toscano cigars - what type of tobacco seed?

[johnlee1933]

from what i took from the article Don, it could be done at home, if you have a chemistry degree, lol....whats weird is looked up cheese making because some of the microbes listed are from cheese....could it be possible that the "accident" of this fermentation could have been from a cheese making shop down the street in florence italy?

http://www.arttrav.com/tuscany/cheese-making-in-pienza/

Possibly or just re using cheese storage or shipping facilities.

 

[SmokesAhoy]

So buy a cigar, soak in water for a few days to get the culture extracted, and use that water to saturate your leaf to 50%, pile leaves in a cooler rotate every few days for 18 days then take out reserving 20% for the next batch. Let the 80% come to correct case, roll, enjoy. Am I missing anything?

 

[driftinmark]

I think the article states that it has to dry cure in the package for at least 6-12 months, clear cellophane... or something like that

is it possible to get the culture from processed cigars? do you think the microbes are still alive at this point?

 

[DonH]

So buy a cigar, soak in water for a few days to get the culture extracted, and use that water to saturate your leaf to 50%, pile leaves in a cooler rotate every few days for 18 days then take out reserving 20% for the next batch. Let the 80% come to correct case, roll, enjoy. Am I missing anything?

I think that would work. I can't see why they would sterilize the cigars.

 

[FmGrowit]

I think it's more like the lambic beer process in that it is just wild bacteria that covers every square inch of everything everywhere. These wild yeasts and bacteria can obviously be cultivated and used in cheese or bread or wine or fermented tobacco. In the case of tobacco, I believe it is a strictly naturally occur phenomena.

 

[Jitterbugdude]

I think that would work. I can't see why they would sterilize the cigars.

I believe all cigars are sterilized to prevent "the beetle"

 

[SmokeStack]

hiya smokestack,
I found an article that might help a lil bit....from what i gather , it uses a starter like yogurt, to aid in fermentation, from previous batches of tobacco...I could be mistaken though....but its an interesting article anyway....enjoy! is it possible that some of this tobacco was brought from italy to start di nobili cigars also?

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1800767/

Thanks driftinmark, that was a very informative article.

 

[istanbulin]

Although I don't like Toscano "Cigars" I smoked them few times, they were all very strong and didn't taste like a regular cigar. There was also another unquiry about them in another part of the forum so I looked for some information.

THE KENTUCKY TOBACCO
This tobacco is a derived, by hybridization and selection, of the North American flue-cured type.
This tobacco is dark and it comes from the fire-cured category, the tobaccos cured with direct fire, with special wood, which smoke slowly penetrates the cells of the tobacco leaves giving to them a specific bouquet of cured tobacco. ...

Toscano cigar ..... including:
* 100% Kentucky tobacco
* Dark fired tobacco and OGM free
...
Anatomy of Toscano Cigar:
Toscano cigar consists of 2 parts: the wrapper, which also acts as the binder, and the filler. In other cigars, such as a Caribbean, you have 3 parts: the wrapper, the binder, and the filler.
...
The Flame Curing Process:
The Kentucky tobacco in Toscano cigars is flame-cured using a traditional Italian tobacco crafting process. The tobacco leaves are cured in ovens fueled by oak and beech woods, which infuse the Toscano with a unique flavor. This treatment has been unchanged for almost 200 years, and it is part of what gives you the one-of-a-kind characteristics of the Toscano cigar.
The Fermentation Process
The tobacco in Toscano cigars undergoes a fermentation process that lasts from 30 to 50 days, depending on the type of cigar. ...

Italians call their fire cured tobacco "Kentucky Tobacco" (which was derived from a flue-cured variety from the US by hybridization with local varieties) and the dark air-cured types are all cigar varieties. Well known cigar (or as they called dark air-cured) varieties grown in Italy are derived (or imported ?) from South American (Paraguay and Brazil (Bahia)) and German varieties (Forchheimer, Geudertheimer). I think any other cigar variety might be ok for rolling Toscano Cigars at home.

And here's a photo of "Kentucky" leaf, from Italy.

I don't know where it might fit among the American varieties. It has really wide auricles.

Curing "Kentucky" leaves in Tuscany.

 

[holyRYO]

Looks tasty to me, interesting backround, another take on Kentucky, thanks for sharing.