CONTEMPLATING SEAFOOD

One of the things to which I look forward, once this pandemic is over, is a steamed fish in Chinatown, or possibly pan seared yellow flower (封煎黃花魚 'fung jin wong faa yü') at an eatery that I like. If they are still around then. Cantonese, Dutch, and Flemish people, know how to cook fish. American Wasps, not so much. It would be ideal for my birthday, which is coming up in six weeks, but this year is out for any festivities. Leastways, there's not much to celebrate.

One early birthday present to myself: a pipe which is older than I am.

Acquired recently, and restored yesterday. From a place where I worked when I was in college, and which has been out of existence for years.
I like odd old things like that.

Properly cooked fish is hard to find in the United States, largely because of Wasps and their berserk fascination with tuna salad sandwiches and fish nuggets, and other things that taste like bad chicken.

I first started messing around doing pipe restoration in the backroom of Drucquers, right around the time I realized that if I wanted to eat well I'd have to cook for myself and few others, as the food in Berkeley was rather primitive then (except for the cheese), good restaurants that were not run by Cantonese people were few and expensive (Chez Panisse), and it would likely be many years before most Americans discovered coffee and chilies.
They've finally learned about coffee, in a manner of speaking, and chili paste and hot sauce are widely available at last.
Tea is still barely part of their world.


Pipe restoration is still something I often do, and I've become a rather decent cook since then. Mostly Dutch Indonesian, with strong Indian, Chinese (Cantonese), and French tendencies.

Good with mussels, bad with frites.


Everything a man can enjoy he should learn how to create himself.
Well, other than writing Vladimir Nabokov novels.
That way lies madness.

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SUMMER IN AN ORCHARD OF THE MIND

One of the most influential people in my life has been a short bespectacled Chinese woman in Berkeley, who smoked a pipe (Drucquer's mixture 805), liked books, and had eclectic tastes in music and in movies.
She wrote a nasty letter years ago which I never answered.
We have since lost contact.

No, she was never "date material". Just a very good friend and a cherished colleague, and still in many ways an example to follow. As were her associates, who have also faded beyond radar range.

My tastes in books and pipes still reflect that, though as far as music and movies are concerned there has been no lasting effect, because I am rather unmusically inclined (tin ear the size of Texas), and I've watched films she would not countenance in a million years, being rather fond of gangster flicks, tearjerkers, and chopsocky.


I still have that letter, but I shall not respond. The misunderstanding that moved her to write it is not material anymore, that her opinion of me changed so staggeringly is no longer as oppressive.
And I have largely gotten over it.
A lot has changed.


She had a lovely pipe collection. I still have a number of her pieces which she traded me. Excellent smokes. Occasionally I light them up, but most briars I use nowadays were acquired since that time, and many of the markers of memory remain in boxes on my bookshelves.

As I mentioned, I do not know what happened to her since then.
But I hope she still has that Sasieni sandblast apple.
It was a lovely pipe, and gave her much joy.




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DRUCQUERS: THE PAST SMELLS

Yesterday a friend wandered in, saw the reprehensibles congregated in the backroom, decided that they would not improve his mood, and wandered out again. But before leaving he offered me some John Cotton's No. 1 from a cutter tin he had recently opened. Whenever he stops by he always has an antique tobacco to share, which I appreciate enormously. It's like having a misguided tour of the past, revisiting old landmarks.

My tastes in many things were formed during my misspent youth, during which I worked at a tobacconist in Berkeley (Drucquer & Sons) that my father and my uncle had patronized when they were going to school. My father had introduced it to me when we visited The States by dryly remarking that it was a kind of snooty place, I might like it.

I did.

More than the offering of tobaccos, however, was the atmosphere (old world, colonial products, opinionated people), and the chance it gave me to wean myself of homesickness by stinking in the manner to which I had become accustomed (Latakia mixtures plus bizarre experiments with straight leaf), and develop my tastes under the benign tutelage of a short strong-minded Chinese woman who read a lot, discussed music with one of the patrons (Jack Gail), and held her own decisively in conversation, especially with the rather jovial collegiate men who drifted in on Saturday afternoon.

I may have partially repaid those lessons by introducing her to the finest Chinese teas, and advising her to visit Amsterdam and Brussels.
As well as teaching her about Indonesian coffee beans.
In those days I was a little eccentric.

Oh, plus pottery, Chinese seals, and I-Hsing teapots.


Eventually I floated out of Berkeley's orbit. Drucquers got sold, Greg Pease worked there a number of years, left, and finally the place closed. People hardly smoke pipes in this age, and though it was legendary, it was unhip in the extreme. Today, tobacco is a black sheep and a political hot potato.
Merchants like Drucquer & Sons aren't suited to the present age.
Tobacconists everywhere are disappearing.
Because of do-gooders.


"Will no one think about the children!?!"


Oh bugger the little brutes! If they smoked pipes and fine cigars, they'd be a lot better than playing video games all day and bullying their more geeky classmates! Besides, most children are little disease vectors, and unfit for civilized society until they've been vaccinated, spanked, taught some manners, and have started getting over their juvenile conceit!
The first step is weaning them away from vapors.
As well as fruity aromatics.

But enough about your loathsome offspring.


Berkeley was at one point the nexus of the universe. Bookstores, coffee, tobacco ... one did not see the pot, patchouli, and self-impressed intellectual failures with gluten allergies that are there now.
It was once a charming place.


Dunhill 965, Black Mallory, Robert McConnell, Constantinople, State Express London Mixture, John Cotton, Capstan ...
[And of course Balkan Sobranie; you knew I was going to mention it.]


The store was in an elongated space, narrow and deep. Main shop floor, humidor, office, blending room, and both miscellaneous storage as well as pipe restoration in the back. I spent hours working on pipes, wandering out occasionally for fresh air, or to talk with Cara and Alice over their bins of tobacco, to grab a cigar, to grab lunch. In the evening two or three of us would stay in the office, where the owner (Robert Rex) kept the hundreds of pipes that weren't on display in his home.
I once outmanoeuvred him on a Comoy Blue Riband, which I still own. But he had some spectacular Dunhills just strewn higgledy-piggledy on the cluttered shelf above his desk; a veritable museum of briar.

