Festiva e-Juice by Cloud Alchemist – Review

Strawberry Vanilla Almond Cream Layer Cake
It’s no secret that I love cake flavor.

Very few vendors have managed to generate the amount of forum chatter that Cloud Alchemist Festiva has in such a short time frame. It’s no secret that a lot of vapers go gaga over the juice inside those deep chocolate bottles, so when I was asked by several of the regular readers of this website to review some of the Cloud Alchemist collection, I made a concerted effort to get hold of some of their almost legendary e-liquid. Due to the enormous demand for their product, once I knew my juice was on the way, I prepared myself for the long wait. When it finally arrived, I was practically in awe of the packaging; it appeared as if my box, had indeed, originated in Wonder Festiva land.

Specifications

Size  10ml  30ml  120ml

Nicotine Level  00mg  1.5mg  03mg  06mg  12mg

                                                        PG/VG Ratio  20pg/80vg   50pg/50vg

Festiva E-liquid Review

This was vaped using Kayfun lite with a 1.6ohm coil, Eleaf iStick, and a cotton wick. Fluffy whipped frosting made with sugar, mascarpone cheese, vanilla, whipping cream, and almond extract are the ingredients of this premium ejuice recipe. Right up front, I get a mix of all the flavors in a manner that perfectly matches the description. The almond is a smooth blend of almond butter and almond milk. It’s followed by a light touch of a bakery flavor with a touch of sweetness. The strawberry lingers in the middle as a fresh strawberry compote sort of flavor. For me, it’s more subtle than the almond but is the perfect addition. On the exhale the almond takes back over in a sea of velvety almond milk with a hint of strawberry.

Flavor and Taste

Admittedly, Cloud Alchemist’s Festiva is not a dead ringer for this particular novelty, but it’s also not a far cry from one of my childhood favorites, Good Humor’s Strawberry Shortcake. There is a rather sweet, cake-like, artificial tasting strawberry that’s bright and quite tasty. The second, underlying flavor of sweet cream nicely compliments the strawberry, as it often does in the berries and cream e-liquids. It’s a good solid flavoring component in and of itself.

The vape opens with a solid short cupcake flavor with a very realistic ‘cakey-ness’ to it. It’s a flavor I often have a hard time describing when reviewing bakery e-juice that’s part taste, part mouthfeel. When the creamy layers of cake along with the strawberry combined, they work so perfectly together simulating the experience of eating the real dream cake entirely.

Vapor Production & Throat Hit

The overall picture here is relatively simple, good strawberries and cream like vape, with the bonus chill. It’s sweet in all the right places, without any off or bitter notes, and while it’s certainly an enjoyable vape for those that favor the sweeter, fruit and cream based vapes. With my standard reviewing rig, I preferred to vape this one at 9.2w or 4.8v on a 2.5Ω dripping atty, which kept the flavors in check while yielding an average throat hit and a decent cloud. Any more heat in this set-up and the delicate cream flavor does begin to suffer a bit, putting off a slight bitter note.

Device Longevity

In a modified Eleaf iStick equipped with a twisted 30ga kanthal coil (.8Ω) on an XC-116 wick, I had no issues at all. It produced clouds of sweet, creamy, strawberry vapor with no flavor degradation at all. The inhale is sweet, creamy and has almond. Between inhale and exhale, the flavors blend beautifully and no one flavor dominates. On the exhale, I get a taste of whipped cream, a sweetness from the strawberry with a touch of strawberry flavor and a touch of a bakery note with more almond

Conclusion

The exhale is loaded with strawberry flavor and an excellent one at that. The vanilla-almond is sweet with a mildly sharp edge that is offset nicely by the rich, creamy realistic cake flavor that makes it return at just the right moment to tie everything together for a long, sweet finish that ends with the taste of vanilla frosting. This is a complex, dynamic, multi-tonal premium e-liquid, and a flavor combination that while unexpected, works remarkably well.