Darkstar Oneshots Part 1 – The Shake ‘n Vapes

Facebook is a useful tool sometimes. I can – publish endless food selfies of all the meals I ate in all the restaurants around Yorkshire and beyond. Keep up with all the gossip from friends and relatives. Watch and cringe as friends of friends post melodramatic ‘vaguebooking’ updates. Oh, and be bombarded by hundreds of fucking cat memes.

The BEST thing though is I also find excellent vape discount codes and win competitions. Well one competition anyway!

Darkstar recently released a new range of oneshot concentrates. Five shake n vape, and five steepers. And on that there Facebook, Darkstar posted a truly excellent 40% off code for this new oneshot range for all to use! Awesome!

So I promptly chose two and got them ordered. A cereal one ( Hades ) and an Italian strawberry lime cheesecake ( Hypnos ). They were put away for a months hibernation.

Cool I thought. Something to look forward to. Then a few days later, I only went and won their competition for all TEN oneshots! Super Cool!

As a thanks for this, I though the least I could do would be to review them all as soon as I could. Which would have been sooner but for a stinker of a cold that’s lasted over two weeks on and off.

So here we go – the Shake ‘n Vapes! All of these have been tested on a good quality Odis O-Atty clone, with a single clapton coming in at around 0.5 ohms.

All these were mixed at the suggested 20% ratio, 75VG/25PG. 3mg, and have steeped now for several weeks

ZEVS

STRAWBERRY LEMONADE

Probably one of the least complex of the five shake and vapes, Zeus is quite a mild-flavoured vape. A very light lemonade accompanies a very , very light strawberry. I’m sure I also get a really subtle cooling effect with this as well.

There isn’t much sweetness with this either. If it had a bit more punch somewhere… a zingier lemonade… a sweeter and stronger strawberry I’d be excited. Otherwise, I’m finding Zeus vapable if a little wishy washy.

PEEGOREVAPES RATING : 

ATHENA

STRAWBERRY KIWI BUBBLEGUM

I sort of avoided vaping this until I’d tried most of the others. Only reason being it had ‘bubblegum’ in the flavour notes… and I tried a bubblegum juice early in my vape life. And it was rank.

Athena vaguely smelled a little like Zeus as I dripped it, but blimey it was much better on the toke!

It’s one of them juices where the flavour is a happy sum of it’s constituent parts. The strawberry ( similar in flavour to Zeus but a little stonger ), melds with the kiwi, which in turn melds with a surprisingly nice bubblegum note . Also sneaking in is a little cooling effect.

The result is actually quite pleasing indeed! A little on the dry side for my taste, but this is a close runner up to Apollo out of the five. Nice!

PEEGOREVAPES RATING : 

APOLLO

ORANGE TROPICAL

Very early in the steep, I picked up on Apollo being one of the better of the group.

A tart, almost dry orange zaps the mouth with flavour. In fact it reminds me a lot of Cotswold Vapour’s Citrus Punch ( reviewed previously ). Why? ORANGE TIC-TACS! Yup, Apollo is doin’ the tic-tac thang too!

There is a very mild tropical flavour in the background too, but it is far to indistinct to be more accurate than that.

Lastly, Apollo is rounded off with a mild cooling effect, which works well in the blend.

My favourite of the five shake n vapes, Apollo is a pleasing juice that will justify a second purchase at some point after my current supply runs down.

PEEGOREVAPES RATING : 

POSEIDON

CREAMY TROPICAL PINEAPPLE COCONUT

This smells amazing. Seriously, I love the smell of this, and a lick test is almost as good. In fact my workmate came to the same conclusion when I brought them in for him to try. It smells like an actual Pina Colada drink in truth.

Vaping this though doesn’t quite translate the same. The pineapple is fairly mild. It’s there, and it’s quite a natural taste, just not quite strong enough I think.

The coconut is a little on the dry side, but I seem to say that with every e liquid I try that is coconutty! Still it’s a pleasant in combination with the pineapple.

I don’t feel I can taste much else in Poseidon despite feeling sure there may be other tropical elements in there, but I do get a creaminess in the background unassociated with the coconut itself. Almost a creamy milkiness.

It’s obvious Darkstar were indeed going for a Pina Colada juice and with Poseidon, I reckon they pretty much pulled it off. But like with Zeuz, it just comes across a little weak somehow, like one of the flavours needs to pop a little.

Despite all this, it’s a nice juice and I can see some people loving this. Me, I just like it every now and then.

PEEGOREVAPES RATING : 

APHRODITE

LYCHEE PEAR CARAMEL

Oh how I wish this didn’t have caramel! The review for this one is no reflection on Darkstar as such, but more a case of I have an issue with certain caramel flavours! ( see my previous reviews for proof of this…)

The lychee in Aphrodite is lovely! A realistic, nicely strong note that just defines the juice. The pear is barely there but adds a slight ‘wetness’ to the mix and works very well indeed.

So far so good. But then comes the caramel. And it’s that sorta curry/savoury flavour I get whenever I vape anything with this in ( not sure if it’s TFA Caramel Original but feeling it might be ) But for me…. it just spoils it.

I’m gonna do a very rare thing and give this two ratings. One for how I perceive it as it is, and one for what others may think of this without my own personal hangups!

PEEGOREVAPES RATING(S) :  / 

FINAL THOUGHTS

I know Darkstar have released one-shots before, but this is their first proper themed range, and as I’m now half way through reviewing the selection I can say they aren’t half bad!

I reckon a few flavours need a little re-formulation at some point, but as things stand, the shake n vapes offer a good, varied selection for a decent price. Especially with a good discount! As freebies… I really couldn’t complain!

So far so good Darkstar. Keep it up!

I’ll be doing Part 2 – The Steepers next week. See you then.

Cheers, Peegore

I bought theme here – Dark Star One Shot Concentrates