Getting the most out of your corn cob pipes

We offer the following tips to lengthen the life of your Missouri Meerschaum Corncob Pipe and to enrich your smoking enjoyment.

• Fill the pipe bowl with layers of tobacco that are not too tightly packed. This will keep your pipe more evenly lit. One old tip is to fill your bowl three ways: First sprinkle the tobacco loosely into the bowl and pack it (or tamp it, as we smokers call it) with a child’s touch. Second, sprinkle a second load into the bowl and tamp it with a woman’s touch. (Sorry ladies) Finally, fill the bowl one last time and tamp it like a man. The goal here is to create enough air space to allow for an easy draw, but without gaps in the tobacco which could cause it to go out prematurely.

• As you smoke use a tamp to tamp the tobacco down gently to keep the unburned tobacco in contact with the burning embers. (Yes, TAMP is both a noun and a verb.) This little trick improved the duration of my smoking enjoyment immensely, plus it added another neat tool to my smoke kit!

• Drawing gently, in short puffs will help to prevent tongue bite. Tongue bite is a euphemistic way of saying the tip of your tongue will get BBQ’d! Settle the pipe in the corner of your mouth with your tongue against the mouthpiece, and try to keep your hands off the pipe. The part about the corner of the mouth isn’t so much to improve your smoking experience as much as to keep you from looking like a goofball.

• After each smoke run a pipe cleaner through the stem to keep it clear of debris and to remove excess moisture from saliva and from the humid smoke generated by properly stored tobacco.

• Though it looks cool in the movies, never knock your pipe against a hard surface like the sole of your shoe. Knock it, instead, against the palm of your hand while holding the stem firmly in the middle.

• Switching, or resting your pipes frequently helps to prevent bitterness or what I like to call pipe-funk. This time-out will allow your corn cob pipe to dry out, which will not only reward you with a more pleasurable smoke but will also lengthen its life. We suggest owning several pipes and rotating through them. Many say you should own seven pipes so that you have a fresh one each day of the week. We suggest you should own at least 31 pipes, and not just because we sell them. Honest.

• It may be an old husband’s tale, but just in case… long-time smokers say to smoke your first bowl of tobacco in a new pipe all the way through without allowing it to go out. They say that if the first bowl goes out, the pipe will tend to go out at that same place each time you smoke it. Sounds like voodoo to me, but just in case I never smoke in the same place twice.  

• Some say that if you enjoy an especially sweet smoke that you should try coating the inside of your new pipe with a thin layer of honey before your first smoke. This may work with briar pipes, but in the case of cobs, we suggest you save your honey for your biscuits.

Well, that’s about all for now. Please stop by www.Aristocob.com to see our entire line of unique pipes and gifts and to learn more interesting information.