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Christmas/Holiday Blends

I know, I know... Christmas creep is getting out of control. But, I’d love to hear your thoughts and suggestions on seasonal tobacco blends. I’ve never tried any holiday blends. How are they different? What do they have something like pine or egg nog in them? Are they typically aromatics? Which companies produce the best ones (IYHO)? I plan on trying one or two out this year but would like to know more about them first. 
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Comments

  • Same here, I ordered a seasonal tobacco for the 1st time with Yule Log, wasn't impressed.
  • Some of the seasonal leave me wondering why they are called seasonal or Christmas blends. McClelland for example does one named Christmas Cheer and has the year on it. It's straight Virginia. Nothing about it makes me think of Christmas other than it comes in a pretty gold tin. On the other hand, McClelland also has done the Holiday Spirit which is a nice aromatic (chocolate, pecan & rum according to the description). I buy a tin of it every year.

    C&D has been doing a Christmas Blend and renaming it each year because it's a new blend and they are generally aromatic. The problem seems to be that once they are gone, they are gone. I didn't care for Golden Days of Yore (2015) which was a Virginia based aromatic or the 2012 offering, Chestnuts Roasting which was Cavendish/Latakia. But Corncob Pipe & A Button Nose (2016) was decent as was We Three Kings (2014). The 2017 version is We Three Kings also.

    I found Peterson's Holiday Season (2015) to be good. Peterson's Holiday Season (2014) was better but is no longer in production. The thing with the Peterson's Holiday Blends is it changed every year and it came in a large rectangle tin with the tobacco in a cellophane bag inside. You had to move it to a mason jar quickly to keep it fresh.

    Kohlase & Kopp did a series of Winter Editions that were good but again, it's hard to find them because they were limited. I recommend the 2015 blend. 

    My two favorites are the Rattray's Winter Edition 2015 which has an Almond, Cherry & Cinnamon flavor and Rattray's Exotic Orange (which has been renamed Exotic Passion). Both are manufactured by Kohlase & Kopp by the way. Exotic Orange wasn't intended to be a Winter or Christmas Blends but it has become my favorite to smoke during the holidays.

  • @PappyJoe -- I'm having trouble finding Kohlase & Kopp tobaccos. Where do you buy yours? It looks like McClelland may be the one I try out this year. I love the Frog Morton's and would assume their Holiday Spirit would also be nice.
  • @jfreedy both pipesandcigar and smokingpipes have carried them in the past. Don't know why they aren't available at this time. 
  • @PappyJoe -- I have to second your Holiday Spirit recommendation.  I also buy a tin every year, and always finish it off before the end of the holidays.

    I tried We Three Kings as well, and at first wasn't too excited about it since it didn't have that over-the-top taste and aroma I was originally looking for in a holiday blend.  I think the orientals threw me off as well.  However, I let it sit for a few months, and for whatever reason tried it again in July and really enjoyed it.  I found few more tins, and go to it several times a year when I want a little bit of oriental tobacco flavor, or just something different.  I hope the 2017 version is the same as the last time.

    I've tried a few of the Peterson's Holiday Season tobaccos, sometimes just for the tin art.  I'll have to look for the Rattray's blends you mentioned once the weather cools down a bit.
  • Unfortunately I have just received word that the Kohlhase & Kopp house blends are no longer being shipped to the states. 
  • “Unfortunately I have just received word that the Kohlhase & Kopp house blends are no longer being shipped to the states.”
    - boo...
  • I like the Christmas pipes from Peterson and savinelli much more than any special tobacco. I like my savinelli saint Nicholas and smoke it nightly, not a fan of this year's option though, the white stem doesn't work for me
  • So what does C&D corncob pipe and a button nose taste like?  I just love the name of it. matches860 talked about it, but he's a big n burly guy. 
  • @Londy3 - I bought some last year for the Christmas season. I smoked it but honestly can't tell you what it tasted like. I just don't remember. In fact, I'm going to dig through the cellar and see if I even smoked it all. 

    So, as far as I remember, it was a forgettable smoke. It wasn't bad but nothing made it memorable either.
  • I just ordered some Holiday Spirit from P&C. Can’t wait to try it. 
  • I ordered a bit too much last year so I'm sticking with what I've already got in my cellar ... Sutliff Christmas Spice, Boswell Christmas Cookies, C&D Corn Cob Pipe And Button Nose, and Hearth And Home Egg Nog. That should be enough to hold me over for the holidays. Plus I have a few winter blends from Russ' Monthly Blends like Snow Drift and Warm-Up.
  • So I have never tried any holiday blends. If you were to only buy one, which would it be?
  • Opened a jar of Peterson's Holiday Season 2015 yesterday and had a bowl. Still had to let it sit and dry out for about an hour before I could smoke it.
    Another one that has gone away. It also made me realize I didn't buy any of the 2016 blend from Peterson last year. 

    I'm going to miss some of these when they are gone.
  • What do you suggest I try that I can actually buy for this season?
  • Guys
    I bought some McClelland 2016 Edition Holiday Spirit last year. I think I smoked one bowl since last Christmas. That was not because I didn't like it, it was just because there is SO many blends to try and i suppose we are on the everlasting search for that heavenly blend that always seems just slightly ahead of our reach. Maybe, just maybe it is a good thing that we never really get there.

