Esoterica Tobacciana Dorchester

The review below is part of a VaPer Showdown that I conducted between several VaPer blends:

Well today was a Dorchester day. I went through the whole sample that Ultramag sent to me last month (Thanks again!!). And after my enjoyment of this blend I've decided that it is now in 2nd place.

Like most people who reviewed this blend, I found that this had the least amount of Perique in it compared to the others that I have smoked so far. However, the taste was still great and somewhat creamy. The perique and the virginias were seperate in the beginning and it was a bit spicy when I finally got it going. After about a third of the bowl the blend settled down and melded together well.

I did have an issue lighting this one. I dried it correctly but I had one clump of tobacco sitting on top that refused to light. After two attempts I scooped that piece out of there and it lit perfectly. This blend stayed lit better than the other two so far. It required two relights but I believe that it was more my fault because my brother called and I was trying to smoke, review, and talk to him all at the same time.

I would recommend this blend to anyone who is just getting into VaPers and doesn't want to get blasted with Perique right off the bat.

The standings so far:

1) Escudo 2) Esoterica Dorchester 3) Stokkebye Luxury Bullseye Flake

From my notes: I'll skip through the chase & keep it short & sweet. This was sampled back in 2010 along with some Stonehaven Flake & Tilbury. Yes. It is good! Perique is dominant and very noticeable throughout all but the last third of the bowl. Best described as a fairly heavily infused Perique blend. It's a very interesting & tasty VA/Per with good burning qualities. But still, a little too wimpy & this will be my one & only tin sample out of curiosity. Didn't matter to me at all that this was an Esoterica blend or where it came from. Stonehaven ended up in my top five but you can keep the Tilbury & Dorchester.

I believe that top shelf, aged VA leaf must have been used in this mixture &/or pure St. James Perique. Simply a great, quality tobacco that can be enjoyed any time if one likes VA/Pers. This, for me, was a unique tasting VA/Per that is unlike any other I've ever sampled. It still tastes good toward the end, smokes mildly, doesn't become harsh or bitter & leaves a light sweetness on the palate. FWIW, it seems that many pipers prefer mild or mild to medium blends but I've always preferred a quicker picker-upper. I think smoking an entire bowl of tobacco & still feeling the need for a nic-hit is a waste of $$. Recommended only for taste & quality & not based on its mild smoking nature. Any blend can be made to taste better if blended a bit on the wimpy side.

Dorchester was a total disappointment. The casing- yes, there is one, and very similar to Germain's Medium Flake- turned out to be totally detrimental to the overall smoking experience, making Dorchester to be a frustrating, syrupy and harsh tobacco. I have spent a lot of time and effort to track down an 8oz bag and will never buy any again.

I’m greeted with a mouthwatering, citrus-like smell. It’s wet and needs to dry for 15 minutes before packing. Pack loose or it will block the air hole.

It lights easily, and I get a flavour bomb. It’s sweet, citrusy, and spicy. I sense bread, hay, freshly cut grass, and something else that’s sweet. It’s moderately spicy, but sometimes more pronounced.

It burns at a slightly more than moderate pace. Take time between puffs, as the bowl warms fast. It’s never harsh, and smokes well in cobs and briars.

It’s approximately medium in body. The nicotine level is a little more than halfway between mild and medium.

Dorchester is one of the best VaPer blends, and I highly recommend it.

First off, let me say that I love VaPer tobaccos in general. This blend knocks it out of the park for me with Dunbar being a close and adequate alternative. The tobaccos comes moist and will benefit from some dry time of around 15 minutes to a half an hour. The smell immediately upon opening the tin is rich, bright and light with a hay-like, grassy and slightly earthy smell. It has a hint of sweetness that is raisen-like in odor and very pleasing because it is not overpowering in the sightest. It is completely in the background both from a smell and taste standpoint as you light up the blend.

Takes a charring light just ok, but once lit, it stays lit with little to no re-lights. Burns cool, tastes medium from a mouth/flavor standpoint, and feels light and springy to the draw. As you "sip" the tobaccco, you are greeted with nice grassy, hay notes with utter simplicity, but amazing taste. There is more perique in here than Dunbar, but doesn't give me a real "peppery" mouth feel like Cornell and Diehl Small Batch Carolina Red with perique does. I can barely feel the nicotine throughout the bowl. Dorchester also has a subtle sweetness as you draw the smoke. It's like a light, but very inviting raisen/plumb note, but it would be like tasting the smell of raisins or plumbs rather than eating it them. Very subtle, in the background and a nice addition. The flavors stay consistent throughout the smoke, nothing added nor taken away which is a very good thing. Smokes down to a fine grey ash with absolutely no dottle. All in all, this is a great blend 3.5 out of 4 stars. A+

