What Makes a Cigar Taste Cigarish?

[Briar Lee]

In 1973 they came out with Winchester Little Cigars at 25 cents a package when all packages of real cigarettes were 40 cents.

Even in 1973 there were do gooders who worried that taking advantage of lower tax rates for cigars than cigarettes would cause teenagers like me to smoke Winchesters instead of Winstons and Marlboros.

But the do gooders decided, that Winchesters tasted like cigars and were not easily inhaled, and let the matter drop. I bought a pack of Winchesters and went right back to Winstons.

I just unwrapped a bundle of 20 Nicaraguan cigars and they have a wonderful, zesty, cigar taste. They are kind of mild compared to more expensive cigars, but taste like good cigars.



How Dey Do Dat?

In fifty years of smoking not one cigarette or pipe I’ve ever smoked tasted like a cigar.

They can’t flavor the premium hand rolled cigars to taste like Winchesters.

What produces that distinctive cigar flavor?

 

[cosmicfolklore]

It's because the leaf is touching your lips. That's what gives cigars their unique flavor.

 

[pantsBoots]

In fifty years of smoking not one cigarette or pipe I’ve ever smoked tasted like a cigar.

They can’t flavor the premium hand rolled cigars to taste like Winchesters.

What produces that distinctive cigar flavor?

Cigar tobacco is fermented in big piles called pilóns where the temperature is controlled. Many interesting chemical changes take place during this time. I don't know about non-cuban manufacturers, but all Cuban tobacco goes through 2 fermentation periods before being rolled; Cohiba is special in that that tobacco goes through 3 fermentations, hence what makes Cohiba stand out among the other Cuban marcas.

Contrast this with pipe and cigarette tobacco which is dried & cured (air, fire, or flue), then aged for a couple years, before being sprayed with casing and processed for the end product.

Also, although almost all is N.tabacum, cigar is known as "black tobacco" which has been genetically selected for different characteristics.

 

[Briar Lee]

Cigar tobacco is fermented in big piles called pilóns where the temperature is controlled. Many interesting chemical changes take place during this time. I don't know about non-cuban manufacturers, but all Cuban tobacco goes through 2 fermentation periods before being rolled; Cohiba is special in that that tobacco goes through 3 fermentations, hence what makes Cohiba stand out among the other Cuban marcas.

Contrast this with pipe and cigarette tobacco which is dried & cured (air, fire, or flue), then aged for a couple years, before being sprayed with casing and processed for the end product.

Also, although almost all is N.tabacum, cigar is known as "black tobacco" which has been genetically selected for different characteristics.

The fermentation process must account for most of the cigar flavor. That, and of course the cigar makers raise cigar leaf.

Another thing mysterious is most pipe tobacco smells delicious indoors or out, but cigars inside stink to high heaven. Outside the cigar aroma is intoxicatingly good.

 

[bullet08]

Per my 9 th grade teacher's uncle who used to hand roll cigars in Queens, NY, horse shit.

 

[cosmicfolklore]

Contrast this with pipe and cigarette tobacco which is dried & cured (air, fire, or flue), then aged for a couple years, before being sprayed with casing and processed for the end product.

Almost… the farmers handle the curing and processing do not add a casing. It is only when it reaches a blender. I’ve talked with many farmers, and if they cased before they sold the tobacco, it would be worthless to blenders.

Even in large corporate tobacco AG businesses they do not case till the tobacco is processed for a particular brand. Usually those aren’t cases the same way as pipe tobacco.

We’ve all heard/read Greg Pease say that his tobaccos may be cased before it gets to his blends. What he means is that blending of his products is done by C&D out of their stock. He doesn’t mean that the farmers are casing the tobaccos. This is a huge misunderstanding.

 

[mortonbriar]

It's because the leaf is touching your lips. That's what gives cigars their unique flavor.

This revelation REALLY hits home when you grow leaf, harvest it, roll a cigar and then take the offcuts from the same leaf and chop it up for a bowl. Smoke the cigar and the bowl back to back...one tastes like a cigar, and the other tastes like a pipe.