That is a beauty. Thanks for the follow-up.
Bon apetít, or whatever’s the appropriate phrase for good smoking.
Ceci n’est pa une pipe.
But it is a picture of a very nice-looking pipe, so that counts.
Solid
Oh my, yes. Especially where the tenon and the stem join. Plus, a nice burl in the bowl. Hopefully it smokes as nice as it looks! Based on nothing but jealously, I think it will.
As you know through conversations we’ve had, I’m a pipe smoker, as well. I’ve got a pretty wide collection of pipes. Many of them are estate pipes, but I’ve also bought plenty of new ones. I’ve never treated the bowls of any of my new pipes, and I clean the bowl/draw hole all of my estate pipes with 180 proof alcohol. So, they’ve had their cakes removed before I smoked them, though the bowl remains carbonized (and yes, sometimes the tobacco preferences of the previous owner hangs around for a bit). Pretty much all of them smoke well. I do follow the practice of loading a pipe 1/3 full, then 1/2 full, etc until it starts build up a cake when I start one out, though.
So my question is: what’s the honey supposed to actually do?
If it’s just to supply carbon, the tobacco and the briar both have plenty of carbon to offer, not to mention the different sauces each brand adds to their tobaccos, which almost always contain sugar. The carbon is going to happen either way.
If it’s to supply a faint taste of honey to the first couple of bowls, I could see that working. At any rate, it’s not going to hurt anything. After all, I’m sure more than one pipe tobacco contains honey.
Since I went through a long period of buying estate pipes and spent wayyyy too much time reading about old pipe brands, I remember Kaywoodie advertised that they used honey to line their bowls, and there are lots of people who recommend it on breaking in a pipe:
https://pipedia.org/wiki/Kaywoodie
Hey, if nothing else you have something tasty to put on your toast. Mmm, eggs, bacon and toast with honey.
Now, if it would stop being so fucking hot in Texas, I might be able to enjoy a nice bowl of pipe tobacco. As it is, suffering through a cigarette outdoors is a pain in the ass. Call me in October.
Seasoning wood does usually involve drying and ageing it, but I wouldn’t be completely sure that this is the only usage in which the term appears in this context - just because ‘seasoning’ has become a term describing a range of different preparatory stages for different things - for example leather can be seasoned with oils and waxes and although the earlier stage of preparing the leather is called tanning, the point here is that seasoning is an end-user process. I would not be at all surprised if the term applies twice in the case of pipes - once for the wood (seasoned by the pipemaker prior to working the wood) and once for the end user (seasoning the pipe prior to smoking it).
This is a guess: the honey is supposed to soak into the surface/pores of the wood where it will carbonise and seal the surface in some way that is not expected through just burning tobacco in it.
Update: I’ve smoked a few bowls in it, after seasoning my pipe with honey.
It smokes beautifully. Just like I thought it would. And indeed, the “Mr. B’s Muskoka Mixture,” is a nice, relaxing tobacco, which is what I used in it.
Now, if I could only find a source for Dunhill’s “Nightcap”. That one is perfect for a late-night smoke.
Glad to hear it smokes as good as it looks. You can get the Peterson version of Nightcap from 4noggins and Iwan Ries.
Thanks for the tips. I’ve actually been to Iwan Ries, when I was in Chicago, many years ago. Great tobacconist! If it’s tobacco, in whatever form, they had it. And they had some of my favourite cigars, actually (Henry Clay Brevas Finas; I ended up buying a box from them).
Problem is, though, shipping internationally. I’m in Canada, they’re in the USA. If they’re completely honest on the customs declaration, I’ll be hit with at least fifty dollars (if not more) in duties and taxes per 2 oz. tin. And they are a business with a great reputation and a business that is known to be trustworthy, so it is unlikely that I could convince them to pass off a few tins of Nightcap as “machine parts,” or some other something.
I guess I’ll just have to wait until my next trip to the US to stock up. Hey, I guess that I have another reason to visit Chicago! In the meantime, I’ve got a fine new pipe, and a great tobacco to smoke in it. Again, thanks for the tips!
I’ll agree that Iwan Reis is almost enough reason to visit Chicago, in itself. I knew of the tax issues with importing tobacco into Canada (and found Reddit posts complaining that some imports were taxed differently from others from the same supplier). I both looked for a Canadian supplier, and realized we probably shouldn’t discuss smuggling openly on the board. However, I just gotta ask: is there actually a tax difference when you carry them across the border yourself?
No, not if it’s within your duty-free allowance. I can buy up to 50 cigars, 200 cigarettes, and about 200g of pipe tobacco in the US or other countries, and if it’s within the allowable exemption (currently C$800), nobody cares. But that’s after seven days outside of Canada. I cannot pop down to Great Falls, Montana (which is only three hours away) to grab a carton of cigarettes or six tins of Nightcap, in the same day. I’d pay through the nose going through Canada Customs on the way back.