As always, the purpose of this thread is to gather the community to explore a category of flavor and its many uses. And it's also to have FUN!. What? Charts and graphs are fun!
Post recipes containing this week's Flavor of the Week, as the star or in a supporting role, with or without development notes. Talk about other people's recipes that use it. Compare and contrast different manufacturers' versions of the FOTW. Ask for help using that flavor in general or to achieve something specific, offer advice, brainstorm ideas, consider substitutions, suggest pairings... really anything at all as long as it's on topic.
#This week's flavor is: Menthol and Coolants
How did that get to be the FOTW?
It was requested. If you're not interested in this FOTW, please take this opportunity and comment to request one that interests you (or send me a PM to do that).
Past FOTW posts can be found here
The NOTED podcasts, which are bascially video FOTWs, are listed on this sheet, maintained by /u/apexified
Next week's flavor will be: Distilled Spirits
The week after that will be: Pear
The week after that will be: Cranberry
The week after that will be: Mango
The week after that will be: Ginger
The week after that will be: RY4
The week after that will be: Honey
The week after that will be: Peanut Butter
The week after that will be: Ube/Taro/Yam
The week after that will be: Cookies & Biscuits
The week after that will be: Lemonade
The week after that will be: Mint
The week after that will be: Crème Brûlée
The week after that will be: International Creams (Bavarian, Italian, Devon, Vienna, Catalan, Irish)
The week after that will be: Domestic Creams (Sweet, Fresh, and just plain Cream)
The week after that will be: Kiwi
The week after that will be: Butterscotch
The week after that will be: Nougat
The week after that will be: White Chocolate
The week after that will be: Chocolate
The week after that will be: Pecan
The week after that will be: Florals
The week after that will be: Ice Cream
The week after that will be: Herbs
Just my .02 on it.
- WS-23
- Cold as shit. Doesn't impart any additional flavoring. Best used between .5% and 1%. Can be taken to 1.5% but I'd stop there since the sheer coldness will drown out any flavoring that's in the mix. Begins to fade after about a 2 weeks but doesn't mute flavors during long steeps.
- Koolada
- The original King Cold that was recently overshadowed by WS-23. For some, like myself, it works well under .75% but it brings along some soapiness/chemical edge with it the higher you take the percentage. Cold factor doesn't fade but you can't steep that chemical note out. You have to mask it or deal with it.
- Menthol
- The only one I care for is FW Menthol. I never take it above 1% since it WILL alter the flavor of whatever you put it in. It plays extremely nice with fruity flavors and bold tobaccos. If you want more coolness than menthol flavoring, FW Menthol @ .5% along with WS-23 @ .75% is great for adding an additional chilling factor without altering flavor too much.
- Eucalyptus
- To my knowledge, INW makes the only Eucalyptus flavoring and it's damn fine as an expectorant. During the Winter and early Spring, I religiously vape [Midnight Oil] (https://www.reddit.com/r/DIY_eJuice/comments/8aj69c/midnight_oil/) to help keep my airways open. It's been said that this stuff may or may not be 100% safe to be vaped since it doesn't completely dissolve, but it hasn't given me any problems. It's slightly sweet and almost medicinal on it's own, but that's what it's for.
- Basically every Creme De Menthe ever
- They all taste the same to me...Slight vanilla creme + something akin to spearmint and/or peppermint with an eeeever so slight cooling factor. Great as a standalone but easy to boost with things like WS-23, FA Spearmint and FA Peppermint. Also, easily the best type of flavoring to mix with chocolate concentrates to make thin-mints.
I was gonna write basically everything you said but in a worst format haha
Do you have any idea how to make WS-23 stick? I've used it at over 2% but even then it'll fade almost completely, giving only a slight coolness.
Vape Train has a "Eucalyptus Robusto" flavor that I will be trying this week. I'll be interesting to see how it stacks up against INW Euc w/mint.
You gonna write a review for it?
So like the OP mentioned, I have a problem where I use koolada/ws-3 and or a menthol and while I get that cooling effect it's not enough to mask the warmness of the vape. Typically I can drop the wattage to where it does balance out but at that point it's not enough power for the flavor of the mix to come through.
