Cornell & Diehl Tuggle Hall

I am not terribly familiar with 965, having smoked a bit more than a half tin of the Orlik version just shortly before it was discontinued. From memory, the 965 was definitely a bit sweeter. Not sweet, just a bit sweeter. It also did not become quite as "ashy" towards the bottom of the bowl.

This is a relatively dry (not sweet) very lightly flavored English with a whole ton of burley, to my taste. As a result, it works pretty well for me in the first third of the bowl, tends to have a bit of a nicotine wallop in the middle third, and the last third is a dark ashy thing that I don't particularly enjoy.

If the entire pipe full could be as good as the first third, this would easily be 3.5 stars. As it stands, I have to give it 2 stars, as there are a lot of other blends I prefer.

(I do very much like burley blends, especially from C&D, but this combination just doesn't work for me.)

Great cut, it's kind of chunky bits of leaf, similar to many other C&D blends, I just generally really like this cut, it behaves itself outside (where I do most of my smoking) and works well indoors too. Can require a bit of grooming, tearing up some of the larger hunks of latakia leaf.

UPDATE February 2010 After smoking this a bit more, it's growing on me. It's very important to agitate the blend before packing, as otherwise you can get a bowl with a lot of perique, or a bowl with a lot of latakia, or a bowl with a lot of burley. As you might imagine, each of those is less pleasant than a well blended bowl. This blend has a LOT of flavor, burns really well, and I like it a lot. It is a bit "dry" in flavor, not at all sweet, and I don't sense much of an Oriental presence, if any. It's a really hearty American English blend, kind of like Epiphany on steroids.

UPDATE June 2011 I've found that shredding the blend further makes it a lot more consistent in the pipe. I don't think it is as multi dimensional as Epiphany, and it's not at all sweet like 965 is.

Cornell & Diehl - Tuggle Hall.

The blend's coarse and more like a mixture than a straight ribbon. This one's not been starved of air in the loose pouch so is of a great hydration to smoke right away. The ribbons are about an equal divide between medium and dark browns.

The Perique gives only a dash of flavour, the Cavendish and Latakia are responsible for the majority. After about half of a bowl I start to get a slight honey sweetness appearing. I like it from this point, but to be honest for the first part the smoke seems too arid and empty for me. Tongue bite doesn't happen but I find the temperature too much.

The room-note's a bit full and the nicotine's medium to strong.

To tell the truth I'm a little disappointed in this. I wouldn't go as far as to only give it one star but neither would I give it any more than two.

Somewhat recommended.

Ohh where is my beloved 965?(tears, whining) Oh, well it seems as though 965 is gone for good. It will always be my all time favorite. Tuggle Hall was sampled out to me to see if I thought that it would be close. Its similar but, is missing a three part dynamic IMO. Original 965 possesses a distinctive sweet, oriental tangyness that is not to be found at the right levels IMO. It is however, a very good blend that does fall in the same catagory of non-monochromatic english blends. I will say, its much better than what is being sold as 965 these days. The tobacco is rather rough, and not near as refined as 965. There was alot of lumber in the sample I got. None the less, I can say that this is so enjoyable that I will use it as a replacement, because I got the same kind of endophrine rush that 965 used to give me. Thankyou Craig and Patty Tarler, for those of us who lost our best friend when Orlick got its grubby paws on the formula, you deserve a medal of honour. Orlick has me mad, I lost DARK STRONG KENTUCKY and they murdered 965, two of my favorites. Same on them.lol!

I tried to like this because this is what the legendary 965 blend is supposed to be like. Maybe I'm more of a lighter english man, but this one tasted too strongly of pepper in all my bowls. I had one bowl that was really good that tasted of sutble sweetness and had blasts of flavor here and there, but then it just turns into a pepper bomb. Maybe I need to let it age and mellow out a bit.

A pretty good example of an English blend, but nowhere near as good as the Dunhill version. I think tobacco quality has a lot to do with it. I always find that C&D has some very raw tobacco, while Dunhill has one of the best in the business.

I got a sample of this pressed in 1998 and have been slowly making my way through it. Sure, it's better now than when first bought, but it never really melded together and aged as well as I figured. The room note is excellent for an English blend and it's fairly tasty, but I won't buy it again.

This is supposed to be a copy of Dunhill 965. It's a decent smoke, but not great. There are others in the C&D line that I prefer. There are also many in the Dunhill line that I enjoy morre than 965. Sacrilege?? YMMV.