First DIY attempt went pretty well

[mill4023]

I just finished my first DIY attempt.
I was a little worried about it because I've heard people say it can take a lot of experimenting to make good juice, but I'm mostly happy with everything I made.

I made a bunch of 10ml sample batches, starting with single flavors, with a few exceptions, and tasting everything the next day

TFA Blackberry - 15%
Too strong and chemically/perfumy. I tried dropping it to 10% and it was better, but still not great. I tend to be sensitive to perfumy flavors, which is why I went with almost all FA over other brands.

FA Tiramisu - 4%
This stuff is really good, but doesn't taste like tiramisu to me. I'm not getting much coffee flavor. More bakery and nut flavor to it. Maybe after steeping, the coffee will come through more?

FA Apple Pie - 4%
This is also really good, but I can't say it tastes like apple. I get all the pie and spice flavors, but no real apple. I'm thinking this might be good mixed with some straight apple flavor.

FA Peach - 5%
Tastes like sweet canned peaches

FA White Peach - 5%
More natural and fresh peach flavor

FA White Peach - 5% + Vienna Cream - 3%
The Vienna Cream adds rich, creamy, custardy, deliciousness to the peach flavor. This is my new favorite juice, so I made a 50ml bottle and I'm vaping it all day.

FA Pear - 5%
Not bad, but pretty subtle.

FA Pear - 5% + FA Cinnamon Ceylon - 1%
Mmmm, this is pretty close to HHV's Cinful Pear, which was one of my favorite juices. On the second day, the cinnamon seemed to get stronger, almost overpowering the pear. I'll give it some time, then maybe up the pear or drop the cinnamon to 0.5%

 

[nwppwn]

Looks good, I come up with a base' consisting of one or two flavors that I like and then start adding small amounts of other flavors to give the recipe some depth. I like sweet juices so I also hit them with a few % of sweetener/EM/cotton candy/marshmellow. Cotton candy works well when blending flavors. What % PG/VG/NIC are you using? Do you drip these or run them through a tank setup? Thanks for posting the recipes.

-- nwp

 

[Heabob]

Happy for ya, good to not get frustrated starting out...

FA Apple Pie is a good basic pie crust, and can be used with other fruits too.

It's good with 2-3% FA Fuji Apple & 2% FA Vienna Cream.

FA Tiramisu is quite strong, I can only use it at 1%, then I added 2% Vienna Cream.

Try 7% Blackberry with 3% Vienna Cream.

I found VZ Blackberry to be the best so far, only need to use at 2.5%.

 

[mill4023]

Looks good, I come up with a base' consisting of one or two flavors that I like and then start adding small amounts of other flavors to give the recipe some depth. I like sweet juices so I also hit them with a few % of sweetener/EM/cotton candy/marshmellow. Cotton candy works well when blending flavors. What % PG/VG/NIC are you using? Do you drip these or run them through a tank setup? Thanks for posting the recipes.

-- nwp

I like a little sweetness, but all of these taste sweet enough for me without adding any sweeteners.
I'm doing 70/30 at 4mg/ml. I've tapered down the nic over the past year, but don't want to give it up all the way.

I'm currently using EVOD tanks and building my own microcoils with cotton wicks. I find the best flavor around 8W on an MVP2.

I thought about getting a cheap RDA for tasting, but with the EVOD tanks, there's actually not much waste.

 

[mill4023]

Happy for ya, good to not get frustrated starting out...

FA Apple Pie is a good basic pie crust, and can be used with other fruits too.

It's good with 2-3% FA Fuji Apple & 2% FA Vienna Cream.

FA Tiramisu is quite strong, I can only use it at 1%, then I added 2% Vienna Cream.

Try 7% Blackberry with 3% Vienna Cream.

I found VZ Blackberry to be the best so far, only need to use at 2.5%.

Thanks. I'll try all those suggestions.
My wife had a half tank of the Apple Pie sample and topped it off with White Peach and that was pretty good.

I got a blackberry juice from Backwoods Brew a while back that was fantastic. Then they stopped carrying it. Since then, I've tried a lot that I hated. The only one I liked was HHV crackberry, but it still wasn't as good as the BWB stuff. So I'd love to find a great blackberry.

 

[DingerCPA]

Mill, sounds awesome! I have found I really like vanillas/custards/creams along with many of my fruit flavors. I think it smooths out the fruit and gives some depth to the flavors. I'm running mostly EVODs on my MVP as well, but I've discovered bumping up to about 9.5W (1.8 ohm coils) seems to enhance the flavors for me. I have a couple of coffee flavors I've made, and that's about the only time I've felt the need to add any sweetener (unless I've already added some cream component.)

I just ordered up some spearmint and wintergreen (along with a zillion other flavors ) Can't wait to pair them with some vanillas

 

[Boletus]

Sounds like you are off to a great start. Your approach to starting out is a sensible one. Too many people want to run before they learn how to walk.