Is it a coil build issue or do you think getting ws-23 and pairing with another cooling agent can get me what I'm after? All used at reasonable percentages btw so I don't think it's an overuse issue
I honestly couldn't tell you what to do outside of getting a device with quality temp control. But you have to bear in mind that certain flavors won't show up until they're heated to a specific temp. It also depends a lot on you as a vaper as well. For me, I can't taste strawberries that well unless I mix them and even then, I can only get flavor if my vape is super warm and saturated. From my own testing, there are some flavors I can't taste at all until I'm in the 470F range.
So.. personal experience... WS-3 doesn't do the greatest job by itself, no matter how much I used I'd still get warmth from a vape along with the cooling sensation. Balancing the cooling with other coolants is definitely the way to go. Still, there are times the off taste helps (which I found rather by accident). WS-5 I've never used by itself, but I've mixed it 1:1:1 with koolada and WS-23 and never noticed any off taste that wouldn't have been the koolada. Menthol, I've only used in a couple of mixes. Not much to say... it's a classic blend of cooling and mint. Used lightly with some fruits it works well... but when mixed with flavors that mint really loves (I'm looking at you, FLV Milk chocolate) that menthol truly shines.
As I've mentioned tho... great care must be taken with cooling agents. They're the opiates of flavors... the more you use, the more you need to use to get any effect. I've vaped a 4% blend of cooling agents before, and it still was only cool rather than cold. Trying that same mix after vaping tobacco flavors pretty much exclusively for a couple weeks... almost painful.
I don't know if I'm overly sensitive to koolada, but 0.2% in a mix seems overwhelming. I'm going to get some of the infamous WS-23 soon and try it out, we'll see how that goes.
Anyway one of my absolute favorite summertime recipies when it's literal hellfire and sticky magma air bullshit outside is;
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INW Grapefruit 2%
-
Koolada as desired
That's it. Simple and delicious, but definitely feel free to add some lemonade, berries, etc to the mix.
Watermelon Chill ^(there are ten thousand watermelon menthols on atf, this is just what I had on hand)
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LA Watermelon 2%
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PUR Watermelon 4%
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Koolada 0.5%
On a related note does anyone get a burnt weird off note with TFA Menthol? It's got a nice cooling factor but I can taste the overbearing off notes even at 0.25% and it sucks.
Edit: I can't wait for the Noted episode of this. I dare you guys to add 2% of all your menthols and coolants together in one blend, ya know, for science.
Wait... 2% each (combined in one mix)? Menthol, FA Polar Blast, WS-5 and WS-23? Hell, even I never tried that. (1.5% each of the last three, yes. 2% of all four, no.) But it could easily be worked up to... don't vape anything without cooling for a couple weeks, just keep increasing percentages every couple days... two or three weeks should be enough to make that simple brain freeze, rather that flash freezing your lungs to the point they shatter when you inhale.
Fun Fact: WS-5 and WS-23 (And the other WS coolants you haven't heard of yet) were all originally created and trade marked by Wilkinson Sword. Hence the name.
Neat huh?
If you're big into molecular DIY or just find it interesting, this is a really interesting PDF on industrial coolants and their various chemical makeup, how they're created, how they came about, their various uses and relative strength, etc:
http://www.leffingwell.com/MBE-SFC-Coolants.pdf
That is interesting. I wonder if I can put a couple of drops of koolada in my shaving lather...
Not a huge fan of cooling. All the way back to menthol cigarettes, it’s always felt like heartburn to me. I can handle it in small amounts, but usually if I want any kind of cooling I’ll just use a flavor that has some cooling stuff built in. FA Royal is still fairly new to me, but it kind of tastes like an almost prune, but not dark enough, mixed with something like one of the WS flavors or Koolada. No menthol taste.
HC Malaysia Mango is pretty good for a Mango, and also has a little bit of the same kind of non-menthol cooling.
INW Morning Rain- same thing. Non-menthol cooling with a citrus type of maybe tobacco. It says it’s a tobacco, but it’s nothing I would really pick out as a tobacco.
Other than that I’ve briefly fucked around with INW Tobacco Menthol and FA Polar Blast, but not enough to have any notes on them.
> All the way back to menthol cigarettes
Funny you mention those... I used to smoke menthol if I got a bad cold. I can't see many tobacco flavors working well with cooling unless you're trying for a Lucky Strike mix. I mean, maybe AM4A ice cream? Maybe if you added some Australian Chocolate... but still...
im pretty new (1 year in to this) and my menthol baccos have been my most successful recipes so far for ex smokers.
tpa turkish and tpa red type both work well with coolants as long as you use more coolant than tobacco, other turkish tobaccos should work as well if not better.
