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Kiln House Silverthorn Menthol – First Taste!
Available today is Johnson Creek’s hugely successful Silverthorn eLiquid… in Menthol!
For the past several days I have been vaping a menthol version of Silverthorn, and had you told me prior to my first vape with it that I would enjoy it, and embrace it, I would have said you’re stone cold crazy. Me and menthol? “Never gonna happen.” And then it did…
Before I get to my personal impressions, and that of the Spinfuel eLiquid Review Team, of the Kiln House Silverthorn Menthol smoke juice let’s get into what makes Silverthorn Menthol so unique, so different, so vapable.
Kiln House is a private label of Johnson Creek Enterprises. In addition to JC’s Original, Red Oak, and Birchwood line, Kiln House is a collection of smoke juice for sophisticated tastes. Some Kiln House smoke juice ‘flavors’ are PG-Free and some contain PG and VG in their recipes, but where Kiln House shines is in the sophisticated blends of mutually compatible flavor profiles that combine and create a vape experience you can count on time and time again. All Kiln House smoke juices are all-day-vapes for many vapers.
Kiln House Silverthorn has been a top seller and a standard setter for Johnson Creek for more than a year now, surpassing Silverthorn Original for the number of devoted fans. A luscious tobacco blend of Turkish and Virginia tobaccos, Silverthorn occupies the top shelf of Tom McBride’s Tobacco Collection.
Kiln House Silverthorn is a PG/VG blend that is reminiscent of a bold pipe tobacco, producing huge vapor clouds, a solid throat hit, and just a small amount of sweetness. You can read our original review (2012!) of Silverthorn here, and our review (2013)of the Kiln House blend here. With exacting amounts of Turkish tobacco and Virginia grown tobacco flavors creates the unique identity of a Silverthorn smoke juice. The Kiln House edition improves on the original, especially with the delicious aromatic accents of Virginia tobacco and the richness of the Turkish tobacco notes.
Why Menthol? Why Now?
The Why: Johnson Creek does menthol blends extremely well. The reason, I believe, is that as popular as Johnson Creek is, as big as the company has become, it’s the dedication to creating superior eliquids, while keeping the artistic foundations that have always been a part of Johnson Creek. Science and Art are certainly an integral combination in every Johnson Creek eLiquid.
If you vape Johnson Creek smoke juice you already know that the depth Johnson Creek will gladly go to create fine ejuice that earns the adoration of its customers is legendary. Bringing a menthol blend of one of its finest creations was as natural as breathing. Silverthorn in menthol was the next evolutionary step.
The Now: There is a new energy at Johnson Creek that began almost a year ago, but became apparent to us at Spinfuel just a few months ago. This new energy has brought to market the Canteen Pro, the new airflow controller for the Canteen Pro, several new Smoke Juice flavors, and more. While creating the menthol edition of Silverthorn was obviously painstaking and arduous, it was also inevitable.
Impressions
John – 5 Stars – When Silverthorn Menthol first showed up at our office I made the decision to take on the review by myself. I know how the Spinfuel eLiquid Review Team feel about most menthol eliquids, and as much as Tom and Jason, specifically, love Silverthorn, I felt that asking them to vape one of their very favorite tobacco eliquids modified with menthol would have been asking too much. So, at first I left them all out of it.
I began vaping Silverthorn Menthol with a simple X.Jet Spider and an iStick 20W pocket mod. Vaping the 1.8ohm coil at 3.9v I was stunned by the authentic Silverthorn flavor mixed with the cleanest, nicest, menthol I’ve had in years. This was a tobacco menthol that reminded me of all the times I shared a Kool or Salem cigarette with a past girlfriend, a menthol smoker.
The menthol in Silverthorn Menthol is unlike any menthol “flavor” I’ve had in an eliquid. With Silverthorn as its base, the menthol component seems organic to the flavor profile, an extension of Silverthorn, not a modification. This is not “Silverthorn with Menthol” as I had originally expected, this is simply “Silverthorn Menthol.”
I had told myself that I would spend a certain amount of time vaping Silverthorn Menthol with the X.Jet, then move to a larger, sub-ohm tank, and spend a total of 24 hours, on and off, vaping it under various conditions; after breakfast, lunch, mid-afternoon, evening, and so forth. That would be enough to decide if Johnson Creek had been successful in creating a new smoke juice and not just a “variation of a theme”.
To my surprise, after several hours I forgot I was in “review mode” and just plain enjoyed myself. I didn’t make a conscious effort to change out the eliquid delivery device, I didn’t make it a point to vape it under certain conditions… I just vaped. At some point I realized that I was actually enjoying a menthol tobacco blend, a very rare experience.
