Rattray Charles Mixture

(1.95)
The perfect smoke. This light tasting, full aromatic tobacco is a special recipe of cavendish & Va. tobaccos mixed with broad leaf Carolina. It has a pleasing aroma and is blended mildly for the palate and the tongue.

Details

Brand Rattray
Blended By Kohlhase, Kopp und Co. KG
Manufactured By  
Blend Type Aromatic
Contents Black Cavendish, Virginia
Flavoring Almond, Vanilla
Cut Broken Flake
Packaging 50 grams tin
Country Germany
Production

Profile

Strength
Mild
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Extremely Mild -> Overwhelming
Flavoring
Medium
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
None Detected -> Extra Strong
Room Note
Pleasant to Tolerable
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Unnoticeable -> Overwhelming
Taste
Medium
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Extremely Mild (Flat) -> Overwhelming

Average Rating

1.95 / 4
2

3

7

8

Reviews

Please login to post a review.
Displaying 1 - 10 of 20 Reviews
Reviewed By Date Rating Strength Flavoring Taste Room Note
Jun 08, 2014 Medium Strong Medium Strong
I received a pack of this mixture. The immediate smell was.....WEIRD. Couldn't place exactly what I've smelled. Eventually got some fruity, sweety notes and coconut. Lit a bowl and was not impressed. Don't like the coconut and the "weirdness" kept lingering on. Eventually changed it by adding some Latakia and made it much bearable.

Good thing this one is discontinued.
5 people found this review helpful.
Please login to upvote this review.
Reviewed By Date Rating Strength Flavoring Taste Room Note
Aug 14, 2014 Medium Medium Medium Pleasant to Tolerable
Rattray - Charles Mixture.

This one does have quite a strong unlit aroma which is a little too much for me: a bit of nuts, a bit of sweetness, a bit of tobacco and an incongruous perfume like smell too. The moisture is superb, with that said it takes to the flame brilliantly!

The flavour from it is quite an even mix of Cavendish and Virginia with a great Nut taste as well. Vitamin N is great, think Black Mallory strength and it can be inhaled with superlative ease. Tongue bite only occurs if I go too hard, so gentle sips totally eradicate this for me. Room Note, superb! It's a very even mix of the Cavendish and Virginia with a lovely nut quality to it. To be fair, the vanilla is very nebulous for me in all aspects of this weed: aroma, taste and room note, but that aside I find this great!

Four stars.
Pipe Used: Peterson
PurchasedFrom: Smoke King
Age When Smoked: New
4 people found this review helpful.
Please login to upvote this review.
Reviewed By Date Rating Strength Flavoring Taste Room Note
Jun 13, 2013 Mild to Medium Medium Full Very Pleasant
My enthusiansm for most aromatics waned a while back but I still hunt all the time for those which do not suffer the usual failing of the type: tongue bite, burning hot, wet, or too fast, cloying, sickly or tasting artificial. This blend is one of the few exceptions I have unearthed.

I have recently drifted more in the direction of a light to medium broken flakes and english mixtures but this is simply one of the best tinned aromatics I have ever tried.

The tin note is of rich vanilla and coconut with a wiff of caramel.

The 2 part blend fills easily and fires up a dream. the smoke is cool all the way though with a light caramel taste with a hint of natural coconut at the end. Pleasant and sweet but not cloying, With just a nip of bite if drawn on too hard. it is a tad strong perhaps at the very end of the bowl. It burns out to a dark grey ash with very little bowl fouling or dottle. The room note is light and subtle and unintrusive. A great aromatic akin to Sunday's Fantasy but a more even blend.
4 people found this review helpful.
Please login to upvote this review.
Reviewed By Date Rating Strength Flavoring Taste Room Note
Feb 21, 2006 Very Mild Medium Mild to Medium Pleasant to Tolerable
Charles Mixture - I think I will just let Charles keep this mixture. Quality tobacco gone bad with flavoring. This weed looks lovely in the tin but smokes like pancakes with maple syrup. I was wondering why I got such a good deal on this tin and a can of Terry Red. I am moving on...
4 people found this review helpful.
Please login to upvote this review.
Reviewed By Date Rating Strength Flavoring Taste Room Note
Oct 10, 2004 Mild Mild Very Mild Tolerable
My first review, and I just want to say I'm happy to be amongst such a fine group of people! Onward...

I acquired as a gift a Rattray's sample pack of 6 tobaccos, Charles' mixture being one. Upon opening the gold foil sample pouch, I saw a pretty tobacco of golds and dark browns, and I was greeted loudly with the smell of fruit, mostly a cherry-like aroma. Here I must interject that I like cherries two ways: fruit off the tree and in a well-made homemade pie. There are no exceptions.

In an effort to be fair to the tobacco, I let the pouch open for airing to see if the initial aromatic qualities would mellow out a bit. After about 30 minutes, the cherry overtones did subside enough for me to pack a moderately sized Alpha apple and give it a go.

Lighting was work. It took three Swans, but finally the tobacco consented to the flame. The initial smoke was sweet, but not overly so. In fact, there was a berry-ness about the tobacco for which I was glad, given my first impressions. However, the flavor was so subtle it was barely noticeable past a slight sweetness. Keeping the stuff lit was also irritatingly difficult.

Unfortunately, there were no discernable tobacco flavors to back up the very mild casing. I'm sure, being a Rattray's blend, that the tobaccos were top-notch, but the flavor just wasn't there. As I progressed into the second half of the bowl, I did notice a fair amount of smoke, but my visiting friend (and fellow pipesmoker), had this to say about the room aroma -- "Eh." Also, for a rather flavorless blend to my palate, the tobacco did develop a fair amount of heat on my tongue, unfortunatley further alienating me from it.