How do we mix menthol crystals into a recipe? Do we just crush them up and throw them into the mix or do we have to make a separate menthol solution with VG/PG and then mix that in?
You'll need to make a solution out of the menthol crystals to use it but if you're feeling adventurous you technically could just add .05g of menthol crystals to a recipe. Sorta. It'll be really cloudy and you'll have to heat it to get the menthol to dissolve. If you make a flavor, though, it lasts forever. you'll have to mix it in PG, VG doesn't like pure menthol.
1g/10ml = 10% so for a 30ml mixture crush up 3g and dissolve in 30ml of PG. 10% is strong. like Halls cough drop strong. my mixture is 3:1 and I use it by the drop.
To dissolve it just get a bowl of warm/hot but not boiling water, shake the bottle, and let it sit in the bath for a while. turn in here and there and shake when you feel like it. If it separates just repeat the hot water bath.
more info: >Solubility in Propylene Glycol is up to 50% and solubility in alcohol is greater than 100%. >Recommended usage is a 10% solution consisting of 1 gram menthol crystals to 10ml Propylene Glycol or Ethyl Alcohol. Use the 10% solution as you would any other concentrated flavoring.
This is for sure wiki material. May I suggest some kind soul writes a sidebar article with all the different cooling agents and products, their pros and cons and uses?
To add to the info listed so far, I believe FA Polar Blast is 7% WS-3 and 3% Frescolat ML. What's Frescolat ML (aka l-menthyl lactate)? What's in FLV Ice? Which ones are inhale coolers, which ones exhale?
Menthyl lactate is mostly a cooling agent. It also has a truly odd side effect - it supercharges the taste receptors for salt. Apparently around 5ppm is all that's required for the trick... it's also how many food companies reduce salt without changing the taste (there may be a few similar compounds also used for the same thing).
Really sensitive taste buds apparently sense some degree of mint from it.
Made this recipe almost 3 years ago and was one of my first ADVs
Fresher Taste
Flavor (All TPA) | Percent ---|--- Koolada | 2% Peppermint | 6% Wintergreen | 4%
It def has a bit of cool to it. I remember some of my friends nicknaming it "Listerine" from the coolness of it.
|Flavor Facts - Menthol & Coolants| |---| |Noted - Menthol & Coolants on YouTube| |Noted - Menthol & Coolants on DIYorDie| |Menthol Recipes on ATF| |Cool Recipes on ATF| |Menthol Recipes on ELR| |Cool Recipes on ELR|
A Compilation of Flavor Facts can be found here
|Flavor|Company|Review|ATF|ELR| |---|---|---|---|---| |Menthol|Capella| - - - |On ATF|On ELR| |Mentholyptus|Decadent Vapours| - - - |On ATF|On ELR| |Ice Mint|Dellosi| - - - |On ATF|On ELR| |Ice Original|Dellosi|by CheebaSteeba|On ATF|On ELR| |Menthol|Dellosi| - - - |On ATF|On ELR| |Menthol|Flavor Express| - - - |On ATF|On ELR| |Extreme Ice|Flavor West| - - - |On ATF|On ELR| |Kool Effects|Flavor West| - - - |On ATF|On ELR| |Menthol (Liquid)|Flavor West|by VAPORMARK|On ATF|On ELR| |Cool Menthol|Flavorah|by ConcreteRiver|On ATF|On ELR| |Ice|Flavorah|by ConcreteRiver|On ATF|On ELR| |Artic Winter|FlavourArt| - - - |On ATF|On ELR| |Polar Blast|FlavourArt| - - - |On ATF|On ELR| |Uber Menthol|FlavourArt| - - - |On ATF|On ELR| |Deluxe Menthol|Hangsen| - - - |On ATF|On ELR| |Eucalyptus + Mint|Inawera|by CheebaSteeba|On ATF|On ELR| |Menthol|Inawera| - - - |On ATF|On ELR| |Menthol|Liquid Barn| - - - |On ATF|On ELR| |WS-23|Other| - - - |On ATF|On ELR| |WS-5|Other| - - - |On ATF|On ELR| |Koolada|The Flavor Apprentice|by TexasHex|On ATF|On ELR| |Menthol|The Flavor Apprentice| - - - |On ATF|On ELR| |Eucalyptus Robusta|Vape Train| - - - |On ATF|On ELR|