Update: After smoking this blend for quite some time now I actually prefer Dunbar over Dorchester. I still really enjoy both tobaccos a great deal, but there is more "pepperyness" in Dorchester than Dunbar and I prefer less of it in my perique blends (I know, I'm strange and in the minority here) . The perique seems to be much more in the Forefront for Dorchester than in Dunbar and although Dorchester claims to have the Aged Virginia's, it actually feels much younger than Dunbar does in taste. Dorchester is definitely more sprite, perky and bright tasting while Dunbar seems more mellow. Both get creamy as you move down the bowl and they stay consistent as well. In short, both are excellent tobacco's in their own right. There is something about J.F. Germain's Virginia tobacco that I just can't get enough of. I would highly recommend trying either of these wonderful tobaccos.

I know that people can have different tastes, but I can simply not imagine how can some put a one star rating to this astonishing blend. Even from the tin it starts to satisfy. The amount of Perique is just right, it burns perfectly well, the virginia mixture is very interesting, the curing and aging are perfect, made, blended and aged entirely in the British Isles. ¿What else can one ask for?

UPDATE: After almost finishing the tin I started to notice that my first impressions were false as regarding the sweetness of this blend. I found that the taste is indeed so spicy, especially at the last third of the bowl, that too much smoking of this can saturate you. So I made an experiment. I had an old Burley Slice that to be smoked alone was too dull and heavy for me, so I mixed the last three flakes with the equivalent amount of Dorchester, and the result was great. Both tobaccos enhanced one another. The dullness and flatness of the BS was given the freshness and grace that was lacking, and the spiciness (like Tabasco sauce, as my friend Tantric says) was tempered and "rounded", so to say, by the Burley. The mixture acquired a deepness and ripeness, to say something, that none of the conforming tobaccos had on its own. After this update I will change my rating to 3 stars for the Dorchester alone, but 4 stars for the mixture proposed. I guess other high quality burleys would work as well.

This is a wonderful matured, naturally sweet and fragrant Virginia, with quite a bit of Périque.. It comes in an elegant tin, with a kind of parchment paper printed to make it look like it was hand written in old ink. The tobacco inside is rather moist, but it is very easy to pack and light. The leaf is beautiful and I believe of high quality grade.

Though I am not (yet) an absolute Périque fan, I have come to enjoy blends with this leaf thanks to Fox?s Dorisco, Petterson?s Irish Oak, and Solani?s 633. IMO, after a number of bowls of Dorchester, I believe this could be the rubbed out version of Solani?s 633: the Virginias are as sweet and winey, and the Périque is as juicy and piquant. Because of the ribbon cut, I find Dorchester easier to smoke than Solani?s, but I enjoy both very much. Neither are tongue biting, and they both offer a rich and fresh flavour, and a medium strength smoke. This is my first experience with Esoterica Tobacciana, and I was very impressed with the quality of this blend. I will be enjoying more of this in the future. Highly recommended, especially if already acquainted with Va/P mixtures.

A highly flavorful, nuanced smoke. The tin note is deliciously fruity as ripe Virginia’s can sometimes smell. This is well aged tobacco out of the tin. As a heavy puffer, I prefer flakes and coins in general for their slow smoking qualities, but a bowl of this thick ribbon cut tobacco is a surprisingly long smoke. Best with some moisture level to savor the flavors. The only ribbon Virginia I search out and very hard to come by it is.

It was all surprises when I opened my first Dorchester tin, well aged. The wax paper was completely soaked and very darkened by the oils from the tobacco. The smell that the tin note gave off is one of the broadest that I have experienced in a tobacco so far, of an old house, a wine cellar, wet wood, dark fruits, damp earth, salted fish, to sherry Pedro Ximenez and others multiple things, it was amazing. It seemed prudent to transfer it to a glass jar and air it a little, given the state of the paper that wrapped it.

In the pipe it burns well and although it almost goes without saying when it comes to mixtures of such quality, without bites. The ingredients, well blended, make this a very tasty tobacco, dark, sometimes sweet, other times acidic, mainly dark fruits and wine notes. In a word: delicious.

When I finished my first Dorchester pipe, the last surprise awaited me: the ash it left behind was a color similar to cinnamon. In the successive pipes I smoked, the ash was whiter in color. The mysteries of the unfathomable world of tobacco.

If you like va / per and have a chance to try it, you should! But be careful, it may change your idea of ​​what a good tobacco is and you want to get rid of some of the tin that you have in your cellar. Don't say I didn't warn ...