By the time I had been there a few weeks I no longer noticed the smell of tobaccos nearly as much. Like with the wonderful aroma of the Indian Restaurant, it had faded into the odour-equivalent of white noise.


During the next few years I read books by Marguerite Yourcenar, Willa Cather, Edward H. Schafer, Herlee Glesner Creel, Wyndham Lewis, Evelyn Waugh, Faulkner, and Proust. My first introduction to O'Henry, and a very fond revisiting of De Spaanschen Brabander by Bredero, as well as finally learning to appreciate Vondel, occurred at that time, as well as a brief flurry of interest in noted literary man Suffridus Sixtinus.

It was an educational interlude.

[No, I shall not detail Donald's friend Elizabeth, who smoked cigars and occasionally a pipe. She collected guns and drank Old Grand Dad; altogether a very exciting girl.
Sparkling, vivacious, and commendably stubborn.]

Tea. Coffee. Scotch Whisky. Pipe tobacco. The office in the back of the shop. The stacks of the university library. Bookstores on Telegraph Avenue. Caffè Mediterraneum. Dwinelle Hall, Sather Gate, Moffit, and the campus redwoods.

I was a very blinkered person.


In the years since, I have lived in Berkeley, Oakland, Alhambra, Monterrey Park, and San Francisco. I have travelled a bit -- South East Asia, Canada, Europe -- and had a long-term relationship. Which ended. Dammit.
Yes, I am older. But I still read, smoke pipes, and drink tea.
Time has not weighed heavily upon me.

I've probably not matured very much. A bachelor again, I have become the still feisty and disreputable uncle you should never trust around your kids, as I will introduce them to tobacco and a well-rounded vocabulary, and may very well plant mind-worms in their impressionable little heads.

At the very least they'll end up with broader tastes in literature, putting hot sauce on everything, and turning into bright young ladies with a marked affection for gluten, roast duck, cigars, and fine pipe tobacco.
As well as the individuals who still enjoy those things.

They won't be safe for the suburbs.


Something Greg Pease said about bringing back the old Drucquers blends stimulated this revisiting of the past, and the years in between. As well as all the nose memories of that time. I wonder if he has found a replacement for the Black Virginia that went into the Arcadia mixture?
Levant, Trafalgar, Red Lion, Blend 805 ...

I used to smoke Royal Ransom a lot.
An over-indulgence in Latakia.
Deep reeky perfume.

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DRUCQUER'S BLEND 805 AND CULTIVATING A FINE WHITE ASH

Years ago I knew a small Chinese woman who smoked a pipe. No, it wasn't a bold statement that she rejected her parents' heritage and value system, it was merely late-teen experimentation gone horribly right. She liked it.
But she didn't flaunt it brashly around the old-folks.

She introduced me to Drucquer & Sons most stellar product: Blend 805.

Drucquers, in that day and age, still did personalized blends for its customers, but the selection of standard mixtures that they made was excellent. Robert Rex had bought the store from Maurice Drucquer a few years before I started working there, and knew his tobacco inside and out. Much like today he knows wine; he's growing grapes somewhere in the foothills, east of here.


THE FULL ENGLISH MIXTURE

Blend 805 was fifty percent Latakia, twenty five percent Turkish ('Djubec'), and the remainder a balance of three different blending Virginias which are now entirely unavailable. Drucquers hasn't existed for two decades, and the proportions 50 - 25 - 25 are fairly standard, so this isn't a great trade secret being incautiously revealed. Besides which, the staff often informed customers of the proportions of Latakia and Turkish.

[I really wish I remembered more about those Virginias!]


If you liked the Balkan Sobranie Smoking Mixture or Dunhill 965, or even Dunhill Standard Mixture, Rattray's Black Mallory, or several of the oddballs that have long since been discontinued from small British companies, you would like Blend 805. Possibly to the exclusion of anything else.
It was the Virginias, you see. Just the right flavor-spectrum and strength to play well in so heady a barnyard.


The small Chinese woman mentioned earlier had started working at Drucquers while she was in college. By the time I got a job there, she knew more about pipes and tobacco than nearly than any other person. And she had excellent taste, a discerning palate, and extremely high standards.
I will gladly admit that working with her was an education, which, so many years later, I still appreciate.
She smoked 805. Rarely anything else.

It was from her that I got my distaste for aromatics, and learned to pack and smoke properly, as well as how to take care of my pipes so that they remained sweet and clean.

We lost touch during the nineties. No, I shall not mention her name, as there is reason to believe that she is a very private person, and would not wish a spotlight.
But no doubt her taste is still excellent, and her standards as high as ever.


She'd probably be somewhat shocked -- startled, at the very least -- to find out that nowadays I smoke mostly Virginias, VaPers, and flakes. But she always suspected me of strange vices anyway, so it might not be too big a surprise.


Still, in retrospect, Blend 805 was truly one of the very best mixtures on the planet, and it is sad that it can no longer be found. I still have some left, sealed for thirty years. Probably aged nearly beyond recognition, but never-the-less very likely wonderful; a Levantine haze.

Until three years ago my own blending experiments veered between medium English -- like Drucquer's Red Lion, and some of the milder Rattray's Scots mixtures -- and full English, which would be represented by 805, Trafalgar, Levant Drucquers) and the Dunhills already mentioned. Plus, of course, Balkan Sobranie, which went out of production in the early nineties.

[The new Balkan Sobranie, made for Arango by Germain and Son in the Channel Islands, is not the same, not quite. Their product is thinner, stringier, and wetter, and I suspect that the exact blending leaves once used can no longer be found. Plus the recipe they are using may be one of the later Gallagher modifications. Still, whenever I find it, I buy it, as I have a great fondness for it. It brings back memories, because in many ways it is somewhat close.
The nose tingles awake in recollection, the mind replays the past.]


Since 2011 my blending has been variations on the VaPer (Virginias plus Perique) theme; some of the results have been extraordinarily enjoyable. The mind required for such products is different, as is the pleasure of smoking them. They're very old-fashioned. Strong tea, books, throw rugs, and long walks across the blasted heath in foul weather, that last being represented in San Francisco by the urban densities of Nob Hill, Chinatown, and Russian Hill. In lieu of scones and clotted cream afterwards, Hong Kong style milk-tea and red bean pastries or charsiu turnovers.

