Snus in the UK and a review of Olde Ving 99 Coffee Portion Snus

Hello, right, now the pleasantries are over. I want to introduce myself. I’m Adam, 33 and from the UK, and I’m a snuser, a British one none the less. Now I know we may be about as hard to find as Lucky Strike snus in the US but we do exist.

Where we do exist we are a small, but loyal, and a tight knit community, we have to be in these times of the iron fist of the EU with its blatant disregard of science and anything resembling common sense. Let’s face it, how can you trust a body that freely allows the sale of a product that does cause cancer, yet keeps banned one that doesn’t? Makes you think doesn’t it!

Apart from the above I like booze, rugby union, tennis, motorsport, death metal and most other sub genres of metal (Megadeth are the greatest band ever!).

I quit a 16 year smoking habit thanks to Swedish snus. Prior to discovering snus I had tried patches; failed! Gum; failed!, Lozenges; failed! Nicotine inhalers; failed! Pills; failed! Cold turkey; failed (was the worst 10 minutes of my life!).

Each time I ended up going back to smoking 20 Marlboro Lights a day (to those who are not from our fair isle, or Ireland, that’s our way of saying a pack a day). I thought there was no hope, cold turkey wasn’t going to happen then, on a trip to Stockholm, I was offered this odd teabag thing called a General White Portion snus. The rest is history!

To this day, General White portion remains a firm favourite of mine, except the fact that to get hold of it entails a flight to Sweden because, yes, you guessed it, snus is banned in the EU!

Olde Ving 99 Portion Snus – a Coffee flavored Snus you can Love

I like coffee (did I not mention that?) Olde Ving 99, the long awaited coffee snus from GN Tobacco is what is in my mouth as I type. What’s it like? It can be summed up in two words, bloody amazing!

Prior to Ving 99 all we had was Offroad Coffee Supreme, before that, Thunder Chrome coffee supreme, and Offroad Coffee Vanilla (stashed in certain people’s snus chillers) the reality is, they weren’t that good.

Thunder was out if you didn’t like starks and Offroad tasted like a bad instant coffee that had cat sick in it.

They both had their fans, but there was a rather terrible, artificial sweetness to them. From someone who does not take sugar or sweetener in drinks I didn’t get on with it.

Olde Ving 99 on the other hand has none of that, it’s a pure tobacco flavour, with a bit of coffee. It tastes like a cappuccino, not an overly milky one, but almost like a 3 shot one from a place that chucks some espresso into frothy milk, sublime!

On opening the tin, there is a wonderful coffee scent, with a creamy after scent and a nutty scent just at the end, it makes you salivate!

On putting the portion in, there is a lot of salt, it is very salty, this, only lasts a few seconds, then it tastes like a normal Olde Ving Portion and then the coffee taste hits you, subtle, smooth and creamy, just like taking that first sip of a cappuccino.

Imagine a cold, wet, windy day, you grad your obligatory morning coffee on the way into work, that scent that greets you as you bring the cup up to your mouth, the taste of that fist sip, that’s what this snus is, throw in some vitamin N and it’s the perfect combo.

Ving 99 is a 9mg/gram nicotine original portion, the pouches are 1g each and there are 18 in a can. The portion material is comfy in the lip and the same moisture as the regular Olde Ving portions, snus nirvana!

To those snusers in the UK, don’t lose hope, keep on snusin and if all else fails, we can now buy Thunder Chewing tobacco here, if you wanted to know, it tastes the same as Thunder Original Extra Strong portion snus, so there is something out there for us.

Lastly, I would like to dedicate this article to Chi Cheng, bassist with one of my favourite bands, the Deftones who sadly died on Saturday 13^th April 2013. Chi was involved in a very serious car accident in 2008 and had been in a coma for many years, then , against the odds he woke up and Drs predicted he would make a full recovery.

He had been doing well but sadly had a heart attack out of the blue and passed away. Deftones music has been in my life during the dark times and the happy times, his spirit will live on through his music, RIP Chi Cheng.

This article has been brought to you by Olde Ving 99 and the Deftones – Around the Fur album.

So, this is my first adventure into the world of blogging, be kind, I bruise easily. I would be interested to find out how others are getting on with the Olde Ving 99 as the roll I bought is quickly disappearing!

Keep snusin and till the next time, ciao.

ADAM SKELLAND
Reporting from the UK for SnusCENTRAL.org