McClelland Top Hat

This is a very monotone vaper that lacks excitement to the smoker IMO. The one positive I can give this is that by stoving the virginias and including a moderate amount of Perique, this blend might be the most forgiving to technique that I have ever smoked. I had this tin in my truck as my truck blend.

My truck blend is always the best for testing how a blend will bite. If I am driving in traffic and running late, I will chug hard on my pipe as relaxation is out of mind; however, when I am just cruising along the highway at stretches, I will fall into a very slow cadence. With Top Hat, the difference on my tongue and palate was very little when exposed to both extremes. So this is the point in the review where I would say this is a great introduction to the beginning smoker who wants to try a VaPer blend.

Unfortunately due to this being discontinued like all the other McClelland blends, this advice is no longer sound as a beginner is not going to pony up any big bucks to buy this blend, nor may they even know what McClelland is at this point in their journey.

So obsolescence weighs heavy in my rating of this blend. It would have been three stars when it was widely available, but I am holding it at two stars for this point in time. The stoving of the Virginia makes it too mild IMO and that process really sucked much of the sweetness out leaving the perique to do too much of the work. The perique is well applied as it does not clobber the smoker with spice yet still provides a bit of body to a blend that would otherwise severely lack it.

This blend was an outlier when it was widely available and there is a reason for that. It just wasn't that great. So my two stars is to say if you are trying to choose between this and a tin of Beacon at a store for the same price, buy the Beacon.