Like Balkan Sobranie, I am the same as I was, but not the same.
I've changed. There's a possibility that I am more mature.



I don't miss Berkeley; the place has become a priggish hell-hole. But I miss some of the people I got to know through the tobacconist on University Avenue there, as well as their insights. Most particularly do I miss a small Chinese woman who smoked a pipe and had high standards. She was a formative influence; I still read the books she recommended.



Please note: It took slightly less than one pipe-full to write this essay.
Afterwards, I stirred up the ash to coat the inside of the bowl.
Which promotes an even cake formation.
As well as drying.

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A SUITABLE PIPE TOBACCO FOR A WOMAN

Back in the seventies many manufacturers started producing tobacco mixtures with what can only be described as whore-house scents.
At that time it was virtually unthinkable that a well-bred woman would smoke a pipe in public, and such people were clearly not the intended audience for these noxious concoctions.
Their dissolute older brothers were.
There is something very unnatural about a cavendish that reeks of strawberries and coconut. It's Frankenleaf.

Unsurprisingly, such things appealed to men of questionable tastes.
As well as highly individualistic clothing choices.

Back then such people did not have tattoos or piercings, and the poor dears had to express themselves in a different vulgar fashion.

One of the selling points of these perfumed monstrosities was that they would not offend the gentler sex. It is more than likely that they offended so well that the anti-smoking movement was given a boost beyond all reason.
Even pipe-smokers like this blogger were almighty upset.
For years, whenever I smelled burnt cherries or chocolate vanilla and boiled nicotine exudate bubbling in the unclean brier of some macho degenerate half a block away, I was outraged, and resolved to give the hairy savage a piece of my mind. Of course my youthful indignation was tempered by the realization that it is useless to lecture such people, as it only makes them more convinced of their own irresistible sex appeal. They will puff up, and think to themselves "dang I must be studly....... because of this wonderful aroma of tropical fruits and nuts!"
It was usually a balding dweeb with a beer gut.
Pathetic, but let the man be.
He's got issues.
Idiot.


If a man shouldn't smoke crap, then a woman should not either.


A WOODSY SORT OF SMELL

In the early eighties I knew a woman whose taste in pipes and tobacco was beyond compare. One of her prizes was a Sasieni sandblast that made men swivel their heads when she entered the room. To my knowledge, she never ever smoked an aromatic therein, solamente full Latakia mixtures (Drucquer & Sons Blend 805 -- now no longer made). The fragrance was heady and sensual, and added more to her attraction than she could possible realize.
Because of her, all over Berkeley there are middle-aged men who still associate the smell of certain tobaccos with likable lovable women. Especially bespectacled brainiacs with a ready wit and impeccable taste.
She didn't drink, by the way. That wasn't her thing.
Good books, fine pipes, excellent tobaccos.
Absolutely ladylike. Well-bred.

Nice women should smoke nice tobacco. Leave the questionable fruity stuff for questionably fruity boys.

Go for smoky Latakia blends and good pressed Virginias. Perhaps something full and dark, or a robust British flake. Even a Burley mixture for solitude, and also if you have a fondness for corncobs.
In fact, there is nothing wrong with a corncob; properly cared-for these will last for years and yield an excellent smoke, especially if you stuff air-cured leaves in them. Burley and a cob are miraculous.

But under most circumstances, the well-bred young lady should probably tend toward fine tinned tobacco with a noticeable Latakia content, up to nearly half of the mixture. These inspire thoughtfulness and vibrancy, and abundantly reward the woman of good taste. Nothing adds to a good book as much as a nice long smoke, quietly by oneself, while any relatives or roommates who lack understanding are off gallivanting about elsewhere.
If you were to have a spot of sherry or a cup of oolong tea while thus engaged, that would be excellent too.


Looking around my own rather crowded living quarters, I can spot several tobaccos that would be utterly perfect.
Wilderness, Legends, Three Oaks - made by McClelland.
These are well-balanced full Latakia mixtures.
Over two hundred tins of G.L.Pease tobaccos, mostly somewhere in the Oriental spectrum, ranging from mild Latakia and Turkish content all the way up to Westminster, which is a lovely full mixture with a profoundly old-fashioned character, splendid with a strong cuppa.
Samuel Gawith and Germains are well-represented - again, full Orientals, additionally various lovely Virginia compounds.
A three year supply of Rattrays, mostly the Virginias, but also Accountants, Black Mallory, and Red Rapparee.
Several boxes filled with tins by Cornell & Diehl in Morganton; full Latakia, exotics, and Burley blends.
More boxes, containing various Dunhill tobaccos, nicely matured.
And of course numerous jars with my own blending experiments, the majority of which range from 20% Latakia to 42.5 percent. Given that I do not have access to the range of raw leaf that commercial blenders can command, I seldom go beyond the low forty range in my Oriental mixes.
My best blends are around one third Latakia or slightly more, and one of which I'm particularly fond is only in the low twenties. In all cases I rely on a good solid Virginia flake to give spirit to the blend; that is key.

After you've had one or two bowls, and before your housemates come home, air the place out a bit, and wash your face. If necessary, fry up some bacon to confuse their sense of smell.
Yes, you will still have an echo of a dark perfume.
But it will be mysterious and alluring.
Quite complimentary.
Enchanting.

A few good pipes, a selection of tobaccos, a favourite tea-cup, and a private place to smoke. That, and a book you cannot put down. Can you imagine anything nicer?

If your room overlooks a garden, open the window one summer evening and enjoy a bowl of flake in the twilight. It will be magical.


AFTER THOUGHT

Of course it is not a good idea to drink tea late at night, and while sherry or singlemalt are nice, you might not have them on hand.
And perhaps you do not drink alcohol.
In that case, I recommend a glass filled with equal measures of ginger ale and cold water, pepped-up with a squeeze of lime. The slight sweetness and the acid will prevent dry-mouth or minor discomfort on the tongue, and will also help bring out the flavours of the tobacco.

