less in any case.
[Virginia: flue-cured; the tobacco leaf is killed and fast dried in heated barns, which preserves the natural sugars yielding a sweet medium strength leaf. Burley: air-cured, originally from Kentucky and Tennessee; the leaf is dried outdoors, maintaining nicotine and certain chocolate-like flavours. Maryland and Caporal are close relatives of Burley which are often steamed under pressure till dark to further develop the taste.
Nowadays Turkish is used primarily for Greek, Cyprian, Turkish and Levantine tobaccos that are not Latakia.
Latakia, formerly tobacco from the port of that name in Syria, now also comes from Cyprus. What differentiates Turkish from Latakia is the curing process, Latakia being a smoke-cured leaf that is dark, tarry, and crumbly because of the incorporated soot. Both types fall under the heading of Oriental Tobacco - which doesn't include Indonesian leaf, Virginia or Burley grown in India, Thailand, or Indo-China, or the thin and acrid tasting Chinese crops. Russian tobacco can be any one of these types, or even some nasty greenish-black shag of unidentifiable origin, depending on region and process.]
With all that in mind, you will surely understand my interest upon once again opening a tin from McClelland's 'Grand Orientals' series, even though I've smoked the product in question before.
[GRAND ORIENTALS, by McCLELLAND]
Tin blurb: "The finest of Xanthi in this blend comes from the best original Yenidje growing area of Western Thrace. These small, delicately aromatic, top leaves from the mountains (Djebel) and lower slopes (Yaka) have been renowned for their sweet, mild, fresh flavor and delicately tangy aroma since the 1600s. This blend is designed to demonstrate why this particular Xanthi is known as "The Queen of Tobaccos."
Even after leaving the tin open for several hours, the reek of that vinegary treatment to which McClelland is addicted is almost unbearable. Surely there are better mold-retardants and bug repellents than British sweatsocks?
I've often thought that the presence of acetic acid narrows the flavour spectrum of many McClelland products, almost killing those tobaccos which are furthest from fully fermented Virginias.
It is especially objectionable in something that purports to have a "delicately tangy aroma".
The appearance of this blend is of small shreds of medium brown and darker hues, the amalgamation likely steamed to meld the flavours.
Taste-wise, it is a smoke that induces contemplation, and while the pong of vinegar in the tin is unacceptable, when lit little thereof is even noticeable, especially if smoked with a steady pace. Instead, there is an old-fashioned quality that promotes peacefulness.
You should not smoke this if you are a nervous or easily agitated person.
It has a pleasant real tobacco taste all the way down, due to the inclusion of other leaves in the blend. Enough nicotine to satisfy, nowhere near enough to knock your sock off. But if you are smoking this, that isn't what you wanted anyhow.
Reduces to a velvety ash, only slightly gritty.
Rather reminiscent of Virginia Woods, though much more like McClelland's Orient 996. Both of those also contain red Virginia. The smoker of paler tobaccos will find the first a good companion to Yenidje Supreme, the aficionado of darker Orientals will favour the latter in rotation with it.
Goes well with black coffee.
This is not a tobacco for a talkative man. If I were still employed in draughting, this would be perfect to smoke at the office..... if one could still smoke at the office.
Quite possibly my father would have liked it.
I shall have to try it in his old Canadians during a quiet weekend.
Most of the lower grades of Turkish leaves, irrespective of country where they are grown, are destined to become cigarettes, and will consequently be treated much like American tobaccos. Usually the factories will augment the sugar-content and steam or toast the leaf to make it fit the flavour-profile expected by smokers, who since the Second World War have been exposed to 'Anglo-Saxon' preferences.
Where former