Hearth & Home -- Anniversary Kake

Brand: Hearth & Home
Blend: Anniversary Kake
Style: Virginia/Perique
Pipe Used: Cob
Price: $19.99/8oz.

Appearance: 7
Taste: 7
Room Note: 8
Value: 7
Overall: 7

Anniversary Kake is a well regarded house blend created by Russ Oullette and crew at the Habana Premium Cigar Shoppe (better known in the online world as pipesandcigars.com) This Virginia/Perique (Va/Per) blend arrives as a krumble kake (don't ask me why the pipe world insists on this odd spelling) and depending on how it was treated in the post it may well be primarily ribbon-cut by the time it arrives on your doorstep. The order I received was about 25% kake and the rest had already crumbled (or is that krumbled?) apart.

The tobacco itself was medium brown in color and while not exactly damp it was very, very sticky. The aroma was top-notch and smelled of dried dates and fruit leather.

Because the blend was so goopy I decided to smoke it in a cob. The crumbled tobacco loaded easily and lit right up.

While I have a fair number of Va/Pers in my cellar I still haven't found one that really does the trick for me so I had high hopes given the almost universal praise for Anniversary Kake. Sadly, this blend failed to fully live up to my admittedly high expectations.

The flavor was nice but fairly mild and the advertised St. James Perique never really made its presence known on the palate. I'm a big Perique fan and just can't abide a VA/Per that's so lacking in the Per department. The presence of the various Virginia tobaccos was also somewhat muted and the rich sweetness I've come to expect from this leaf just wasn't there in enough force.

The room note was pretty nice and had that classic grandpa's old pipe smell that most folks seem to appreciate.

The tobacco burned well and only required a few relights along the way. It also remained bite-free and the Perique stayed fairly mellow on the tongue. Although the tobacco was sticky when I loaded the pipe it didn't leave any messy residue behind leading me to believe that no nasty artificial flavorings or preservatives were used in this blend.

Towards the end of the bowl an odd taste and smell emerged and that's when I finally realized why this blend seemed so familiar. To my palate Anniversary Kake tasted like the big brother to the classic drugstore blend Half & Half. Everything from the pouch aroma to the taste to the room note reminded me of this OTC blend. That's not a knock as I actually enjoy Half & Half but it certainly isn't at all what I expected from a Va/Per.

Anniversary Kake is a good, solid tobacco but it just didn't click for me as a VA/Per and as such my hunt for that perfect combination of sweet and spicy will continue. In the interests of fairness I gave the blend a try in both a meerschaum and a briar and while the meer seemed to make the tobacco shine the best it still just didn't impress me all that much.