The Team
I knew after a full day of vaping this terrific new juice that I had to bring the team into this review after all. If I could enjoy a menthol tobacco eliquid, then certainly one or more of the team would as well. More importantly, if a member of the team enjoyed Silverthorn Menthol as much as I did it would put all menthol eliquids into a new perspective. The team would have to admit that it isn’t the idea of a menthol eliquid they disliked, it was the execution of menthol blends that was the problem all along. That would be a difficult admission for the team to cop to, but I was determined to see if they would find Silverthorn Menthol as pleasant as I did.
Here is their honest take on Kiln House Silverthorn Menthol
Tom: 5 Stars – Right now I have three bottles of Silverthorn in my collection. I always kept two in stock before now, but I have since added a lower nicotine version when I began using the sub-ohm tanks more and more. Having to face down a Silverthorn with menthol seemed to be almost cruel. I kept asking; “Why ruin a good thing?”.
Taking 4ML from the .6mg nicotine bottle I filled a Kanger Subtank equipped with the RBA component and began vaping. After letting out my first large inhale I was shocked by the purity of the Silverthorn flavor enhanced with a cool, clean tobacco-like menthol. Spending a half a day with this extraordinary smoke juice I came to the conclusion that whoever it was at Johnson Creek that developed this menthol version of the award-winning Silverthorn knew exactly what he or she was doing, and what the endgame for it was. Johnson Creek was out to create a real alternative for vapers that spent years smoking menthol cigarettes. If you were a menthol smoker than you know how impossible it was to find a true alternative.
I will add Silverthorn Menthol to my collection, and believe me, during the hot weather, when vaping something both delicious and cool, this is going to be my tobacco vape.
Jason: 5 Stars – I am awarding Silverthorn Menthol 5 stars because this is an eliquid I did not think was possible. Johnson Creek captured the heart of Silverthorn and blended the perfect amount of coolness to it so that the Silverthorn flavor profile was in tact, only now it was a cool vape instead of a rich pipe tobacco dream. Not sure that I could actually buy a menthol of any kind, but honestly I enjoyed Silverthorn Menthol for quite many hours. This new juice has me rethinking the whole menthol eliquid paradigm.
Julia: 5 Stars – I won’t kid you, I didn’t like this Silverthorn Menthol much, but then again I don’t enjoy menthol eliquids and although there is no doubt in my mind that Silverthorn is one of the finest tobacco blends, I’m just not a huge fan of that flavor genre.
John, Tom, and Jason are right when they say that Silverthorn is very much alive inside this menthol blend, and if I enjoyed menthol I have no doubt that I would enjoy this one. I will say that I firmly believe that vapers looking for a great tobacco menthol eliquid will find it in Silverthorn Menthol. Of that, I am absolutely positive.
Keira: 5 Stars – Johnson Creek Silverthorn is too close to the real thing for my liking. I enjoyed my time with Silverthorn, for a while, but I have long since returned to my non-tobacco flavors.
Faced with vaping Silverthorn again, this time laced with Menthol, I knew that Johnson Creek would do a great job, but I also knew it wouldn’t hold much interest to me. Then I tried it and I found a new respect for tobacco menthol.
I won’t buy Silverthorn Menthol but I will tell you who I think should buy it. Any vaper that smoked menthol cigarettes would be doing themselves a disservice if they did not plunk down some money on a bottle of this stuff. I’m telling you, I took my portion of Silverthorn Menthol around to a few of my menthol ex-smokers and asked them to tell me how close this was to what they remembered their menthol cigarettes had tasted like, and every single one of them told me that Silverthorn Menthol was the closest eliquid they’ve ever vaped to their old menthol smokes. Believe me, these vapers would have loved nothing more than to trash talk an eliquid that was attempting to be a menthol smokers eliquid, so when they told me that this was “it”, I believed them.
The 5 stars I am awarding to Silverthorn Menthol is not based on what I like or dislike about it, it’s based on the execution and the excellence of this blend as a super premium menthol eLiquid.
Conclusion
Something we all agreed was that this Kiln House Silverthorn Menthol was the closest eLiquid yet to a real tobacco menthol experience. We agreed that Johnson Creek succeeded when they took the superior tobacco blend that is Silverthorn and created a true menthol variation.
As for me, I’ll keep it in rotation for quite a while because it’s the first menthol blend I actually liked enough to want to vape it.
Tom seems to be enjoying it in spite of himself, and Jason admits that it is the eliquid menthol smokers were looking for. Julia and Keira… well, I knew this would be a hard sell for them, they just aren’t vaping much tobacco these days, and they never vape menthol, so its not surprising that they won’t have anything more to do with it. But even they admitted that Silverthorn Menthol was the answer to the question; “Is there a menthol eliquid that can satisfy a menthol smoker?” The answer is a resounding Yes, it’s Silverthorn Menthol, a Spinfuel Choice Award Winner.
Kiln House Silverthorn Menthol is available right now on johnsoncreeksmokejuice.com. Order early, and when you’ve had the opportunity to vape it, come back to this review and let us know what you think.
John Manzione, with Tom McBride, Jason Little, and Julia and Keira Hartley-Barnes
