Types of Tobacco used in blends

Common Types of Tobacco used in blends.

These are the main ingredients found in pipe tobacco.

Virginia – Leaf colors are red, lemon, orange and mahogany. The mildest of all blending tobaccos. Virginia tobacco has a high natural sugar content and a sweet taste, it is used in virtually all blends as it is a good burner and lights easily. It imparts a light, mild, sweet taste, which naturally increases when properly aged before blending.

Burley – A naturally thicker leaf than Virginia, Burley is the second most widely used leaf tobacco. It has a soft, nutty/ chocolate taste that never bites. their colors range from light brown to dark brown.  It also burns very slowly and is used for slowing down the combustion rate for many blends.

Cavendish – Cavendish is a process of curing and cutting method. Often mistaken for a type of tobacco leaf. Cavendish is actually a type of manufacturing process. This special heating and curing process used to bring out the natural sweet taste in the tobacco. The process also creates a tobacco that is quite mild, very light in taste, and easy to pack. There are several colors, including the well-known Black Cavendish, and a wide range of flavors such as vanilla, cherry, chocolate, coconut, rum, strawberry, and Whiskey.

Black Cavendish – The natural process of heating and curing Virginia tobacco to bring out the natural sweet flavor.

“Taste” of Tobaccos

Think of these blends as adding sugar, salt and pepper to a meal. Most of these tobaccos are added to pipe tobacco to create some unique flavors and aromas.

Perique – “Spice” tobacco grown only in Louisiana. Perique is a very dark tobacco that is renowned for its very spicy flavor usually used in Virginia blends. Its unique flavor is quite strong, so it isn’t usually found in high percentages in a blend.

Latakia – Basically, Latakia is Oriental tobacco. The leaf color is black and has a very strong aromatic and smoked taste that is similar to burning leaves. Latakia is a very overpowering tobacco that is primarily used in English blends pipe tobacco.

Oriental – Its leaves are 2 – 15 cm long and have light golden to dark orange color. Oriental tobacco leaves have a light and sweet aroma.  The tobaccos in this category are grown in Western Turkey, Macedonia, Cyprus, Greece, and Syria.