Vape Train Australia Blood Orange Champagne
ConcreteRiver
Disclaimer: I didn't pay for this, shoutout to Vape Train for sending this to me.
Setup: Recoil w/ flavor barrel, Dual 12 wrap 24g 3.5mm SS316 @.31 ohms. 60w power, 450F temp limit. Full Cotton Wicks.
Testing: Vape Train Blood Orange Champagne, 1%, 4% and 8%, 60/40 VG/PG base, Steeped 17 days.
Flavor Description: Great champagne, fake-ish orange. Feels like an orange sparkling wine beverage you'd buy in a can, rather than a mimosa.
The champagne here works really well. It has some fairly convincing effervescence, more so than FW Pink Champagne and probably pushing up against FLV Root Beer in the fizz arms race. Definitely tastes light and sparkling. I'm actually getting some of that mineral twinge you get from champagne that isn't straight prosecco. Light, but accurate, kind of booziness here. Doesn't go the sour acidic route like TPA Champagne.
The blood orange here isn't all that realistic. It feels like a flatter, almost candy blood orange flavor instead of a tarter actual citrus. Does taste like the blood variety of orange flavor though, with a light bitterness to it offsetting at least a bit of that candied body. That blood orange bitterness plays really nicely with that light mineral note from the champagne base. I'm not getting any real zest or heavy waxy notes. The orange here feels like a slightly more bitter version of FA Blood Orange.
That sweeter orange weighs down some of the etherealness of the fizzy champagne base, but overall it still has a pretty solid sparkle to it. Ends up feeling just a bit on the sweet side for a realistic champagne, but nothing too sticky or cloying.
Off-Flavors: Artificial rather than realistic blood orange flavor.
Throat Hit: Light? I mean, it has a bit of bite but nothing really explicitly harsh. Hit seems to fit with the profile.
**Percentage testing:**At 1%, I'm not getting much out of this. Light texture, light mineral tang from the champagne, and a bit of thin bitter orange.
At 4%, this is actually pretty well balanced. Light, fizzy texture. Sweet blood orange flavor, starting to taste a bit candied but not too cloying.
At 8%, nothing really tastes offensive based on the profile, but I feel like that blood orange is maybe getting too sweet and candied and is steamrolling that champagne base. That blood orange bitterness is also getting a bit aggressive and throaty.
Vape Train suggests using this at 2-5% in a mix, or 5-9% standalone. That sounds fine. Just based on these tests, I'd probably be around 7% as a solo flavor, 5% for a cocktail application where both the orange and champagne are going to work for you, and maybe 2-3% where you're mostly trying to grab the texture and some orange.
Uses & Pairings: Cocktails, basically.
You could the easy route, march in lock step with ID10-T and pair it up with FLV Morning Mimosa like in his "1-2-3 Sparkling Mimosa." Congratulations mixers, he beat us all to the low hanging fruit. But we can go deeper.
If you want to stay on the brunch theme, you could probably cover up some of that pronounced oranginess with a heavier peach flavor like JF Honey Peach or FLV Peach and get yourself a perfectly serviceable bellini. It's going to be sweet, but brunch and all.
I don't think you'll be able to mix around the orange, but you have some cocktail options where it can be slipped in fairly unobtrusively. You want to do a French 75? The orange in here could be bent toward a more generic citrus with some extra lemon. I'd say the cognac version would probably work a bit better, but this should work just fine with the gin version. I'd even say you could do a classic champagne cocktail and just don't call attention to the fact you're using orange instead of lemon. Add some INW Shisha Punch and you're set to go.
Still not odd enough? I think the fizz in here could make a fairly effective cocktail texturizer, giving a thinner body to some pretty traditionally heavy and not really liquid-like alcohol flavors, especially with a light touch of cooling. That champagne flavor isn't too aggressive and will be pretty easily masked by more aggressive and darker liquor flavors. Plus, a boatload of stuff uses orange liqueurs like Curacao, Grand Marnier, or even just chunks of oranges.
Does your old fashioned taste like an old fashioned hard candy? Lighten and brighten it up with some of this mess.
You want to go big and try to get a workable sazerac-esque cocktail with a spin like a Millionare? Try some of this.
It's also pretty good solo if you're into that sort of thing.
Second Opinions: Noted literally just did an episode on Oranges. At 3:40, the mighty ID10-T has some notes on this one. Selected excerpts: "They ruined an amazing champagne flavor by adding blood orange flavor to it." "It's yummy, it's not bad." "super accurate champagne flavor" "not actual orange juice" "generic store brand 0 calorie sparkling water (type of orange)" ... and just for the record I'm pretty sure I coined the FLV Prison Wine term. Fite me.