Cavendish isn't a tobacco like Virginia or burley. It's a method of processing and everyone has their own ways. [This] is rich and smoky therefore suited to Scottish and English blends. Fire cured Virginias are chosen, and then cooked with a little sugars until jet black.
If anything, I'd say this particular type of Cavendish tobacco has been cased. I personally use it to mix with other tobaccos (Virginias and Orientals), and it seems like it wants to make itself noticeable even if you don't put too much in it. The tin note is rather mellow and sweet and it has a jet black appearance, which in turn suggest this might as well be "American Cavendish" and not "English." For one thing, it is very moist, and it sticks in your fingers too. If only to compare it against other Cavendishes present in other tobaccos, it seems to be very similar to Robert McConnell's The Original Oriental. As for the room note, it is quite nice, actually, and I bet on it your wife will love it, or anyone around you for that particular matter. A tip of advise is you go an use it sparingly (don't abuse it) as it is quite strong. The taste, on the other hand, is sort of mellow, sweet and sour at the same time. Just give it a go and see how you get on with it.
This black cavendish provides some brown sugar, earth, wood, light smoke and floral aspects with small hints of leather, sourness and spice, indicating a smidgeon of Cyprian Latakia is present. The sugary topping sublimates the tobacco quite a bit. The strength and nic-hit are a couple of steps past the center of mild to medium. The taste is medium. Won’t bite or get harsh, but it does have a few small rough edges. Burns cool, clean and a little slow as the tobacco is a tad moist. The sweet flavor is very consistent from top to bottom. Leaves a little moisture in the bowl, and requires some relights. Has a lightly lingering, pleasant after taste, and room note. It can be smoked straight, but certainly does better as the mixer it is intended to be.
This smells sweet. From the pouch it smells as if it's been given a fairly heavy casing of sugar! The pieces of tobacco are generous in their sizes, being quite quite long and fairly thick. Another area where generosity prevails is water content. Sadly it needs a decent amount of drying time.
Once lit the flavour isn't what I was expecting. It tastes as though it has a semblance of Latakia in it. I get a subtle smokiness all the way through. Not 'strong' but still an addition of smoke. The sweet side is wonderful, exactly as the smell had me anticipating! The temperature of the smoke is brilliantly cool, I could see this being perfect to calm down a harsh blend. Another calm quality is tongue bite. I can be as reckless as I wish and I don't even get a nip! If you smoke for nicotine then smoking this neat would be totally pointless as it contains nearly none of the good stuff!
Although this is targeted at blending I could see it being a good smoke unaccompanied due to the depth of character. Very sweet, quite smoky, and brilliantly cool. Three stars.
I popped into a local shop called Leaf and Bean that sells mainly cigars, loose leaf teas and artisan chocolates and occasionally has some pipe tobacco. On this occasion all they had on offer was this Black Cavendish and I was a little disappointed as I don't usually have a good relationship with Cavendish tobacco (weak, cloying and a disappointing smoke). However when I voiced my opinion the proprietor said that his grandad used to swear by it and so I purchased an ounce in grandads memory, took it down next to the river and filled my small Peterson full bent and lit it up. I was quite pleasantly surprised as this had a lot more body than I was expecting. It's the usual oily, dark Gawith and Hoggarth tobacco that has a sweet, leathery aromatic flavour, with enough nicotine to leave me satisfied and relaxed. It required a few relights as the bowl progressed and the flavour stayed pretty consistent throughout. I wouldn't want to smoke more than a couple of bowls a week as I much prefer floral Lakelands and I'm interested to see how it performs when blended with something else. The strength is medium and the room note is one of the best I've experienced. Flavour is akin to tobaccos like St Bruno and Condor with a slight bbq and underlying smokiness that makes me think that there must be an element of flue cured leaf somewhere in its DNA and I didn't find it quite as smoky as it would if it contained Latakia. And enjoyable and satisfying smoke with good potential
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