member's blends

[juan carlos]

tonite i rolled a
1 leaf Corojo viso
1 Leaf san vincente seco
1/2 leaf nica habano seco
in a habano seco double binder

it smelled so good on the table. tomorrow i'm excited to wrap half of the them in a CT shade and the others in a spicy maduro.

 

[WLJayne]

Corojo oscuro wrapper over Nica Habano binder with Habano seco, Criollo 98 Viso and Criollo 98 Seco = dulce de leche, vanilla custard, low-medium nic, slow burn, amazing flavor, requiring continual burning down of the wrapper with more flame since the wrapper doesn't burn.

Yeh, think I might have to try that one!!!

 

[juan carlos]

I could use a suggestion for wrappers that don't make the cut. Lets say i have some CT Shade that has some holes in it....can i use this as a filler in something? it seems really mellow, so i'm thinking as a filler it would be like air.

I also have some fire cured wrapper. it's really smokey. should i be blending this as a filler, or using only as a wrapper for an appaliatian-style 'merican smoke?

i have used a good quality filler leaf as a binder...


the overall question is: can i use a wrapper as a filler?

 

[deluxestogie]

Yes, you can. CT Shade (a portion of a strip) added to filler contributes that unique aroma of CT Shade. I don't think it's all that subtle. For the fire-cured, a single strip among other fillers can approach the flavor of some of the hard Italian cigars (Avanti, etc.). Mostly fire-cured will taste like a Toscano.

The problem with using wrappers as filler is that they usually don't have much body, and require some heftier filler in the blend to balance. I run into this when I make a cigar of my long rolling scraps. The long scrap is almost entirely wrapper and binder. So I just add a ligero leaf of anything.

Bob

 

[webmost]

Yes, you can. CT Shade (a portion of a strip) added to filler contributes that unique aroma of CT Shade. I don't think it's all that subtle. For the fire-cured, a single strip among other fillers can approach the flavor of some of the hard Italian cigars (Avanti, etc.). Mostly fire-cured will taste like a Toscano.

The problem with using wrappers as filler is that they usually don't have much body, and require some heftier filler in the blend to balance. I run into this when I make a cigar of my long rolling scraps. The long scrap is almost entirely wrapper and binder. So I just add a ligero leaf of anything.

Bob

I rolled a batch of Scrappowoc Perfectos quite a while back before I learned to use wrapper scrap for binder. Filler all Habano wrapper scraps. They had a super flavor; so I stashed a bunch. Mild, it's true; but I didn't think they lacked "body". Smoked one of the few still left, just last night.

My only gripe using wrapper for filler is that wrapper is so thin and limp that these Scrappowoc wind up drawing very tight. That's why I now use scrap wrapper for binder.

 

[Smokin Harley]

im still on the fence about using the fire cured . Its a very pungent aroma and you have to segregate those sticks from the rest of the herd so the aroma doesn't infiltrate the rest . I also have to double bag them so the humidor (the spare one) doesn't end up reeking of smoke.
It did surprise me on the few I rolled that I wrapped with it. It didn't end up tasting smoky so much as sweet.
I use my wrapper and binder scraps in short filler sticks but I keep it handy when I'm trying to firm up the head (two fingers width from the head end) on some that otherwise would be soft and mush up when in the mouth more than 5 minutes. Its not going to be smoked and it won't add much flavor so why not use it in there.

 

[waikikigun]

Corojo oscuro Burnability Issues - Saltpeter test

As has been noted elsewhere, the WLT Corojo oscuro wrapper has a serious burning problem.

I decided to douse some leaves in saltpeter solution, the old-school (and who knows to some degree current school) method of getting tobacco leaves to burn. The recipes in the old tobacco books are based around a 16:1 water:KNO3 (saltpeter) recipe.

So I gave my wrapper leaves several wet sprays over a few days, letting them dry in between. Then let them dry one final time, then used them to wrap with. Then dry-boxed for two weeks until the test sticks felt very dry, then lit one up.

Still wouldn't burn.

Next time I try this I'll increase the dose from 16:1 to 8:1, maybe. I'd like to get that stuff burning. But for now I can tell you the old-school recipe is not enough fire power for these wrappers (several sprays should have been enough, I think, to replicate the methods in the books).

The reason I care is not only that I have a pound of the stuff, but also that the flavor profile is excellently spicy.

The various binders I've tried with this leaf are all good-burning stuffs.

 

[webmost]

Corojo oscuro Burnability Issues - Saltpeter test

As has been noted elsewhere, the WLT Corojo oscuro wrapper has a serious burning problem.

I decided to douse some leaves in saltpeter solution, the old-school (and who knows to some degree current school) method of getting tobacco leaves to burn. The recipes in the old tobacco books are based around a 16:1 water:KNO3 (saltpeter) recipe.

So I gave my wrapper leaves several wet sprays over a few days, letting them dry in between. Then let them dry one final time, then used them to wrap with. Then dry-boxed for two weeks until the test sticks felt very dry, then lit one up.

Still wouldn't burn.

Next time I try this I'll increase the dose from 16:1 to 8:1, maybe. I'd like to get that stuff burning. But for now I can tell you the old-school recipe is not enough fire power for these wrappers (several sprays should have been enough, I think, to replicate the methods in the books).

The reason I care is not only that I have a pound of the stuff, but also that the flavor profile is excellently spicy.

The various binders I've tried with this leaf are all good-burning stuffs.

Good luck and keep us posted. It is some good smelly stuff. Too bad it won't spark.