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BALKAN SOBRANIE ARTICLE BY G. L. PEASE

Greg Pease discusses Balkan Sobranie Smoking Mixture in an article at PipesMagazine.com.
It is a significant essay, which pipe smokers will find well-worth reading.


BALKAN SOBRIETY by G.L. Pease
http://pipesmagazine.com/blog/out-of-the-ashes/balkan-sobriety/#more-5519


One of the things he reveals is that the original recipe contained 50% Latakia, which would put it exactly in line with several other well-known mixtures, including what was probably the most popular blend at Drucquer & Sons in Berkeley.

The proportion of 'Coarse Cut Turkish' was 20%. The other tobaccos are unidentifiable, but were most likely flue-cured products.


I have not smoked a significant quantity of the Gallagher versions of Balkan Sobranie - his evidence establishes that Gallagher tinkered with the recipe several times, reducing the Latakia content - and as far as the Drucquer mixtures are concerned I did not smoke them after the early eighties either, as I was going through a bit of a non-smoking spell.
By the time I woke up, both Drucquers and Balkan Sobranie had disappeared.


50%

That fifty percent proportion is very interesting. When I started blending on my own again, I remembered what I had smoked before among the Druquer spectrum, and compounded accordingly.
The Latakia was not the same as it once had been.
Many of the varietal Virginias and other American tobaccos that were available to Drucquers were no longer made.
Black Virginia Ribbon was nowhere to be found.
Consequently my first efforts, while conceptually similar to what I had liked in the past, were unsmokeable monstrosities.
This was back around the turn of the century, and since then I have come up with better personal mixtures.
Of some of them I've made several batches over the years.


It wasn't till Marty Pulvers at Sherlock's Haven on Battery Street introduced me to Greg's products that I realized that actually there were still many fine tobaccos well worth smoking. My initial stockpiling of the new era was several dozen cans of Greg's blends, significantly Kensington and Blackpoint.
Since then I've also put aside a few score tins of Westminster.
Et autres. Lots of autres.

G. L. Pease learned at Drucquer's that age makes a difference.


Age was something that many of the factories in operation since the sixties did not fully understand. They had streamlined their production methods, tightened up their supply chains, and by the eighties what had taken years from farm to smoker was often a much younger, "fresher" product. Some old-style manufacturers had been notorious for having blending stocks older than the owner's grandchildren.
In the modern era, tying up funds for that length of time lessened competitiveness, especially when others kept no more on hand than what was needed for the next production run.
The effect of increased efficiencies on the blends was noticeable over time.
Retail tobacconists and wholesalers also tightened up their stocking practices.
That too had its effect.
Even if the composition was EXACTLY the same as it always had been, it no longer yielded the same end-result.

Robert Rex at Drucquer's understood the effect of age on tobacco.
Greg Pease understood the effect of age on tobacco.

When I first popped open a tin of Greg Pease's Kensington, it reminded me of the smell from tins of Balkan Sobranie when I first became fond of the mixture back in Valkenswaard.
My tobacconist at the time had a supply which had been acquired years before, and I was the first customer in a very long time to develop a fondness for stinky English offerings, as the vast majority of his clientele prefered cigarettes or Dutch cigars. At some point he ran out of stock, and I survived on various other products, including some Dunhill mixtures that had been gathering dust. The newer supply didn't taste quite the same, and when I returned to the States in 1978, the Balkan Sobranie here did not taste the same either.
A certain smell was missing. Plus something else.

Was it really Balkan Sobranie? I had doubts.

But it did have the right amount of Latakia.

So it kept me happy for a while.


THAT CREOSOTE REEK

Nowadays I do not use more than about 42.5% Latakia in my own experimental mixtures. And really, given the blending tobaccos available to the average consumer, 36% to 40% is probably best. This week I've smoked several bowls of something I put together a few months ago that's around thirty percent Latakia, the rest being mostly a medium red Virginia flake, plus some other stuff including Turkish.
The proportions seem quite balanced. And it's pleasantly leathery.


In conversation recently, Greg stated that the quality of Latakia available today is excellent, and again mentioned that since the seventies or earlier the leaf available has been Cyprian rather than Syrian.
He avers that the Latakia today is much the same as we used at Drucquers.
The differences between the two types can be significant - Cyprus grows Smyrna seed tobacco (small leaf, more or less 'Turkish') - whereas Syrian was usually Shek al Bint; large leaf, and to my mind that suggests something more akin to a mild air-cured tobacco, possibly somewhat similar to Maryland (?).
The smoke-curing is also different.

I tend to doubt that modern Latakia is sustainable in a mixture at anywhere near the measure that was once fairly common. But Greg has access to much more good blending stock, and greater variety too. Plus a lot more familiarity and experience with tobacco.
So I'll yield the floor, and refer you to his article for more assured information about Balkan Sobranie.


Besides, Kensington and Westminster are among my favourite tobaccos.
He sure knows how to make a lovely blend.

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DRUCQUER & SONS LTD - A BERKELEY INSTITUTION

One of the first places in Berkeley that became a home away from home away from home for me was the tobacconist at 2059 University Avenue, just below Shattuck.
Drucquer & Sons Ltd. had been founded in London in 1841, then re-established in California in 1928 when John Drucquer III settled in Berkeley. My father had shopped there before the war, my uncles bought their blends from the store when they were at school, old family friends and classmates of my parents.......
Sometime in 1978, in August or September, I walked into the store puffing a pipe and dripping from a deep gash on my hand.
A few months later I was working there.
Must have been that excellent first impression.


BLEND 805

The other employees persuasively introduced me to the most popular blend at the store - made with Latakia, Djubec, and three types of Virginia - before I had even started working there, as well as the strongest Latakia mixture on the shelves (Royal Ransom), Arcadia (similar to Craven A Mixture), Levant (in the same category as Balkan Sobranie 759), and Red Lion (a very traditional English-style mixture of Virginias and Latakia, no Turkish leaf at all).
But Blend 805 was the absolute standard, the hallmark blend - in the same range as Dunhill 965 and Dunhill Standard Mixture, various Rattrays blends, and a multitude of now long gone blends and compounds from legendary English and Scottish houses.

