Cornell & Diehl Purple Cow

Not for me. I don't need a pipe tobacco to emulate a cigar. I smoke both anyways. This is really a flat tasting blend even after considerable aging. It does smell like a decent cigar but has a flat undesirable taste. Couldn't finish this tin.

In the Can, the Latakia and the Cigar Tobacco are easily noted. Cigar Leaf is also noted in the smoke but in the room note,

During smoking, In the flavour, pure tobacco scented, bu so strong, even so strong to easy overhelming and after this, neither more in noted!

Also in the taste, the Burley dominates and this Blend is bitter, much bitter. Than, the taste is too strong to fast saturate the gustative impressions, and because of this, neither more is noted... Overhelm.

Smoking this is good in the begin, but their strenght saturates all the environment easily, becoming tasteless and boring. Large Nicotine ammount.

May be good for people that enjoy Cigars, and for that like extremely strong English mixtures,but this tobacco is not remarkable for me. Excessive Strenght, overhelming all... as Cheap Cigars and Vinegar taste.

This is not because the Latakia content, since almost pure Latakia blends,such as Pirate Cake are better.Also,in the kind of Cigar Leaf Mixtures, Dominican Glory is much better.

2 Stars for their quality,because is well blended, bus is only for people that enjoy very strong tobaccos or cigars, but not so good for me.

UPDATE: I have to downgrade this....the vast majority of the tin recently got thrown out in a "spring-cleaning" of old tobaccos I no longer enjoy. It is tastes ok for the first part of the bowl but then degrades into a taste of stale cigars that makes me nauseous. It also leaves its stench in the pipe long after. Maybe I just don't dig cigar-leaf blends, but considering that this costs as much as many other better tasting "premium" tins I do not see the point. Either buy a good English blend or just get a good cigar. I leave the original review below.

General impression: The tin smell is very pleasant, with latakia (rather than cigar leaf) in the forefront. The taste when smoked is...unusual for pipe tobacco. The first half of the bowl is actually quite nice and feels like you are smoking a strong, spicy, smoky maduro cigar in your pipe. However, after that the taste begins to lean a little more toward the kind you get when you reach the very END of a good cigar and it's time to let it go out.

Who should buy this stuff: You feel adventurous and you like cigars. You want to try something unique and you like strong tobaccos.

Final notes: I actually think this is a well-blended tobacco and that any faults with it lie mainly with the inherent nature of cigar leaf. I did not regret purchasing it (although I probably will not get it again - I would rather spend that money on a real cigar). I recommend smoking this in pipe that you won't feel bad about throwing out a lot of unsmoked tobacco (like a corn cob).

A friend sent me a sample of this tobacco: upon opening the pouch the smell was wonderful and it promised a great smoke. The cut was coarse, with sheets of Havana leaf, cubed burley and mostly ribbons of the rest. Big promises, but little taste: the only real tobacco taste I could detect was the burley one, while the others came into here in there, but very lightly noticeable. Really nothing to write home about.

Took me ages to finish this tin, very cigarish. I did not like this, but powered through it anyway. Tastes very dry, no sweetness at all, very robust flavour. Mixed with roll cake makes it better, I'd get the occasional chocolate / cocoa nots, but all in all there is no way I will buy this again. Tobacco quality is good.

If you want to try cigar type blends, give it a go.

Tin note is excellent... Promising and full bodied. The smoke itself is a big letdown. I mean, this is one of those tobaccoes that does absolutely nothing for me. Sure, I can smoke it but I just don't see the point of it.

A little too strong but not enough body which makes it feel kind of like when you forget all other spices (salt and all that) and just remember to put in chilies in food. Strong but not full. No flavor to back it up with and just a peak of the strong stuff.

Not even close to cigar either and the latakia (which I love) feels very out-of-place too.

Not recommended from me!

Purple Cow's tin aroma was promising: rich, full of smoky Latakia and dark sweet Maduro leaf. Upon lighting up there was a nice burst of Latakia. I found that after that, I had to smoke nice and slow to coax out the Latakia flavor. I suppose it was getting lost in the Burley, and what was progressively becoming, as one reviewer accurately described, a nauseating taste of stale cigar. I slogged my way through a few more bowls, each of which kinda made me sick. Maybe I just wasn't enough of a cigar guy to get it...

So then I pawned the tin off on my brother, who is more into cigars than I am. He smoked a bowl and promptly gave it back. So I passed it on to a friend who is a bonafide cigar lover. He smoked a bowl, took the old violet bovine out behind the shed, and put her out of her misery.

I very much wanted to like Purple Cow. I like Latakia. I like Maduro cigars. I like the funky tin art. I do not like Purple Cow; I do not like it anyhow.

As a lover of cigar leaf blends, I'd like to say with the utmost enthusiasm- SKIP THIS ONE ! This was a major let down for me. The cigar leaf flavor is there but the blend is so muted nothing really comes to the forefront. I would describe this blend as very SOOTY. It shows no resemblance to Pease's "Robusto" or "Robert Lewis' 123 MIXTURE". A good try but no Cigar! PUN INTENDED!