    This blend was very good, in fact I looked back and see that I had given it an 8.5 out of 10 at the time. The tobaccos were Virginia, Burley, and Cavendish flavored with dark rum, pecan (unusual?) and cocoa. I do recall the experience as very pleasant. I just reopened the tin lid and the aroma is very, very nice......damn, now I have to fit this tobacco into todays' schedule.

    Not being very familiar with the McClelland offerings having only a handfull, I cannot really prove my following assumption.

    I think the "Holiday Blends" that are offered by the leading tobacco companies could be using some of their "regular" blends customized for the season when we all go crazy buying stuff. They might (just an opinion) add this or that, put it in a different tin, give it a fancy name (or in the minimalist tradition just a suggestion) and put it out there for us to desire because after all, it is the holidays! They are almost always 'special" limited editions because they offer these to those who get caught up in the name relative to the time offered. They also run these typically as a limited edition with implied shortages. I would also bet that if a particular holiday blend went ballistic, it would then be marketed under a different name as some people might shun buying a "holiday blend" for the rest of the year just out of habit. The holiday blends of years past that are still available are perhaps stock that did not move for the supplier.

    As much as we love our tobacco products we have to remember the relationship of the supplier and consumer......and understand which one we are. Very often we are the benefactors of that paradigm.

    These are just my thoughts.......
  • Yep, that's exactly what they are doing. It's like anything else, manufacturers have to keep giving you a good reason to buy. Change is an important element here. So is "new and improved' or "limited addition" and sometimes a rebranding in a new package to sell the same thing only better...lol. it's true. Just look at the size of your Tobacco tin stock...I bet it keeps growing.
  • @pwkarch - and here I was thinking I was the only cynic on TPL.  The test of what you say is to read the descriptions and reviews for the holiday season blends on tobaccoreviews. 

    On the other hand just in the past week I have smoked Rattray's Winter Edition 2014 and 2015. They are similar in that they both have some almond flavoring but the 2014 is an almond/caramel aroma and taste while the 2015 has almond/cherry/cinnamon. I can tell the difference between the two.

  • @Londy3 - on smokingpipes.com I recently saw that C&D has Corn Cob Pipe & a Button Nose and We Three King and McClelland has Holiday Spirit 2017 available.  

    pipes and cigars has a bulk blend, Russ's Sugar Plum and a couple of other holiday bulks.

    payless pipes, another on-line retailers I've dealt with for years, also has the two C&D blends I mentioned and they may also have Golden Days of Yore in stock.
  • @Londy3

    My tobacco 'collection" (both daily use and cellared are growing at an amazing speed. I absolutely KNOW my position in the supplier-consumer relationship. I have also helped the Mason Jar company turn a hefty profit I am sure.
  • @PappyJoe

    Been there, done that. A very large percentage of the blends available have very similar ingredients with what is assumed to be varying quantities. All they need to do is take a burley, virginia, and cavendish tobacco that is available all year long.....add some 'elf dust" or "Santas' Dandruff" or whatever and repackage it as a limited addition "Christmas", or "Holiday Blend" to conform  to Political Correctness protocol, and off to the races they go. We get the catalogs, see this "new" blend and we have to have them. Again, just a supposition on my part.
  • LOL, guess we are all just fools of fools making pipe smoking a constant adventure.
  • @pwkarch - That's like my two private blends. They both have the same components but in different percentages that make one more enjoyable during cooler weather and one more enjoyable during hotter weather. 

    With so many tobaccos on the market today it's hard for me to imagine that they are all unique.  For the record, I have found at least four other tobaccos that are close matches to Molto Dolce in my opinion. 
  • @Londy3

    I don't consider us fools, myself perhaps, but there are some pretty sharp dudes on here that know the art of smoking a pipe. They have a wealth of knowledge, huge portfolios of experience, and dare i say have been around the block more than a few times. Just for full disclosure, I have been around the block myself a few times but usually with either blinders on or with rose colored glasses.

    I think collectively this is the best pipe blog on the net. And, I think everyone is very enthusiastic to share their knowledge and experience.

    In real life we smoke what we enjoy, and smoke what we want regardless of the name attached to the tobaccos we buy.
  • It's hard to capture the spirit of Christmas in a tobacco blend ... what constitutes the flavor of Christmas. Can't be simply cookies because we have them year round. The only thing I can think of that embodies the flavor of Christmas is fruitcake or possible egg nog since they are both seasonal products. And possible the scent of pine trees. Other than that most everything we eat during the Christmas holidays that can be attributed to the flavor of the season is something we eat normally throughout the year. So I can see why tobacco manufactures would simply change labels on an already established blend with some festival Christmas inspired product name.
  • Flavor of Christmas: No one has mentioned peppermint candy canes, almost unique to Christmas. Perhaps a hint of peppermint and then choose one or more possible additive flavors: cinnamon, apple, nutmeg, eggnog, rum <giggle>, fireplace (yule log), clove. Just making it up as I type. But what do I know? 
  • Topaz75Topaz75 Professor
    Perhaps the guys who make Merde de Cheval could come up with a reindeer variant.
  • Or "Chipmunks Roasting on an Open Fire"........
  • @pwkarch, definitely agree sir. No doubt. 
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