Brebbia Balkan and ammonia

[mike_68]

Ok...I'm hoping this post will serve 2 purposes. First as a question and second as a warning of sorts.

Question - have any of you experienced smelling a very ammonia -like smell when burning a particular tobacco? I was smoking a bowl of Brebbia Balkan today and with about a quarter of it left, I smelled ammonia! I was sniffing the air on the porch because I knew what I smelled but didn't think it could possibly be coming from my pipe. When I took my next puff I smelled it again...it wasn't lingering but I SWEAR I smelled.it. Has anyone ever experienced this?

Warning-As the one person on BoB that might have recently recommended this toby, and if you might have taken my advice, I apologize if you have a bad experience with this stuff. Honestly, my first couple of bowls of this stuff were good but I've wrestled with it ever since. It's been bitey and I've not found an optimal drying time for it either...just a real challenge.

Anyway, I'm gonna keep trying but I'm not really feeling it anymore. Danggit!

 

[szyzk]

I have no idea if pipe tobacco acts nearly the same as cigar tobacco, but from my experiences with cigars I can offer this: ammonia is a by-product of tobacco fermentation. I don't know how possible it is, but your tobacco could be going through this.

Or, somebody could have dropped some cleaning materials on your 'baccy at the factory. :lol:

 

[Richard Burley]

I'm really stretching here, but I seem to remember reading a long time ago that cigarette tobacco sometimes has ammonia added to it to boost the nicotine hit. Cigarette smokers wouldn't know the difference. (I also vaguely remember reading somewhere that dry snuff is sometimes added to pipe tobacco [the Lakeland types] for the same reason.) Take my musings for what they're worth--essentially nothing. But it does seem insane that a pipe tobacco producer would add something that reeks like ammonia to a blend. Of all the scents I have detected in tobacco, real or imagined, that one has so far eluded me. What you need is a chemist, and I fled from the field after high school, never to return--a tremendous loss to civilization. Let us know how you make out, if you live to tell the story.

 

[mike_68]

I can tell you this...one more bowl and if I smell that again, it's ALL hitting the trash...I wondered if maybe it was some by product of fermentation and maybe my only frame of reference was "ammonia" although it might not actually BE ammonia.

Not sure but it sucked...

 

[szyzk]

I can tell you this...one more bowl and if I smell that again, it's ALL hitting the trash...I wondered if maybe it was some by product of fermentation and maybe my only frame of reference was "ammonia" although it might not actually BE ammonia.

Not sure but it sucked...

If it is a fermentation - and again, I don't know if pipe tobaccos go through that like cigars - it may just need to be put away for a while. It happens to cigars all the time, sometimes over the first year that they're in my humidor (I've noticed this on almost all of my Cubans because they aren't aged pre-retail like most non-Cubans are, and the Arturo Fuente Anejo and Opus are notorious for this too), sometimes not until the 24 to 36 month mark.

When I find a cigar that's doing this it goes into quarantine and I'll forget about it for 6 months before I check it again. Then, I won't touch them again for another 6 months.

If nothing else, this might be an interesting science experiment for you. Tuck it away for a while and come back to it only to allow an air exchange (and I know that goes against everything that people do to age tobacco, but you'll want to allow the ammonia to escape and to "wash out" the container with fresh air)... Then, when you open the tin and don't smell anything, and if the tobacco itself doesn't smell, you can try it.

I'll dig around the GLP website to see if he has any information on tobacco fermentation. Maybe I'm completely off the mark, and my second brainstorm which was more of a joke than anything else ("Or, somebody could have dropped some cleaning materials on your 'baccy at the factory.") is actually the correct answer. In that case, there's no reason to save the stuff - but I would at least contact Brebbia about it.

 

[Anonymous]

Second-hand info here --

Briar has to be "seasoned" before making pipes of it even though it's been dried adequately. If it isn't, it will not be a good-tasting pipe for quite some time (a point people seem to overlook in their excitement at scoring a pretty one at an ultra-low price. Guess how the outfit that made it pulled that off ? Blocks of bought-&-paid-for briar laying around in a warehouse for years are murdering cash flow).

Tobacco, similarly, needs to be turned periodically, "sweated" &c. for a surprisingly long time before it's really ready to blend/roll. If not, you'll have an analogous situation to the cigar problem.

ANY tobacco, no matter how long it's been tinned, CAN present you with a whiff of ammonia now and again. I swear (as what passes these days for "an honest man") that I've (briefly) detected the unmistakable "Lakeland Shampoo" in smoking Balkan Sobranie Virginian Nr. 10 that was tin-aged 20+ years.

But little weirdness like that should be occasional and interesting -- not consistent. If they are, it probably points to a manufacturing shortcut. And not necessarily one endorsed by the outfit the blender employed to produce his blend for sale.

:face:

 

[the macdonald]

Sometimes the Oriental part of Balkan blends pop up and hit me as sort of an ammonia or cat piss-ish sort of funk. I'm never sure if it is the pipe/blend combo, packing or what, but I've experienced it. The tangy, pungent oriental spectrum can be sort of a tricky animal becuase how it's percieved can be greatly effected by what it's blended with.

 

[Dave_In_Philly]

I get ammonia rather often actually. I just assumed it was normal. Its always in a pipe that's smoking particularly wet and and hot and giving me trouble keeping it lit. If I were you and your next bowl gives off the same smell I'd set it aside for a month or so, the let it dry well before smoking again.

 

[mike_68]

Thanks for all the responses, at least I know I'm not the only one that's experienced it. I'll try letting it sit a bit more...see what that does....thanks again!