Stanwell Melange

Update..... I allowed my tongue to heal after smoking Mac baren blends, lol...and tried this again, To my suprise it is quite tasty ! Sweet with an aroma more like hickory nut than apricot. In fact it tastes and has an aroma like an ultra premium version of Middletons Hickory ! I wish Hickory was this good. This is very nice, fruity and smooth, no bite. Its nice and soft and full of flavor and it lasts long. I was smoking Peterson's deluxe blend all day and was suprised to see how slow and cool this is, delicious ! It required a few relights but tobacco tastes better to me when moist rather than dry. When tobacco is dry it tends to be harsh and rancid, this is delightful ! One medium sized bowl lasted me an hour and 15 min.! Just a LaRocca due egg bent. I up this to 4 stars today thanks to my tongue being replenished ! Try this you won't be sorry, yum !!! I may make this my go to tobacco !

PS. This tobacco has some kick ! I'm an ex cigarette smoker and I get a nicotine Buzz from this. This has the kick of a medium English! Anything with Burley is going to have more nicotine than a latakia blend. I upped the strength t o medium because I have other mild medium blends and this has more punch ! Not a bad thing but if your a beginner start with a smaller bowl or smoke it a little slower, it will get you .

I can't get enough of this blend, I can't wait to try the Kir and Apple ! I think this is the best tobacco I've ever smoked, the perfect aromatic ! Finally, I've found nirvana !

A tobacco smokers aromatic. Nice coconut, vanilla, fruity smell in the tin, yet the casings/flavoring are not heavy and the blend is not goopy. The mix has a predominantly tan/brown color from the burley, virginias and orientals. The balck cavendish is mixed in with a light hand; just a smattering of BC throughout.

The smoke is very pleasant and enjoyable. Slightly sweet taste, maybe a litle nuttiness from the burley. The aromatic casings/flavoring don't overpower the smooth virginas and orientals. Nice kind-of-salty finish to each puff.

This blend is very competitive with some of the equally excellent "big name" aromatics I've tried over the years. An excellent aromatic and a very pleasant surprise, especially for the price.

I think I just found the perfect aromatic! I am usually a VaPer, burley smoker but I enjoy aromatics a few time a week for a change. But this one, WOW! It does not bite! It has a full, creamy, apricot taste that is not overwhelming. It lights on the first light and STAYS lit all the way down. It burns to a fine ash with no moisture or goo or dottle in the bottom of the pipe. The casing flavor stays all the way to the bottom. And it is delicious leaving a very pleasant taste on the palette. In fact in 39 years of pipe smoking, this is the first aromatic that I wanted another bowl full after the first one was barely tapped out. In fact, I had a third. A neighbor came up to my deck where I was enjoying it this afternoon who normally does not like my pipe smoke and asked what I was smoking. He said it smelled wonderful. It does have a great room note. Out of the tin, it is a mixed color blend running from light brown up to a black in a ribbon, and rough cut mix. It is perfect in moisture right out of the tin, no goopiness, no stickiness at all, loose and easy to load in the pipe. This is the perfect smoke for new smokers, for experienced smokers wanting a change of pace or those that like aromatics but don't like tongue bite. I experienced none, and I tried to make it do so. I highly recommend this blend and an added bonus is that it is not expensive and easily found. It is made by Orlik which makes Golden Slices one of my favorites for Stanwell. So it is a quality tobacco. It uses a base of VA, some burley, Orientals, and black Cavendish.

Decided to christen my new Stanwell Vario with some pipe weed of the same name. The 50g tin has a classy look about it. Upon opening, your nostrils are overwhelmed with the scents of citrus and apricot. Definitely a nice tobacco to smoke during the warmer months here in New England with its fruity aroma.

I don't think this blend requires much drying but I am reviewing it a year after opening it originally and it's still fine. Burns nice and evenly with no need to relight after getting it started. The taste is very sweet to me with the flavor of the apricot coming through strongly. The burley acts as a nice base, imparting a bit of its nutty disposition into the mix. Unlike most aromatics, I find the flavor stays pretty consistent with the Melange throughout the bowl. The oriental and VA peak a little bit in and out during the later half of the bowl adding a little bit of spiciness to the fruit.

