Continuing the Experiment Using Rum

For anyone seeing this site for the first time, here is the crack.

My home-made baccy is too ‘intense’. It has a tobacco taste, but too strong. I have used the word ‘tarty’ on occasions. Also, the smoke is very smelly.

Because I know more than I used to, and have the materials to hand, I am conducting a series of experiments to try to bring the stuff more to my liking. The objective is to get rid of the tartiness.

A couple of days ago, I tried using whiskey as a moisturiser and flavouring. It seems to have been successful to an extent, in the sense that I was able to create a nice 50/50 blend of my treated stuff will Lemon Virginia.

THERE IS NEXT TO NO SCIENCE IN MY TINKERING! I just vaguely feel that alcohol should react with the tobacco and do something to it. Alcohol is a molecule consisting of carbon, hydrogen and oxygen. Nicotine consists of carbon, hydrogen and nitrogen. But what other chemicals are common to whiskey and tobacco and how do they react with each other if heated, or not?

I doubt that anyone has the foggiest idea.

But the ‘myth’ is that tobacco was carried across the Atlantic packed in kegs which were also use to transport rum……

OK. Let us not go any further with ‘the science’, otherwise our ‘science’ will become the same as tobacco control science – “ifs, buts, and maybes”, which are anything but science.

So, one is flying by the seat of one’s pants.

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But there are other ideas which are worth exploring. ‘Toasting’ is one such. This idea has been around for decades, and is almost certainly used all the big manufacturers.

Generally speaking, the farmers who grow and cure tobacco only process the stuff to a certain extent. When the cured leaves go to the tobacco manufacturer, they are still ‘raw’. That is, they have not yet been ‘treated’ to make the taste nice. ‘Secondary curing’ takes place.

The following is my personal opinion.

The first ‘cure’, by farmers, produces ‘raw’ tobacco. That is sold to tobacco manufacturers. Note that the ‘curing’ process has been interrupted – it is not a continuous process. Tobacco Manufacturers then apply the second ‘cure’ to the ‘raw’ tobacco.

We should note the stated claim that “curing is partial during the yellowing phase, but is completed during the early drying phase” [Paraphrased]

Thus, it may well be that tobacco companies get the tobacco after stage one (yellowing) and proceed to stage two in their own time. I speak only because I have seen videos which show yellowed leaves being baled up for transport.

In my own experience, I have held yellowed leaves ‘in suspense’. The simple tactic is just to enfold them in a towel to hold the moisture in to some extent and to stop them drying and to keep out mould spores.

Thus, it is reasonable to say that ‘the curing’ need not be a continuous, uninterrupted process.

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I believe that I ‘over-fermented’ the leaves when I wadded them. They shrunk and shrunk and became sticky and smelt sweet. That may be OK for cannabis – I do not know. Using that process was A TERRIBLE ERROR.

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I suppose that I am trying to reconstruct the stuff with the vague intention of reversing the effects of the bad methods. But what is important is to counter the effects of the bad methods. It may well be that a combination of alcohol infusion and heating (at a low level) might do the trick.

I like experimenting, although I would draw the line at the ingredients of the witches’ broth in Macbeth. “Bubble, bubble, toil and trouble” just about sums up tobacco control.

A little like psychopaths, socio-paths lack empathy. One might consider a group of social service persons, backed up by the police, who raid a home and snatch the children from that home in the early hours of the morning. None of those persons have empathy, otherwise they would refuse to do it. Only when the demands of compliance get too much does empathy have an effect.

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In Bristol, the Zealots (funded by smokers) have put up posters on lampposts. Shops decorate their windows with all sorts of posters. Few people read them unless they are interested in the wares that the shop offers. At least, in those circumstances, the shop has something to offer.

But what do the posters in Bristol have to offer? It seems that, in exchange for no one smoking in those two open-air places, the whole of Bristol and the cubic airspace in the vicinity of Bristol will be cleansed.

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I must admit to being pleased by this development. No matter how the MSM might spin it, the reality is that no one can be dictated to by posters. You do not need to read them. They are not people or policemen.

I have a simple vision. Only two people who are smoking there are needed. Not one single Zealot will dare to attack a duo. One person smoking is fair game, but two persons smoking terrify the Zealots.

I think that that is terribly important. Two persons smoking is not just duplication. It is magnified by mutual support. What should happen in Bristol is that citizens should tear those posters down.

Will they do so, or are they too terrified?