Perique and cavendish first try: @Redleaf

[Redleaf]

Well here goes nothing. My first season is underway after some early priming of lugs and some early large leaves. I understand proper ageing and curing is important but I couldn’t help myself from doing multiple (daily for a couple weeks now) tests of this Virginia gold. It seems not too bad with a little vanilla/rum/homemade maple sugar casing applied. Yesterday I decided during a rain delay in my harvest I would pick the majority of my crop. I netted about 450 large leaves and strung them up colour cure on strings in the shade of my maple trees. Damaged leaves and smaller ones were donated to a good friend who will consume them in cigarette form. I am not fond of cigarettes and prefer a pipe so thanks to the wealth of info on these forums I have been emboldened to start a batch of Perique a few days ago and just even now have put 4 jars of very moist tobacco into an instapot to try my hand at cavendish. These leaves were mostly open air cured to a crisp and a nice golden brown. Very little green apparent. I will try to post a couple pics of before and after harvest and report on success or failure of curing efforts.

 

[Redleaf]

I see my pics turned out as after and before as I’m sure anyone can see. I am not sure when the growing season will end so left some very nice but in my opinion “not ready” leaves on the plants. I would appreciate any one’s input on what to expect with remaining plant material. Are small topmost leaves good for curing ? Will I see remaining leaves grow much larger over the next 2-3 weeks if frost stays away ?

 

[Hayden]

Nice and big plants. Kilning/fermenting will improve your harvest if you have air cured. Also build yourself a kiln to do some flue curing which is the difference between okay virginia tobacco (which needs time to ferment) and instantly getting into commercial tobacco quality and above. In addition you can press some tobacco which also leads to better flavour and in my case also to a better and longer burn.

 

[Redleaf]

Yes a kiln is in my future ..... I hope. Haven’t checked into pressing yet. I’m sure there are some good threads here. Sooooo much information........ falling down the rabbit hole !!!

 

[deluxestogie]

Nice grow. Those top leaves are the secret treasure of pipe blending. They are slower to cure, and slower to age, but produce the fullest, richest blending condiments. Do save them, even though they won't grow very large. It's not for nothing that tip leaf is known as "corona".

Bob

 

[Redleaf]

Any advice on curing my “corona” leaves Bob ? I was thinking I would leave my plants to continue growing until the threat of a season ending frost forces harvest. That threat becomes very real in about two to three weeks. Mind you i have seen the season here last right through September albeit with much shorter hours of daylight. My plan at that point would be cutting the entire plant and going for a stalk cure.

 

[deluxestogie]

I'm not sure where you intend to color-cure (indoors or outdoors). As the season ends, curing temps in a curing shed can be the determining factor. If the top leaf is mature enough, I would be inclined to harvest it now, to give it a better chance of curing in warmer weather. I color-cure all my leaf the same way. I just hang it up in my shed, and check back periodically. Once it is color-cured, kilning will dramatically shorten the time before it is at its prime for blending and smoking.

Bob

 

[Redleaf]

I have the option of colour curing in a heated garage. So for the time being I will leave the plants stand. Research for best type of kiln to build. Lots of info on the site.

 

[Redleaf]

I am onto about day 5 of the Perique press and all seems well with some bubbles around the edges of the water seal but no barnyard aroma yet.
My cavendish try has me scratching my head wondering how it will turn out and berating myself for mismanaging it. Just a heads up for anyone who has no knowledge of pressure cooking or instapot use. I have never used or even seen anyone use one before. With instruction from this site and my daughter I used an instapot to try four pint jars of cavendish. My daughter assured me I could not use the instapot for “canning” because it is a lower end model not meant for that. Pressed for reasons why it can’t work for food it appears it is not guaranteed to build up enough pressure to make certain all the possible bad bacteria are killed. Well so what I figured and proceeded. I packed remoistened, well browned, destemmed Virginia Gold into my jars. Two received a light treatment of rum, vanilla and homemade maple syrup. One nothing but water and the fourth two spoonfuls of lemon juice. The timer only sets to four hours so just before that elapsed I added two more. After 6 hours I made what I later learned was a an egregious error. I thought I should release the pressure from the pot with the toggle on top of the lid. I did that and I think that is why my jars did not seal. All that aside one jar did seal and I am leaving it sealed. I tried resealing two of the jars with another hour in the pot with no success. So they are in the refrigerator awaiting airing and drying. The one jar that I have sorted out and left spread to dry is taking its sweet time drying out but definetly has an unusual smell about it that while not unpleasant is not especially appealing. Not sure how to describe. The texture of the leaves is as one would imagine very wet and soggy coming out of the jar and is very hard to sort and unfold as it tears easily. Perhaps 6 hours of cooking was just too long or possibly the instant release of pressure may have damaged the cell structure of the leaves. Soon I will pack some into a pipe and report.