Over several months I obsessively, neurotically even, absorbed more data about pipes, tobacco, and cigars than I had ever imagined possible. More, in any case, than most smokers will ever need.
For a couple of years I also spent time in the back room polishing pipes, steaming out dings, cleaning away caked-up crud, refinishing, restaining, restoring - mostly on collectable pipes left in the care of the shop by the coterie of aficionados that had made Drucquer's their home-base.

[The other employees at Drucquers also introduced me to single-malt Scotch, pure grain alcohol, various Chinese and Philippino restaurants, Vanessi's on Broadway in San Francisco (long gone), Chez Panisse, and sinsemilla. That last substance convinced me that I should never become a pot head - I buffed the trademark off a Barling pipe after Don insisted I have a toke. He used the effect the stuff had on me as the benchmark - one evening I spent several hours on the bus after two puffs, not being able to find my way to the back exit. Haven't touched the stuff in thirty years.]


Robert Rex sold the store in 1982.

Greg Pease started working there a few years later.

Though it was long after I had ceased to frequent the place due to some rather interesting ups and downs in my life, many other regulars still hung around - one does not gladly forsake a provider of good products - and Greg describes both the atmosphere and their company every Saturday at the second location (4024 Piedmont Avenue, Oakland, CA 94611), in an article on his site.



The Back Room

Quote: "...where I first began to learn the subtleties of the pipe, and the profound pleasures it could bring. It was where I was introduced to vintage tobaccos, and the advantages a few years of age would offer those patient enough to lay some tins aside. Very few people consciously aged tobaccos then."

The idea of aging tinned tobacco was, more or less, a happy discovery. Several famous brands had either changed hands or were disappearing during the seventies and eighties, and desperate addicts had stockpiled their favourite smoke before it permanently vanished. Not only the now legendary Balkan Sobranie, about which I have perhaps waffled more obsessively on the internet than almost anybody else, but also State Express (a medium English style mixture with bright Virginia and Syrian Latakia), John Cottons No. 1 & 2, John Cottons Smyrna (like burning ambrosia!), Dobie's Four Square......

Even Dunhills changed enormously, as the old factory in London was closed and BAT moved production to Northern Ireland. What came out of Belfast in the first years was well-nigh unsmokeable, being nasty, twiggy, and rough. Putrid, when compared to the fine old blends we were familiar with.
So it was with considerable amazement that I heard other people complaining about what the Danes were doing to the blends when Murrays was finally shuttered and production moved to the continent.

Given that crusty old farts had insisted that Dunhills and other brands just weren't the same after some seminal event or disaster for at least twenty years already, it was inevitable that old tins were opened up during the seventies and discovered to have changed considerably - a metamorphosis that considerably improved the leaf, while yielding a smoke that bore little resemblance to the smoker's nose-memory of the blend.
Aged tobacco - better than a fresh tin.

[It was while working at Piedmont Avenue that I developed an addiction to fine dark chocolate, by the way. Cocolat had one of their locations diagonally across the street, and daily I would go in for a three or four truffle fix. Cocolat (started by Alice Medrich in Berkeley in 1976), also, is a gilded memory, having closed its doors in the early nineties.]


Greg continues: "It was where I had my first bowls of so many classic tobaccos, including my first brush with the now legendary Craven Mixture, stronger than I’d been led to believe, and which sent me spinning on the dreaded E-ticket ride on the Whirl-n-Hurl, my first experience of high-octane, pipe-induced nausea."

That's quite understandable. Craven Mixture had a strong dark aged Virginia as one of its primary components, and everything else was tailored to fit around that. So it smoked like an English or a Balkan, but kicked like a Navy Flake or a mule.


Greg's article is worth reading in its entirety.
Please visit him HERE.

Many of the people he describes are familiar to me. But the person named Mark whom he mentions is NOT the Mark whom I remember.

Mark Kaufman, alav hashalom, was a brilliant attorney, married to a violinist, who took his own life sometime in the early eighties.
Zichrono livracha.
I still have one of his pipes.
Can't smoke it. Keep thinking of the man.


G. L. PEASE
The Briar & Leaf Chronicles
On the Pleasures and Gentle Art of Pipes and Tobaccos
http://glpease.com/BriarAndLeaf/


ROBERT REX
Deerfield Ranch Winery
http://www.deerfieldranch.com/


I still have a seven-ounce tin of Trafalgar on the shelf, along with a few other Drucquer tobaccos from that time.
One of these days I'll just have to open it up and see how its changed in all these years.

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Other blogposts about tobacco:

BIG HEAP OF TOBACCO
http://atthebackofthehill.blogspot.com/2010/01/big-heap-of-tobacco.html
BALKAN SOBRANIE
http://atthebackofthehill.blogspot.com/search/label/Balkan%20Sobranie/
DRUCQUER & SONS LTD
http://atthebackofthehill.blogspot.com/search/label/Drucquers


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WUSSY BREAST PARTY

This weekend I could’ve gone to a poker party at a friend's house. More or less in celebration of Mothers' Day, it was going to be a charity event for Breast Cancer Awareness.
And I was pleased to be invited - tickled pink, in fact.
I like breasts. Breasts are very nice.

"Please, let me bring something - cigars, Bourbon, pizza. Just tell me."

The offer was sincere. Breast Cancer Poker Party, oh boy!


No cigars! Smoking is bad for you!
No Bourbon! Some AA members will be there!
No Pizza! There will be Vegan snacks!


No cigars, Bourbon, or pizza? What the hell kind of poker party is this?
Did all of you guys learn to play poker from your computers?

Apparently, not all guys. There would be several variations on womanhood there too.
Including the co-host, a big transgendered green lesbian who used to be a weightlifting champ.
Non-smoking, non-drinking, ex-alcoholic.
With very large artificial..... landscaping.


I decided that there were too many conflicts of interest for me to attend, and declined gracefully.


When I was still in college I took part in a few poker parties. Nothing like a bunch of guys hanging around all evening smoking stogies purchased at Drucquer & Sons on University avenue, scarfing down pepperoni pizza, swilling Bourbon, and telling off-colour jokes. By four o'clock in the morning, everyone has fallen asleep - whether it's the oxygen deprivation or the booze that done 'em in is immaterial.
By ten in the morning, you'll wake up on a couch, seriously groggy and achy.
You'll slowly bring your still-plastered self to an upright position, and survey the damage.

