Maybe it’s just the American in me, but when I see something advertised as “red hot”, I immediately think that it’s either something spicy, like Better Made RED HOT! chips…
Or, Red Hots cinnamon candy.
Any of those would have been okay with me. But Nick & Johnny had other ideas. What those ideas were is a mystery to me. “This doesn’t taste very good, but at least it burns your gums!” quite possibly.
On the first opening, I was expecting to get hit with a wave of cinnamon but barely detected any. Maybe if someone took one of those cinnamon-flavored toothpicks, hid them in one of Grandpa’s old shoes a few years back, and as you’re going through his things after the funeral, you notice it fall the the floor before you add to the “DONATIONS” box — and for some reason, you decide to put it back in the shoe and sniff it.
My friends, this is not good.
I saw this described as being like Red Hots candy on SnusCentral. SnusMe describes it as “…clear taste of cinnamon and clove with hints of bitter orange and chili”. Wrong, and wrong. Let’s see what Swedish Match has to say about this abomination… looks like what SnusMe says: “heavy and spicy tobacco taste with distinct notes of cinnamon and clove, along with hints of bitter orange and chilli. A full sized pouch that is moist on the surface for a quick and strong flavour release.“
On the first try, it was just tobacco and chili pepper. No sweetness at all. Tobacco with a touch of capsaicin, and a gentle dash of salt. Yuck. I set it aside for a few days and tried again. This time, all I really got was a boring original portion that burned my gum a little. Several minutes in, I could find an echo of cinnamon, and eventually got what I wouldn’t personally describe as bitter orange but “vaguely citrus”.
Drip is a little scratchy and generally tastes bad. Slightly more than a white portion. Much less than a regular General portion. The nicotine hit is pretty “meh” for extra-strong.
I always feel a bit defeated when my conclusion is to throw away a can that’s only missing a couple of portions, but this is probably best described as “inoffensive, but not worth the time”.