So, /u/Skiddlzninja is trying to put together a new beginners guide wiki and has asked us to controbute. There seem to be a lot of good ideas but not a great deal of actual content for the guide.
One of the ideas that cropped up in that post was a shopping list of ten commonly used flavour concentrates and an accompanying recipe list. Somebody has got to get the ball rolling so here I am.
Here's what I've thought of so far, I'd be interested in hearing everyone's opinions before the list gets finalised though...
Concentrates
Fruits
- TFA Strawberry
- TFA Pear
- FA Fuji
- LA/TFA Banana Cream
Creams
- TFA Vanilla Bean Ice Cream
- CAP Sweet Cream
Bakery
- TFA Graham Cracker
- CAP Sugar Cookie
Other
- Koolada
This list is obviously incomplete and is just a first revision to spark interest. Quite honestly, I'd like it to be a community project, I don't think it will have legs without lots of different opinions.
Before anybody gets too over excited there are a few things to bear in mind here...
- This is intended for beginners
- These recipes don't need need to be amazing, rather a starting point based upon simple ideas. Recipes should ideally have two to four flavours each
- Recipes could be stripped back versions of other established recipes (they could contain a footnote along the lines of 'You can make this even better by adding the following flavours...')
- Concentrates/recipes that require little or no steeping would be preferred (hence my not including Cap Custard V1!), I think it's important that new mixers get instant results.
- All flavour concentrates should ideally be as versatile as possible - a new mixer doesn't want a concentrate that only gets used in one very specific recipe. Particularly if it's a recipe that ends up not being their cup of tea!
The ingredient list above would allow for some classics such as Mustard Milk and Nana Cream to be made, as well as some interesting variations. I'm sure simplified versions of some other recipes would also be achievable.
I'm going to keep thinking about this but I'd really like to hear all of your opinions. What ten concentrates should make the list? I thinks it could be fun to come up with some recipes using only a very restricted selection of flavours. Do you agree? - Would you be interested in doing the same?
Nearly done (thanks for reading this far!), I didn't come up with this idea all on my own so credit to /u/rogeorgie, /u/BuryMeInSmoke and I'm sure a few others too.
Finally, I've mentioned this above but can't stress how important it is that there are as many people as possible involved with this. Whether you're one of this subs legends or a relatively new mixer, your opinion matters. Between us we could make something amazing!
Edit: edited the first paragraph 'cause I'd made it sound like /u/Skiddlzninja was being a lazy bastard!
The single best thing about this list is the way it's broken down. As somebody who has zero interest in cream/custard/bakery vapes, all those lists of "must-buy starter flavours" that include 8 creams, 12 bakeries and one fruit are pretty much worthless to me.
"Here are some good flexible fruits. Here are some good creams. Here are some tasty bakeries. Here are some useful odds and ends (like Koolada). Here are a couple of fruit recipes, a couple of fruit polluted with cream recipes, and a couple of fruit polluted with both cream and acetyl pyrazine recipes you can make from these basic ingredients"? That's useful.
You need to add TFA Dragonfruit for Nana Cream.
I think that while most of the recipes should definitely provide instant results, new mixers should also be introduced early to the concept of steeping. You've already got TFA Pear on the list, which I think does usually benefit greatly from steeping, might as well add CAP VC V1. And if you'll forgive my self-promotion, I submit this as a possible recipe. 8% CAP Sugar Cookie, 4% CAP VC V1. It's meant to be sort-of a Mustard Milk of cookie recipes. Are there better ones? Of course. Much better ones. But it's easy and good, and new mixers can be encouraged to add things to it and make it their own. You've got Sugar Cookie on the list already and it's so versatile it definitely belongs there, but the other ingredients don't give much to do with it. That needs to be rectified.
Another option would be adding CAP Italian Lemon Sicily to the list of ingredients and /u/EdibleMalfunction's Lemon Cookie to the recipes. That might be a better idea than my cookie, actually, because then we could add TFA Bavarian Cream (which would open it up to number of other recipes, I think), replace TFA Graham Cracker with CAP's version, and add Skiddlz's Serially Easy Lemon Bar to recipe list. Edit: /u/CosmoVerde's suggestion is better than mine. Forget the list of flavors, just give them some recipes to choose from.
Thanks for the input, I always respect your opinion. The list was really just a starting point to get discussion going. The beauty (and the pain) of this concept is that we can make the flavour list whatever we (as a community) want it to be. We just have to stick with it when it's finalised.
Did you see the edit where I said CosmoVerde's suggestion is better than mine? I left mine up for the sake of discussion and in case we're hell-bent on having a list of flavors, but I've changed my mind and now think the list of flavors is the wrong way to go about it. Recipes, yes, flavors, no.
Before making a list like this, an important question needs to be answered by the community: Are we okay with giving everyone popcorn lung?