Oh my. Half-eaten pizza everywhere. Empty bottles. Ashtrays filled with butts.

It reeks.

You look at your companions, still sleeping the sleep of the wicked. One of them is on the rug in front of the teevee, head in an overturned bowl of potato chips. One of them is in lying in a recliner, with a layer of drool down his chin. Two of them are slumped over the table.
And one of them is on the other couch. The apartment dog (a retriever) is there too.
Eating a slice of cheese pie off the recumbent body.
She must have fallen asleep while eating, the pizza is wedged between her breasts.

One of the guys, I need to explain, was the mom of one of the guys.

A woman with the body of Marilyn Monroe as Lorelei Lee and the sensibilities of Walther Matthau as Oscar Madison.

She had shared a box of Royal Jamaica Presidentes with us. Anybody who can bring a box of fine cigars to a poker party is a welcome addition.
Even if she is bankrolling her son, and swears that we're all a bunch of sissies.
We didn't dare argue, heck, we couldn't dispute it - she was outdrinking and outsmoking us.

At all times, respect the voice of experience.
One might learn something.

Bourbon and stale pizza - the breakfast of champions.
As well as their moms.
Also champions.


The body of Marilyn Monroe and the sensibilities of Walther Matthau


I'm fairly certain that if she had organized the "Great Mothers Day Breast Cancer Charity Poker Party", there would have been cigars.
And Bourbon, and pizza.
She believed that if you were old enough to stay up all night, you were old enough to make your own decisions about what to stick in your body.
Sometimes, a temple becomes a toilet.
Grown-ups have choices.
Not all rational.


Anyhow, I didn't go to the poker party yesterday, but I do support breast cancer organizations.
We've all been incredibly fond of people who have breasts. Wonderful people.
And breasts are wonderful too.
Support your local mammaries.
Donate.


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THE COMPLETE INTERNET FETISHIST

Occasionally I check out the stats for this blog to find out how many people cruised on in, and what they were looking for.
My readers (including you) are a fascinating lot.

You'll be pleased to know that the Pakistanis haven't discovered me yet - they lead the world in Google searches for "child sex", "animal sex", and "rape sex", so it should be quite a while before they come here. None of those categories of typical Pakistani sexuality are featured much on this blog.
Except in passing, primarily to sneer at Pakistanis.


What are my readers looking for instead?


Drucquer & sons tobacconist
This search I can well understand. I worked at Drucquers for a few years, and like many pipesmokers I keenly wish it had not faded from sight. The famous mixtures that this store produced are no longer made, alas. But those who remember blends such as Trafalgar or Red Lion with fondness will no doubt have already discovered Greg Pease, who since leaving Drucquers went into the tobacco business for himself, and has compounded some absolutely fabulous stuff.

Balkan Sobranie
Another search-criterium that has my sympathy. And like Drucquers, Sobranie is no more. Some people are paying extraordinary prices for unopened tins, three hundred dollars and up. Which is rather ridiculous.
I still have over a dozen tins, and I'm not selling. Sorry.

Frilly panties
A cute posterior attractively packaged in frilly panties may well be one of the finer things in life. But you will find no pictures on this blog, nor excessively tactile descriptions. Again, sorry.
I encourage you to find or feel your own.

Geert wilders
This must be a newly popular sexual fetish. Frankly, I am rather appalled, but I realize that most people cruise the internet looking for Balkan Sobranie, kittens, and Japanese porn. To the best of my knowledge, there is no Japanese porn featuring Geert Wilders. Yet.

Black lace garter belt
Like the aforementioned 'Frilly Panties', one of the finer things in life. At some point I may acquire one of these myself, but I would much rather meet a person who wears one.

Pipe smoking ladies
Probably the sweetest fantasy that anyone can have. No, it's not sexual. Charming young women should smoke pipes. Cigarettes are for sailors, snuff is for coots.

Little virgins
This too is wonderful, especially if you're a Dutchman. Cover 'em with chopped onion. Even many non-Dutch love little virgins, although the Germans tend to pickle them in a vinegar solution, and other people drench them with cream or capers.
I do not know anyone who isn't fond of matjes herring.



You will note that this post is both self-serving and YOU serving.
I got to post links to some of my most popular articles (thus boosting them in internet searches), and you now have a handy list of everything you've always wanted. Enjoy.

Sorry, Pakistanis, nothing here for you.
But do please keep checking.
Regularly.


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ASTLEYS NO. 99 - FULL LATAKIA MIXTURE

In the seventies there was a middle-aged medical gentleman at the Eindhovensche golf-course with whom I would occasionally share pipe tobacco. He would have some of my ribbon cut Maryland, I would try some of whatever he had in his pouch. We did not speak much, and having lit up, would part and go our own way - I did not drink in the clubhouse in those days, and preferred to wander around near the swampy end of the links where the scrubby pines and sand gave way to pools of black water in the forest.
Occasionally I would run into him there also - especially if he was golfing by himself, and hitting his balls badly.


RATTRAY'S
In 1981, when I still restored pipes in the backroom of Drucquers, and lived with my grandmother in Berkeley, I discovered Rattray's tobacco. Charles Rattray of Perth produced blends of great repute, seasoning assertive Virginias boldly with Turkish, Latakia, and Perique.

In those days I would go out to the end of the Berkeley Pier after teatime to watch the sun set and smoke a pipe. Doing so was peaceful, and allowed me to forget things. The pipe was often a Castello, the tobacco was Rattray's.

That autumn my grandmother finally succumbed to cancer, and I severed my ties to Drucquers, crashed the car, and put aside Rattray's tobacco.
I no longer have that Castello pipe.


KOHLHASE & KOPP
Rattray closed and the blends eventually landed in the care of Kohlhase & Kopp in Germany, who, despite many recent negative reviews by crotchety old crocks, are doing a credible interpretation of the blends. The only major difference, and this is actually a serious problem, is that the climate in their part of Germany does not resemble the climate in Perth - average temperatures differ, as do moisture levels in the air. It really does change the flavour of the blends considerably. The bacterial influences are not the same.


