. The tin note is tangy from the Red Virginia, and plummy and musty from the Perique. Every now and again I get a hint of barnyard; cigar smokers will know what I mean. The tobacco is easy to peel off and rub out, and it takes a light really well. I find that this blend can benefit from a light drying time but it will light fine without.

Once lit, this blend is fairly simple and straight forward. The Red Virginias are bready, woody and tangy. They add a slight sweetness but not too much. The Perique offers raisin and plum notes, but not too much spice. This has a tremendous potential for aging. The blend is fairly mellow because it's pressed into a cake, but with some time this could be smoother still.

The taste is a medium, and the aftertaste is pleasant with Virginia sweetness hanging on your tongue. Adding Perique often increases the strength of a blend, but I still find this mellow even after eating a light breakfast. I'll give the strength a medium. Room note is up to you, but I think it won't win any non-smokers over to our side of the table. Is it the best VaPer I've had: no. Is it a decent blend for a light it and leave it, working in your shed kind of experience: yes. It's quite simple and is good at what it says it is. I give this three stars.

My only VA / PE experience has been with St. James Flake (Kendal Mayor's Collection), and I wanted to try another blend of this type. I have been anxious waiting for the small can of KK since I discovered a C&D distributor in Argentina. When it arrived, the first thing I looked at was the packaging date: 05/2018. Well, it won't be too young a tobacco. When I opened the can, a deep aroma, with notes reminding me of certain almost sweet oily seed mixes, delighted me. With a few more days of time since I opened the can, I can find aromas of raisins and certain reminiscences of the roasted fruit of the carob tree. I extracted an almost whole cake and a thick flake that was cut to fit into the small container, dark oak in color, with few more reddish tones. I made the mistake of choosing a pipe with a large bowl to start with KK. The first three puffs I got when I turned on put me on alert: a bitter blow that subsided as I continued smoking, and that finally did not appear again. They were gradually replaced by slightly sweet notes at the base, and somewhat more spicy at the top, which reminded me of that itch of Dijon mustards, rather than capsicin of chili peppers. You can taste the maturity and complexity of the VA (I read in some of the comments that the mixture has Cavendish too, but it seems to me that it would not be a Cavendish based on Burley), holding the spiciness of the Pe throughout the smoke, which I had to finish without consuming all the pipe. At some point it reminded me of some mixture of oriental tobaccos without latakia, but it is only like an ephemeral sensation when you become aware of the spicy Pe. This tobacco is robust, for only one puff per day, but without hitting like a mass. I think it will be one of my favorites in the rotation when it deserves more complex puffs in more serene moments.

Just got this. Lit up a bowl. First thing I noticed is it doesn’t tase like it smells. The flavors are a wonderful combination that blend together perfectly. Sweet and quite spicy. Bought 2 cans so I could put one away.

Good stuff this Kajun Cake. I recently got a few tins of this and have been really liking it. Smokes nice and cool, and easy to keep lit, and with really great flavor. I tend to not like their blends but this VAPer is the best C&D blend I have ever had.

Conclusion: Not being a fan of Cornell & Diehl virginias I came in expecting quite little. However I put my faith in their use of perique and it did not let me down. This is an excellent smoke that will never dissapoint if one is looking for a smoke like this. Recommended. Aged six months when smoked.

Taste: Deep and earthy with a lot of spice, black pepper, from the start. A little sweetness lingers, it's not dark as in Samuel Gawith Lakeland Dark but something less fermented. The perique is the component in charge and dominates the profile. It is rich, spicy and really flavourful. It does not change profile in any significant way throughout the bowl but remains steady and composed all the way. No detected topping or casing. Full bodied.

Mechanics: Crumble kake. Burns clean without bite or dottle. Good moisture straight out of the tin. Medium to high in nicotine.

So much potential here. Great smoke. Tastes sweet and spicy. Refreshing. A little brown sugar and tang. Fresh cut grass. Delightful strong nicotine "hit." But something seems to be missing- the perique! Where is it? There is no musty, oak whisky barrel flavor that I can detect. A little spiciness, but no funk. No backbone. All treble and no bass. Burns mighty hot, too. So hot that embers fly out of the bowl and burn my hand. This is truly a diamond in the rough.

I love flakes, but I love kakes more, because when I work them pre-tasting the smoke, I live again that wonderful sensation I had when I could literally break a big leaves foil into small pieces and fill my bowl: it happened here in Tuscany when I visited a tobacco manifacture, and I could rip my part directly from an enormous pack. That was huge!

And this is a lovely cake, you can separate the leaves, play with them, go for little pieces or for big ones... great. The tin smells a lot perique, overwhelming the rest. Takes me back to figue trees in my hometown.

Great smoke, very tasty, very peppery. No relights, little ash.