Levi Gross
Well-Known Member
Alright my fellow Tobacco Men here is my first go with this. I had Ten very large leaves of tobacco that had only been air cured for about a year. I am not even sure of the variety. To the best of my knowledge it was one of these three. 1. Little Yellow 2. RG8 3. Ohio Red with that being said this is the process I used.
1. 10 large leaves brought up to a workable case stemmed and shredded.
2. 1 Oz. distilled water
3. 1 Tablespoon of Karo syrup w/ real vanilla
4. 1 Tablespoon of Bakers imitation vanilla
I first toasted the tobacco @ 170 F. for 20 min. I then sprayed it with a half Oz. of my mixed casing and toasted it @ 225 F. for another 20 min. Finally I sprayed it with the other half Oz. of casing and toasted it for another 20 min. This tobacco was very harsh from the start and I was hoping to tame it down a bit... When I sampled it after the whole process I noticed that it had in fact lost some of that harshness but is still a very stout smoke in the pipe alone. It did go from a raw tobacco smell and taste to a nice kinda nutty taste though and has a very distinct but pleasant aroma. I also noted that the ammonia taste and odor were completely eliminated. There is also no taste of the vanilla even though on the bottle it claimed to not be able to be baked out. No big deal to me I was just trying to sweeten it up a little and get rid of the hay or leaf like taste. What I ended up with was about three Oz. of toasted tobacco that I added to my Balkan Sobranidje whole leaf tobacco from WLT. At this point yes most of you are probably thinking why didn't I let it rest for a few days or a week to see what happens... Well my theory is that if I added it to the Balkan it would take the edge off of the Virgina leaf that I am assuming came in the kit. I figured at any rate it could not hurt anything. Please note that I do love the Balkan but my taste buds are still majorly adjusting to whole leaf tobaccos especially the ones that I have grown myself... Hope you all find this of some use and interest.
1. 10 large leaves brought up to a workable case stemmed and shredded.
2. 1 Oz. distilled water
3. 1 Tablespoon of Karo syrup w/ real vanilla
4. 1 Tablespoon of Bakers imitation vanilla
I first toasted the tobacco @ 170 F. for 20 min. I then sprayed it with a half Oz. of my mixed casing and toasted it @ 225 F. for another 20 min. Finally I sprayed it with the other half Oz. of casing and toasted it for another 20 min. This tobacco was very harsh from the start and I was hoping to tame it down a bit... When I sampled it after the whole process I noticed that it had in fact lost some of that harshness but is still a very stout smoke in the pipe alone. It did go from a raw tobacco smell and taste to a nice kinda nutty taste though and has a very distinct but pleasant aroma. I also noted that the ammonia taste and odor were completely eliminated. There is also no taste of the vanilla even though on the bottle it claimed to not be able to be baked out. No big deal to me I was just trying to sweeten it up a little and get rid of the hay or leaf like taste. What I ended up with was about three Oz. of toasted tobacco that I added to my Balkan Sobranidje whole leaf tobacco from WLT. At this point yes most of you are probably thinking why didn't I let it rest for a few days or a week to see what happens... Well my theory is that if I added it to the Balkan it would take the edge off of the Virgina leaf that I am assuming came in the kit. I figured at any rate it could not hurt anything. Please note that I do love the Balkan but my taste buds are still majorly adjusting to whole leaf tobaccos especially the ones that I have grown myself... Hope you all find this of some use and interest.