Overall, a very enjoyable aromatic if that's your thing (which it is for me). I would certainly recommend this to new pipe smokers that want to enjoy sweetness without the bite. Also, quite light in the nicotine department. Stanwell Melange is a spicy apricot tobacco ripe for summer smoking in your backyard and quite enjoyable with a little bit of brandy as well.

This is one fine aromatic. There are many aromatics out there, but not too many that also have Orientals in them. Some, but not a lot. This one does and it's what also really separates it from the pack.

First off, when you open the tin, you are greeted by that wonderful apricot-like scent that is used for the fruit flavoring here. It's delicious all on it's own. The leaves are also a nice mixture of colors, adding to the intrigue of this blend. But again, what separates this blend from the others is the addition of the Orientals. In this case, they aren't spicy. Maybe a little sour or tang to compliment the sweetness of the apricot flavoring, but what I really like about them is that they also add a real nuttiness to the blend. You hear that a lot, "it's nutty", but in this case, it really is and has an almost cashew like feel and taste to it. However you particularly perceive it, it's great and very different.

It's also one that is really a crowd pleaser. When I used to smoke in the car, I remember one day going through a drive-thru in the morning for some breakfast. The cashier leaned out of the window to tell me how nice this smelled. When I got to work, the receptionist who usually grimaced when I came in after smoking some other tasty blends said, "now this one I like!" I laughed. Finally, I was sitting on a bench smoking this and a guy walked over to me and said he could smell it from a block away and wanted to follow it. OK, that was weird and a bit creepy, but who can blame him? It does smell good!

Now, it does remind me of Orlik's Mellow Mixture. They both have that similar scent in the tin, but Mellow Mixture lacks the Orientals and the sour and nuttiness that this one also brings to the pipe.

Not much nicotine to speak of in this one, but it is by far one of my favorite aromatics out there, if not my number one. It's tantalizing.

My only negative with it is that I find myself having to relight it more often than normal. Probably just me. I will also say that it benefits from being fluffed out and aired out in a pint jar for a few days. When you open the tin, the ribbons are tightly packed. Air it out and the smoke is smoother and fuller.

Get out and try it.

Enjoy!

Some pipe smokers, when reviewing aromatics, complain about not being able to taste tobacco under the casing. I think differently: if I want to taste Virginia, then I smoke Capstan , if I want to taste Latakia, then I smoke Commonwealth, but if I smoke aromatics then I want to taste fruit, vanilla, chocolate. Stanwell Melange is all this: an amazing tin smell, which fully translates to the smoking taste, overall an excellent aromatic. It’s a shame that it isn’t available here in Italy.

Tremendous taste! Such a thick, luscious smoke! Took a while to aquire as I am from the UK but my perseverance was rewarded! I'm not going to give you poncy simlilaritys to orchards of apricots blablabla, just the simple fact that what you smell in the tin is uncannily accurate to what you will taste in your mouth!

Stanwell are well known for making high quality aromatics and, in my opinion, this is by far their best blend. Indeed, the apricot is there and, if you smoke this one slowly, the flavor will be almost perfect. Doesn't heat the pipe and doesn't bite the tongue, even if you smoke the pipe without a filter. The room note is fantastic, the most pleasant of all Stanwell tobaccos. Everyone around you will love it and will bring you only compliments. This is definitely something I will buy again. Highly recommended for aromatic lovers, and even latakia smokers might give this a try.

I purchased this tin because a friend of mine who only smokes aros considered it his favorite. When I first opened the tin I was blasted by a pleasant tin note of Apricot, but when I smoked it, I found the topping to be too overwhelming for my tastes. I set this aside for about a year and came back to it.

While the topping was still quite strong, it seemed to have settled quite a bit and the smoke was much more pleasant this time around. As to what the underlying leaf is, it is pretty much irrelevant since you will not taste it. This one is all about the topping. Apricot is the obvious and dominating flavor. I also picked up peach and was pleased to see a few others have as well.

This topping is pretty pleasant to my tastes and it will hang through to the end of the bowl. This, IMO, is a mark of a great aromatic. How one will view this will depend on one's taste. If you like this topping as I did, you will love this blend.