Newminster No. 403 Superior Round Slices

I do not think this is a bad tasting blend. It has sweetness from the bright VA and some vaguely floral character. The pouch aroma is mild, lacking any of the DFK smokiness that I would expect. It is untopped, but I suspect some maple casing. I was super annoyed with this blend for the following reasons.

First, I posit that the coins are quite visually deceiving. I would expect much more DFK based on appearance alone. When carefully unraveled, the coins yield long interconnected slices of bright and red ribbon with small rough veins intact. Next is a birdseye haven of dark leaf. There is very little actual leaf, here though, mostly stems.

So, about the birdseye… There sure is a lot of it. It’s basically stem and mid rib that would normally be cleaned up during processing. Seeing that I’m not a 19th century sailor, I have no soft for or connection to birdseye. Being a modern consumer, I simply see this as an effort to weigh the bag down with stems and schwag, you dig? The stem carbonizes as opposed to a normal burn and doesn’t add much to the flavor as it is just xylem and cellulose. If you bought a bag of…herbs, and found that half the bag was seeds and stems, you might be a bit disappointed.

Which brings me to me next point… the burn. These coins burn about as well as asbestos. I was constantly relighting even after some last ditch measures : drying to a crisp, rubbing out to a fine shag, picking the seemingly fireproof birdseye and stem material out. This blend burns hot when I could get it going for any length of time. It also burns paradoxically wet as I was quite diligent in drying appropriately.

I don’t mind preparing flakes and plugs. This is a two star blend before accounting for how much tedious effort went into preparing it into something semi smokable. When the mind numbing task of “cleaning it” like a bad bag of weed back in the day is considered to get it to smokability, this is squarely one star. I really did try to get this blend to sing. Clearly I am in the minority here. I just don’t see why anybody would pay a premium on getting a product with less actual leaf.

I also felt the blend to be a bit thin. I don’t need nicotine as part of the experience, but these little coins left me wholly unsatisfied and wanting in every imaginable way.

Picked this up as a free sample from P&C's. Having smoked DNS I thought this would be a good comparison. From the start, this tobacco came off very harsh. I did notice the Perique in the retrohale however the mouth feel was like I had hot sauce in my mouth. Not tongue bite just hot. I did notice grass hay quality to it. Moisture was perfect. I couldn't really taste much more than the aforementioned qualities. I didn't care much for this tobacco and will not order more.