Two Friends Deacon's Downfall

The Deacon has confirmed that I am indeed an English tobacco smoker. I don't know that I have much to contribute to what others have already said, but here goes.

I do my smoking primarily at home in the evening and while driving. I don't consider it an all day smoke. I think the nicotine would overwhelm me if I tried more than a couple of back to back bowls.

A non-smoking friend described the raw tobacco scent as "a campfire" and I would agree with his assessment.

I have tried it in a couple of pipes and find I enjoy it best when smoked from a medium sized billiard. A strong cup of coffee and I am home with 2 old friends, nicotine and caffeine. I find the coffee compliments DD quite nicely on my taste buds.

This is not one to smoke around finicky spouses and small children, the room note is quite pleasing to me, but failed the sniff test with the lady of the house.

Recommended.

This one does not smell good in the tin. Any Deacon who offers his parishioners a whiff of this stuff will be defrocked. I am sure the tobacco used here was of good quality, but the combination seemed to be out of balance. The Latakia is noted, but the added flavoring mutes it a bit. The backbone of Virginia ad Black Cavendish works well in offering a palate filler that lets you know when this one is on fire in your pipe. I see this as a polarizing blend as some will love it and others will not.

This delivers a big tobacco taste, which is what I look for in a blend. I put it a bit behind Presbyterian because I find it not as tastey a blend. Saying that, if you like big robust taste, pick yourself up some.

This is probably the most "conventional" of the Two Friends blends, IMO. This is a latakia-heavy blend, reminiscent of a strong Balkan or English. What makes this one stand out from the crowd is an odd, semi-sweet flavor/aromoa I've never encountered before. It's not strong but it's noticeable. I don't know if this is due to some kind of flavoring or if it's the leaf, but it adds just enough of a kick to elevate this to a three-star tobacco. There are a couple of reasons why I don't give this blend four stars. For one, there are many tobaccos on the market that are better examples of this type of blend than Deacon's Downfall. Also, as other reviewers have pointed out, the many tobaccos in this blend don't quite seem to "meld" together. It's like listening to a half-dozen virtuoso musicians trying to play Mozart while mildly drunk. I'm giving this 3 stars because it's a pleasant experience despite its drawbacks and I think it will improve significantly with age (at the least, adding a couple of years to this blend should take care of the drunken orchestra problem). As an experiment, I'm thinking about ordering a batch of this from C&D and having it pressed.

I like this tobacco, quite a bit! It is unique in that it hosts a wide range of tastes - latakia is steady, the virginias consistently donate flavor accented with a little perique and the orientals complete the chords of this billowing sonata.

Add this to the fact that my wife finds this "less offensive" than most other brands I smoke (ie, Charing Cross, 965, Nightcap, House of Lords, Victorian Stroll) and full in the taste department, I am classifying this as my "human-friendly" brand because of the sweet, toasty aroma.

This comes right in time as I'm leaving with the extended family to stay with other family in Thailand for a month. This is the first 2friends blend I've tried and I'm liking it a lot.

When I smoke this tobacco, images come to mind of phantasmic fiddlers serenading flames within a light-hearted, jumpy Beltane fire.

This is clearly a good quality tobacco, but I couldn't taste the latakia overpowering many have detected before me. To me the other tobaccos play their role, maybe just the Virginias are in the background to support the body of the mixture without adding any sweetness. I can taste a nutty flavour from the cavendish throughout the bowl and many "intrusions" from the orientals and the perique. Latakia is in the frontline, of course, but I've tried many more latakia-oriented tobaccos.

Usually Greg Pease is a master of subtlety and complexity... Here, instead, he decided to have a go with the sledgehammer and create a blend which packs a big tasty punch. And he hit bullseye!

The latakia overpowers the rest of the tobaccos, but the result is not harsh or excessive: it's simply a delicious blend for those who like it dark, smoky and stout.

So, if you like heavy latakia give this tobacco a try by all means!

I was all over the map on this tobaco untill I got it to settle down a little. The key to getting the most of this tobacco was to age it in a warm place for awhile. That was accomplished by accidentally buying 4oz. of this stuff while having 4oz. vacuum sealed in a warm closet for the last three years. Here's what I found:

I opened the new plastic bag that I had just received from the tobacco store. Immediately, it smelled like angry, bile soaked Oriental. Not too pleasant at all. I packed up a big bowl of the stuff and Viola- it tasted like C&D Rajah's Court, cased with Lysol. O.K., it really was not that bad, but the Oriental note was harsh, and the nicotine was forceful. I found it just satisfactory, but all in all a sour, mean blend.

Fast forward three days. I found my vacuum sealed DD in my storage area, marked 09-2001. Cool, a horizontal tasting of sorts. I ripped open the bag, and guess what....? Still smelled mildly of barf; but I like strong smells and tastes, so who cares?

I loaded up my pipe, torched it, and was more than pleasantly surprised. After the second light, DD settled WAY down into a delicious blend. Every last microgram of nicotine was still present, however the Virginia and Perique kicked-in and made the flavor of the Latakia and Oriental just sing out. Gone was the antibacterial scent. Away went the odor of the humors produced by a healthy liver. This turned into a very well behaved English that packed well, stayed lit, and burned down to an end that came all too soon. I believe that this could be smoked all day, save the waves of nicotine.

Last but not least, in the interest of science, I took my new package of DD, and placed it in the back dash of my closed car, parked in the sun. DD arrives vaccum packed in a mylar and plastic bag. I set it with the tobacco exposed to the sun through the clear side of the pack. It was about 125 degrees, and it was left for a good hour. I then removed it and let it return to room temp. on my kitchen counter. The next day I tried it.

The "home-stoved" tobacco apparently went through the same changes as the three year old. The Virginia element immediately stepped-up and added body and the needed sweetness to stave off the assaultive nicotine and bitterness of the condimental leaf. This was absolutely not the same tobacco that I had opened and shrunk from just days before.

If this blend is not your cup of tea, I highly recommend laying it down for a few years, then revisiting. Or, you can "stove" it yourself and see what magic you can obtain by re-arranging those sugar molecules by showing them some heat.

Either way, I was made into a believer of this blend. I recommend a(n) (older) package of this.

Where to start with this one...I do not care for it. The pouch aroma is reminiscent of Nitecap, but strangely mildewed. I compared notes with a fellow smoker and his findings were similar in the aroma department. I am a fan of latakia heavy blends but this one is astringent in its presentation. There is no cohesion of leaf in this blend at all. I smoked it in 4 of my best, most reliable Latakia pipes, with nary a positive result. The flavor is sharp and thin at best. There is no noticeable change, good or worse, as one works down the bowl. Then there is the matter of room note. I checked 'strong' because 'nauseating' wasn't offered. Lastly, there is the matter of flavoring. I am not sure if any of the other reviewers made mention of it, but his concoction is cased in some way or another, very sharp at lightup. This blend was not conceived by my two friends, nor will I revisit it.