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Pressureless perique?

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ChinaVoodoo

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I'm sure this is ludicrous, but it's my first year curing tobacco, and I didn't want to waste my stems, so I am experimenting.

I flattened all of my stems out with the rollers on my pasta maker. Then, I packed them into a jerky shooter. It's an oversized caulking gun with an aluminum tube. I reefed on it as tight as I could. There was a little brown liquid that came out around the gasket. I don't know how much squeezed out though, because you can't see what's happening inside the shooter. After a couple days, I pulled it out. It was a cylinder at least as hard as a tobacco plug. It was dry, so I deduced that either the cells didn't burst, or the stems were to dry. I then stuck it back in the shooter, compressed it, and threw it in the freezer, because I know with fruit and vegetables, the freezer helps break cell walls. I took it out and let it sit for a few more days, compressed. Then I removed it from the shooter, weighed it and added ten percent water by weight, and vacuum sealed it. It is now in my kiln.
 

oldbear

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I tried using a yoghurt incubator and keeping tobacco at about 95 F for weeks with little result, so, at least at that temperature it isn't working. The commercial fermentation or the cigar processes typically use temperatures at around 125 F.

I personally suspect the pressure is there to create a saturated humidity and anaerobic environment. The test would be creating a good seal in a jar at various pressures (as many as possible).

Oldbear
 

Planter

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The jar with the green, uncured, wilted leaves is just sitting there after a week, not much visible activity/change, the leaves got a bit darker. But they did not rot (yet). The liquid is greenish.


For a second jar I rolled wilted green leaves (with gloves) between the hands to disrupt the cell walls. The liquid in that setup is brown and bubbling. The leaves look like the ones in the first jar.


A third jar with sort-of-air-cured-but-still-a-lot-of-green leaves produced some bubbles, the liquid is brown, and the whole thing looks more like it should after 6 days.


Another jar with brown, oven-dried/flue-cured leaf started bubbling after 2 days.


So far no loss. At what point should that "fermented fruit smell" appear?
 

oldbear

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Mold is an aerobic organism and requires air to breathe. In a sealed jar other organisms should be active, but mold will only grow until the oxygen is used up, then anaerobic bacteria will take over.

How do marine animals (fish, etc.) exist at 3 miles below the surface and under pressure high enough to crush most submarines? The answer is that the pressure inside the fish is the same as the pressure outside the fish, in short, they don't care! Disrupting the cells of a dead leaf with pressure might be either impossible or irrelevant.

The purpose of the pressure is to create a saturated environment with a minimum of water and to eliminate oxygen. It is also interesting that the expressed juice of the perique process does not mold or rot either, though I don't know why; perhaps too many tobacco toxins.

The reasons we ferment or "perique" tobacco is to raise the pH of the tobacco, creating protinated nicotine which is more active, and the processes also break down some of the unpleasant compounds (starches) and create other pleasant compounds (aromatic and pleasantly odorous materials).

My experiments didn't create wondrous tobacco, my pressure treated samples of commercial tobacco taste similar to the original tobacco, but the pH was higher and the nicotine was stronger.

I will continue to experiment!

Oldbear
 

Planter

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Update: The green, uncured leaves are turning brown in the jars. (I did not open the jars or otherwise allow exposure to external air/oxygen). The one with the rolled-to-disrupt Prilep leaves "boiled" a little bit over, and that liquid is dark brown, thick, sticky and vinegary.
 

Jitterbugdude

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My experiments didn't create wondrous tobacco, my pressure treated samples of commercial tobacco taste similar to the original tobacco, but the pH was higher and the nicotine was stronger.

Try using your own whole leaf or get some from WLT. Your Perique will taste better than the commercial stuff. Burley and/or Cigar filler make wonderful tasting Perique.
 

oldbear

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I processed a batch of Virginia and burley today. I packed one jar of burley and one jar of alternating Virginia and burley and clamped these down under strong pressure. One additional jar of mostly burley was packed only hand tight and closed with a loosely screwed on lid.

I will let you know how these turn out next year!

Oldbear
 

Planter

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So far that "low-pressure" method seems to work... another week later no sign of mold or rot, and all jars (even the ones with the green leaves) have gone to a more winey odor.


The leaves in all jars are still sufficiently covered by liquid (to two of them I did not have to add any water at all after hand pressing).


(Note that the leaves in my tests are not loosely packed or entirely pressure-free: I first pressed them firmly by hand into the jars, which is usually enough to squeeze brown liquid out, then placed a smaller jar on top which is stuck between the leaves and the lid. A piece of oak may serve the purpose of keeping the leaves down and below water level as well.)