There may (and obviously are) fellow pipe smokers who would enjoy this blend, and perhaps they have a tongue more suited to this mixture's subtleties. I, however, must pass.
4 people found this review helpful.
Please login to upvote this review.
Reviewed By Date Rating Strength Flavoring Taste Room Note
Jun 10, 2002 Very Mild Mild Mild Very Pleasant
Upon popping the tin, a lovely bouquet greets the nose, and for a tobacco fan like myself, that is good news! I was greeted with a mild aromatic taste that reminded me of the promised Vanilla and Almonds. It does smoke fairly cool for an aromatic, and was truly tobacco tasting with a little extra yummy stuff!

If you are a fancier of flavored tobaccos, then Charles Mixture is probably a classy blend for you to try.

Pipestud
3 people found this review helpful.
Please login to upvote this review.
Reviewed By Date Rating Strength Flavoring Taste Room Note
Jun 16, 2015 Mild Medium Medium Very Pleasant
What to say about this one?

Tin note is superb, i really loved to sit there and just smell the tin. Its of vanilla and all things cookie. And strong too! I was surprised to find something that strongly flavoured coming from Rattray's.

The smoke tastes like something-something vanillaish. And thats all there is to say. No tobacco taste, no other flavours not nothing but something-something vanillaish. But at least the taste lasts till the very end of the bowl

It burns cool and dry and will give your tongue no grieve. I did not try to overheat it, so smoking it cool is probably something you have to keep in mind, since i have the strong suspicion it would not fare well with being smoked too hot.

This is the first blend of the Aromatic Line i tried so far and the reason i did not try anymore as of yet. This is no bad blend at all but since its just vanilla (ok, maybe some caramel and almond are there, but it really just boils down to that one taste) i fail to see any unique selling point. If you want vanilla you can get anyone of the 35.000 vanilla blends out there, why should it be Charles Mixture really?

Having said that i only somewhat can recommend this blend, although objectively it's a high quality blend.
Pipe Used: It went trough rotation.
2 people found this review helpful.
Please login to upvote this review.
Reviewed By Date Rating Strength Flavoring Taste Room Note
Jul 06, 2010 Mild Mild to Medium Medium Pleasant to Tolerable
The First one I review. When the tin is openend you can strongly smell the fruity smell. Really nice. Once lit its very pleasant to smoke. Indeed it hasn't has to much deeper tastes but just a real pleasant tobacco. Maybe gonna buy an extra tin for later on my smoking career.
2 people found this review helpful.
Please login to upvote this review.
Reviewed By Date Rating Strength Flavoring Taste Room Note
Mar 01, 2010 Mild Medium Mild to Medium Pleasant
Originally a Christmas gift, this came straight out of left field with its volume of flavour. From the packaging, one could be forgiven for placing this as a general English blend, rather than the full aromatic it actually is. The British Racing Green and gold script accents (of the newer packaging), being rather regal, traditional, and staid, are rather misrepresentative of the taste. Actually, from the off, I liked this a lot. This tobacco's got a decent amount of casing that'll supercharge the lover of aromatics and send those who like traditional tastes squealing like stuck pigs, with a hot poker up the clack-valve. Evidently, It's not for everyone, and yet, for me, liking both English blends, and as a person happy to advocate neo-tobaccos, the initial experience was far from derogatory. I didn't have the issues with the bite that some of had, which I certainly find more prevalent in the Peterson line, and I found it a relatively smooth smoke, when tamed. However, one would be best sipping, as opposed to erratically chuffing this weed, erring on the side of caution.

It's a no-holds-barred aromatic, with a robust sweet coconut; ever so almond-like finish, which smokes akin to drinking a Chinese pearl tea. It's fairly easy to see where those who draw comparisons with Pina Colada are coming from. I certainly didn't find the casing particularly abrasive, and it was nice to partake in an aromatic where taste follows the aroma suit - a rare thing, indeed. However, It's not as pungent as folk make out; It's certainly representative in the smoke, but it's better on most other coconut- flavoured offerings. The room note is a definite winner with non-smokers in the house, too.

Initially, I'd have been inclined to attribute a three star rating, but upon letting the tin air for a short time, It's marked personality was lost, and even the Virginias became flat, papery, and nondescript. I think if I was to buy this again, then it would need to be in sample or pouch quantity, rather than tinned at 50g. Certainly, It's worth transferring this to an air-tight container, and for once, I'd dissuade folk from actually letting it breathe.
2 people found this review helpful.
Please login to upvote this review.
Reviewed By Date Rating Strength Flavoring Taste Room Note
Dec 18, 2002 Mild to Medium Very Strong Overwhelming Pleasant to Tolerable
I tried this blend based on Rattray's reputation and after smoking and thoroughly enjoying several of their other blends. Also, from the description on the tin it sounded like a great blend.... Hmmm...tin aroma delicious, beautiful golden virginia, Carolina broadleaf, Cavendish, dark leafed varieties, very pleasant to look at, packs easily,(filled one of my best pipes to the very top). Now for the the reward, touch of a match and started puffing. Not bad, kind of sweet, no wait, awful sweet....I mean awful and sweet! This is an aromatic gone berzerk. I tasted very little tobacco and a lot of Pina Colada. If you like the taste of burning coconuts then you'll probably enjoy Charles Mixture, otherwise you might want to pass on this one. Oh well, even the Yankees lose once in a while.
2 people found this review helpful.
Please login to upvote this review.

target="_blank"