Peterson Hyde Park

Seems like Peterson have opened one new play corner within their already wide range of tobacco blends. Hyde Park presents itself as a broken flake, the way of packing (cellophane bag instead the usual paper) and the pouch smell indicates this blend obviously being manufactured by Gawith & Hoggarth. On the first opening, rum flavour dominates, but evaporates soon, remaining with a clear “Lakeland” scent.

Smoking confirms first impressions… what a wonderful smoke ! Strong, slightly nutty flavour and somewhat sweetish, but never gooey, just the fine hint from maple syrup added. Further down the bowl, the Dark Fired takes the leading role, presenting an opulent, but not over-powering smoke, however the nicotine dose should not be underestimated. To my taste memory, Hyde Park carries both, elements from G&H's ‘Rum Flake' and ‘Coniston Cut Plug'.

In conclusion I think “Peterson” (tinned by Kohlhase&Kopp) achieved great success with this quite unique blend ! An impressively tasteful and satisfying tobacco, with significant hints of “Lakeland” aroma, however standing for its own by not being just a copy of something already known. Highly recommended !

I have smoked a whole tin, and conclude that this tobacco might have potential for aging, consequently, several tins went to the “cellar”… Meanwhile cracked another tin… can't stay away from this stuff... !

Rem.: The tin description is a perfect example how confusing "English Blend" oftentimes can be. For those blends commonly understood as being "English", hence containing Oriental and Latakia tobaccos, I personally prefer the expression "Latakia Blend". This might avoid misperceptions.

This is a burley-virgina, lakeland style, broken flake. It cool, steady burning, and quite sweet, to my taste. It is similar to Kendal Cream Flake (creamy but sweeter) and Rum Flake (essences but not as dark tasting), and has that rum essence recently favored by Master Pease. However, it is the maple that I believe gives it that lasting sweetness. Unlike most American style aromatics -- not wet, etc. -- but you do need a sweet tooth to favor this baby. It is excellent in its delivery of flavor a plenty.

Wow.. I think I really missed the boat on this one.. I was really looking forward to an under the radar lakeland produced by Gawith Hoggarth for Peterson.. This is clearly now an STG blend through and through.. No hints of lakeland at all.. Looking at older reviews that mention a broken flake with all the hallmarks of Gawith really just put salt in my wounds.. A day late and a dollar short.. Disappointment aside.. This is actually one of the better STG blends I have tried.. It is barely topped but does have something subtle going on.. I don't really taste rum at all.. but maple maybe a tad.. it tastes well rather like a plain virginia/burley.. A lot more red virginia leading than I anticipated.. It has a little strength but not nearly as much as I had hoped for.. I was hoping for something close to rum flake.. That is what I had heard this was similar to.. I imagine when g&h were producing this it was just that.. Oh well.. Everything does change.. and this blend is not bad.. just a lot more straightforward and bland than I had anticipated.. I actually wish they had gone a bit heavier on the topping somehow.. I did notice a touch of toastiness which either comes from the burley or dark fired virginia.. if that were amped up a little more and more rum came through it may have distinguished the blend a little more.. This just tastes like a lot of other STG ribbons.. better than most because of that little extra strength.. 2 stars accounting for my disappointment.. but I will say it would be a 3 for a more fair assessment as I think this is still a pretty good blend especially for Peterson.. I guess I just need to wait for Rum Flake to come back into stock to get what I really want.

I was quite keen to try Hyde Park given the rumors that it is actually a closeted Lakeland, with experts Gawith, Hoggarth & Co. themselves secretly behind its production, at least at one time. Certainly, it appears very much like what I’d imagine the familiar thick GH flakes would look like after a quick run through the STG shredder and, as with many GH offerings, it is definitely chock-full of unusual flavors that you are absolutely going to love –or hate.

If Hyde Park isn’t officially a Lakeland decendent, the family resemblance is striking. Whereas some have compared Lakeland essence to nana’s perfume, here it manifests more as granddad’s aftershave –less floral, but spicier and slightly alcoholic, but in a way that’s more… Aqua Velva than liquor. And this is the aspect of Hyde Park that might be a deal-breaker for some. I’d never encountered this flavor in a tobacco before, Lakeland or otherwise, but once I got over the initial shock, I sort-of warmed to it and eventually I got to like it. Your enjoyment requires you do the same, as this flavor is present in varying degrees throughout the entire smoke.

Then there is a prominent maple syrup flavor, though it is more complex than overtly sweet, and possesses a certain musty depth, as real maple syrup will (we are not talking about Mrs. Butterworth’s here), and it does well to offset the slight bitterness of the burley. That you can even TASTE the burley is part of the true magic of this blend as, despite all these flavorings, a full tobacco taste still shines through.

Which brings us to the third aspect of Hyde Park that may or may not appeal to you: the tobacco itself. This mixture has a definite cigar note from the first puff to the last. Indeed, this is the most cigar-like blend I have ever smoked, even among those described as cigar-leaf blends specifically. If that’s not your bag, then this is not your mix. Either way, what you will appreciate is its fantastic burn characteristics: slow, very cool, bite-free, and all the while producing voluminous smoke until disappearing completely into pure white ash, like it was never there.

I approached this blend with some trepidation given the many reviews that mention its strength. However, it turned out my fears were unfounded. I like enough nicotine to know I’m smoking something, but not so much that I have to be too mindful of my cadence or need to take a break. While it is quite a full-bodied blend, it always stayed perfectly mellow for me and I’d even consider it somewhat gentle. It’s really no stronger than, say, London Mixture in this regard.

