Storing whole leaf vs storing cigars

[Drewsnow17]

My understanding is that whole leaf can and should be aged for years in a fairly dry environment, and the rehydrated prior to rolling to make them workable.

Cigars on the other hand must be stored within a certain range of humidity not just because they will be harsh if dry but because flavor producing oils will evaporate if to dry for to long. A cigar rehydrated will still be short or perhaps much some of its flavor.

If these two premises are true, why is it that these oils can stand being dry in a whole leaf but can’t stick it once they’ve been rolled. Scientifically why can’t a rolled cigar be treated like whole leaf and be aged 5 years out of a humidor, and then rehydrated slowly for 6 months? If anyone’s got an explanation deeper than “that’s just how it is” or can refute one of my 2 premises I’d be very interested to here it. Thanks

 

[deluxestogie]

Welcome to the forum. Feel free to introduce yourself in the Introduce Yourself forum.

Both premises are untrue. The process of "aging" tobacco is not the passage of time, but rather the progress of intrinsic leaf enzymes in modifying (mostly oxidizing) carbohydrates and albuminous proteins, as well as other compounds. As with all enzymatic reactions, it requires the availability of water, and its rate of action is temperature dependent. Totally dry leaf does not "age" in that sense. It needs both moisture and temps generally greater than about 60°F.

There are volatile compounds within tobacco (rolled or not) that gradually dissipate. But those are not dependent on the humidity maintained. Just the ambient temperature and time. And under the best of storage conditions, most of the lighter volatiles are gone within two or three years.

Cigars that are allowed to dry do not dry uniformly. The wrapper dries (and attempts to shrink) before the binder and filler. The open foot dries before the closed head. Cigars that have been slowly and carefully dried my be physically intact, and will show no ill effects of having simply dried, so long as their storage temperature is within a reasonable range. But a fully dried cigar is slow and sometimes troublesome to rehydrate to an ideal, smokable condition. As you might expect, the wrapper rehydrates and becomes stretchier before the inner tobacco, and the open foot rehydrates before the closed head.

Whole leaf tobacco and a rolled cigar experience the same positive and negative effects of ambient conditions, with the exception that whole (unrolled) leaf is more readily exposed to changes, and also offers more degrees of freedom for remaining physically intact during more rapidly changing ambient conditions.

Bob

 

[Drewsnow17]

Thank you for the well thought out response.

So any time anyone says oils and nicotine in a cigar will evaporate if dry and that those oils are essential to flavor they are incorrect?

What I gather from a practical standpoint is that if someone were to leave a closed box of cigars with cigars in cellophane outside a humidor they would probably dry slowly enough to avoid damage but would not age. If that entire box were put back in a humidor it miiiight rehydrate slow enough to avoid damage.

Last paragraph is more hypothetical than anything. Just trying to separate myth from fact. Thanks again.

 

[GreenDragon]

Hi Drew and welcome to the forum! Just a few comments on your questions.

Those cellophane wrappers - totally breathable. They are actually made from wood compounds. So if the box is stored in a dry environment, the cigars inside are going to dry out. If you are buying several boxes at a time and don’t have humidor room, buy a cheep cooler to store them in. (Google coolidors).

Most cigars are made with tobaccos that are 2-3 years old at a minimum. The most volatile flavor compounds have already gassed off, leaving the more stable, long lasting compounds intact in the leaf. Limiting access to dry, circulating air will help preserve those that are left however, hence a nice airtight humidor or bulk storage for whole leaf. I like Rubbermaid bins.

Nicotine will not evaporate. It’s actually a very time stable alkaloid.

A lot of people will let their humidor dry out and then try to quickly rehydrate it along with the cigars. This inevitably results in exploded cigars and a warped humidor that is no longer airtight. Also, if you had flavored cigars, many of those contain very volatile oils and esters that will evaporate off easily, and if that happens then there is no recovery for them.

If you want to get lost in a black hole of discussions on aging tobaccos, google cellaring / aging pipe tobacco. LOL!

Hope this helps!

 

[Drewsnow17]

No shortage of quality storage space in my humidor so I don’t have an issue with dry boxes. (I say that but it’s basically stuffed to the gills bc I can’t avoid ordering a box if there’s room). My question is more theoretical. If it’s a disaster to let cigars completely dry why is it not a comparable disaster to let whole leaves dry. I have the impression that a cigar drying isn’t a disaster so long as it happens in a way that doesn’t destroy its integrity. Whether it splits or cracks the tobacco in it is the same and as good, though the sum of the parts (ie cracked cigar) is no longer much good.

 

[GreenDragon]

Sorry, let me augment my response. If you can slowly rehydrate a completely dry cigar, it should be fine. It’s no different than letting whole leaf dry out. I have a buddy that buys humidors to restore and they frequently come with dried cigars that he salvages (free bonus!). The problem is if a cigar is rehydrated too fast, it can crack the wrapper and binder ruining the draw. It’s not great to let whole leaf completely dry either as it becomes very very fragile and will literally disintegrate if you try to handle it.

 

[Drewsnow17]

Glad to here, all my googling indicated that after being completely dry flavor compounds start to evaporate and are largely gone after 2 months but that didn’t seem to stack well with other things I’ve heard.

 

[deluxestogie]

The confusion arises from the fact that most of the folks writing about cigars and pipe tobacco have never cared for tobacco from seed to cigar or seed to pipe. There scope and experience is limited to commercial products. Of those, all commercial pipe tobacco contains casings (if only polypropylene glycol, in the least troubling scenarios). So they have never experienced real, 100% tobacco pipe blends, and how they respond to drying and rehydration. With cigars, very few folks on earth have cared for the seed, seedlings, harvesting, curing, finishing, aging, rolling and long-term storage. (In a similar vein, nobody knows the reality of raising a child if they have not personally raised one or more from infancy through high school, and into adulthood.)

My point is that Googling these subjects may lead anyone to odd or conflicting recommendations--especially from articles in popular tobacco-themed magazines.

Bob

 

[tullius]

I think Bob's generally got the gist of it: both premises are somewhat-to-mostly untrue. Some moisture may help to mature tobaccos, whatever the type and whether rolled or in flat leaf, or it may not. Maybe it's just time and atmosphere. Maybe it depends on the leaf, temperature, pressure, RH, etc. That said, in my experience, if a box of stogies or a tin of pipe tobacco is allowed to go completely bone dry and then rehydrated, never does quite recover the original flavor, feel or texture.

I have a full 4'x4'x2' oak & glass display case humidor that I let go unattended and undisturbed for more than 5 years: bone dry in the winter, 70+% RH in summer. Last year, I began slowly bringing it and its resident tobaccos back into case 24/7/365. After a half year now of gradually bringing up the RH: the cigars and pipe tobaccos are very smokeable, even delightfully so, but I can tell they're not the same. Worse off? No, because they have more age. Better off? Not sure, but the cigars sure don't have the sheen they used to. I will say: I and my guests have been far more pleased than not, smoking the contents to date.

Rehydrating too fast will cause problems others above have described: split feet, split wrappers, mold, etc.

Sloooooow'n'steady and ventilation/gentle circulation are your friends when bringing tobacco back into case, especially ready rolled cigars.

 

[deluxestogie]

...but I can tell they're not the same.

We're lacking an experimental control group, which would eliminate the elephant in the room--passage of time. My assertion is that if you maintained the same selection of cigars in two different humidors, one well controlled, and one--like yours--left to its own, the controlled ones would also change, but exhibit more progressed "aging" than those for which some of the time was spent languishing in insufficient ambient humidity to allow for enzymatic oxidation.

Anybody want to run the deluxestogie two humidors challenge?

Bob