I know it is a tired old argument, and for the most part these days we just let everyone get on with their own thing. But this is different. This is an attempt at a definitive general purpose guide for everyone. This isn't about personal choice anymore when you are trying to directly influence newcomers.
We're all ex-smokers here. Some of us have spent decades treating our lungs like shit and now we need to watch what we put in them. If we're about harm reduction here, I strongly urge that we do not include any DA/AP flavors in a guide such as this.
If people want to start including these flavors in their recipes as they progress in the hobby then that is fine. But we as a community should not bare the responsibility of telling new mixers to use DA/AP when they are trying to reduce the harm they're doing to themselves.
I feel like diketones should be discussed separately, but ultimately maybe just offer the DX/v2 derivative in the first order flavor suggestions even though most of us think they suck. In the end, it's up to the mixer what they want to use.
newbie here, I started mixing my own e-juices a week ago, the combination of labor day sale and /u/afflaq's post gave me the motivation to finally take the plunge and commit to mixing my own ejuices, and so far I'm enjoying it.
the first 2 recipes I made are Mustard Milk and Cinapple Fritter and they turned out great.
The specific info included in /u/afflaq's post had everything I needed to start, what to buy, where to buy it from, in one simple easy to read post.
All I had left to do was find a good recipe or 2 to start with.
thank you all for making this subreddit beginner friendly.
<3 mixing is fun. Just be careful with it tho. Next thing you know you'll have thousands invested and think it's a good idea to start a company.. Lol
ELR published something similar today:
http://forum.e-liquid-recipes.com/t/a-beginners-guide-to-making-the-most-highly-rated-recipes/83612
I don't see why Pear, Fuji, and Koolada are in there, for beginners. I'd replace those with Vanilla Custard (Cap), Cheescake (GC) (TPA), and Strawberry Ripe (TPA).
I wanted to include an apple, I picked Fuji because it's probably the communities favourite. Koolada was included because it's pretty unique and lots of people like the Koolada/menthol effect. To be honest, pear was just to fill it in a bit. The list is really just to get people thinking. I think one variant of any flavour is enough. Do you think Strawberry ripe would be a better fit than regular Strawberry? I was thinking of Nana Cream and Mustard Milk when I Picked.
I think having Koolada on the list is a good idea. Some people want that stuff in everything, but I'd make sure to note that if you don't like menthol, you probably won't like sensation you get from even small amounts of Koolada.
I think FA Fuji is a great flavor to have on the list. So many great recipes have it and it's a great stand alone flavor to get them going right off the bat.
I would include
•FA forest mix
•FA Fresh cream
•tfa strawberry ripe
•tfa vanilla bean ice cream
•tfa raspberry sweet
Essentially the ingredients to make Cliche. I think its good confidence building recipe with a pretty short steep time. Plus those flavors are really versitile for other recipes.
Maybe have groups 3 or so well regarded recipies that fullfil profiles like fruit, cream, bakery, etc.
From there they can pick what they want to mix and buy the relevant flavorings.
They'll even be forced to see how the calculators display information. This knocks out:
'what are good recipies'
'what flavorings should I get'
And the unusually common 'is there an app that shows you recipies?'
I don't think a list of 10 go to flavorings is going to do a beginner any good if they still haven't mixed anything at all.
This is good stuff. We tell them to go find recipes that sound good to them and get the things to make those rather than ordering flavors willy-nilly, but don't give much guidance on recipes. So they go find some recipes on ELR and come back with: "Why does my juice taste like felching hobo jizz from a diabetic bum?" Give them the easy and good recipes, tell them to pick a couple and order the flavors for those. Tell them to make those recipes, but also single-flavor test their flavors as a first step to creating their own recipes.
Bingo.
Every time I order flavorings I pick a couple of recipies that I want to make, mix those while also getting a feel for what each flavoring tastes like and then I start using them in my own recipes that are in progress or build entirely new ones.
I bought stuff for that shurb clone and it lead me to making a solid orange cream, for example.
This is a good idea as well. I guess it's better suited to people who already know what they like.
Edit: I may or may not have had a few drinks and replied to the wrong post. I'll get back on the case tomorrow!
FWIW, I've been through the most upvoted recipes on this sub, around 100 of them.
I was hoping that we'd get a nice comprehensive list of recipes that could go in the wiki and possibly build the 'must have ingredients' from that list. Sort of what Scottes777 did over at ELR.
There's a few problems with sorting by upvotes.
The commercial guys who have contributed recipes get upvoted heavily. A lot of them require too many ingredients (IMO) for new mixers. Some of them are just overall average recipes as well (no offense intended to the commercial guys that posted the recipes, it's great to have input from that side of the eJuice scene).
There were a few recipes that got upvoted heavily because meta, inside jokes, whatever. They could be good recipes but there's no real feedback in the comments.