ASTLEYS
Quite recently I cracked open a tin of Astleys No. 99.
Astleys is another brand that was once ranked up there with the legendary British tobacconists, most of which were eccentric operations run by opinionated gentlemen sincerely devoted to guiding their smokers on a fragrant journey. Many of them were either heirs to a family business, or staff who had purchased the company upon the owners retiring. Astleys had been founded in 1862, and was owned by Mr. Bentley, whose family had acquired the store in the nineteen thirties.
Astleys was located in the Piccadilly Arcade - their address of note was 109 Jermyn Street. They blended their own tobacco, and had pipes made for them by Comoy, GBD, and Charatan. They closed their doors about four years ago, I believe.
Their tobaccos are now, like Rattray's blends, manufactured by Kohlhase & Kopp.


Almost all of the great London tobacconists are gone now. Times have indeed changed.



ASTLEYS No. 99 ROYAL TUDOR
Full Latakia Mixture
"Traditional full strength English mixture of Virginia, Turkish and Latakia."

Kohlhase & Kopp
Von hand gemischt und gepakt


This tobacco smells in the tin precisely like an old fashioned British mixture should; nicely plummy-raisiny, due to a proportion of pampered Virginias. The problem is the description of the product as a full Latakia mixture.
Which it isn't. Not by a long shot.

Unless you started smoking a pipe back in the nineteenth century, when this blend would indeed have been at the full end of the spectrum, Latakia-wise.

It's an excellent product, and the cut is lovely. It is, however, so old-fashioned a blend that many modern pipe-smokers will not understand it, nor want to understand it. It reflects a blending tradition that based everything on the interplay of condimentals and base tobaccos, with the seat of honour given to a ribbon Virginia. Such blends were frequently melded by panning over heat, causing the flavours of the tobaccos to mix and unite.
As such it cannot possibly appeal to young men, or smokers searching for a full strength Latakia dump. It is far too restrained.

There is a nice sweetness to the first few puffs, that slowly gives way to a more complex range of flavours, before gracefully closing at the bottom of the bowl.
It smokes easy, and will not bite unless provoked.

This is perfect for wet summer days. Teatime and early evening. Perhaps with a bottle of sherry and a good thick book.


AFTERTHOUGHT

You will note that I have already mentioned Kohlhase & Kopf in reference to Rattray's. But there is another point where Rattray's and Astleys coincide - the Astleys No. 99 is remarkably reminiscent of the Rattray's blends that I smoked in 1981.
I suspect that the medical gentleman at the Eindhovensche Golfclub must have been a smoker of either Rattray's or Astleys, and I'm inclined to believe that it was actually Astleys' tobacco in his pouch. There was a Londonian temper to his habits.

I shall not smoke this often, but I will order more of it from back east, along with a few tins of Astleys No. 1 Medium Latakia Mixture. Which is a little more Scottish in its tendencies.



Post-teatime afterthought: You might want to read up on Rattrays. In October of 2006, when this blog was still young, I quoted several angry people on the subject of Rattray's tobaccos.
See here:
http://atthebackofthehill.blogspot.com/2006/10/they-are-beasts.html
Their remarks can fairly be described as cheapskates mad with both barrels. Each one of them spent money on that tobacco.

TOBACCO INDEX


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DRUCQUER & SONS LTD - PIPE TOBACCO BLENDS REMEMBERED, AND A DISCUSSION OF TOBACCOS AND TIPS

A reader writes:

I found your web blog, which is the only reference Google could find on "Drucquer Levant" blend. I've got a very small amount left which is pretty dry. I'd like to find something similar in flavor, possibly with less nicotine.

Any idea what were the components in Levant, and the rough proportions?
Or any similar blend, maybe from Pease? I think I also liked Drucquer's 805, but I like Levant better. I don't think I ever tried Royal Ransom, but it sounds like I would have liked it, too.


So. Let us discuss tobacco (readers who are not interested should probably skip this post...).


DRUCQUER'S PIPE TOBACCO

Brief description of Drucquer & Sons Ltd pipe tobacco blends:
Royal Ransom - slightly more than half Latakia, with Turkish and Virginia (including black Virginia to mellow the Latakia). Similar to Sobranie black and Nightcap.
Levant Mixture - full strength English-Balkan mixture. Possibly like Royal Ransom but with a bit more Turkish.
Mixture 805 - the classic English mixture, half Latakia with the remainder evenly divided between Turkish and Virginias (comparable to Sobranie white and 965).
Trafalgar - a classic Balkan, the oriental balanced by enough Latakia to be noticed (around 37.5 percent?) and Virginia to support.
Red Lion - about forty percent Latakia, the rest a mixture of Virginias, no Turkish (I wish I could remember what the Virginias were - it tasted complex enough that I didn't miss the Turkish.
Arcadia Mixture - lower on the Latakia totem-pole than the blends mentioned precedingly, with some dark Virginias to boost the Turkish, ribbon Virginia to lighten the load, and a hint of toasted Cavendish.
Temple Bar - no Turkish, a blend of light and medium Virginias spiced with Latakia (probably slightly over a third of the total), and maybe (?) a touch of Perique.
Inns of Court - a complex mixture containing the full range of Virginias with some Burley and Maryland, plus Latakia (less than Temple Bar) and Perique.
Prince's Blend - a Virginia Mixture with minor amounts of Latakia and Perique as spice, some air-cured (?).
The Devil's Own - a Virginia base with depth, spiced with less Latakia than Inns of Court.
Ye Olde London Baccy - a Virginia and Burley mixture which I found hard to like (hardly any Latakia).
Blairgowrie - matured Virginias with some Perique, somewhat dry.
St. James - a classic Scottish mixture with both Oriental leaf and Perique.

[Years before I started working at Drucquers each of these blends had its own label, the printing blocks for which were still in the backroom. But by the late seventies a light brown generic label was used, with the blend name rubber-stamped in the space provided. Early in the eighties five other blends were developed, stoved and aged in the tin - they were actually pretty good, but I don't remember a darn thing about them. I think all of them were English blends.]



