Flavor West Dulce de Leche
ID10-T
Setup: Recoil RDA. Dual kanthal clapton coils @ 0.339 ohm. 55w power, Cotton Bacon wicks.
Testing: FW Dulce de Leche @ 2%, 4%, and 6% 70/30 VG/PG, Steeped 6 days.
Flavor Description: Milky cream taste without milky cream texture or much thickness, accented with a touch of caramel at lower concentrations that grows into a dry, cocoa-esque thing at higher concentrations. Testing this next to a jar of actual Argentinian Dulce de Leche (DDL) courtesy of ATF user NaCHeF, this is not DDL. Actual DDL is thick, sticky, and super sweet. It's very close the caramel fruit dip sold next to apples at the grocery store. This is pretty much none of that.
Off-flavors: It's called DDL and it's not DDL, so... the whole thing? It gets extra milky caramel like DDL but it's not sticky or sweet, just a disembodied milky sweet cream flavor with caramel notes.
Throat Hit: Not really, but at 6% it's a dry and that dryness makes it a little scratchy with prolonged vaping.
Notes: 2% you get just a weak hint of milky caramel but no creamy mouthfeel or body, and nothing approaching the sweetness of actual DDL, or even the sweetness of FW Sweet Cream, for that matter. It acts like it might kinda develop into a DDL at a higher concentration, but that's a lie. 4% is a fuller version of the essentially same flavor, with the caramel starting to take on a slightly sharper edge. At 6%, the absence of a creamy mouthfeel becomes much more noticeable. It's still primarily a milky and not very sweet caramel flavor but it's bit dried out, and there's just a little of that distracting cocoa note similar to the one that's very prominent in TFA's DDL.
Uses & Pairings: I'm probably not going to use this flavor at all, honestly. But if I had use it for something, I might try using it as a bridge between cream and a caramel, if I wanted those two blended into something like a caramel milk or caramel ice cream instead of caramel on top of ice cream. Don't know how well that will work, but it's worth a shot, though one of the other known emulsifying flavors would probably work just as well if not better. It's not caramelly enough to serve as a primary caramel flavor (an accurate DDL would be). And it's certainly not creamy enough to stand in for a heavy cream, but it has a milky flavor that I can't imagine wanting in too many other places. Might have some cereal with milk applications, as long as you don't ask it to be to be the only milk or even the main milk.
Second Opinions:
ELR notes (to date, 33 ratings, 3.5 stars):
A Kopel of users say their preferred single flavor mix is 7.0%, and there's the obligatory 10% in there as well.
TheFlavorSeeker loves this flavor and describes it as "like (thick) milk cream sweetened with a hint of honey" and uses it at 3% "as a cream base for fruit mixes" in place of "classic plain creams or the vanilla based ones."
Mofogger writes, "Solo tested @ 7% (6wk cure) If you took FA Condensed Milk (which tastes like chalky, sun-dried dog shit)..and added cardboard with sugar.... You'd get this... Nasty...."
Hollywood VApes says, "Its not bad, it has a bit of a twang to it that may fade over steep but I prefer Jungle Flavors over this. Pairs well with milks/creams, berries, bakery flavors and one of my favs is butterscotch(FW nat. is my preferred)"
Three reviews on Bull City Flavors, link provided to prevent the mobile user's thumbnail for this post being a large portion of my large bald dome.
"This is a 'go to' for me. It works great with just about everything. Think creamy brown sugar. What's not to love?" 5 stars
"Good stuff, slightly different taste than sweet cream and is good used with or instead of..." 4 stars
"This is a must have for Root beer barrels awesome flavor." 5 stars
Be sure to check out all of the other great reviews at:
Except the one about FA Cookie, that one's just stupid.
Video Review: In this video, the second episode of NOTED, I try this flavor for the first time and talk about it and other related flavors with my co-host /u/CheebaSteeba and temporary co-host /u/Skiddlzninja (filling in for permanent co-host /u/mlNikon who will start this upcoming week). This free weekly hour-long podcast tied to this subreddit's Flavor of the Week posts is live on Monday nights at 10 p.m. Central and available after the fact on the DIYorDIE Youtube channel.