Tobacco cannot, of course, be smoked as quickly as it is collected. It will remain green and wet, like most other plants, and will not easily ignite. That’s why once you begin smoking, the tobacco leaves require a curing process. Curing is drying tobacco leaves after they have been harvested from the area. It has a significant effect on the result of its standard and the quality of the tobacco leaf. Tobacco curing should be strictly managed to bring out all the unique attributes of each tobacco characteristic. Curing methods vary based on the type of tobacco. Curing would be the method whereby tobacco leaves are primed and ready for consumption. As little more than a cigar that color, fresh leaf is reasonably flavorless, but it’s too slightly damp to activate after all. Tobacco for cigars is typically cleared up in a barn, but prefabricated metal containers are also used for curing. To be clear, it is the tobacco leaves that are fixed. Any cigar you’ve ever continued to smoke has been on a long drive. There are various requirements to ensure that the cigar you’re using is the right choice it can be, from the beginning plantation to the finished product.
What is a Curing barn?
The curing barn is built out of logs wherein you can see and visualize the ceiling in which the tobacco has been decided to hang to dry, and the heater is often used to dry the tobacco as part of the curing process. Curing barns or other people, call them curing sheds or Casas de Tabaco, are built-in or close tobacco fields and are extremely important to the growing season. After being harvested from the fields, cigar tobacco is taken into the curing barn and kept hanging to dry. The tobacco leaves are generally placed on pieces of wood identified as lathes or cujes, but they are now and then draped on wires known as sartas. The tobacco is kept in a casa de tabaco for about 45 days, whereas it transforms from color green to brown, but the number of days varies on temperature and moisture, and it can differ from seasons. Usually, the curing procedure consists of the following critical stages: Wilting, Yellowing, Colouring, and Drying. These stages typically include biochemical changes inside the leaf that are controlled to attain the required properties.
4 Main Types of Tobacco Curing
There are four main types of tobacco curing which add additional appearance, fragrance, and taste to the cigars you enjoy. These four are named; Air curing, Fire curing, flue curing, and curing in the sun.
Curing with Air
One of the first techniques used to cure tobacco was air curing. Original explorers characterized Native American tribes drying their tobacco leaves after harvesting them in the heat or the dark of their huts. Initially, the leaves to picked and accumulated in heaps to dry until it was discovered that tobacco cured best once hung up. That is the technique used to cure most of the tobacco used in top-quality cigars. Tobacco leaves are collected and transported to tobacco barns, further identified as furnace houses. The barns are well ventilated in hot weather and house the leaves for about months. Air-cured tobacco is distinguished by its reduced sugar, which imparts a lighter, naturally sweet flavor to tobacco smoke while maintaining excellent nicotine levels. Cigarette tobacco is typically air-cured as well.
Before getting tripped up in well-prepared barns, air-cured tobacco usually is; the entire plant is trimmed down. The curing process is complete when the center rib is free of water content, and the leaves have reached the desired color. Depending on the circumstances and the successful outcome, this procedure can take three to twelve weeks. The far more essential element of air curing tobacco is keeping the moisture in the barn minimal. Any water can cause the leaf to mold or rot when not carefully controlled. Because of the limited amount of sugar inside the leaves, air-cured tobacco has a mild flavor when smoking. They also have a more significant amount of nicotine and generate a rich, mellow smoke.
Fire Curing
Back in the Americas, people realized that when using fire in one’s tobacco curing methods, they may not only keep the leaves from acquiring moisture, and yet it also retains the tobacco. That made it a lot easier to ship tobacco to other countries. Hardwoods also were engulfed in flames in barns and kept burning at a reduced level on a continuing or unreliable basis. The result corresponds to air-curing, but with a bit of smoke. This technique can be used for piping systems, munching, and snuff tobacco. The fire curing tobacco method is very similar to those of air curing tobacco, seeing as how the tobacco is hung up and put away in a barn.
But even so, open fires are lit underneath the leaves between the second and sixth day with fire curing. Must more completely seal the barn during fire curing to retain its smoke. Based on the growers and the preferred finish for the tobacco, the firing process can be different for each individual. The procedure can take anywhere from three to ten weeks. Fire cured tobaccos are typically used as condimental cigars due to their overly strong flavor. These tobaccos have been used in tiny portions to strengthen a tobacco mixture.
Flue Curing
Flue curing tobacco was noticed by coincidence. In the 19th century North Carolina, a tobacco farmworker took a nap while observing a barn of what would otherwise be fire-cured tobacco. The fires had started to die, so the working person took charcoaled logs from the woodworker ship and positioned them on the fading fires in an apparent effort to rekindle them. Because of the high turnaround of dry heat, the moisture from the tobacco was driven out, resulting in bright yellow leaves.
The primary distinction among both flue-curing and the other methods is the barn used. The tobacco leaves must be exposed to high temperatures and not fire during flue-curing. That is accomplished by directing hot air, smoke, or vapors throughout a pipe or flue. The enclosed space’s radiating heat quickly dries the tobacco, giving it that yellow color. In the current period, gas is used as the source of heat, giving the farmer even more influence on the outcome. Virginia tobaccos are the most commonly used tobacco for flu treatment. Flue-cured tobaccos usually have higher sugar levels than other processes, granting them a mellow but sweet aroma. They both have lower nicotine levels.
Sun-Cured Tobacco
Some people believe that sun curing tobacco is the same as air curing tobacco, so we’ve tried to combine the two for their convenience. There is, even so, a critical distinction. Aside from air-cured tobacco, sun-cured tobacco is not tripped up in a barn. Instead, they are arranged on trays and given access to bright sunlight. As a result of the rapid drying, some of the added sugar is locked in, resulting in a sweet flavor. Sun curing is most commonly used with cigars grown in Asia and Southern Europe that have plenty of light from the sun and little rain. Sun-cured tobaccos can have a herbal and spicy aroma that complements the added sweetness.
The Last Step: Fermentation
Cigar tobacco is usually produced by fermentation after curing it, occasionally multiple times and, less frequently, three times. The last phase, or stages, of curing in which impurities, most notably ammonia, are sweated out of the leaves. Nicotine, along with other chemicals, is released during fermentation, contributing to the taste of a fuller, overall pick cigar leaf. Normal fermentation faded away moisture in the tobacco leaves. It lasted about as long as the tobacco was fully prepared, usually when the pile temperature was 110 and 115 degrees. The tobacco stacks are sprayed with water at the right moment, and the tobacco is oxygenated for about 24 hours. Finally, a leaf is frequently rolled and checked by smoking it.
