Pairing Pipes and Tobaccos

The joy of pipe-smoking is all about deriving intense, complex flavor from my favorite tobaccos. Like many of you, I’m sure you like more than one blend, maybe even more than one style of tobacco. I know I do.

I have a great fondness for English blends, especially those with Oriental leaf. These blends require great skill from the blender in that every component tobacco should add value to the other components present in the blend.

If you’ve been here long, you know that I have been exploring the relationship between chamber geometry and flavor delivery for years. That investigation has led me to conclude that nothing beats a large diameter chamber with square geometry when it comes to making a good English blend sing. The difference is so profound as to render comparisons obvious.

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How and why chamber geometry impacts tobacco flavor

Engineering Principles

In our pipe communities, a great deal of time and no little energy has been expended on what is commonly called “engineering.” There is no shortage of argument concerning those variables that combine to produce an excellent smoker. Draft hole dimensions, air-flow, whether or not one should polish a pipe’s interior passages, the design of the last inch of the stem (button end), the precision of mortise and tenon dimensions – there are varying degrees of disagreement and consensus as to how these features of a pipe should be designed and accomplished, and the extent to which they contribute to a pipe’s superior smoking qualities.

Discussions concerning chamber geometry have been relatively absent, especially compared to discussions regarding how how open or constricted a draft hole should be. All other things being equal, my hunch is that there is no more important design variable than chamber geometry, especially when it comes to how amenable specific pipes are to different tobacco types and blends.

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Finding That Magic Fit Between Pipe and Tobacco

Updated on Thursday, October 28, 2010 at 3:02PM by Neill Archer Roan

Updated on Friday, October 29, 2010 at 11:46AM by Neill Archer Roan

Why do we dedicate pipes?

Some pipe smokers dedicate pipes to particular blends or styles of blends. Because dedication is often accomplished when a pipe is new, the process precludes the possibility of experimenting with several blends before making a final decision. This practice prompts a couple of  questions:

• Why dedicate pipes to specific tobaccos?
• Without having experienced different blends in a pipe, how do we pre-judge which pipes are best suited for particular tobaccos.

I dedicate pipes to tobaccos for several reasons. First, I have concluded that particular shape types or chamber geometries is often better-suited to a particular type and/or style of tobacco, e.g. English, Oriental Blends, and Virginia-Periques.

Secondly, because I smoke a range and variety of tobaccos that are incompatible with others, I want to avoid obscuring the taste of a particular favorite blend with some other tobacco, especially if that favored blend possesses singular flavors that are amenable to lingering within the pipe. These residual flavors – commonly called “ghosts” – add undesirable notes to different styles of blends, obscuring or sometimes destroying the blender’s intentions and the tobacco’s flavors.

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