Disclaimer: This flavor was given to me for free, for the purpose of this review.
Hardware: N80 Clapton Wire, 2.5mm, 0.45 resistance, Asmodus C4, 55W
Mixing: 1-5% 70/30 VG-PG. 1 week steep.
Flavor profile: A floral juicy black cherry.
Throat hit: Medium. I get some itching and scratching and a tad pressure on the chest too.
Uses and pairings: Fruits, fruits and lots of fruits and tobacco! That is exactly what I can see this being used for. Don't bother adding this to bakeries or deserts really. Possibly creams, but not as a main note at least. For an accent, you kinda wanna push this to around 2% and this is where the juiciness start's to appear. I have pushed it all the way to 5%, which I find to be just fine as a stand-alone. Although I can't really see this being used as a main note nor as a stand-alone. It's a little too floral to be used as a main note, which the juciness and deep black cherry notes can't overcome. With that said, it is one of the better cherries that I have tried, as it does have a more natural cherry flavor and not much candy going on.
Off-flavors: Sadly, like many other cherries, this one has issues. In the range of 2-3% I pick up a heavy note of perfume, which are common in many cherry flavors. It does have a nice juciness and a deep note of black ripe cherry, but that perfume kinda destroy the joy. At the exhale, I sadly get hit by a wave of the perfume, which puts a bad end to your vaping circle (sorry, lack of better explanation).
Notes: Let's adress the elephant in the room here. Besides the perfume, this flavor has one HUGE issue. It's not based in the taste itself, but this is an issue that will make the more experienced mixers stay away from using this. This flavor has red food dye in it. It's common in this community amongst the experienced mixers, that food dye has no place in mixing, as you do not want to add something that is just not supposed to be there. It's all about control, and once something like food dye is forced upon you, then you're at the point where as an experienced mixer you probably won't use it. If you don't care, then it's fine and dandy (besides the rush of perfume).
Finally, which I forgort to mention in my previous reviews; their concentrates come in a minimum at 30ml, which again is not ideal. If they offered at least 10ml, so we as mixers has a chance to test their flavors, then I think they'd have a much better chance at competing with the other brands out there.
Hi, I really appreciate your work and I think you are doing a very good job testing every flavor in different concentrations, but I also think you are missing the opportunity here. I miss some important points in this review for it to be really helpful.
The main one is that you are not describing the flavor by itself, you are only giving a little flavor profile, but very little.
Second, you continue with de Uses and pairings section without describing the most important characteristics and properties of the concentrate first. For example in this case:
Flavor: Is it the right flavor (v/s the name on the label)?, is it natural or artificial?, is it light or bold?, does it have presence?, some flavors are light but have a very good presence. Is it top, medium or bottom heavy?, is it tangy, acidic, spicy, musky, floral?, is it flat?
Texture: Is it fleshy?, does it have any peel?, is it dry, juicy, syrupy, jelly?. In this case what happen under 2%?
Density: Is it thin or thick?
Sweetness: How is it?, does it need any assistance?
There is one point I don't understand. You are saying this is one off the better cherries you have tried, and next you are saying the wave of perfume puts a bad end to your experience. Is this a good concentrate or not?. Is the floral part a good or bad experience outside the 2-3% range?
I'm trying to be helpful, so please take these comments in good faith.
P.S. English is not my main language.
I appreciate your inputs and take these into consideration for upcoming reviews.
Let me explain why I call it one of the better cherries. If we look past the wave of perfume, the cherry flavour itself is actually pretty spot on for a natural cherry. The cherry itself has nothing fake going on, like you would see in a candy cherry. Take FW Cherry Berry as an example. That one is a good “cherry” flavour, but it’s not a natural cherry at all. It’s more of a candy drop where the cherry tastes awfully synthetic.
Cherry flavors tend to peak at "not horrible". most are more accurately rated as 'abysmal'.
There are basically three cherry flavors I'll use - GL Cherry, INW Cherries, TFA Cherry Extract. They aren't perfect, but a bad cherry is a hell of a lot better than a perfect strawberry, because cherries are great and strawberries are an abomination.
You steeped it for a week, did you try it off the shake? How was it? What difference did it make to steep?
There aren’t much of a difference really. The cherry is slightly more there off the shake and fades a little over the week, but it’s to such a minimum that I doubt you’ll really notice it. After a week the flavor is pretty much still very forward. No change in the floral perfume.