I was sitting on the couch earlier this week, after filling a fresh Rad Davis prince with, fittingly, Prince’s Street Mixture, a fine blend created by Dick “Chief Catoonah” Silverman for the 2012 Chicago Pipeshow John Cotton Throwdown. According to the website where the tobacco is sold, Prince’s Street “is a blend of two Virginias, a small amount of Turkish Ribbon and Cyprian Latakia and a touch of Perique. The result of the careful balance of these components is a mellow, medium bodied smoke.” After this, there is a bit of a caveat emptor moment, where it is stated that “it is very important that you realize that it is a re-creation of the current character of a 25+ year-old tobacco. Over time the zest of the Latakia fades and the subtle flavors of the orientals do diminish.”

I’ll admit, I noticed that the flavors were slightly muted in this blend in the attempt at recreating an aged blend, but that is not what concerned me. As I sat on my leather couch, full of its puncture wounds courtesy of my young kitten, Isis, I found myself transported back to the smoking tent at the 2012 Chicago Pipe Show. I was sitting next to Rick Newcombe as I tried one of the contestant blends for the Throwdown in my Yanik meerschaum. Of course, at the time I did not know that it would be the winning blend or would later be called Prince’s Street Mixture.

The transportation was so vivid, so real that I savored every sip of the English tobacco even more than I might have otherwise.

Researchers have explained that memories relating to an event are located through many different areas of the brain, specifically the areas that have to do with sensory reception, which makes sense (no pun intended), considering that events are no more than stimulation of the senses and our reaction to those events. The significance of this is that the stimulation of a certain sense will not only bring back memories related directly to that specific sense, but also the other senses. The result is that a fully formed memory can be recalled simply by the activation of one of the senses.

Fascinatingly, a study done in the early 2000s involving brain scanning found that a visual stimulus can actually activate regions of the brain associated with a previously experienced and remembered smell. As many of us know, the opposite is also true. It is often said that smell is the sense most strong related to memory. While this has not been totally confirmed, there are several theories as to why this might be.

One part of the theory is that taste and smell are so closely related, thus giving smell the advantage of two senses. More advanced studies of the brain have also shown that the olfactory cortex might have a direct link to the hippocampus, the area of our brain which plays a large role in moving information from short-term memory (sensory perception) to long-term memory.

In contrast, as a fascinating article on Science Blogs by Jonah Lehrer states, “all of our other senses (sight, touch and hearing) are first processed somewhere else – they go to the thalamus – and only then make their way to our memory center. This helps explain why we’re so dependent on metaphors to describe taste and smell. We always describe foods by comparing them to something else, which we’ve tasted before. (“These madeleines taste just like my grandmother’s madeleines!” Or: “These madeleines taste like the inside of a lemon poppy seed cake!”) In contrast, we have a rich language of adjectives to describe what we see and hear, which allows us to define the sensory stimulus in lucid detail. As a result, we don’t have to lean so heavily on simile and comparison.”

In addition to its connection to the hippocampus, it also appears that the olfactory area is closely related to the amygdala, which is what process emotion. This helps to explain why smells and tastes not only spawn vivid memories, but also frequently conjure up intense emotion. A scent might make you think of an old romance or a taste might remind you of the comfort of home.

In my case, the smell and taste of Prince’s Street Mixture filled me with extreme happiness as I remembered all of the friends that I made while at the Chicago Pipe Show. I remembered the incredibly relaxed feeling that I had in that moment in the tent and the joy that I felt to be somewhere that my hobby was not simply tolerated, but appreciated.

There was a lot of scientific language, but let me summarize simply: this blend reminded me of a very happy time and has continued to create even more pleasant memories.