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Amphora Black Cavendish
pwkarch
Master
in Tobacco Talk
Yesterday I was going through my cellar spreadsheet looking for things I have overlooked or just have not given the proper attention. "And what in my wandering eyes did appear" but Amphora Black Cavendish stored in a mason Jar for almost two years. I bet I had not smoked this blend in 20 or 30 years. When I bought this several years ago I did so wih a comment on my speadsheet "nostalgic".
I set the jar our for today which was busy with a doctors appointment this morning, and catchin up on various chores and issues the rest of the day. So after dinner I filled my Bones "Fat Author" and fired the blend up to turn the clock back and see if I was missing anything. The tobacco was just about perfect in terms of moisture, and the distinct aroma of Black Liqorice was rther pronounced. The Black Cavendish added a rather sweet note that really made the annisette aroma of the tobacco pop. I have to admit that since a wandering kid I have always loved Black Licorice going for Good and Plenty Candy when everyone else chose otherwise. Often through the years I had a bag of the Black Licorice in my garage, and often would grab a stick and chew it instead of going back in the house to grab a cigar. To me, the Licorice often scratched the same itch and save me needing to walk that 50' back to the house.
I fired up the pipe to be greeted with a nice annnisette taste and aroma. I was amazed at how quickly that note showed up. The taste was so much stronger that the aroma from the jar. I sat back to enjoy the next half hour or so.
The first third or so of the bowl continued to burn wonderfully wih no relights as the magic of this blend came rushing back to me. As much as the licorice note was appreciated, the Cavendish added a very base sweet background. There was just a tiny bit of tongue bite which I chalk up to my initial cadence. Sitting on the porch I could not get a real "room note" per se, but I could get and appreciate the aroma of the smoke as the air currents changed.The first third of the bowl was very good wih some very profound points where the individual notes (Anisette and Semi Sweetness) showed their individual characters. Very Enjoyable for this guy.
The second third or so was very much like the first wih some of the same observations. The slight tongue bite isue mentioned above dissapeared as the smoke progressed. I can see where if pushed this could cause some bite issues and discourage any smoker. So if you are so inclined to try this, slow cadence will be your friend. During the actual smoking of the pipe there was no moisture or "gurgling" noticed, and the bowl remained just lightly warm. The seond third of the bowl did require a quick relight mostly to incinerate tobaco on 'the edge". This portion of the smoke was every bit as good if not more so than the first third. The major taste and aroma elements stayed true, where often down in the bowl some blends will produce an ashy almost cigarette like smoke. This stayed very interesting and flavorful.
The bottom of the bowl began to deteriorte just a bit. I lost most of the Annisette note while the Cavendish seemed to still be producing a sweet component, although it too was falling off a little. I was searching for the licorice component and it was just on the edge. At this point I was getting a somewhat "bland" taste near the end ot the bowl but stayed with it to see what was happening. Now i was fighting it to stay lit and decided to do the right thing and set the pipe down.
After several minutes I dumped a pile of white and light grey ash followed by a decent chunk of dottle into the ash tray. The dottle was fairly damp and was obviously the cause of the less than enjoyable smoke t the end. I ran a pipe cleaner into the pipe (assembled) and it came out rather dry. So I believe I have realized the reason God gave us dottle.......to keep some or all moisture within the bowl.
I, even with the slightly negative issues mentioned above, thoroughly enjoyed this blend. And yes, It did take me back more than a few years. I still have probably 3 or 4 ounces left so I will continue to pull it out when I get the itch,. And if I am still on the green side of the grass when that is gone I will efinately buy more.
That is my take on this, and recommend it to anyone who loikes the profile of this blend.
I set the jar our for today which was busy with a doctors appointment this morning, and catchin up on various chores and issues the rest of the day. So after dinner I filled my Bones "Fat Author" and fired the blend up to turn the clock back and see if I was missing anything. The tobacco was just about perfect in terms of moisture, and the distinct aroma of Black Liqorice was rther pronounced. The Black Cavendish added a rather sweet note that really made the annisette aroma of the tobacco pop. I have to admit that since a wandering kid I have always loved Black Licorice going for Good and Plenty Candy when everyone else chose otherwise. Often through the years I had a bag of the Black Licorice in my garage, and often would grab a stick and chew it instead of going back in the house to grab a cigar. To me, the Licorice often scratched the same itch and save me needing to walk that 50' back to the house.
I fired up the pipe to be greeted with a nice annnisette taste and aroma. I was amazed at how quickly that note showed up. The taste was so much stronger that the aroma from the jar. I sat back to enjoy the next half hour or so.
The first third or so of the bowl continued to burn wonderfully wih no relights as the magic of this blend came rushing back to me. As much as the licorice note was appreciated, the Cavendish added a very base sweet background. There was just a tiny bit of tongue bite which I chalk up to my initial cadence. Sitting on the porch I could not get a real "room note" per se, but I could get and appreciate the aroma of the smoke as the air currents changed.The first third of the bowl was very good wih some very profound points where the individual notes (Anisette and Semi Sweetness) showed their individual characters. Very Enjoyable for this guy.
