Peretti Park Square

Smoking now:

Sample bag smells mostly sweet woody slightly tart and some hay. Ready rubber moisture was perfect.

This is one of those woody earth vaper blends. A tiny bit of tart, some hay, lots of wood, earth, some dark fruit, and a fair amount of pepper and spice . Tingles the nose in the retrohale. I suspect there’s a healthy dose of vitamin P in here as I taste the dark fruit, spice, and pepper. Some bready notes as I continued the bowl. Not a sweet vaper blend. The blend does develop nicely with more of the bowl you smoke. Light mouth feel, pepper after taste, didn’t bite, smoked well. Probably repeatable if you’re a veteran Virginia perique smoker. Nic hit was a medium.

Outside of my wheelhouse when it comes to vaper blends but I’d you like perique a lot I would give it a try. 2 stars for me but if you like perique I would definitely recommend.

There are VaPers in the citrus/bright category and there are VaPers in the stewed fruit/bready category. This offering from Peretti is neither!

Park Square is an earthy organic mixture which casts the perique to the sidelines as a condiment. The interplay of the red...matured...and stoved virginias are the main event. It's not a bad thing!

The sweetness I cannot detect. It is more an earthy sourness reminiscent of telegraph hill..... which is much better than it sounds.

The mixture comes in a Kaleidescope of fluffy wide ribbon flakes that pack and light well. It behaves as it should in the bowl when given the respect virginias need.

I'll class it as an all day VaPer.....lovely to smoke without blowing me away.

has great balance everything seems to come together with this blend smoke it slow and enjoy it. I will be ageing some to see how it turns out

This is an OK Virginia Blend its have a very nice flavor and its Consistent. But nothing to rave about. It can be a bit bitey if not carefull. But there is better Virginias on the market with the same price point.

Oh! This is some really good baccy. I generally do not like VaPer mixtures at all, but this is excellent. It is so masterfully blended it comes off as almost an aromatic. If you can imagine Deep Hollow meeting Haddo's Delight and combining the 2, you get a very good idea what this is all about. It is simply silky smooth, rich, and sumptuous. This is for all VaPer lovers and those who think they do not like VaPer mixtures. Please, if you try 1 new tobacco this year make it PARK SQUARE. 4 of 4 stars!

This is one of the house blends put together by the Perreti company at their store in Boston. Here is the description of the blend on their website:

Red Virginia, Matured Virginia and Stoved Virginia are delicately spiced with just the right amount of Perique to create a rich and complex blend whose character evolves and emerges throughout the bowl.

Boy was I surprised by the appearance and texture of this blend. It is listed on tobaccoreviews as a ?broken flake? but the sample that I got would be classified more as a ribbon cut. The only word that I can think of to describe it is fluffy. It is very fluffy and springy and at first appearance appears to be really damp. Boy was I wrong. This blend seems to defy the moisture rules that I have come to learn. Packing it was extremely easy and it pushed down into the bowl without any pressure having to be exerted on it.

The light was also easy. I had to wait for it to go out after the false light because it wanted to keep going!! Once this was lit it was off to the races!! I now see why this is one of everyone?s favorites. And again I am surprised at the quality and taste of a ?house blend?. This is sold in bulk and like AJ?s VaPer and Anniversary Kake the taste and behavior of this blend outshines many of the more expensive tinned blends. The taste and burn stayed pretty consistent throughout the whole bowl. Doesn?t smoke hot and there is very little dottle when you get to the bottom.

I would classify this one as a mild to medium blend that could be smoked all day long if you wanted to. It has about a medium amount of Perique in it. Not the most I?ve smoked in a blend but certainly not the least either. It is also very smooth when you smoke it. The different tastes play off of each other but never outshine each other. I think that they mixed the individual components of this blend perfectly

Intro: I have smoked many VA/Perique blends and have enjoyed almost all of them, yet none have ever stood out like Peretti's "Park Square". It has established itself as my main blend of this genre. Loved by many respectable pipemen, Park Square is a diamond in a mountain of rubies.

Appearance: Dark red, brown and black ribbon/loose-cut leaf. Pretty even ratio of all three.

Pouch smell: Cloves, pepper and fruity wine.

Smoking quality: Park Square burns cool, dry and leaves the pipe clean. It can bite if pushed hard which is only to be expected given the nature of this blend. When treated properly, relights are a minimum.

Taste: Upon the initial puff, one tastes the sweetness of the Virginias. Soon, the spiciness of the Perique kicks in and it all comes together in a well-balanced flavor of subtle sweet with a dash of peppery spice. It is best when smoked slow and savored. The fullness gradually grows throughout the bowl but never becomes overpowering. Eventually, it goes out and will not relight. Turn the pipe over and see the soft white fluffy ash fall out of the bowl and into your ashtray. You will feel sad at first that the smoke is finished, but there is always more. You will want more.

I never thought of myself as a Perique addict, but Park Square did make me reconsider given that I found myself always wishing that there was more of that component in this otherwise fine blend. That historic tobacconist did a very fine job with the three Virginias, presenting a very broad flavor range that can be had from the leaf. They were sweet yet subdued and never overwhelming. There was Perique, yes, and I had been given to believe that it was a prominent feature of the mixture. It really seemed like it was just along for the ride, though, as it never exerted a strong enough influence on the taste. With every smoke from the one pound tin I ordered, I imagined that if that Perique dosage were just increased, I would be taken on a strange but joyous ride. The complex though quiet Virginias already there could have made this happen, I think, but old L. J. decided to play it safe this time.

Park Square should provide interesting opportunity for experimentation through augmentation with a tin of pure Perique, should I ever find the need to order either again.

As a novice and someone who prefers English/Balkan blends, the VA/Per category is one I have not delved into much. I got a sample of this along with several others, and on first try I set it aside as one I did not much like.

Now, four months later, I have retried it and have to say I'm impressed. Probably one of the main problems for me at first was my inexperience and failure to smoke slowly enough to enjoy this type of blend. Now I'm a bit better, and I had three bowls of this today and enjoyed them immensely. The tin note is lovely, dried fruits and wine dominating, and the smoke, when cool and sipped, is flavorful, rich, and smooth. I still get a bit of bite and heat in the bowl, but again my bad not the tobacco (based on my understanding of the qualities of this type of tobacco).

Love it......