ambrose_leatherin Ambers, Spices & Gourmands · Northampton ·
MemoryTonka beans and the foreman's pipe tobacco
Right then. Our foreman in the clicking room smoked a pipe at break, and his tobacco smelled of hay and marzipan, nothing like my dad's roll-ups. I never knew why until my granddaughter put a tonka bean under my nose on Sunday. Same smell, near enough. The club's page on the tonka bean and its coumarin says tonka is still used to flavour some pipe tobaccos, so I should of guessed. Fifty years on and it's still there, like the feel of a last you handled every day.
Cheers, Ambrose
4 comments
bev.boston
My late husband's aftershave had that hay and almond smell. Now I have a word to look for.
hamish_heather
Older folk who come in still talk about pipe tobacco when they nose a sherried dram. Hay and nuts, every time.
callum.peat
My grandad's tin smelled like that too. I'd forgotten until now.
ambrose_leather
Right then, funny what stays with you. I would have sworn I'd forgotten that foreman entirely.
Cheers, Ambrose