Monjure Pipe Show et al

Author's new Brebbia Pipe

Howdy all, it's been a while since I last posted anything to this blog.  A lot has happened since my last post. I went to two pipe club events, one being the annual NY Pipe Club picnic and the November meeting.

The pipe club picnic featured, as always, the summer corn cob pipe in both straight and bent styles.  We had a few aromatics and other tobaccos brought by the club members.  We also had great food, pork chops, burgers, sausages and this time we enjoyed beers from a number of micro breweries.  As in 2010 the weather was perfect not too hot and we had a slight breeze blowing.

The November meeting was our pre-Thanksgiving leftover event.  We smoked tobaccos that were featured at previous meetings.  Some of the tobaccos that were featured included samples of the pipe club blends (still in progress) plus samples of the blends that were featured in the Balkan Sobrani showdown at the Chicago pipe show.  Two of those blends won and one, Blue Mountain (McClelland's entry), is available for sale.  The other by Russ Oulett is still in work and should be available soon.  It was a pretty nice event with a pretty decent turn out.  Pictures can been seen here November_Meeting.

The Monjure pipe show took place at Barclay Rex Tobacco shop, 75 Broad Street and 70 East 42nd Street, on December 8th and 9th, 2011. This is Steve's big event in NYC before the Christmas / New Year Holidays.   As always pipes from Brebbia, Ardor and Rinaldo were featured. Steve Monjure was on hand to answer any question regarding the pipes.  Yours Truly bought, yet, another Brebbia pipe.  This one was smaller than any of the other Brebbia pipes I bought in the past but it is great as I didn't have a pipe for a quick smoke.  Also on display was a gorgeous Rinaldo pipe which, is the custom, was to be raffled off.  As always I put my name into the hat not expecting to win.  Low and behold I get a phone call from the folks at Barclay Rex informing me that I won the raffle pipe from Steve Monjure.  I collected my pipe the next day 12/9/2011 and have been smoking it since. Here are pictures of the pipes at the show Monjure Pipe Show. Pictures of my Rinaldo pipe to follow.

As I write this I am sitting in the dining room of my grandmother's house in Kingston Jamaica in the West Indies.  The temperature here is in the low 80's.

As I close I want to wish all the people who take time out to read this a Merry Christmas and a Healthy and Prosperous 2012.

March 2011 Pipe Club meeting

Michael and President Lou Carbone discussing pipes

Hi all, just got some time after a busy week and week-end to bring you up to date with the latest happenings in the New York Pipe Club.  This month we were fortunate to get two tins of Solani Pipe Tobacco, courtesy of Steve Monjure from Monjure International, for the club to sample. 


The blends we tasted were:


Blend 633 - A classic flake with bright Virginias and perique. This cool, slow burning blend has a natural sweetness and a wonderful room aroma.


Solani Aged Burley Flake - Blend 656- A skillful mixture of three aged Burley's - dark brown Burley from Kentucky, light Burley from Brazil, and white Burley from Malawi - Southeast Africa. A very natural blend with absolutely no additives or flavors - a true Burley blend.  


I had the opportunity to try the Blend 633 and as a fairly novice virginia smoker it was refreshing to try another virginia blend.  I found it an easy smoke and took care to smoke it slower than I normally smoke other tobacco blends.  For those not familiar with pipe tobacco blends Virginia blends have Virginia tobacco as either the only tobacco or one of the components (as was the case with the Blend 633).  The Virginia component is high in sugar which can lead to tongue bite if smoked too quickly.  Also the flavor component is not as sharp as other blends so smoking it slowly allows the subtle flavors to develop.


We had a great turn out for this meeting so a lot of folks got to try the blends as well as peruse the pipes Hank brought to sell.  i looked thru the pipes and purchased another Brebbia pipe (guess I'm drawn to this brand).


A great time was had by all.  Up next I'll be reviewing the NY Pipe Show that took place earlier this month in Newark NJ.  

INTERNATIONAL PIPE SMOKING DAY

New York Pipe Club celebrating International Pipe Smoking Day

Howdy all, back with you again this time we're at De La Concha Cigar Shop celebrating International Pipe Smoking Day.  This year we celebrated IPS Day one day earlier, on Saturday February 19th, since the official IPS Day fell on Sunday this year. We had a good turn out, on such a cold day, by members of the pipe club (as seen in the picture above).

We arrived at roughly 2pm and proceeded to get setup in our usual spot by the window.  Our thanks go out to Vernon Vig who secured the spot for us to hold IS day.  Also, to our surprise, Vernon had De La Concha display the custom made Dunhill pipe presented to him by the NYPC.  President Lou brought couple of bottles of Port Wine for the members to share,  Also De La Concha extended a 10% discount on all pipe tobaccos and some of the members took advantage of this.

It was a fun time and everyone enjoyed getting together to celebrate International Pipe Smoking Day even if it was a day earlier.  As always pictures can be seen here IPS Day.

Hope to see you all at the next meeting to be held on March 8th, 2011 at Florio's from 6pm - ?.

MEETING WITH PIPE MAKER PEDER JEPPESEN

Pipe maker Peder Jeppesen

Happy Friday to all my readers, as the title of this post states I will be giving you an overview of the New York Pipe Club's meet and greet with Peder Jeppesen at Merchants East on Thursday February 10th. In attendance were club president Lou Carbone, Avi, Larry, Bob Sacks, Hank Satchi, Allan Goldschmidt and yours truly Patrick Grant.

