It’s a popular misconception that a bigger hookah means bigger and better smoke. But this is untrue. Let’s look at the facts.

Larger Hookahs Often Have Traditional Chambers

Larger hookahs have a number of great advantages, but also their fair share of drawbacks.

Bigger hookahs, hookahs larger than about 30”, are usually made in the Middle East according to many traditional standards. For example, larger hookahs frequently employ what’s called a ‘traditional chamber’. This is a reference to the inner-workings of the hookah…

I know it’s tempting to look into the bottom of an almost-empty tub of Al Fakher Soft Black and see all that juicy goodness and think, “this is going to be great!” But don’t be fooled! All that juice in there is actually going to create all kinds of problems.

Smaller hookahs pose little question about how to clean them. They fit in the sink. Larger hookahs, on the other hand can seem pretty daunting. Trying to figure it out for yourself can take a lot of trial and error and can take a lot of time. Some fill a bath tub and clean them that way. Others take them outside and use a garden hose. But this isn’t necessary. Any hookah can be successfully cleaned in a kitchen sink, and with practice, can be done in less than one minute. Reviews here at HookahReport are always performed on a clean hookah, so we’re cleaning hookahs a lot.

Ash. The annoying stuff that falls off your coals and all over the floor and couch. God forbid someone walk by the hookah too quickly and send those little grains everywhere.  If you’re outside smoking, this stuff is even worse. It ends up on your clothes, in your food and drink. Ash management is definitely annoying. But did you know that old ash is also the key to solving another annoying problem all of us hookah smokers suffer from.
Once you’ve lit your coals, they’re actually burning. Like regular fire, they …

If you smoke consistently, you’ll eventually run into this problem. You tear into a fresh box of natural coals and start using them. Before long, you realize a lot of your coals are going out after 20 or 30 minutes. Your coals are water damaged. It might have been too much moisture in the air. Perhaps they were stored improperly, or maybe you got a bad box. However it happened, before you throw away 15 hard earned dollars, try to repair that box. It’s not a quick fix, but it’s …

Everyone has been to one. It is probably where you first tried hookah. Hookah lounges are starting to appear everywhere in North America. While walking downtown, you have probably smelt the sweet aroma of shisha being smoked for a cafe. Hookah lounges or cafes are great places to bring friends if they want to have a good time socializing. But what makes for a good hookah lounge? What would make you want to spend $10 or more for one bowl of shisha? Here is a list of some of the things that I look for in a good hookah lounge that I think you should look for too.

The Vortex Bowl from Sahara Smoke is one of only a few very popular specialty bowls. While it has a few drawbacks, one of its major selling points is that it’s among the easiest to pack. In this short tutorial I’m going to show you how to pack your Vortex bowl and get an excellent smoke, no matter what kind of shisha tobacco you fill it with. So, lets get started.
Mix Your Shisha
The Vortex Bowl shines the most when using a wet shisha (though brands that are more dry will …

The ongoing bane of any hookah smoker’s experience is returning a well used hookah bowl to its freshest, cleanest state. After a few weeks or months of smoking, it is inevitable that your bowl will get caked with a solid black gunk that most people find nearly impossible to remove.

A quick search on the internet will tell you to use baking soda, lemon juice, vinegar, oven cleaner, Bar Tender’s Friend, or even boiling the bowl for a long period of time, to remove the gunk. But if you’re anything like me, you’ve never had much success with these methods. Which makes sense. The stuff that’s stuck on there is a residue that’s been baking at around 400 – 600 degrees for 20 or 30 hours—or more, if you’re not in the habit of cleaning the bowl regularly. The popular cleaning methods simply aren’t powerful enough to make too much of a difference. With this cleaning method, you bowl will be about as clean as it will get, and it will only take about 10 minutes.

Recently, I purchased a box of CocoNara’s from a local market in my area. Unfortunately however, having never tried these coals before, I did not know what to expect when I purchased them. I grabbed the first box I could find and bought it. A couple of hours later, when I decided to open the box and have a smoke, I noticed that the coals were shaped awkwardly and not in a perfect cube shape like I am used to getting when I smoke Chronic Hookah coals. So, I took it upon myself to search around online to see if the coals I received were really CocoNara’s. After a little bit of searching and a couple of emails back and forth with a CocoNara representative, I found out that the ex-distributor for Canada started to import fake CocoNara’s and that is what I received.

First we talked about the basics of hookah anatomy. Then, we got into the gritty details of hookah charcoal. This week, we’re going to discuss what it takes to pack your tobacco in your bowl and get a great smoking session out of it. So, lets get started.

If you’re reading this guide, there’s a good chance you’re not using a specialty bowl, such as a Vortex or phunnel bowl. Rather, you’re probably using the bowl that came with your hookah. That’s a standard bowl. It may be an Egyptian bowl, a mod Bowl or a Mya bowl, but regardless, the routine for packing pretty much any of these will be about the same. So, for this guide, we’re going to assume you…