 

[deluxestogie]

Experimentation is always fun. I have zero experience with mixing foods into the tobacco prior to cooking into Cavendish.

When the cooker pressure is suddenly released, it immediately causes any liquid within the closed jars to froth, and contaminate the seal surface. A more significant issue is that super-heated steam can instantly cause a serious skin burn. Be careful.

On the safety thing, if the pot can reach 121°C (that is, boiling point of water under 15 psi), then the contents will be sterilized.

Bob

 

[Oldfella]

Experimentation is always fun. I have zero experience with mixing foods into the tobacco prior to cooking into Cavendish.

When the cooker pressure is suddenly released, it immediately causes any liquid within the closed jars to froth, and contaminate the seal surface. A more significant issue is that super-heated steam can instantly cause a serious skin burn. Be careful.

On the safety thing, if the pot can reach 121°C (that is, boiling point of water under 15 psi), then the contents will be sterilized.

Bob

I'd agree with the burn thing. I was cooking in the Pressure Cooker and decided that it was ready. I released the Pressure, went and done something else, the lid was hard to remove when I came back, so without thinking I gave it a good thump. Bad move, the Pressure had rebuilt, I was badly burnt on my arm. I'm still going to the clinic every two days to have the dressing changed. The drive is 30 minutes good to do while we are in lock down. Please be careful when opening your Pressure Cooker. I won't bore you with pics of my arm but it's burnt from elbow to wrist.
Well cooked Oldfella

 

[Redleaf]

I'd agree with the burn thing. I was cooking in the Pressure Cooker and decided that it was ready. I released the Pressure, went and done something else, the lid was hard to remove when I came back, so without thinking I gave it a good thump. Bad move, the Pressure had rebuilt, I was badly burnt on my arm. I'm still going to the clinic every two days

I’m glad to hear it was only your arm OF.
I was a bit leery and was expecting a sudden blast of steam when I released the pressure so I was somewhat prepared. I hope others hear of my lapse of judgement and don’t make the same mistakes. EXTRA CAUTION whenever we are dealing with high temperatures and higher pressure is well advised.

 

[Oldfella]

I’m glad to hear it was only your arm OF.
I was a bit leery and was expecting a sudden blast of steam when I released the pressure so I was somewhat prepared. I hope others hear of my lapse of judgement and don’t make the same mistakes. EXTRA CAUTION whenever we are dealing with high temperatures and higher pressure is well advised.

You would think that life time working with all pressures from -0 to over 20000 psi I'd know better, just shows how a moments inattention can can make it all go wrong.
Oldfella

 

[Damanadaplaya]

I have question about using the pressure cooker. I have never used one for cavendish, but it makes great rice.... Is it better to put in jars, or can you just set stemmed leaf in the pressure cooker pot and let it go for 6 hours?

 

[deluxestogie]

To avoid leaching out all the flavor and alkaloids from the leaf, it needs to be separate from the cooking water. I've used a steel colander inside a cooker, but found that is not ideal. The advantage of using jars is that you can adjust the moisture content of the leaf ahead of time, AND you can simultaneously cook Cavendish from several different tobacco varieties. Also, once completed, the soggy Cavendish inside a sealed canning jar is sterile until it is opened. So you can open, spread and dry one variety at a time.

Bob

 

[Redleaf]

I would like to hear from others, including you Bob, how they feel about the texture and general characteristics for handling after pressure cooking. I think my six hour scenario destroyed the cell integrity or perhaps it was my unfortunate and rapid release of pressure.

 

[deluxestogie]

perhaps it was my unfortunate and rapid release of pressure

I would say that is the issue.

Bob

 

[Redleaf]

Last priming of my plants is colour curing nicely.
my perique project seemed to have started a bit of white mould on the surface so I cleaned it out and reclamped. Has anyone else experienced that ?
My cavendish has a different flavour to add to my immature VG and certainly has helped the burn properties with a bowl in my pipe lasting much longer and certainly a smoother smoke. Still a fair bit of tounge bite but probably to be expected from tobacco not fully cured.

 

[Redleaf]

 

[BarG]

Making perique is an art probably long lost to big tobacco growers. Check earliest posts on it by fmgrowit and Bigbonner, some really good stuff.