Does anyone flavor there cigars?

[Brown Thumb]

Sorry to ask. But I do like Swisher Sweets and White Owls
What do you expect I smoke Menthol.
I was grabbing a beer and saw the snow cone flavors and was pm'd the cigar roller was going to be headed my way in a few days.
I was thinking some rum and snow cone flavoring with cigars put in a Tupperware sealed container for a few days soaking. Am I nuts?
BT

 

[FmGrowit]

I was told by a 90 year old pre-revolution Cuban torcedor that he made a tea from the wrapper mid-ribs and often times would add rum, cinnamon and sometime vanilla to the tea. He used the tea for hydrating the wrapper. He never told me any thing about quantities, so you'll have to experiment.

 

[Brown Thumb]

That is a start. Thanks Don. If I wanted it stronger I could also do the binder with the sauce.
I might get drunk soaking the whole Cigar in a rum mix.

 

[DonH]

I have seen a guy dip the mouth end of the cigar into his whiskey before lighting it.

 

[Matty]

I've never flavored the cigars I roll but years ago I soaked a few cheap ones in red wine and dried them out. They smoked a whole lot nicer after.

 

[jekylnz]

Iv tried dripping some of my sons blunt flavours (juicy fruit.berry.cherry etc) onto the filler when rolling a few sticks for something different. .its not bad..not something I smoke often though. ..the vanilla rum spray on wrappers sounds tasty. .im sure alot of cigar companies use more flavour than they would be willing to admit.
I've seen them dip them in honey before to..but just the one end

 

[BarG]

The Havana 425 has a menthol type flavor to me when used as filler. I have never tried flavoring.

 

[deluxestogie]

Drew Estates has offered a coffee-infused "premium" cigar for about a decade. Although I have never smoked one, I always start of my day with a cigar and a cup of potent coffee. Also, slowly sipping Kahlua, while smoking a cigar works some sort of magic on the tongue. Kahlua is a liqueur that is nothing but ethanol, sugar, vanilla and coffee. For flavoring a Kahlua cigar, I would skip the sugar. Coffee extract is available at some liqueur stores that carry wine-making and beer-making supplies, or you can dissolve an entire jar of good instant coffee crystals into a quart of warm water (or not-warm alcohol).

Bob

 

[jekylnz]

I think anything like cinnamon. .vanilla. .coffee..anise. licorice. And a nice rum and you can't go wrong. .long as you don't over do it.
Im definitely going to give that wrapper midrib cinnamon.Vanilla tea a go

 

[FmGrowit]

Acid cigars seem to be popular. I don't care for them, but they are heavily infused with gobs of herbal essence. I think introducing flavor in moderation is a sound practice especially with otherwise bland tobaccos.

BTW...never put an Acid cigar in the same bag with traditional cigars...unless you want a bag of Acid cigars.

 

[Indianamac]

Sorry to ask. But I do like Swisher Sweets and White Owls
What do you expect I smoke Menthol.
I was grabbing a beer and saw the snow cone flavors and was pm'd the cigar roller was going to be headed my way in a few days.
I was thinking some rum and snow cone flavoring with cigars put in a Tupperware sealed container for a few days soaking. Am I nuts?
BT

I don't think you are nuts! I have some smokes in two seperate zip-loc bags, inside one larger (1) gal. bag.

1 bag is filled with French vanilla coffee grounds. The other bag has a cotton ball, saturated with cotton candy flavoring, inside a smaller plastic bag and is open on one end. I put some sticks into these bags and let them sit for approx. (1) month or as long as I can stand it.

These make some really great smelling smokes and are really not over flavored, while smoking. They make my humidors smell even better.

 

[jekylnz]

Mmm cotton candy. Haha

 

[DGBAMA]

I have thought about using JD or similar full flavored whiskey to bring my wrapper into high case for rolling, but have not tried it yet.

 

[jekylnz]

I've tried scotch.. j.d's. J.b dark and white rum..I didn't like the bourbon and Scotch much..the white is better than dark rum to.

Also I was just thinking about the wrapper midrib tea Don was talking about. .I wonder if you could do this with some strong filler midribs and scraps..and help to give your wrapper some extra kick and flavour .?

 

[Ashauler]

I've tried scotch.. j.d's. J.b dark and white rum..I didn't like the bourbon and Scotch much..the white is better than dark rum to.

Also I was just thinking about the wrapper midrib tea Don was talking about. .I wonder if you could do this with some strong filler midribs and scraps..and help to give your wrapper some extra kick and flavour .?

Some use a "tea" as a moistener during pile fermentation. The term they use for it is bethune, and it is variously described as containing herbs, spices, and even wine. It is used, but discussed by virtually no one. I would expect that the exact composition of each mixture is a very closely held secret very similar to the "recipes" used by the rollers in a cigar factory.

There are some videos, somewhere, that show workers misting tobacco with a pump sprayer while the pilones are broken down, shaken and restacked.....my guess is there is more than water in those pump sprayers.

 

[deluxestogie]

For what it's worth, Lew Rothman, the founder--now retired--of JR Cigars, and in the business for many decades, asserted that the only commercial brand of cigars still using bethune is Royal Jamaica. Over the years, Rothman made scores of journeys to cigar factories throughout the hemisphere. On the flip side, he was surprised to learn that tobacco was grown in Peru, so he was pretty much tied to the market in his knowledge.

Every Royal Jamaica cigar that I ever tasted (not many of them) had an "off" flavor that I would describe as overly vegetal--almost weedy.

This brief 1899 book by Oscar Loew contains a section on the bethune process.

Curing and Fermentation of Cigar Leaf Tobacco by Oscar Loew US Govt Printing Office 1899.

http://books.google.com/books?id=Flw1AAAAMAAJ&oe=UTF-8

To download a copy (~1.1MB) hover your mouse over "READ EBOOK". Select "Download: PDF"

Bob

 

[Ashauler]

Lew produced some of the most entertaining cigar advertisements I've ever read. He even marketed a cigar named "Flor de Baloney" in an effort to expose all the non-sense used to market cigars. One of his saying was "The only difference between a $10 cigar and a $2 cigar is 8 bucks." Not exactly true, but not exactly a lie either.

I'm certain that he's seen way more cigar factories and growing operations than I ever will.....but not so sure he's seen it "all" or would share it if he has. As far as I know, the only manufacturer that has given an unqualified answer to the question of bethune is Padron...and they say strictly H2O is used in there operations. I could certainly be wrong though.

 

[rainmax]

Curing and Fermentation of Cigar Leaf Tobacco by Oscar Loew US Govt Printing Office 1899.

http://books.google.com/books?id=Flw1AAAAMAAJ&oe=UTF-8

To download a copy (~1.1MB) hover your mouse over "READ EBOOK". Select "Download: PDF"

Bob

It is not available in my country yet...

 

[Knucklehead]

It is not available in my country yet...

It is available in your country now ... check your email.

 

[Ben Brand]

I can`t read the book on curing and fermenting, it says no ebook available!!!!!