Recent content by Mongo

LJ Peretti's Royal Blend has a bunch of Yenidje in it. An excellent tobacco from an excellent store.

With most non-aromatic pipe tobaccos, "fresh" usually isnt' the goal Tobaccos mature over time, and change in amazing ways given enough time. (I recently opened an eight year old tin of GL Pease' Haddo's Delight, and it was truly remarkable. I enjoy the tobacco when it's young, but after this...

For flat metal tins (round or square), I put the tobacco into a platic bag, fold up the bag (expelling as much air as possible), put the package back into the tin, then wrap a rubber band tightly around the tin to hold the lid down on the base. This pushes the soft sealing strip that's inside...

I've been threatening to do this for years. My best, oldest, dearest friend called me on it: He gave me a pre-drilled Pimo plateux block with a bit for my birthday. I've studied the block and now know what I want to do with it. As soon as I find my vice and pick up some dust masks, I'm going...

I rarely set out to do this intentionally, but I do end up doing it quite often. I'm a very slow smoker, and oftentimes have to put a bowl down simply because it's bedtime. I've not had a bowl turn bad from being allowed to sit overnight, though I suspect that wet aromatics might not react...

Thanks for the birthday wishes everyone.

I prefer a sandblasted finish on a pipe. I like the tactile pleasure a blast provides while revealing the beauty of the wood. The depth of the blast isn't the most important characteristic for me; rather, it's how well the blast enhances the appearance of the pipe. A good blast still shows...

I'm fairly sure that Black Dog was reformulated when the warehouse fire burned up the Syrian Latakia that C&D and Greg Pease were using. I'd check with Craig before buying a bunch of this for the Syrian, as it likely now contains Cyrprian Latakia.

Congratulations Lucky...you have a much better cellar than I had when I was a "Noobie". (Back when dinosaurs roamed the Earth.) In addition to Dock's "One tin per week rule", I'll add my personal rule: Never buy one tin of anything. Buy two, and put one away. Best of luck!

SG Best Brown in a Jack Howell long-shank billiard. What a combination!

I love RB Plug, and have a Sasieni prince dedicated to it. If I'm not in the mood to cut up a plug of RB, I can load the pipe up with a Virginia or Va/Perique blend and have the RB experience without the work. I did this once for about three months, and the taste of RB never seemed to...

Nightcap in a Radice bent billiard. I don't get back to this stuff often enough.

I never think of myself as the type of person who collects pipe tools, but somehow I've managed to gather a bunch over the years. I've got the usual collection of Czech pipe tools (both the older, larger version as well as the current one), various nails, a pipe-shaped tool with metal sides (at...

For me, Westminster was a rare "swing-and-a-miss" for Greg Pease. There are many of his blends in my top tier, but Westminster didn't do anything for me. It was very popular when it was launched, so it's safe to assume that I was in the minority. I do have a few tins put away to see if some...

Thanks for the heads-up. I'm going to be inventorying my cellar next month, and I'll be sure to check the tins as I go along. I'll report anything that I find that's out of the ordinary.