REGARDING LEVANT MIXTURE

Levant was a full English blend. Those are usually around fifty percent Latakia, twenty five percent Turkish (Oriental), and twenty five percent Virginia (flue-cured) - these were the exact proportions of the 805.
With English and Balkan blends the proportions may vary, but there is usually twice as much Latakia as Turkish - though blends identified as Balkan often increase the Turkish slightly in proportion.


If I remember correctly, Levant was just at or slightly above that fifty percent Latakia mark (but maybe not quite twenty five percent Turkish). Both Latakia and Turkish have relatively low nicotine levels. Virginias (and all other flue-cureds) have medium to medium-high levels of nicotine. Burleys (none to my knowledge in the Levant mixture - mentioning them for perspective) have medium-high to quite high levels of nicotine.


Sweetness (the natural sugars) vary also - Latakia is hardly sweet, Turkish is low-medium, Virginia is high. Burley, depending on how it was processed after aircuring, may have no sweetness whatsoever, or be so sweet (added sugars and flavourings) as to leave your pipe a tar-pit of bubbling ick.



G. L. PEASE and DUNHILL

If you want low nicotine, go for a full English or Balkan mixture.

GL Pease produces a number of blends which are very good. See here:
http://atthebackofthehill.blogspot.com/2006/03/pipe-tobacco-some-g-l-pease-blends.html
I would think that Abingdon would be a good choice. But his products are all quite good.


Dunhill ups the Turkish ante nicely, see here:
http://atthebackofthehill.blogspot.com/2006/04/pipe-tobacco-some-dunhill-mixtures.html
For a really full Latakia level, I recommend Nightcap. For an emphasis on Turkish, try Durbar.


ADDENDUM as of September 16, 2016:
What has Greg Pease done since drucquers? just a few GLP tobaccos.
For the past several years I have been smoking mostly flakes, though I still love Latakia blends. There are moments of crystal clarity that require dark leaf, but during the working days Virginias are very forgiving.
Another great blender was Mr. Bob Runowski, who is no longer among us. His efforts lay in the Burley realm.
One person who should have gone into blending, but didn't, is Miss Lim, with whom I lost contact in the nineties. Two decades later I am still influenced by her taste in literature, food, and pipes. Not sure if she would appreciate that.


BLENDING

If you want to blend your own full English mixture, think in these proportions to start:

10 or 11 parts Latakia.
5 parts Turkish (also called Oriental, includes Greek tobacco).
3 to 5 parts mixed Virginias.
1 part Black Virginia.

Your choice of Virginias will determine how you proceed from here. And you may decide that the black Virginia is unnecessary. On the other hand, several blends from English and Scottish houses relied on black Virginia as a component that could well carry its own weight in blends dominated by the Orientals (Turkish and Latakia).

Latakia is Oriental leaf from Syria or nowadays Cyprus, cured over smoldering fires till dark and resinous. Surprisingly, it can be used in large proportion, though anything more than about forty-five percent is risky - the remainder of the blend may lack complexity and character. Thirty to forty percent is quite noticeable. McClelland sells this in fifty gramme tins. Most wholesalers should carry it, and any tobacco store which has house blends should also have some.

Turkish by itself has a grassy smell, and needs the Latakia (which develops the resinous quality of the Turkish, in addition to contributing its own smoky creosote-like aroma). Greek, Balkan, and Persian tobacco is included under the nomen 'Turkish'. It is available in a pure form from McClelland in 50 gramme tins (Oriental).

Red Virginia and Bright Virginia (usually ribbon-cut) are bland and fruity, but combine well with Turkish - nevertheless, they can bite ferociously if they dominate, so I would rub out a medium flake (unflavoured - McClelland produces some very fine examples) and use that with only a little bright or red ribbon. Note that Virginias also come from elsewhere - Mozambique, India, Canada, etcetera. Available at most tobacconists.

Black Virginia (NOT Toasted Cavendish!) is a heavily stoved black shiny sweet leaf - it cuts tongue bite, and assists Latakia. Any blend which has bright ribbon Virginia will probably benefit from Black Virginia. Available at most tobacconists.

Toasted Cavendish, in small quantities, adds an old-fashioned perfumy quality. Available at most tobacconists.

Perique may also be added. Two to five percent of a blend. Unless you want to grow hair inside your breathing apparatus, in which case up to ten or twelve percent. It counters the bitey-ness of ribbon Virginias, and adds a saltiness, plus complexity. Best used at a low percentage, just under the radar. Made in Louisiana by a process of controlled rot.
Available at most tobacconists, but also in fifty gramme tins from McClelland.

Burley is nutlike in taste and smell. In small quantities it emphasizes the smokiness of Latakia, but suppresses the floweriness of Turkish. Quality and level of adulteration with stinky sweeteners vary from supplier to supplier. Formerly only Kentucky, now from all over.

Maryland is a mild and not very distinctive relative of Burley, good to add in proportions of up to about twelve percent to improve how a blend smokes. It can be smoked straight, but that would prove unexciting. Nicotine content is roughly the same as Virginia or slightly higher, with which it pairs nicely as the lesser component. Usually not available from local tobacco stores, but probably on the internet.

[Correction as of 2014: Maryland is actually quite low on the nicotine score, and not, as I had assumed, simply a relative of Burley. The state is discouraging its cultivation now, and paying farmers to convert their curing sheds to art-spaces, cottages, and studios. Consequently much Maryland leaf is now grown in Italy. Bless those Italians.]

Cavendish is pressed and heated leaf, usually Virginia, but the process is also used for Burleys. The heating opens the cells and lets the leaf absorb a disturbing amount of flavouring. Unflavoured Cavendish can be a valuable addition - Dunhill uses Cavendish Virginias in a lot of their English mixtures (it allows a greater proportion of Turkish).

Flake is heavily pressed aged tobacco. Like Cavendish this is usually Virginia. Flakes can be used as blending bases with little other Virginia added, or to add sweetness and a matured taste. One must be careful, however, as these dense products can also unbalance the smoking characteristics of Oriental blends.


Some more on blending, as of January 2013: further notes


Cornell & Diehl (here: http://cornellanddiehl.com/ and here: http://cornellanddiehl.com/blending_tobaccos.htm ) is a good source for various blending tobaccos, but they also produce a number of interesting compounds - explore their website.

TOBACCO INDEX


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