Cornell & Diehl Crooked Lane

Based on the short number of reviews, people seem to be really in favor of this blend or not with not much in-between. This rough cut tobacco will put me in the latter group. I found Crooked Lane to be fine from a moisture standpoint. It has a little kick, which I like, but I don’t find this to be strong. I think it is a bit “rough around the edges” like a lot of C&D blends. On the positive side, I like the use of the toasted Cavendish. I know I have said this before, but there are so many English blends for today’s pipe smoker to choose from that it really needs to stand out to get my attention, and Crooked Lane IMO doesn’t do that for me as it is just somewhere in the vast middle. I wouldn’t be put off by my comments as I do think that it is worth a try since many people do favor it; maybe you will be one of them.

I have been loading my tobacco pouch recently with blends and smoking them for a week, this blend made it three days. This is my attempt to thin out my rotation and lower the amount of open tins or jars.

This weeks blend was crooked lane, I originally jarred this July of 2019, so it has been sitting in the jar for 4 months as of this review.

This blend as others have stated seems to be a mild English, with various other players, however I get mostly Latakia with a touch of the Oriental leaf, this blend is flat, nothing particularly stands out. This blend has varying amounts of different leaves. When I first smelled this blend I thought Virginia oriental as I could smell the sour leaf.

Crooked Lane, is not a bad blend but nothing that it offers says buy me again, or even recommend me, i don’t hate it but I think I will need to revisit this blend in a few months and see if age changes it.

This blend currently sits at 2.8 stars, I will have to give it two out of four as I could see a new smoker enjoying this, but experienced smokers wondering where’s the steak in this blend.

For the most part I enjoy most C&D blends. This one however, was a little off for me. I was given this tin in Richmond VA by a fellow pipe smoker that raved over it. I opened it up this morning to have with my coffee and I noticed the cut was very ruff. Not what I expected at all. I rolled it into my pipe and fired it up. It sputtered and died. This was a tobbaco of 1,000 matches. After moving to a lighter I finally got the thing lit. I smoked if for about 30 minutes and then just dumped to the ashtray. In never made the hype in my view. Flavor was mild and nothing and I do mean nothing ever stood out. It was a very flat tobacco. My friend loves it. I don't. I did not think the quality was that good and the extra twigs from the leaf was just distraction.

In the tin; a very strong lemony sour aroma. No woody (Latakia) or spiciness one would expect from an English blend.

Taste had a hint of sweetness on first light. Not much smokiness from the Latakia (or typical English Blend) as you would’ve expected from a typical English blend. Rather a light English blend. Too much Virginia to my liking as I get a bit of tongue bite from Crooked Lane

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b6gt8tY5L5U

I've got to go against the crowd, I find this bland and strong. It just doesn't bring what I think as flavor, "stoogie".

Updated 11/14/2013 - After a week, I decided to retry this blend and return to this site to see my initial review. I was surprised to find the above comments by "King Weed 11/12/2013" basically agreeing with my very short and non-descriptive review. I have to agree with "King Weed ' in that the cut of this blend is very strange with pieces the size of "corn flakes" mixed in among rubbed flakes. However, my tin did not require drying, which leads me to believe there maybe some inconsistencies. I don't feel this is as strong in "N' as I initially reviewed, I think I was just puffing so hard to get some taste I was growing lightheaded.

Well Mr. Big, I'm with you on this one. This tobacco blend was a disappointment for me and it started right away with the opening of the tin. Ribbon cut? I don't think so. I was taken aback at the roughness of the cut of the tin I opened: yes, some ribbon content, but long coarse strands that needed to be pulled apart and very large chunks that unrolled into little flags of tobacco tissue - the largest of which measured one and a half inches wide and two and a half inches long! I also found this tobacco to be quite damp for a C&D blend and needed considerable drying for smokeablity. When I prepped my first smoke by overnight drying, I tore up all of the coarse ribbons and flags for a better consistency. This revealed another aggrevation - many sticks, stems and other woody debris. I emptied-out about a third of the tin for examination and this woodiness and coarse texture was consistent throughout.

The tin aroma, although pleasant, was very mild for an english blend - not at all what I would classify as a medium english. The overall color was a blond to medium light brown with a sparing amount of darker components. The latakia and black cavendish were almost invisible in the mixture, as there was so little of them. I chose to smoke this blend in a pipe that always gave a good and satisfying smoke - an ELX Ashton Pebble in a one-third bent cogniac configuration with a deep and narrow bore. On lightup the light english nature of this blend became evident; more of a virginia/oriental nature than the advertised medium english. I will say that the underlying base tobacco aroma was fairly rich - kind of like the first few drags on an unfiltered Camel cigarette. The remainder of the bowl continued in this fashion to the finish, leaving me wishing that more of the darker components had been included.

Considering the four star and glowing reviews given this blend initially, I was let down by my tin's reality. I have faith in the cognative abilities of my fellow smokers who have reviewed this blend. They were sensing something good and solidly english and they said so. I can't help but wonder if the tin I opened was atypical and subpar, as it seemed so different than what they were describing.

Epilog and Update 11/25/13: Don't be surprised Mr. Big, your one-line review spoke volumes - such is the inherent nature of true succinctness. You weren't happy with this blend and you said so. For my part, I was relieved. I was worried about being the lone dissenter in a stream of four-star reviews. When I saw your review I felt justified in going forward with my two-star review. Thank you.

Now, I always like to have something positive to say on a given subject. I have discovered that C&D Crooked Lane has a wonderful quality that fits right in with one of my pipe smoking joys - microblending. I had stated that there is an underlying richness in this blend, though I thought its english qualities were a bit thin. This richness adds a wonderful note to micro english blends that I delight in making and smoking. I highly recommend its use in blending.