Capella Blueberry Extra SL
ConcreteRiver
Setup: Recoil w/ flavor barrel, Dual 15 wrap 26g 3mm Nifethal 70 coils @.14 ohms. 60w power, 450F temp limit. Full Cotton Wicks.
Testing: CAP SilverLine Blueberry Extra, 2 and 5%, 60/40 VG/PG, Steeped 4 days.
Flavor Description: Great Blueberry, not nearly enough "Extra." A spooky realistic fresh blueberry, with some issues involving concentration and vibrancy.
The actual blueberry flavor in here is really impressive. It's a tarter, fresh blueberry. No jam, no candy, not a baked blueberry, just a ripe, tart, and fresh blueberry. I complain a lot about capella fruits being artificial tasting, dry, or flat... but this is actually pretty great. There's a pretty accurate balance of warmer, juicy sweeteness, bright almost tannic tartness, and just a tiny hit of that slightly soapy floral note from actual blueberries. The overall impression is surprisingly realistic, at least in terms of flavor. This is by far the closest thing I've had to vaping an actual blueberry.
I've got two issues with this relating to strength. The first is that it seems to be a relatively unconcentrated flavor. The usage percentage seems to be largely in-line with the TFA Blueberries, where 10% in a mix isn't out of the question. The second is that flavor itself is fairly soft, even at those higher percentages. This is a softer, not particularly saturated type of flavor when it's all in balance. Just upping the percentage doesn't seem to work as it's blowing out the bottom end and ruining the balance. As much as I would love using this a single flavor realistic blueberry, I just don't feel like it has enough presence to really pull it off.
I haven't tried all of the blueberries by any stretch of the imagination, but of those that I've tried I'd say this most closely resembles TPA Wild Blueberry. Comparing them side by side, it really accentuates just how candied blueberry wild actually is. The SL Blueberry Extra is markedly more tart and realistic. The SilverLine version does a lot of what adding a small percentage of FA Bilberry can do for blueberry flavors, but with a whole lot better balance than I've ever got.
Off-flavors: None. It's a pretty damn near perfect fresh blueberry that happens to be way too meek. That might actually be a fit for the profile, but it's going to be difficult to mix with.
Throat Hit: Not really. It's probably a bit too soft and smooth.
Percentage testing: Therein lies the rub, at least for me.
2% is normally low for a capella fruit, but consistency and all that. I'm not getting much out of this at 2%. There's a little bit of blueberry tartness in there, but I mostly taste raw VG. It's basically blueberry scented VG at 2%.
5% is a bit better. The tartness has filled out, there's some realistic blueberry sweetness showing up with a little bit of warmth, and just the slightest bit of a realistic blueberry floral. It's actually fairly well balanced at 5%, it just tastes like it's sitting in the background of a single flavor test, which is odd.
Increasing the percentage on this is giving me fairly mixed results. The heavier blueberry sweetness in here does move a little further toward being bright and vibrant, but it's swamping the tarter nuance and getting a weirder blueberry candy and really light ammonia thing. Probably needs a longer steep, but 8% seems to be my sweet spot with this. It adds a little bit more body without destroying all that nuance. This gets a bit flat and weird by 10% and 12% is even more candy heavy.
Just based on these tests, I don't think this really can pull off being a primary note in a busy mix, but if you were going to use it as a softer blueberry flavor I'd probably mix between 6-8%.
Uses & Pairings: The first thing I'd want to do with this would be figure out a way to make it actually work as a primary flavor. I have a mix steeping right now with 8% and .5% FLV Sweetness to see if some sweetener can drag that flavor up to the front without destroying the balance here. If you're into blueberries, and want a solo mix, this is a great flavor for a full, fresh blueberry in here, but you'll have to figure out a way to get it out.
As a fan of casual blasphemy, I'd say that you might be able to mess around with EdibleMalfunction's Holy Trinity of blueberries. This may be able to stand in for the TPA Blueberry Extra, FA Bilberry part of the stool, covering some of the tartness and more authentic-ish blueberry flavor. That FW Blueberry is still going to be required to actually make this punch a little harder.
If you just want some blueberry in the background, should mix well with damn near any fruit. Should also work as a light but realistic blueberry in a mix with lighter creams. Something richer like an ice cream or custard would probably stomp all over this.
Second Opinions: Still fairly new. I can't find much.
Shoutout to ceedee99uk for linking reviews from PeegoreVapes in another thread.
Here's the product page from Capella. Their description: "More Blueberry. Silverline’s Blueberry Extra blends so perfectly with creams, candies and pastries, the possibilities are truly endless! For the ripest, most flavorful blueberry out there, pick some Blueberry Extra!"