So dry your tears.
[Clarification for the tobacco-impaired: Samuel Gawith is a brilliant company located in Kendall, Cumbria, England. They produce some marvelous smoking products, as well as some bizarre things aimed at a hobbit demographic living in their moms' basements all over the States.]
Numerous tins we have seen for sale recently:
SAMUEL GAWITH – BALKAN FLAKE
Fifty percent Latakia, fifty percent Virginia, steam-pressed. Dark and perfumy because of that treatment. If aged, crystals form on the ragged slices. This is a delightful afternoon's smoke.
SAMUEL GAWITH – BEST BROWN FLAKE
Medium in strength, with a pleasing mellowness. Straight Virginia, nothing else. One of the classics.
SAMUEL GAWITH – BLACK FOREST
Black cavendish, blonde Virginia, honey essence. Queer fish.
SAMUEL GAWITH – BLACK XX FINEST KENDAL TWIST
A dark pigtail, quite strong. Suitable for young men with something to prove, and old men who are bored. Mono-dimensional.
SAMUEL GAWITH – BOTHY FLAKE
Mostly Virginia. A little Latakia, and a whisper of whisky. Liquour in tobacco usually translates to a mellowness and a melding of flavours, rarely to any noteworthy taste of booze. Quite enjoyable.
SAMUEL GAWITH – BROWN NO. 4
Virginia with a little cigar leaf. Do not smoke this on an empty stomach. Tangy notes, but a powerful product. Unless you are impossible to live with, this should be only an occasional indulgence.
SAMUEL GAWITH – CABBIES MIXTURE
Little roundels with a smidgeon of Perique. Delightful.
SAMUEL GAWITH – CELTIC TALISMAN
This is bizarre. Very suited to Americans.
SAMUEL GAWITH – MAYORS COLLECTION, CHOCOLATE FLAKE
Virginias with Burley and a little Latakia to support the chocolate flavouring, which is not over-the-top. This is a high quality old-fashioned smoke. Pleasing woodsy notes. Mild to medium.
SAMUEL GAWITH – COMMONWEALTH MIXTURE
Fifty percent Latakia, fifty percent Virginia. Rich and delicious.
SAMUEL GAWITH – FULL VIRGINIA FLAKE
Sugar crystals! It has sugar crystals!
SAMUEL GAWITH – GOLDEN GLOW
An extremely nice blonde Virginia in a coarse cut.
SAMUEL GAWITH – LAKELAND DARK
Strong tobacco, but rich and creamy. This is a solid whoomp of a smoke. It has nuances.
SAMUEL GAWITH – MAYORS COLLECTION, SAM'S FLAKE
Virginia with Turkish, steam-pressed. A very slight tonquin dressing added. Very pleasant, a good blender, also excellent smoked straight. Mild to medium in strength. Refined.
SAMUEL GAWITH – 1792 FLAKE
Full load of tonquin extractives. You may fall over smoking this.
SAMUEL GAWITH – SKIFF MIXTURE
A medium mixture where the Turkish moves to the fore, surprisingly mellow.
SAMUEL GAWITH – SQUADRON LEADER
The paradigm of medium English mixtures; Virginia, Turkish, Latakia. Nearly divine.
SAMUEL GAWITH – ST. JAMES FLAKE
The perfect Perique dosage on a Virginia base. Spicy, but it perfectly hits the spot. Worth stockpiling.
Currently smoking from a tin of Sam's Flake, and from a large stockpile of Saint James Flake. Purchased Cabbies Mixture, Golden Glow, and Skiff. Primarily to augment my stash. One should not deplete without refills.
[By the way: please note that Pipestud (Steve Fallon) has written a recent post on his blog: "Is Cyprian Latakia Dead or Alive?". Remember, this is the man who seeded a pipe-smoking competition with Dunhill's Royal Yacht, sheerly for the pleasure it would give him and the discomfort of the participants. An inspired man.]
Current beverage: Strong coffee. I should go to sleep soon. But I have a large amount of tobacco drying in a stainless steel tray on my bed, near the vicious little black kitty who wants to eat the little girl hamster when she visits. So instead I'll load up a last pipe for the night, and go stand on the front steps looking wiser and more mature than I actually am.
UPDATE:
SAMUEL GAWITH'S FIREDANCE FLAKE
Best Brown Flake with blackberries, brandy and vanilla.
And perhaps mango.
The blackberry is dominant, the brandy and vanilla allegedly round out the edges and give balance. This is, underneath the cloying funk, a very decent tobacco. It took me over a year to finish the tin. Mixing it with something else did not help. If this was the only tobacco that you were stuck with on a desert island you would go insane. Unless you were a ruddy degenerate. For its type it is extremely well-made, and some people will like it.
TOBACCO INDEX
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