Out of curiosity I set up another jar in a similar way, but used a mixture of rum and Petimezi/Pekmez instead of water. In principle this should resemble the old sailors way of wrapping tobacco with rum and sugar tightly into a canvas. Does anybody know how long "Navy Flake" was kept this way before it was smoked?
 

Jitterbugdude

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Travel time from Virgina to England was almost 5 months. The sailors would not have been busting open kegs of prized tobacco. Most likely the tobacco they had on hand was obtained locally in small quantities so they probably started smoking it rather quickly.
 

oldbear

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My leaf was sent dry enough to last without mold, meaning quite dry.

I used distilled water in a spray bottle and sprayed it thoroughly, enough to soften it to de-stem it without the leaves breaking.

When packed the leaves were slightly damp, but not soggy. When put under pressure enough water pressed out to pour off.

I believe that this is the point of perique; compressing slightly damp leaves creates a saturated anaerobic environment. At the factory, when leaves are removed from the barrel they are not soggy, only moist. The compression creates a saturated environment.

My pressure-less jar was the same batch, but because nothing was squeezed out or poured off it may have been slightly more wet then the pressure batches.

We'll see in a few months.

Oldbear
 

Planter

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Did you fill that pressure-less jar till the top? Perhaps at some point there´s not much oxygen left this way.
Slightly damp leaves with a certain air exposure always ended up moldy for me, unless I used rum/whisky instead of water and heated the whole thing for a while.
 

oldbear

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I put in as much leaf as I could. The mold and aerobic bacteria will use up the O2 pretty quickly; we will see in a few weeks.

If I do more of this I will go with PVC pipe and end caps. The leaf can be pushed out the open end more easily after fermentation.

A vacuum bag isn't a bad idea either, though some O2 gets in over time.

Oldbear
 

oldbear

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Any time the humidity approaches 100% mold will start to grow. Mold can also grow in an enclosed space if it gets started by some other process such as condensation, then the mold can produce its own moisture from the carbohydrates, much like water is produced from your tailpipe from burning gasoline. Without oxygen mold will stop growing. Anaerobic bacteria can then take over, though it will not produce water, but methane and other chemicals, some of which we call flavors.

The perique process uses pressure to create a high humidity but anaerobic environment.

Oldbear
 

Knucklehead

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Any time the humidity approaches 100% mold will start to grow. Mold can also grow in an enclosed space if it gets started by some other process such as condensation, then the mold can produce its own moisture from the carbohydrates, much like water is produced from your tailpipe from burning gasoline. Without oxygen mold will stop growing. Anaerobic bacteria can then take over, though it will not produce water, but methane and other chemicals, some of which we call flavors.

The perique process uses pressure to create a high humidity but anaerobic environment.

Oldbear

The water on top of the tobacco during the perique process should create an air lock that prevents the growth of mold.
 

oldbear

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Progress report, photos to follow.

After a few weeks my pressureless jar of leaf developed spots of white mold that never progressed past small spots. The leaf is otherwise unchanged.

My pressured jars are darkening along the tops and appear "normal" for this type of processing. They are about due to be repacked.

Oldbear
 

oldbear

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Here is a NEW idea: The pressure may only be pushing out air, accelerating the anaerobic fermentation and inhibiting mold and aerobic bacteria.

I set up a jar of pressure-less leaves, in a one pint jar I packed a mixture of Virginia and burley (mostly Virginia) slightly damp and watched it. In one week it developed spots of mold that did not progress. After one month I opened up the jar. The mold only progressed slightly, but the leaf had a typical grassy odor and had not darkened like my other jars of pressured leaf.

I quit the process, repacked the leaves into a jar and applied pressure with a wood block. A small amount of liquid squeezed out. The top portion seems to be darkening like other jars now and it seems to be developing like "normal perique".

Looking at my other jars, which I also opened and repacked after one month, I suspect that the actual process is being caused by the aeration, then packing under pressure which squeezes out the air that mold and bacteria need to grow.

This suggests that the vacuum bag treatment might work well. I suspect that the regular repacking admits a small amount of oxygen that is used up quickly, but causes a desirable breakdown of the carbohydrates. I do not know what the best schedule for repacking is, but that would make a wonderful experiment.

I tried a couple of leaves from my other normal perique jars and the Virginia burley mixture has a lot of very good flavor and a lot of nicotine!

Oldbear
 
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