cellaring tobacco

[postie]

I have quite a lot of tobacco in large jars and i am going to transfer them into the smaller size jars,i normally put the tobacco in loose is this correct or should i pack it in tight or does it not matter.

Many thanks

Roy

 

[jankomatic]

From what I understand you want the tobacco to have some air in the jar for proper aging.

 

[cortezattic]

I heard the same thing that janko says.

PM.com's Bob Tate wrote an interesting article on the subject of Pipe Tobacco Storage.

 

[romeowood]

one thing I'll recommend is to sterilize those jars, store it a tad on the dry side and wear rubber or nitrile gloves while handling. My mother lectured me about mold to no end when I asked her advice about canning (we're welsh, it's in the blood). And yes, tobacco needs a bit of air to age, as oxygen exchange is part of the aging process.

 

[my19]

Anything special to do with flakes and krumble kakes and plugs and other non-ribbon tobaccos? I have 8 ounces of Penzance that I want to jar, but I'm unsure whether I just dump it in (while spilling as little of the precious tobacco as possible) or whether there is some other technique to preserve its fresh-from-the-tray appearance ... I didn't see that addressed in Bob's fine article on tobacco cellaring.

 

[unclearthur]

I just set the jar on a magazine and chuck the tobacco in, then dump in the stuff from the magazine that missed.

 

[winton]

I paid about $2 for a canning funnel, to make it easier to transfer tobacco from bags to jars. Warning!! Do NOT use your wife's canning funnel. That may have serious repercussions.
Winton

 

[jayh]

I've been packing bulks into 4oz 'jelly' canning jars. Hold about 2oz, interested to see how they age compared to big jars or tins.

 

[unclearthur]

That may have serious repercussions.

Or contusions followed by a concussion.

 

[zunismoke]

I made a trade with a guy that had been cellaring in Mason jars for about 10 years. Since I have been doing that for a couple of years, I asked him all the questions I could think of. One of the things I asked was whether he filled the jars tightly or loose and did it make a difference. He said that he could notice no differece. And he said that he tried to put as much as he could in a jar. I got a lot of the fruits of his labor and all that I got was well aged. I think that even tightly pcacked there is still a good amount of oxygen hanging about between the tobak.

 

[harkpuff]

When transfering tobaccos from large 8oz tins to smaller mason jars, I simply lay a piece of 8-1/2" x 11" copy machine paper on my work bench, dump a pile of tobacco in the center of it, pick up the paper by the sides and lift off the table. The paper will fold nicely in the center creating a nice funnell affect. Take it to the mouth of the jar, raise the opposite end...give it a few gentle shakes and the tobacco slides right in with little if any being spilled onto the table top.

 

[timely]

The funnel is a must, handy tool.

 

[saltedplug]

I'm the guy zunismoke speaks of above who tried to answer his questions.
I have a novel approach to cellariing tobacco. I age it for 5 or 10 years to get it right as I truly adore aged tobacco. Then I decide I'm going to quit smoking and sell everything I have to savvy guys like zsmoke at a sizable loss. Then I change my mind and start smoking again and have to buy back, at the current higher prices, the tobacco that I sold. I then decide to cellar this tobacco as I still want it aged.
Though some might say this a circuitous approach, I love buying tobacco, and in the end I feel blessed.
Oh, and as regards the OP's question, no one knows enough about aging to have an opinion about a loose or tight pack inside jars. Oxygen is, however, essential, as is moisture. If the moisture is too high or low, correct this before jarring, and in the end aging will be less than optimum without moisture's contribution to fermentation. I agree that the truth of aging is revealed in the smoke, but here too I would be careful as it is impossible to really assess aging's outcome. You have no baseline of optimally aged tobacco against which you can compare the batch in question, nor can science tell you know how much the tobacco has changed.
All you really have is the accuracy of your palate, which is another non-measurable, subjective entity.
I recommend wide-mouth pint jars as the ideal vehicle for aging as they are easier to load and can be filled with a goodly amount of tobacco sufficient to keep you puffing for a significant period of time. You can age it for however long tickles your fantasy, open and smoke it without disturbing the other jars of this tobacco that you jarred. I feel this is better as I have an unprovable bias for uninterrupted aging; used to be that Mr. Pease advocated this but no more. But to me undisturbed aerobic aging is better as if you open the jar, the anaerobic aging that was humming along immediately reverts to aerobic aging at the introduction of air. I consider the best aging as exhausting the available O2 in the jar, aerobic aging, and then dropping into anaerobic until you open that jar. This is a more steady chemical process. But Mr. Pease says that uninterrupted or interrupted aging produce will be different but equal results.