English blends

drac2485

What are your favorite English blends?

thewanderingdude

Macbaren Vintage Syrian, Dunhill 965, Boswell Northwoods

jabraham326

@thewanderingdude ditto

thewanderingdude

@jabraham326 obviously you are a man with impeccable tastes as well!

PipeProfessor

ACPC Heady Doctrine! Too bad it is no longer in prodction!

CretinDan

Mine:
-GL Pease Maltese Falcon
-GL Pease Odyssey 
-GL Pease Blackpoint
-McClelland Frog Morton on the Bayou
-Dunhill My Mixture 965
-Esoterica Penzance

mhajec

Frog Morton, Dunhill 965, 3 Friars, Stokkebye 52, and Night Cap

judandhispipe

Peterson Old Dublin, McCranie's Murdock's Pipe, Dunhill Standard and Baby's Bottom. Enjoy HH VS a lot, but at some point there will be no more Syrian latakia - and it won't be that many years away.

Woodsman

McClelland 5110 Old Dark English, Newminster Ultimate English, are 2 of my favorites.

judandhispipe

I should give a nod to SG's latakia flakes, too - Balkan, Navy, Bothy - in descending order of lat content. I've got this big Cayuga pot that I discovered, by pure chance,smokes all of those like a dream.

idbowman

GL Pease Blackpoint is usually my go to.

PappyJoe

Just opened a tin of RO Series Acadian English. It's good.

Kirbyb

Penzance

GLP Westminster

GLP Piccadilly

Dunhill EMP

H&H Magnum Opus

SG Squadron Leader

tomatobodhi

Capt. Earl's Ten Russians
McClelland British Woods
Dunhill Durbar

IndyJG

McClelland Wilderness

C&D Star of the East

McClelland Samovar

Ashton Artisans Blend

Dunhill Nightcap

...to name a few.

Woodsman

McClelland 5110 Dark English

Sutliff Proper English

Frog Morton

Balkan Sasieni

H&H White Knight

judandhispipe

@woodsman reminds me to give a nod to some blends I think of as Balkans,not English, but are all still  latakia blends I enjoy a lot - H&H White Knight and Larry's Blend, Balkan Sasieni, and McClelland's Balkan Blue.

thesubcon

4th Generation - 1882
The Country Squire -
Bag End
The Country Squire -
Bowser's Castle

riobrusa

Balkan style, with a lot of Latakia. For aromatic, like 1Q by Lane

motie2

Will someone help me understand the difference between "English blends" and "Balkan blends." Is it more-or-less the presence of Latakia and/or Oriental leaf? I have read up on the difference via Google searches and perusal of various informative pipe smoking websites, and I'm still unclear. The two terms appear to be used synonymously.   Help a fella learn?

PappyJoe

@motie2 - The following is my understanding of the difference between the two but I warn you that it may or may not be correct. I had to do a lot of research over the past few days because I really just discovered Balkan blends.

English blend are either Virginia or Virginia/burley base with latakia. It may also contains some Orientals but always less than the latakia.

Balkan Blends are either Virginia or Virginia/burley base but the amount of latakia and orientals vary and neither one dominates the other.

To my taste the amount of Orientals in an English blend is almost negligible while the latakia is noticeable.

In a Balkan Blend, the Orientals is more pronounced and the latakia is just barely there.

Does that make everything as clear as a brick wall?

motie2

@PappyJoe --No, and it's helpful, because it sort of syncs with what I have gathered in my "research."

I've considered http://pipesmagazine.com/python/pipe-tobacco/english-blends-and-latakia-blends-one-in-the-same/ to be a summation. But I liked the succinct nature of your explanation.

PS, did you like my follow-up Democrat joke?

PappyJoe

@motie2 - yes. All political parties are jokes.

drac2485

@motie2 - @pappyjoe hit the nail on the head.  I'll add a bit though.  England/Britain used to have some very strict rules about what you can add to tobacco so because of that they generally were natural tobacco with no additives (no humificants or anything).  That was the "original" English blend tobacco so they generously mixed multiple tobaccos to get some amazing flavors without additives.  More modern, people generally consider Latakia dominant blends English.  From what I have read and heard among the smoking communities is that most Balkan blends are English blends (in the traditional sense).  However, as @pappyjoe said, commonly, now we consider Balkan blends as predominately Oriental tobaccos versus Latakia.  If I remember right the difference between Balkan and Oriental blends is that Balkan generally has Latakia where Oriental doesn't.  However, like Balkan versus English, it still sits in the middle and sometimes confusing area with the Balkan versus Oriental.  I hope I was able to help add a little bit and confuse us all a little bit more.

paulwansing

I like PS proper english, C&D Star of the East and Plantation Evening, and Dunhill Nightcap. 

motie2

@drac2485 - Thank you for your contribution. I learn a lot from these discussions.

Now, does Perique have any role in English blends, or is it confined to VaPers?

motie2

I learn a lot from Russ Ouellette who opines:

English- The older use of the term “English blend” just meant that the tobacco used was unflavored, since, under old laws, processors in the UK were not allowed to add much of anything to their tobaccos. Today, the description is a bit more specific. For my purposes, an English blend is a tobacco which has a dominant note of Latakia, and the secondary flavor comes from Virginia(s). 

Balkan- Similar to an English, but after the Latakia, the most prominent flavor will come from Turkish or Oriental tobaccos. The name, of course, comes from the superb Balkan Sobranie (a blend which used some of the most outstanding Orientals ever). 

Oriental- The flavor will mostly come from Oriental or Turkish tobaccos, with Virginias and/or Latakia and, possibly, other tobaccos used for “spice”. 

Charles

Motie2, check out this link for an explanation of Perique:  https://youtu.be/nHL8ik3rsVE

motie2

I found this wonderful addition to the English/Balkan/Oriental discussion from GLPease

http://glpease.com/BriarAndLeaf/?p=90#more-90

The Briar & Leaf Chronicles: "What is a Balkan Blend?"

motie2

@Charles -- Thank you. I'd seen that vid. but how does Perique figure in to English/Balkan/Oriental blends, or does it? I know Latakia seems to play a major role...

Charles

@motie2 - As it was explained to me many years ago, Perique is an ingredient sometimes included in modern English blends.    British tobacco companies use quite a bit of Perique in some of their blends to add flavor and aroma without the use of additives.
Due to its full-bodied nature, Perique is used on a limited basis in
blends. About 5 % in a blend is the maximum. It is usually blended with
Virginia to give it more body. Escudo is a good representative of a
Virginia blend with Perique.  Some other tobaccos to try are Germain's Royal Jersey Perique Mixture or Dunhill’s Elizabethan Mixture.