WoS Grand Cairo...huge nose burn?

Hi All, I’m enjoying WoS Grand Cairo but am struggling with a mighty nose burn every time I take a pinch. Is this normal? It’s by far the heaviest nose burn any snuff gives me, to the point where it makes my eyes water like crazy and my face really throb. It’s worst if I take it from the back of my hand, but it’s still full-on when I take a pinch, it’s a shame as it’s a lovely snuff otherwise. I can cope with nose burn normally, but this one is so intense it makes the first phase of snuffing GC quite unpleasant, to the point that I find myself not reaching for it when I open the Kilner jar where my snuffs dwell.

It’s a pretty ‘hot’ snuff. The way I avoid burn (some people love it but I can’t stand it) is to take a large pinch and insert it slightly into the nostril and then inhale it gently. It tends to cut the burn down if you experiment a bit with this. Taking large pinches of something that is intrinsically an irritant may seem counter-intuitive, but it really works and gives you better flavour appreciation and, obviously, a bigger nivotine dose. Most, if not all, snuffs can be tamed with technique.

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I LOVE GC it’s probably my favorite if not second favorite snuff. I love the nose burn and scent/nic hit. It’s a masterpiece IMO. You’ll get used to it. I actually like the “burn” nowadays but didn’t at first… it’s an “acquired taste?”

I love the scent, and the nic hit seems to be immediate and very pronounced with GC…it’s the only snuff to make me feel queasy from the nicotine after two pinches in rapid succession. Am I right in saying GC is higher in nic than most other WoS offerings?

Most snuffs are pretty much the same in all honesty - the apparent ‘strength’ has as much to do with grind, flavouring etc etc as nicotine. That said, its probably one of the stronger WoS snuffs but it won’t be by any great amount.

Me too, and I obviously haven’t analysed any of them, but I bet a pound of Abraxas that come the day when some government body requires all snuffs to show the nic content that they are 99% the same. I don’t doubt there will be some strong ones but not many.

I make no comment on US snuff because I haven’t used enough of it, but ‘snuff’ is descriptive of oral tobacco as well in the US. I can’t imagine any 100 page academic work, written in the US, that is not mostly dealing with ‘dip’. But regarding the UK types, what I am talking about are the snuffs that all share the same flour - so WoS SP types, florals etc will all share the same nic content, as will the Poschl and Toque lines no doubt - I am no expert but having used most of them I don’t see too many differences. Tom Buck, for example, is often described as a stronger version of WoS best SP, but it is the flavour that is stronger - the flour is probably identical to the best, so therfore is the nic content. But until the whole bunch of them are analysed it will remain a moot point.

Very interesting stuff. By the way, thanks @snuffster for the handy advice on minimising the burn from GC, I’ll try taking it that way on the morrow and see if I have more luck…it’s a snuff I really want to get into, as once the burn phase has passed it’s lovely, but I’d rather tip things in my favour on the pleasure/pain front!

I have tried all day to get to grips with Grand Cairo and I just can’t seem to hack it-it’s very frustrating. Maybe my tin is dry? It seems to fly right up my nose and into my throat however softly I inhale, and makes me cough like crazy. Small pinch, big pinch, back of hand, ASB, boxcar, even if I tilt my head back and drop a pinch in, it still gets into my sinuses, even with no inhalation. What am I doing wrong? Duff batch or duff snuffer?

I’m going to second @Snuffster…the perceived strength is grind related. After all, most UK snuffs are the same “flour” re-worked with scents and such to produce unique products, and no one knows how US dry snuff is made: I’m a fan of “its all from the same giant batch from the 1960’s” school of thought. Back on topic, Grand Cairo wasn’t a revelation for me; it was pretty good, but that’s about it.

By jove, I think I’ve mastered Grand Cairo after two days of trying (and failing)! I have started taking a large pinch, inserting my fingers just into my nose, closing my windpipe at the back of my throat and taking small, sharpish inhalations by moving my tongue down, creating just enough suction to get the snuff into my nose without it ending up in my throat, lungs, sinuses etc…I’m really starting to enjoy this moreish snuff now, at long last! Inserting a little way before insufflation cuts the nose burn down too. Happy days :slight_smile:

The other day I took a pinch from a tin of Grand Cairo that had sat, forgotten, in a drawer for a while. The spicy flavor seemed to have intensified with age. It’s still quite enjoyable, but the change was a bit of a surprise. Has anyone else experienced something similar?

@pipenSnusnSnuff I have found that my old tin of Grand Cairo was quite different from the brand new one that I have just opened. However it wasn’t the spiciness but the Bergamot that had become more pronounced in the older tin. It could of course just be a difference in noses, but I think its amazing how snuffs of the same kind can age differently

@tommybegley like scotches there will always be variations between batches. Tobacco is a plant and where it’s grown, it’s breeding, how it’s cured and handled, etc will vary before it reaches sharrow mills. If the scenting is natural they too would have some variation from shipment to shipment. Then Sharrow mills, blends, scents and stores the snuff products but there is human input, machine wear, etc to all the processes and there will be unavoidable variations in each step along the way. I guess my point is that snuff isn’t a synthesized product. It’s difficult to confidently say that the differences between an older batch and a more recent one are due to aging. What would be Spectacular (dreaming here) is if our retailers like MrSnuff would list and let us choose the date codes for WoS. “Oh a January 2016 Grand Cairo, that was a very good month” :smiley: Then if the differences between various productions of snuff over time have a consistent trend we can start to make informed conjecture around how they age vs. batch variation. I’ll be your Guinea pig!

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In 3-4 years even factory taped WoS large tins loose most of the original moisture. Some WoS scents will be goners after 4-6 years. Menthol will stay there for longer.

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@ar47 That would be an amazing reality! I’m sure if WoS labelled their tins with month/year we could work it out ourselves, a bit like wine or something. Damn brilliant idea if you ask me

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I’m just getting into this snuff and I agree that it has a prominent burn. Not unpleasant, though.  This is a fresh tin and the bergamot is very strong - definitely the dominant flavor.  I also think it’s stronger nic-wise than other WoS snuffs.

BTW, @MrSnuff - your description of Grand Cairo on the website seems to erroneously be for French Carotte.

@tommybegley, WoS do label their tins with a mfg year. It’s on the bottom sticker. The last couple of digits marks the year.

@Chico, I find it stronger, too (on a par with the Gold Label).

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I believe the extra burn with GC also comes from cinnamon. My next order I’m getting a large tin … I miss the stuff

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@ar47 I believe you are right about the burn being cinnamon. Grand Cairo is my favorite complex SP, love the sharp citrus start that gets taken over with the burn of the spices. Only trouble is it gives me a bit of front and back drip, if I have a few pinches of it. I often just try to have a few pinches thought the day to freshen things up. Also I just pinch or massage my nose a bit to get a second bite of the snuff!

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