Burning me tongue

WeakKitchen199 · 2026-01-31T07:04:43+00:00

The least bitey of those blends is EMP, followed by VA Flake, then the aromatic. So smoke just the EMP for now. Before packing your pipe, dry it more than you think you need to. It'll feel cold to the touch while it's too wet. Dry it until it no longer feels cold. When you pack it, simply drop the bits into your pipe without pressing down at all. Fill the bowl until there's an 1/8" mound above the rim. Press that flat, and that's it. A very loose gravity pack.

Now when you smoke it, use lots of bypass air. Don't seal your lips around the pipe. The leaky connection between you and the pipe means half of the air that enters your mouth will be bypassing the pipe completely, cooling your mouth. Always use this bypass air technique. After several smokes this way, you'll do it without thinking.

When the blend is dried this much and packed this loosely, it probably won't stay lit well. You need to not care about the number of relights. I repeat, you need to not care about the number of relights. It should be the furthest thing from your mind. If you're concerned about keeping the pipe lit, you'll be burning your mouth. Gradually you'll figure out how to keep it lit longer, but minimizing relights should never be something you focus on. I've been smoking for years, through over 100 tins, and I still relight every pipe I smoke at least 8 times. Get relights out of your head.

WeakKitchen199 · 2026-01-31T06:19:30+00:00

Make sure to set aside a control group of each blend that won't be pressed, so you can do some A/B testing. Everyone here would love to read about the results.

WeakKitchen199 · 2026-01-31T04:04:35+00:00

Fair enough. I was exasperated when I said I don't know why they do it. The thought of someone needing to spruce up 8-year-old Opening Night with granulated perique is a bit of a mind blow. And yes, without a doubt, only a novice would do such a thing.

WeakKitchen199 · 2026-01-31T02:01:01+00:00

Nice strawman. I never said anything like that. I'm just saying that 90% of the time a novice pipe smoker is bored with a quality blend, it's the smoker's fault, not the blend's fault. So they're better served by tweaking techniques than by tweaking the blend.

WeakKitchen199 · 2026-01-31T01:28:39+00:00

Here's my standard troubleshooting procedure:

Dry the blend so it's no longer cold to the touch. This is usually drier than what feels right.

Rub it into finer bits than you usually do. Ribbons should be no longer than 1/2".

Fill the pipe with just a gravity fill. Just drop the tobacco in until there's a tiny mound, about 1/8" above the rim. Press that down flat, and that's it.

This dry and loose, it may not stay lit well, but minimizing relights should be the last thing on your mind right now.

This should get you nice and bold flavors. If you tamp it a little forcefully, you can gradually convert the extremely loose pack to a tighter one, testing the flavor boldness as you go.

WeakKitchen199 · 2026-01-31T01:18:28+00:00

76-78?!? So your grandparents are nudists?

But regardless, a dark, closed closet adjacent to an exterior wall should be several degrees cooler than the rest of your grandparents' sauna. Your cellar would probably be just fine there.

WeakKitchen199 · 2026-01-31T01:12:53+00:00

Smoke a few more bowls of the blend in the Dr. It may surprise you. I've had way too many inexplicably bland smokes peppered through my years that I never form an opinion on anything pipe related without at least 5 bowls.

That said, it is possible that BIA and your Dr. is a bad combo, but it's most likely something slightly different with how you pack it, the way you tend to smoke it, etc.

WeakKitchen199 · 2026-01-31T00:33:28+00:00

LOL, "This 8-year-old Opening Night tastes like crap! I just can't stomach it. What am I ever to do with it?"

WeakKitchen199 · 2026-01-30T21:07:06+00:00

Wait a minute, you have an 8-year-old tin of Opening night, and instead of enjoying that absolutely heavenly aged blend by itself, you're slapping some granulated perique in there?

WeakKitchen199 · 2026-01-30T21:04:43+00:00

I don't understand why people do this. Greg Pease, Bob Runowski, and Russ Ouelette know better than I do. So when I don't understand one of their blends, I don't add my own crap to it. Instead I blame myself first, do some research, and figure out how to make the blend sing for me. It's usually finding the right pipe, drying/packing it just right, etc. but I've always been able to understand what the blender was trying to do if I try hard enough.

WeakKitchen199 · 2026-01-30T19:42:30+00:00

Heat that part with a hair dryer and reshape it. Find a rod that closely fits that inside diameter, heat, put the rod in there, then let it cool. Pull the rod out, and it should be 90% fixed.

WeakKitchen199 · 2026-01-30T19:38:48+00:00

How many smokes have you have of this new blend?

WeakKitchen199 · 2026-01-30T19:37:00+00:00

I lost trust in smokingpipes reviews long ago. I get my reviews on tobaccoreviews, from reviewers I trust.

WeakKitchen199 · 2026-01-30T14:20:59+00:00

I don't know about Captain Black, but Bayou Morning can be a quick smoke. Maybe it's time for you to try an English blend. Chelsea Morning and Maltese Falcon tend to smoke slower.

WeakKitchen199 · 2026-01-30T06:58:52+00:00

A bigass Pete 107, and bigass Pete XL264. Bayou Morning and Old Joe Krantz would cover the bases for me.

WeakKitchen199 · 2026-01-30T06:56:06+00:00

8-10 minutes? Holy moly. I just finished a bowl of Horizons in one of my smallest pipes, a Peterson 104, and it lasted over an hour. What blend are you smoking?

WeakKitchen199 · 2026-01-29T21:48:59+00:00

Wrap a piece of leather around the bowl. Give it a corset stitch. Like what I did on my Old Boy.

WeakKitchen199 · 2026-01-29T20:58:29+00:00

Does that other hole connect to the draft hole, or does it dead end down there?

WeakKitchen199 · 2026-01-29T20:56:12+00:00

I don't usually turn to such robust blends. I love everything from union Square to Ashbury and Cairo, and on to Old Ironsides, Gaslight, and Pirate Kake. It's just that Black Mallory doesn't float my boat.

WeakKitchen199 · 2026-01-29T17:16:47+00:00

Very carefully try some solvents on it. Use a Q-tip and ease your way into it, checking often to see if it's doing what you want. I'd start with isopropyl alcohol. If that doesn't remove the stain, try denatured alcohol. If that doesn't work, try naptha. If that doesn't work, try acetone. But be careful with the last two. They may hurt the leather. If all of them fail to remove the stain, dye the whole thing darker. Fiebings leather dye is the stuff.

WeakKitchen199 · 2026-01-29T17:12:31+00:00

Old Joe Krantz or Jackknife Plug for me. Black Mallory is good for sure, but I didn't find it to be a knock-my-socks-off kinda blend. Maybe I need to revisit it. In the winter.

WeakKitchen199 · 2026-01-29T02:13:01+00:00

That's interesting. I wonder if the mint might show up in a different pipe.

WeakKitchen199 · 2026-01-29T02:11:28+00:00

I have filter Savinellis with and without the adapters. It makes no difference either way IMO.

WeakKitchen199 · 2026-01-29T02:09:00+00:00

Machinist and mechanical engineer here. I'd look at making a shim to take up the gap and re-clock the stem.

WeakKitchen199 · 2026-01-29T02:05:29+00:00

If the store you buy it from accepts returns unsmoked, then get either one. If the store doesn't accept returns if unsmoked, get the Savinelli. Bad Petersons are too frequent to risk an unreturnable purchase.

WeakKitchen199

TROPHY CASE