So it this really a 4-star blend? Well… When I first tried Hyde Park, I thought it was reasonably good, but that it probably wouldn’t make it into my regular rotation. That was in summer. But as time went on and the weather cooled, it was a flavor that I thought about more and more. Now that autumn has arrived and latakia-heavy english mixtures should be the order of the day, I find that it’s been Hyde Park that I’ve instead been reaching for. That, perhaps more than anything else, is very high praise indeed. Call me an Aqua Velva man.

I’m an intermediate Pipe Smoker at best and am no way an expert. I started on aromatics and switched to Virginia’s and am trying to get into English Blends. I was suggested this by a friend and thought I would give it a try. The pipe I used was a Peterson 2017 Christmas Pipe.

Packaging was great and I found the Tobacco is a ribbon cut, and had a nice moisture level and burns well and even.

The tin note is great, you defiantly get the sweet smell that does remind you of rum and maple sugars. However, I find that smoking it, it does have a “soapy/floral” aftertaste that does turn me off. I have had this blend again and made sure to smoke it slow which I enjoyed more than the first time.

Would I buy this again? No. Being from Canada, the average tin is $45.00 can and would rather try something new at that price.

well first: its named peterson but in fact its produced by gawith &hoggarth, that leads us second: to the fact that english here and this time means lakeland! third: its called aromatic but in fact there is more good plain tobacco flavour in here. overall three misleading announcements but what is real for me: if i can say so its simply the tobacco i have ever dreamed of! it is that fantastic...

I have never smoked anything that is close to this one. The smell reminds me of African tobacco sold in jars and plastic pouches. Being someone that has never consumed alcohol, i now know it to be Rum

Leaf quality is excellent as one expects from Peterson.

The taste is where this one gets away from me. I really do not care for the topping at all. It is cloying and very strong. I have had this tin for a little over 2 months now and it has spent about a week of that time airing out and still that topping is ever present to the point that when i handle the tobacco i can feel it to be sticky. Tongue bite was not an issue once the tobacco aired out for a bit.

I knew it was an aromatic when i bought it so i should not complain, my gripe is that i am searching high and low for a tobacco that is exactly this MINUS the topping. My, what a blend THAT will be.

For what its worth, i can see how some folk enjoy this blend.

6 Years ago I decided I would take my pipe smoking in as a hobby not just a relaxing evening ender. Over these 6 years I have tried to smoke as many different brands and varieties of tobacco as I can. I operate a "don't knock it till you've tried it" policy. This means occasionally I'll buy a tobacco with strong preconceptions about how it will perform.

I expected this tobacco to burn hot, it did not. I expected this tobacco to have a weak almost bran flavour, it did not.

I could not have been more wrong. This tobacco has a rich flavour and is beautiful on the nose out of the tin. This has replaced heavier and latikia based blends as my favourite and go to tobacco.

It's relatively new so I have a few in storage hoping they will become even more beautiful with age.

One of the first blends that I can say has an identity crisis. The tin says it's a "traditional English" and this site says it's a Va/Bur. Some people call it a lakeland and I could see a strong argument for a Scottish, given that it reminded me of Sail - Regular and that's what it's listed as. As is established in pipe smoking long before I was born, none of the agreed upon definitions seem to mean anything anyway and smokers and blenders alike just seem to make stuff up as they please.

I suppose if I wanted to be granular about it, I'd say it seems like it is primarily a Virginia and Burley blend with some lighter dark fired leaf (as opposed to dark fired Kentucky) and condimental oriental. I'll further complicate things by saying how the flavoring is stated to be "rum and maple sugars to pressed mahogany tobacco" which makes sounds kind of like it was topped and pressed virginia and not cased which I believe most cavendish's are (but I'm not sure as there is such a thing as unsweetened cavendish). So it sounds like the flavor is achieved via the pressing before it is presumably cut into flakes and then made into a nice ready rubbed, a cut of which I'm growing more fond of. I tend to really enjoy lakelands, and I don't perceive any floral notes (some say soapy to their nose) which I tend to associate with lakelands, so I'm thinking this is just a nice flavoring of rum and maple as far as I can tell. Either way, it's a light enough topping that you still get a full tobacco flavor but strong enough to hold up to the bolder tobaccos.

So with all that preamble out of the way, how the heck does it smoke? Well, I'd say this is a beautiful and sophisticated smoke that has some backbone to it. It's a bit of a mélange with a great range of depth and flavor. The main player seems to be the bright and dark virginia's while the burley gives it some good amount of body and the oriental weaves in and out with bright woody notes. The sweetness from the rum and maple deepens as the bowl progresses and makes for an enjoyable and complex aromatic that plays well with the other tobaccos. After trying SG - Hansom Flake and Sutliff - Eastfarthing, I've started to grow very fond of crossover and non-traditional aromatics and this fits in with that group for me. I feel like this would be a decent but boring tobacco without the sweetness from the rum and maple, and the flavorings add to the experience rather than take away. I feel like the rum and maple would make this a great fall blend that would stand up well to the cooler weather and work as a transition into the colder months.

I would say that if you're the type of pipe smoker that knows what they like and how they like it (thank you very much!) then possibly stay away from this one, but if you consider yourself and adventurous pipe smoker that likes to see what the more diverse and interesting offerings are, then this should be right up your alley. I was a bit worried about the strength when I purchased this, because I don't tend to seek out stronger tobaccos on purpose, and orientals can sometimes add a bit of nic-hit IMO, but I didn't get that from this blend. I think the top note helped sublimate everything and make it a bit more uniform of an experience even though I'd say this is a fairly complex and varied smoke.

Note: Hyde Park is in a category of its own, but I wanted to include Sail Regular and Irish Dew as being similar in presentation and overall experience. Sail and Irish Dew are very different in flavor, but I was reminded of them while smoking. I've never had the aromatic version of Sail but it might also fit into this category.

Edit: I've bounced around from recommended to highly recommended and so I'd say it's more of a 3.5/4 than a solid 3 or 4.