Custom Cigarettes and Fine Tobaccos – Smoking Less and Enjoying It More
Why would anyone pay a visit to the effort to make their own cigarettes? As i can only answer personally the reasons are a large number of. Coming from a low-country town in Carolina, I can still very well remember the sweet and pungent aromas of the tobacco auction season and the myriad sights and sounds that accompanied the auctioneer and buyers as they walked among the beautiful rows of golden leaves.
Due to my age, I can also recall sitting in the company of many others because they instructed me in exactly how many leaves to grasp by their stems while then wrapping another around the top to produce a hand of tobacco. My father, being from upstate The big where propane was employed by many purposes, owned a propane gas company and very soon afterwards invented the system that inaugurated the move from wood to propane in flue curing bright tobacco. Those many aromas and the bustle of the auction season still lingers with me as Chance back on the many sensory delights of fine tobacco just out of your curing barns.
Maybe from that getting exposed I was exposed for appreciation of what tobaccos SHOULD smell like. In fact, I even remember watching once as I was given a lecture relating to the differences between our fine Carolina brights versus those “other” tobaccos that were left in the fields. the burleys of the up-country. To even further educate me, I was once given a demonstration of how burley was soaked in the solution of sugar, salt and water, wrung out, shaken, and then converted to a twist for drying out. Back then chewing tobacco was regardless of whether similar twist or a plug, not the subtle stuff of today’s highly cased bags.
Years later, when Employed grown, I was subjected to many of the “store bought” cigarettes that rarely had filters. Lucky Strikes, Home Run, Camels, Chesterfield, Phillip Morris and others. Eventually, the American taste turned to filtered cigarettes and decrease of intense toasted flavors and Turkish blends. However, as cigarette tobaccos were more and more enhanced with additives better transportation and communications led into the growth of international blends in pipe tobaccos where Balkan, Turkish, and English blends led to a range of pipe shops which includes rapid growth in new blends, cuts, and flavors.
Maybe it is a personal recollection as many belonging to the older ways seem better, but it seems that in now having so many options among cigarettes today, much of the flavor and aroma has left. With the hundreds of additives the standard, are we using tobacco or some lesser grade tobacco and myriad chemicals?
When I first deemed Roll Your Own cigarettes my thoughts were of the old men I accustomed to see who fascinated me with their dexterity although hand rolled a smoke from one of numerous over the counter varieties found in many groceries and pharmacies. For myself, this meant something the objective inevitably leave you by using a mouth full of bitter shreds and a smoke that was dry, harsh, and packed the subtlety of a mule halt.
However, after a moment of exploration on the online market place I soon found that there were indeed alternatives. After reading in RYO Magazine in addition a quick call to D&R in Smithfield, North Carolina, I was soon eagerly awaiting a shipment of an injector, some filter tubes and a wide choice of blends. Upon their arrival, my wife and I spent a few days sampling and experimenting.
I am now glad to say that we had been both thrilled with our purchases and what we since experienced. Now, the house no longer has that foul reek of inferior tobaccos, in fact, fresh blends actually are more a fragrance than what previously was more that foul stench of stale cheap tobaccos. Too, currently has both rediscovered the overwhelmingly pleasant taste and aroma of great tobaccos. However one totally unanticipated side benefit is that and thus smoke far fewer cigarettes as the wonderful D&R and other blends are infinitely more satisfying. Even more, there is lengthier that coughing and congestion that used to accompany each morning’s waking.
Today, we have come a long way, once we now experiment with some of our blending and have studied the many varietals, variations, and characteristics. For general smoking there is a light blend, but sometimes put on pounds . the enjoyment of a solid Turkish blend or just a dessert blend with a tiny bit of Latakia. Sometimes a sweet smoke and solutions on times more of an English blend. The fun part is that with our own custom made cigarettes we now have opportunity to enjoy the highest quality in an incredible selection of styles. Sometimes a thin, rolled smoke, other times a thicker injected smoke, with NO additives.
When we once tried the premium brand of pre-made commercial cigarettes, the two of us looked at one another with a grin. No taste, no flavor, an awful bitter residual, and that all too familiar stench up. As though an interesting spin on an old commercial, we are now smoking far less, but enjoying it so more!
Smokey Johns Tobacco Company
424 Elmwood Rd, Lansing, MI 48917
(517) 703-8170