 

[Gdaddy]

Corojo oscuro Burnability Issues - Saltpeter test

As has been noted elsewhere, the WLT Corojo oscuro wrapper has a serious burning problem.

I decided to douse some leaves in saltpeter solution, the old-school (and who knows to some degree current school) method of getting tobacco leaves to burn. The recipes in the old tobacco books are based around a 16:1 water:KNO3 (saltpeter) recipe.

So I gave my wrapper leaves several wet sprays over a few days, letting them dry in between. Then let them dry one final time, then used them to wrap with. Then dry-boxed for two weeks until the test sticks felt very dry, then lit one up.

Still wouldn't burn.

Next time I try this I'll increase the dose from 16:1 to 8:1, maybe. I'd like to get that stuff burning. But for now I can tell you the old-school recipe is not enough fire power for these wrappers (several sprays should have been enough, I think, to replicate the methods in the books).

The reason I care is not only that I have a pound of the stuff, but also that the flavor profile is excellently spicy.

The various binders I've tried with this leaf are all good-burning stuffs.

Need more cowbell.

If you put enough in the mix it should fly off the table like rocket.

Try using it on the binder as well.

 

[Smokin Harley]

I found a youtube of Waikikigun and a friend trying one of his salt peter Corojo Oscuro wrapped stogies...pardon the language ..

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MHaaF6IlhdY

 

[LewZephyr]

Funny Smokin Harley. I was already imagining something like that in my head, especially after Gdaddy's comment.

 

[waikikigun]

So you're saying I should add some charcoal powder and sulfur into my saltpeter spray for improved results?

I found a youtube of Waikikigun and a friend trying one of his salt peter Corojo Oscuro wrapped stogies...pardon the language ..

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MHaaF6IlhdY

 

[Ben Brand]

I had a very nice home grown tobacco cigar last night. Ligero- Dom olor; seco- Vuelta Abajo; Volado- Criollo 98; Double binder- Pen B leaf; wrapper- Pen Red ligero, dark and oily. Nice and spicy, but smooth, a finger burner

 

[kullas]

So you're saying I should add some charcoal powder and sulfur into my saltpeter spray for improved results?

Charcoal powder, sulfur and saltpeter is the makings of gunpowder. when mixed in water it mixes it all go together and when dries out is gunpowder. So careful with that mixture around a flame. while i dont think it will blow up, ya may get a sparkle or 2 where the KNo3 crystallizes

Saltpeter is the same thing as KNo3 and Potassium Nitrate and is the active ingredient in spectracide stump killer

 

[Gdaddy]

Charcoal powder, sulfur and saltpeter is the makings of gunpowder. when mixed in water it mixes it all go together and when dries out is gunpowder. So careful with that mixture around a flame. while i dont think it will blow up, ya may get a sparkle or 2 where the KNo3 crystallizes

Saltpeter is the same thing as KNo3 and Potassium Nitrate and is the active ingredient in spectracide stump killer

Anyone remember years ago they sold 'cigarette loads'. You slipped what looked like a piece of rice into a cigarette and as it burned down and got hot it would explode in your face. Actually quite explosive little buggers. I understand why they discontinued them. I bet KNO3 was involved.

Sparklers and model rocket fuel can be made using sugar and salt petre. Much safer.

I use the salt petre on both sides of the binder. A bigger treated surface area. Not on the filler and I don't want a taste on the wrapper.

Can you imagine telling someone your cigars have "Spectricide Stump Killer" in them? Talk about a lead balloon. OMG!! lol.

 

[waikikigun]

Lol, Gd, yeah, that'd go over great. "Now with more stump killer!"

I was a major fireworks manufacturer as a kid. Severely wounded myself once with a bo*b employing an aluminum 35mm film canister as the shell, went off to a private boarding school for my sophomore year in high school and had to sign all kinds of crap guaranteeing I wouldn't so much as light a match while I was there, because I arrived with a mummy-like bandaged head.

Well, I violated those agreements when I went out into the forest and, as usual, rolled my own cheroots from newspaper and whatever dried leaves I could find, something I'd been doing since age 6. Didn't get caught, tho. And my eyebrows eventually grew back, double win.

 

[kullas]

I shoot a lot of black powder and used to make my own I have also made rocket motors. And kno3 and suger makes a great smoke generator.

 

[Smokin Harley]

So you're saying I should add some charcoal powder and sulfur into my saltpeter spray for improved results?

depends on who you're giving them to...

 

[deluxestogie]

I believe we're drifting toward a different sort of blending than originally envisioned for this thread.

Kids do many hazardous things. Some of them even survive.

As mature adults, we only seriously consider far more sober choices, like adding stump killer to cigars.

Maybe BigBonner could open a private boarding school for wayward FTT members.

Bob

 

[waikikigun]

Please help me select my next wrapper choices.

Please give me your input, from experience (specifically of the WLT leaves), of these WLT wrappers. I am interested in the following characteristics, from most to least:

Overall satisfaction with the wrapper in various blends.

Strength: the LOWER the nico, the better, the more subtle the effect on the overall blend, the better. But something that brings something to the blend is preferred to something that is just not there.

Aroma/flavor.

Smoothness/lack of huge veins

Thanks! I'm interested in how you would describe the characteristics of these leaves as well as your subjective ideas of about the relative desirability of these wrappers compared to the others. Like, "If I had to only have one I'd take the Habano first, the Criollo 98 last," or whatever.

Much appreciated.