The second third or so was very much like the first wih some of the same observations. The slight tongue bite isue mentioned above dissapeared as the smoke progressed. I can see where if pushed this could cause some bite issues and discourage any smoker. So if you are so inclined to try this, slow cadence will be your friend. During the actual smoking of the pipe there was no moisture or "gurgling" noticed, and the bowl remained just lightly warm. The seond third of the bowl did require a quick relight mostly to incinerate tobaco on 'the edge". This portion of the smoke was every bit as good if not more so than the first third. The major taste and aroma elements stayed true, where often down in the bowl some blends will produce an ashy almost cigarette like smoke. This stayed very interesting and flavorful.
The bottom of the bowl began to deteriorte just a bit. I lost most of the Annisette note while the Cavendish seemed to still be producing a sweet component, although it too was falling off a little. I was searching for the licorice component and it was just on the edge. At this point I was getting a somewhat "bland" taste near the end ot the bowl but stayed with it to see what was happening. Now i was fighting it to stay lit and decided to do the right thing and set the pipe down.
After several minutes I dumped a pile of white and light grey ash followed by a decent chunk of dottle into the ash tray. The dottle was fairly damp and was obviously the cause of the less than enjoyable smoke t the end. I ran a pipe cleaner into the pipe (assembled) and it came out rather dry. So I believe I have realized the reason God gave us dottle.......to keep some or all moisture within the bowl.
I, even with the slightly negative issues mentioned above, thoroughly enjoyed this blend. And yes, It did take me back more than a few years. I still have probably 3 or 4 ounces left so I will continue to pull it out when I get the itch,. And if I am still on the green side of the grass when that is gone I will efinately buy more.
That is my take on this, and recommend it to anyone who loikes the profile of this blend.
Comments
Yep, that and the Magic Inch........
Kudos to @pwkarch, and, as ever, thank you, Paul, for sharing with us......
Joe
He may have done it fictionally for the nicotine value. My guess (and only a guess) is that the dottle plug has a significantly higher amount of vitamin "N" since the plug probably acts as a filter of sorts. Let them sit on the mantle where the would dry out, crumble them up or just stack fill them in your bowl and you are off to the races. This is something I would never want to try.
@pwkarch is probably right on the above. You also have to consider that relatively speaking, the time period when the stories were written were probably more austere and tobacco or pipe costs during that time could have been more expensive relative to what we pay today. For example, a tin of Peterson's tobacco at James Fox in London retails for 18 Pounds. In 1896 it sold for .14 pounds (10 shillings, 9 pence) but the average wage of common workers in the 1890s (according to once source) was around 29 shillings a week. That would put the cost of that tin of tobacco somewhere around half a week's wages.
Tobacco
A pipe is not much use without tobacco, and we may reasonably assume that Holmes had produced the ash from those 140 varieties by smoking his way through the entire list. It is a dismal thought that if he bought one ounce each of the 140, the process would, based on the prices quoted in "The Yellow Face", have cost him somewhat less than L3. (US $5 or Y750.)
Sherlock Holmes does seem to have settled on the cheapest and strongest tobacco he could find, for everyday smoking at least. And Watson, in the early stages of their acquaintance, did the same, for in _A Study in Scarlet_ Holmes asks if Watson has any objections to strong tobacco, and Watson replies that he always
smokes 'ship's' himself. 'Ship's' is corded plug, formed by placing the leaves of an inexpensive tobacco – in Watson's day, quite probably the inferior "Nicotiana rustica", rather than the now universal "N. tabacum" – on top of one another in a long row, then rolling them up and compressing them, originally with a thin cord, though machinery was used on a commercial scale later. When the resulting roll was a very thin one, the tobacco was called 'pig-tail,' and this form was widely smoked, or, in the days of wooden hulls, when burning tobacco would have been a fire hazard, chewed, by sailors.
'Ship's' can still be found at specialist tobacconists, but is not recommended for those of a weak constitution. The mere act of lighting the pipe produces a concentrated blast of tar and nicotine at the back of the throat, which makes breathing extremely difficult. There is no taste as such, only a harsh, rasping sensation, and the fumes and smell are 'acrid', just as Watson describes them in _The Hound of the Baskervilles_. A marvellous line by the underrated Nigel Bruce, in one of his films with Rathbone, sums it up very well: 'Fresh in here. Smells like a pub after closing time.'
If Holmes' before breakfast pipe consisted, as Watson says in "The Engineer's Thumb", of plugs and dottles from yesterday's smokes, and if he had been smoking 'ship's' yesterday, then it is not surprising that he sometimes left his breakfast – and other meals – untouched.
Holmes remained faithful to his early love, the strongest possible tobacco, frequently asking Watson to arrange for vast quantities of 'shag' to be sent round. 'Shag' is a generic term for any rough-cut tobacco, but Holmes usually insists on the strongest available.