Peter Stokkebye Optimum (No.31)

Upon opening the bag, one can immediately smell the Jamaican rum casing. It's a mildly sweet,smooth and flavorful smoke but has the ability to bite if smoked too fast.

As with most cased blends, you may do well to smoke it in a Sav with a balsa filter.

This is a medium to loose coarse cut tobacco, IMO this way to mild for my tastes. The bottom line as person who loves an aromatic tobacco this one just does not make the grade with me. I found it to be very mild almost to the point of being flat.

I have tried this early in the morning, late in the evening, after dinner, in a Savinelli Estella, a Sasieni 5 Dot, a Nording Quail. The outcome was the same, the fulfillmennt was never there.

This was an impulse buy for me. I rarely smoke aromatics not so much out of snobbishness as opposed to the fact that even when I started, they rarely do anything for me. The tin it?s packaged in was a bonus, modeled to look like a tea tin. As with most aromatics I have smoked, it smells great once you break open the tin. What is different is that although VERY mild, it does taste like it smells when smoking. Relatively clean burning, it is not harsh, and overall not bad. I really cannot give a more fair review other than that, as these types of tobaccos are generally not my things. If you are a fan of aromatics, I suspect you would find this a decent blend, but certainly nothing to rock your world.

I found no "BUZZ" with this in anyway. Very little taste & not much else either.Infact I found it to be "Very Bland". Maybe if you have very sensitive taste buds & hate any tobacco with some strength,you might love this! Would be good for the newcomer to pipe smoking.It doe's smoke clean. In it's class-I'll give it 2 Out of 4 Star's.

A good tobacco needs a good taste. Having stated that fairly obvious fact, let me move on and say that Optimum is almost totally without taste of any kind. In fact one is tempted to suppose that the manufacturer has left the tobacco out altogether and substituted some subtle cellulose material masquerading as tobacco. No taste, no nicotine, a little sweet flavouring and absolutely no satisfaction whatsoever. This just about sums this tobacco up.The health authorities would love this one, as it's just about the equivalent of sucking fresh air through your pipe. YEUK!!!

Ideally maintaining the True North of an open mind, when presented with a tobacco blend labeled as optimal, my learned pragmatism automatically takes over filtering my reaction. Coming home to roost is a working recognition that, largely, blend ratings can be highly subjective. So, with best intentions I strive to promote unobstructed impartiality and factual accounting as the sited target. And with that goal in mind, we see entering for consideration a customary Danish styled aromatic tobacco, Optimum No. 31, from one of the piping world’s most prolific blenders the influential Peter Stokkebye.

Optimum No. 31 renders a standardly sweet and mild admixture of substantial Black Cavendish, modestly tempered Burley, and a tactful gathering of choice African Virginian strains. Generously dressed in a combination of fruit-based coatings, refined vanilla, and a few other unchristened seasonings, this Stokkebye product ministers a softly cultured flavor and a polished texture that is creamy smooth. Regaled in appearance, the mixture comes as a well-prepared combination of an ennobled dark base of deepened brown/black morsels coarsely cut, lightly disturbed by a scattering of gold-tan fine shaggy stringers.

Individualizing the pouched nose, Optimum carries a quiet and delicately polished air. Mainly, a sweet mixed fragrance of sugared berry and enriched vanilla gracefully embellish the prime introductory facing. Sheltered passively below this forward aroma, the dimmed confluence of a peaceful soured nuttiness, a bundling of cultured tart grass and some well-seasoned native wood fill the bottom layer of standard essence. Supremely dry in composure, the mixture lends itself to an easeful exercise in packing, thus offering the advantage of smoking immediacy. As a light-bodied blending, Optimum exemplifies the fine traditions of European style aromatics, posing a casual topping-prevalent depiction that leads the smoker onto a pleasantly tasteful course of eased mellowing sweetness. In fact, if I were to estimate I could presumably state that the gentled flavorings seem to occupy about 70% of the taste sphere.

On that attribute, at first lighting, a pleasing duo of a rich French vanilla note and sugary berry come to center without delay as the featured headline. Namely the vanilla endows a milky, custard-like influence as the tart sweet prominence of mixed fruit, blackberry and perhaps elderberry, sort their way forward forming an appealing ground of contrasted sugariness. Pleasing accents in the form of basic mulling spices such as reduced cinnamon, clove, and trace hints of sweetened lemon garnish the rendering. Furthermore, existing with a trailing highlight is an interesting blood orange tea nuance perhaps a combination of an additional citrus flavoring and a stronger native attribute occurring from the Virginia.

The native tobacco streams themselves are not that succinctly independent, but rather roll and tumble fused in an expressly joined fashion. Nonetheless, waves of distinguishable indigenous flavors do randomly crescendo for proper individual registration. With Optimum, the resident Cavendish endows a supporting wealth of smokey, spiced earthiness. The succeeding evidence of the Virginian is a bit wider of girth, projecting some Red fermented herb-wood, a base citrusy tang, decorated by dark tarty fruited undertones. For the Burley, it tends to encounter as a brown sugared candied nuttiness, occupied with just a hair of controlled sourness. Overall, the combined savor is charming by all objective measures.

