Inawera Cherries in Liqueur
ConcreteRiver
Setup: Recoil w/ flavor barrel, Dual 15 wrap 26g 3mm Nifethal 70 coils @.16 ohms. 60w power, 450F temp limit. Full Cotton Wicks.
Testing: INW Cherries in Liqueur, 3 and 6%, 60/40 VG/PG, Steeped 9 days.
Flavor Description: A cherry and chocolate flavored liqueur.
I don't get an overwhelming cherry out of this. It seems like a darker cherry flavor, not like a bright red maraschino cherry. I don't get anything too overtly realistic out of this, it's feeling a lot like the kind of slightly dry, thin kind of cherry vibe like from INW Cherries, albiet a bit closer to a black cherry. I feel like I'm not picking up a real cherry body, just some cherry flavor. Same kind of familiar cherry off-notes here, but it isn't overwhelming at least in balance with everything else going on here.
In terms of the liqueur part of this, I'm going back and forth a bit. I do think there is some kind of booziness in here, but it feels like an artificial kind of spiced rum flavor. No specific spice sticks out and it's a bit hard to pick out a discrete alcohol note with some of the cherry off-notes floating around.
I also get a good deal of chocolate here. Checking the second opinions, I might be picking it up a bit more than other people or something here is just hitting me weird. Overall the concentrate reminds me a lot of a cheap cherry cordial candy somehow made into a liqueur. The chocolate is more like a medium-dark cocoa note without any kind of waxy or rich body.
Mouthfeel overall feels a bit thin and dry for something that should have a pretty heavy liquid component.
This is fairly dark and the chocolate thing makes me worry a bit about coil gore. I'm getting a bit of muting and some muddiness to the flavor, but I haven't noticed anything that seems like burning. FWIW, I'm thinking INW Cherries in Liqueur and INW Cherry Liqueur are the same thing. I can't find any references to a specific INW Cherry Liqueur on the Inawera storefronts.
Off-flavors: Chocolate. A pretty sizable amount of chocolate. If this is liqueur I'd guess it's a chocolate liqueur. Not a bad thing per se, but a pretty substanial contribution to the profile. At higher percentages I do pick up some plasticy cherry off notes, but they're relatively subtle compared to other cherry concentrates at comparable strengths.
Throat Hit: Moderate. Overall just a bit harsh and dry for me.
Percentage testing: At 1%, I'm not getting much cherry. There's a bit of it, but it feels like it's being drowned out a bit by some of those boozy notes. Not quite plasticy but it's sort of thin and bitter. I pick up a good bit of that chocolate on the tail of the inhale and the exhale.
At 2.5% there's a clearer cherry for here, and I'm getting some good cherry sweetness and a darker, not too cloying cherry flavor. The booze notes here seem a bit toned down, but I'm feeling like the off-notes from the cherry are coming out a bit more. Fairly strong darker cocoa here for me.
Just based on these tests, I'd probably go around 1.5-2% in mixes where the chocolate and cherry are a fit for the profile. I feel like the cherry and the chocolate are pretty well intertwined and will be distracting if you want one but not the other.
Uses & Pairings: Pretty good solution for getting some cherries and chocolate together.
Seems like a really good fit for anything that is supposed to use a cherry cordial, maybe with some additional cream or something like FW White Chocolate to fill out that darker cocoa note and a juicier red berry to fill out the cherry note.
I could also see this working really well in a black forest cake recipe. Actually a pretty stand in for kirsch if the profile will handle the chocolate.
Second Opinions: [Here's the ELR Page.] No mention of chocolate, so maybe I've completely lost it. User "naxoc" writes: " Very intensive cherry taste with a hint of sweet liquer. Add 3-4%." User Monk writes: "Tested about 1% in a premade icecreambase. Meant to buy Cherries... but this one is quite nice! (maybe not in the icecream). It has something that makes me want to throw it into a tobacco, chocolate or coffee rather then fruits, candy or softdrinks. A taste for grownups. Maybe its the liqueur-part that makes that darkness."
"4 drops per 5ml was too weak to properly describe flavor, increased that to 7 drops per 5ml then waited another 14 days to taste again. I detect dark rum (?) soaked cherries. Not quite sure on the liqueur used here, but to me it tastes kind of like a dark non-spiced rum, cherry flavor is not "popping" out at me, but more of a lightly blended cherry into the dark rum/alc taste. And I do believe I detect a VERY faint tobacco note in there as well possibly.
Above average TH for this one. This would be great mixed into a alcohol type drink, or a citrus mixed type drink like MT Dew or Hypno, and I'm sure this would be a welcomed addition to a dark pipe style tobacco as well!"
Here's a review from user "Bryan123456" on Planet of the Vapes that starts out talking about someone's aunt getting drunk, but it does contain the following: "There’s a lovely exhale with a cherry note and I like this very much. It’s vapeable from 4 drops into 5ml (1.6%). I went up to 12 drops (4.6%) and it was sooo cherryish. I finally mixed this up at 6% and then soused it with sweetener and got the De Kuyper thing."