The voting also seems to be skewed towards favouring newer stuff. I'm assuming after the FDA regs there's been an influx of new users. Newer recipes from the last few months have been upvoted a lot more. We've also had much better content/recipes over the last year or so, so maybe it's justified.
The staples like Mustard Milk, the 'nana Cream clones and a few others I can't remember off the top of my head are there. But when Rhodonite (ie the best recipe of 2015) isn't there, it really has me doubting the total upvotes method for selecting good recipes.
My whole idea of having a go-to list of recipes is that we could point the newbies there. I see a lot of 'I threw 'random concentrate that no one has' with 'other obscure concentrate' and it tastes like shit, what do I do?'. It would be much easier to help troubleshoot if the experienced folk are familiar with the recipe that the new guy is using. It also makes it easier for the intermediate level mixers to chime in.
So I dunno, I think what /u/CosmoVerde said is a good idea. Maybe we pick a few categories - custard/creamy, bakery, fruity, cream+fruit, maybe tobacco. Then get 2-3 solid recipes for each category. Because you could have the 10 best flavours ever produced and new mixers are still going to concoct retarded shit with it.
Sorry if this doesn't make much sense, writing this between jobs at work.
*TFA Graham Cracker (CLEAR) for the sake of coils.
I have a few more suggestions for beginner flavors, but I don't think newbs should limit themselves to the same 10 flavors across the board. Some people don't taste strawberry, some don't like apple or pear or vanilla in their cream, etc. Maybe a bit longer list, but "pick 10-12" suggestion based on what recipes sound good? I'd leave FLV and INW off the beginner list for the sake of it being fairly easy to screw up by using something like 5% INW Raspberry in a recipe right out of the gate.
When suggesting flavors, maybe try to explain subtle differences or just note that recipes will taste different than intended and why you can't just sub TFA Pear when the recipe calls for FA Pear.
Also, steeping is a very important part of mixing, so limiting certain creams from the list might let someone new miss out on that aspect. I know as a beginner, I thought it was pretty neat to see how much recipes changed throughout the steeping process.
Here's my input for additions to the list: (without respect to steeping time or diketones, sorry)
-
TFA Cheesecake Graham Crust
-
TFA Blueberry (ripe or wild)
-
TFA Key Lime
-
TFA Dragonfruit
-
TFA Bavarian Cream
-
CAP Golden Pineapple
-
CAP VCV1
-
CAP NY Cheesecake
-
FA Pear
-
FA Cream Fresh
Don't crucify me for my suggestions, taste is subjective and I respect your preference.
I'd suggest actually having two beginners lists. One for fruits, one for bakery. Not only does it make this more accessible by catering to personal tastes, but it also provides room for a person to progress. There could even be a couple of recipes that unify the two.
Think of it as a course progression:
Step 1) Choose the set that tickles your fancy the most. Step 2) Sample each flavor individually (so let's make sure the flavors all taste good solo). Step 3) Try some simple mixes using 2-4 flavors. Step 4) Perhaps with 1-2 flavor additions, try a more complex mix. Step 5) Go buy the other set, and repeat #2-#4 Step 6) Now make this awesome capstone recipe utilizing both.
I personally think the list should be a little Bigger (20-25) But still put into Categories., for example you could say Fruits Drinks/Candy Bakery Cream and then list Recipes that fall into 1-2 of these Categories. In the End someone could pick like 5 Recipes and then pick maybe just the one he/she needs + he/she knows that he/she likes Fruits so he takes all fruits. For example i hate everything that tastes remotely close to milk or coffee creamer so i cant stand most (not all) cream tastes.
I think I have about 15 flavours so far. Many of the ones you suggested.
I agree with koolada or menthol, not all vapes have to be creamy or bakery.
My suggestions Tfa strawberry ripe Cap sweet strawberry La banana cream Fa fuji Watermelon or raspberry
Cap vanilla custard Cap my cheesecake Tfa vbic Fw lemon meringue pie
Koolada or menthol
I have been using the lemon meringue pie as a sub for la lemonade and it works amazingly.
Lots of recipes you can make just with these. Just started vaping my strawnana custard. Amazing!
Got a variation of vurve's best damn pink lemonade
However 12 to 15 flavours would increase the variety substantially.
Hey mate, just woke up and still in the midst of sorting all my morning shit out so haven't had a chance to read through the entire thread/post yet. Will come back to this later in the day though.
I've started compiling a list of the most upvoted recipes here - list is currently huge and needs to be culled. Sorting by upvotes isn't the best method for a couple reasons. Anyway, I think the recipe list and the first order list could sort of mesh in together.
I think 10 flavours might be a bit limiting and around 20 flavourings would be better, but 20 flavourings is about $50 which might be a bit much to expect of beginners.