As one would anticipate, the elegant brilliance of the lighter resultant room aroma is markedly polite in demeanor. The sum effect of the thickened gray cloudy smoke generated by the tobacco’s expending, is a plush sweet airy fragrance of buttercream fruity effervescence. This reserved essence is tailored with a slighted natural low fringe of darker zest, paled grass, and earthen wooded tart. Exceptionally docile, Optimum scent charts a tolerant impression on the accommodating scale of orderliness and magnitude.

Given consistently solid mechanical properties, the only demerit worth mentioning is that the tobacco tends to deposit a considerable lot of displeasing gungy dottle at the end of the bowl. And as indicated, the quality of smoke is unquestionably smooth, tendering no experiential palate bite with the up taking. Additionally, this mixture ignites easily, burning with an obliging coolness and moderate relaxed tempo.

As such, I can think of no plausible reason why any standard aromatic pipe smoker or those who are looking to simply try a peaceful specimen of the subject genre would find dissatisfaction with this blend. Is it perfect and optimum? Maybe or maybe not, again that is a delicately subjective and conditional assessment 3.1 Pipes

First Take: This blend has a very pleasant, soft, pillowy, slightly fruity, tobacco-forward flavor. It reminds me of 1-Q in its flavor profile and its relative mildness. It burned a little faster than I anticipated.

Mine was bone dry. I needed to relight it a couple of times even though I constantly puffed on it. Other than that, I had no issues. I burned it hot, and it didn't bite at all. Because I burned through my bowl so quickly, I went ahead and lit a second one, and I still didn't feel any nicotine.

Pleasant and mild aftertaste. This blend is not bold and doesn't linger. I'm glad I tried it and I would definitely recommend this blend to anyone looking for something around the 1-Q target, but different. That said, I won't re-up.

2023-02-10 Update: I smoked this blend in my churchwarden, and I think that made a pretty big difference. This blend shines when it has a bit of heat, and the long stem of a churchwarden helps cool the smoke from the hot ember. I'll reinforce the 1-Q link, as I smoked 1-Q yesterday. However, this blend doesn't necessarily taste like 1-Q. It tastes like Stokkebye's answer to 1-Q, as in it fits the same niche. This blend is well-rounded, well-blended, high quality, low nicotine, lightly cased, naturally sweet, approachable for any newcomer, and interesting enough to keep a well-seasoned pipe smoker entertained.

A great, mellow aromatic and a wonderful people pleaser. Even as somebody who doesn’t care for most aromatics, I can say that this one is really good.

Opening the jar, the smell of the berry from the topping and the cocoa from the burleys and cavendish are the most noticeable. I can’t smell any virginias in the jar.

Getting this stuff lit is kinda tricky. I don’t think it’s from the moisture though. Unlike a lot of aromatics, this one isn’t super sticky or gloopy. It’s actually pretty dry. Once it gets lit though, it stays lit. The first thing you taste is brown sugar from the cavendish and a nutty, woody note from the burleys. Underneath that is some cocoa, probably from the burleys again, and the berry & vanilla topping. The berry & vanilla topping mixes very well with the other flavors in the blend, leading to a very creamy, smooth smoke. On the finish, you can taste the virginias. It has a nice dark fruit taste to it that again is complimented by the topping, as well as a brighter, grassier note. While I never got tongue bite from this, it will heat up the bowl quite a bit if you puff too fast.

I was pleasantly surprised when I first tried this. Unlike most aromatics, it doesn’t taste like hot air. The tobacco flavor isn’t hidden. You’ll taste everything the cavendish, burleys, and virginias have to offer along with a topping that never gets strange tasting. This has become my go-to aromatic due to the presence of the natural flavors. I actually prefer this over many of the more popular aros like Autumn Evening which I find starts tasting like hot air after a bit. Also, get ready for compliments when smoking this. It leaves a really nice smelling room note. For my personal taste, I’ll give it three stars, but among aros, this is a four star blend in my opinion.

FUN TIP: If you wanna add some more depth, strength, and natural flavor to this, mix 50% Peter Stokkebye Optimum and 50% C&D Haunted Bookshop together for a great light aromatic that contains a ton of natural burley and virginia flavors with a good amount of sweetness, some spice, and a bit of berry topping. I’m calling it Optimum Bookshop.

UPDATE: Upping to 4 stars, as this has become my go-to aromatic along with The Country Squire’s Old Toby.

A very pleasant, mild aromatic with a dreamy room note. First recommended to me when I started the hobby over 20 years ago by a tobacconist at the Pipe Den at the Harrisburg East Mall (both places long since gone).

I get from Optimum sweet, creamy, nutty, vanilla, dark cherry/fruit, black licorice spice and liquor. Remarkably, all of this is accomplished without the blend being too heavy handed with candy-like syrup casing. You can still make out the tobacco taste as the flavors work with the tobacco.

I also really like the ribbon cut which makes for easy loading and burning.

While not a nicotine knockout, it also has some as compared to others blends prepared in the same way.

In my opinion, Optimum is the best bulk aromatic on the market today.