Custom Blends: Giving away our secrets!

It’s been a few weeks now since the new tobacco legislation came into effect and people are still adjusting to it. In the grand scheme of things, it hasn’t been too horrible for us. Sure, our packets are now a little more off-putting, (or very off-putting in the case of cigs) but – other than certain flavoured tobaccos- we’ve not actually lost a huge amount of our range.

There were a few bits that didn’t survive though and one thing that we’ve noticed people are really missing is our range of “Custom Blends”. These were “Hybrid blends,” i.e. blends that we concocted in store, consisting of pre-exiting blends, combined to make an entirely new taste. Since the new laws, any blend we sell has to be officially “Registered” which means we’ve had to cease selling them.

However, there’s nothing to say that you can’t buy the individual components yourself and then mix them at home. I’m going to look at getting some samplers containing the blends made up and listed online, so you’ll just be able to buy a pack and mix them yourself at home. But for now, I’m going to give it the Masked Magician treatment and reveal our secrets (serious hats off to anyone who gets that disgracefully dated reference 😉)

Wave Crest

This was one of our earliest custom blends and it predates me my several years (possibly decades). It was also one of our bestsellers, with a crisp maple scent and sweet, aromatic undertone and cool smoking characteristics. The blend for this one was actually pretty simple.  It is:

1 part Gawith Hoggarth New Prince

1 Part Gold Block

I’ve always liked the way this blend works, it mixes a classic “Supermarket Tobacco” with something a little more unusual, with excellent results!

Sweet Leaf/Sadorian Blend

Now, I’m afraid I’ve got some bad news. We can’t really replicate Sweet Leaf any more, as a large component of it was shredded cigar leaf, which cannot be “Registered”, so we can no longer do it. Also, I always used to blend it by smell, rather than exact measurements, so I can’t really give you a true recipe.

Fortunately, I actually based Sweet Leaf on one of our older Custom Blends: Mr. Sadorian’s Mixture. This was very much a labour of love, between many staff members and Mr. Sadorian himself. It was an attempt to replicate Balkan Sobranie after it went off the market and was tested and tweaked several times before the final mixture was set.

The recipe is:

2 parts Peter Stokkebye Kentucky MS

1 Part Latakia Blending Tobacco

1 part C.C.

This creates a blend that is a true hybrid: Sweet and mild American Style tobacco, mixed with a light Scandinavian style blend, topped off with a classic, English Mix style Latakia. Something for everyone! If you really miss Sweet Leaf, you can always shred a bit of cigar leaf into the recipe above… it’s a great way to get some use out of any damaged cigars you might have!

The Classic Gentleman

This was a funny one. It was initially made as part of our “Blended by you” Range, where we released a few of our customers’ favourite custom mixes as ready-made blends. However, the customer in question for this blend is none other than Henry, who now works at our Knutsford and Chester stores! This is one we blended together, trying to make a mix that represented the classic English style blends. To make it yourself simply combine the following:

2 part Mac Baren Roll Cake

1 Part Latakia Blending Tobacco

1 Part Perique

I’m a big fan of this one too. It shows how varied and interesting tobacco blends can be, without the need for adding extra flavours.

From what I’ve seen, they were our three most popular and easy to replicate blends, so I’ll leave it there for now. If you have any blends that you like, I’d love to hear it! Let me know in the comments or hit me up on Twitter @see_a_con

Keep an eye out for our custom mix samplers!

Until next time: Put that in your pipe and smoke it!

Calum