A history lesson for those who are not familiar with this pipe maker. He is a Danish pipe maker who, for 25 years, worked with a few well known Danish pipe makers one of whom is Erik Nording. After perfecting his pipe makings skills Peder went out on his own forming Neerup Pipe Company, named for one of his grandmothers.

Peder was on a tour of the US visiting as many Tobacconists and the occasional Pipe Club to introduce the stores and pipe club members to his rather wonderful pipe line. Avi and Allan purchased a few of the pipes Peder brought to show us.

It was nice to have this event at Merchants so some of the members could see the location and decide, for themselves, if this was a venue they'd vote for.

It's now Saturday the 19th of February and I figured I should, since I have a free moment while I clean my pipes, to finish this post before heading to celebrate, a day early, International Pipe Smoking Day at De La Concha cigar shop and lounge. Hopefully we'll get a great turnout for this event.

Pictures from the Peder Jeppesen meet and greet can be found here Peder Jeppesen. See you at our March meeting at Florio's in Little Italy.

REVIEW: FEBRUARY MEETING NEW YORK PIPE CLUB

Club President Lou Carbone enjoying his pipe

Howdy all, just got a free moment riding the #7 train to update my blog site. Here we are in the second month of 2011 and we just had our second pipe club meeting. As always we met at Florio's in Little Italy to have dinner then retire to the smoking lounge to smoke our pipes.

This meeting was different, what with the passing of Larry Amarouso the previous month, we now have to pay $10 to use the smoking lounge. The management referred to this as a usage fee. The members that were there paid the fee and enjoyed a night of pipe smoking and camaraderie. We had a total of 19 people that showed up in the lounge, with a smaller contingent coming for dinner.

All that being said, we still had a wonderful time smoking our pipes and trying tobaccos brought in by other members. Meeting adjourned around 11:30pm or so.

The next Pipe Club meeting is in March, plus we have the International Pipe Smoking Day on Saturday February 19th from 2pm - 6pm at De La Concha on Sixth Avenue. Hope to see you there to hoist a bowl for a wonderful evening of pipe smoking.

Before I go, here is the link to the pictures from the meeting Photos. Enjoy!!

REVIEW: JANUARY PIPE CLUB MEETING

Well it's a miserable day here in New York so I figured I'd take the time to get you up to speed on the latest happenings in the cigar and pipe worlds.  Since my last post I suffered an unfortunate mishap.  Nothing too serious, if you don't consider a broken left elbow serious.   It will require surgery to repair and at least a three month recovery, but other than that all else is operational since I'm a right handed person so I can still function.

On to better things,  on January 18th we had our first pipe club meeting of 2011.  It was both a happy and a sad occasion.  More on the sad bit later.  Our first 2011 meeting was delayed a week due to the inclement weather we've been having in New York this winter.  We met, as usual, at Florio's in Little Italy where we had dinner and  then went upstairs to smoke our pipes.

At this meeting we honored former president Vernon Vig with a one of a kind custom made Dunhill pipe for his hard work and dedication to the efforts of the club.  We also had a custom certificate made to commemorate the occasion.  Vernon was quite surprised by the generous tribute bestowed on him by the club. In honor of the occasion the club generously bought all in attendance a drink of their choosing.

We then retired upstairs to enjoy the newly reintroduced Dunhill pipe tobaccos, courtesy of Peter Guss and Liam O'Mally, which were a big hit with all in attendance.  Meeting was a great success with all in attendance.

Our normal high energy meetings were made a bit somber when we were informed of the passing of our host, for many years, Larry Amoruso at 51 years young.  He lost his battle with cancer on January 13th, 2011.  Our condolences go out to his family and close friends.

Our next meeting is on February 8th, 2011.  Hope to see you all in attendance where we may sample some unusual tobacco.  Before I forget here's the link to the pictures of the evening  Pipe Club First 2011 Meeting

DECEMBER 2010 PIPE CLUB MEETING

A belated Merry Christmas and a happy 2011 to my followers.  Sorry about the lateness of this post, but like most of you, I was enjoying a bit of the holiday cheer myself.  I'm sitting down with a lovely cocktail and figured that I've put it off too long and I should get to writing the latest installment.  As the title suggests this is my review of the year end holiday meeting of the New York Pipe Club.

As always we had a wonderful turn out of folks at this meeting and we also had some brand spanking new members who came to support this wonderful past time.  In attendance was our current president Lou Carbone as well as our past president Vernon Vig.  We all sat down to a wonderful dinner followed by a round of drinks on the club, which as Vernon explained has been a tradition.  Afterwards we proceeded to the smoking lounge where we unpacked our pipes in preparation for smoking.

This evening featured a tasting of some wonderful blends from GL Pease.  The blends we tasted were Quiet Night and Chelsea Morning.  Quiet Night is a flake tobacco while the other, being the same blend, is a ribbon cut tobacco.  Also in attendance was a gentleman named Charles, who said he was a long time member.  Charles is the keeper of the 'leaf' and to that end he produced the suitcase of some unusual tobaccos for members to sample.

As always we had a wonderful time trying the GL Pease blends, one of the author's favorites, and celebrating the holidays with the members.

Our next meeting is January 11th, 2011, it's hard to believe 2010 is in the rear view mirror, and hopefully we'll have some interesting tobaccos to taste.

As always I'll keep my ear to the cigar / pipe ash to see what events are in the works.

Oh, least I forget, here's the link to the pictures of that fun evening.  NYPC FINAL MEETING 2010

Hope to see you at the first pipe club meeting of 2011.