Why would anyone pay a visit to the effort to make their own cigarettes? As i can only answer for myself the reasons are many. 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 even though instructed me in just how many leaves to grasp by their stems while then wrapping another upon the top to produce help of tobacco. My father, being from upstate Brooklyn 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 belonging to the auction season still lingers with me as Think back on the many sensory delights of fine tobacco just out of the curing barns.
Maybe from that getting exposed I was exposed to an appreciation of what tobaccos SHOULD smell like. In fact, I even remember watching once as I became given a lecture inside the differences between our fine Carolina brights versus those “other” tobaccos that were left in the industries. 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 dehydrating. Back then chewing tobacco was either a similar twist or a plug, not the subtle stuff of today’s highly cased bags.
Years later, when I am grown, I was encountered with many of the “store bought” cigarettes that rarely had filters. Lucky Strikes, Home Run, Camels, Chesterfield, Phillip Morris and some other. 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 towards the growth of international blends in pipe tobaccos where Balkan, Turkish, and English blends led to a wide variety of pipe shops as well 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 gone. With the hundreds of additives the standard, are we smoking tobacco or some lesser grade tobacco and myriad chemicals?
When I first imagined Roll Your Own cigarettes my thoughts were in the old men I which are used to see who fascinated me with their dexterity although hand rolled a smoke from one of the various over the counter varieties found in many groceries and pharmacies. For myself, this meant something that can inevitably leave you having a mouth full of bitter shreds and a smoke that was dry, harsh, and packed the subtlety of a mule knock.
However, after a moment of exploration on the net I soon found generally there were indeed alternatives. After looking at in RYO Magazine using a quick call to D&R in Smithfield, North Carolina, I was soon eagerly awaiting a shipment a good injector, some filter tubes and a wide selection of blends. Upon their arrival, my wife and I spent a few days sampling and experimenting.
I am now glad to say that we were both thrilled with our purchases and what we’ve got since experienced. Now, our home no longer has that foul reek of inferior tobaccos, in fact, the blends actually are more a fragrance than what previously was more that foul stench of stale cheap tobaccos. Too, right now both rediscovered the overwhelmingly pleasant taste and aroma of great tobaccos. However one totally unanticipated side benefit is that we now smoke far fewer cigarettes as the wonderful D&R and other blends are infinitely more satisfying. Even more, there is extended that coughing and congestion that used to accompany each morning’s waking.
Today, we have come a long way, as we now experiment with this blending and have studied the many varietals, variations, and characteristics. For general smoking there is a lightweight blend, but sometimes there is the enjoyment of a great Turkish blend or just a dessert blend with a bit of Latakia. Sometimes a sweet smoke and solutions on times more of an English blend. The fun part is that our own own custom made cigarettes we now have the opportunity to enjoy the highest quality in an incredible associated with 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 uphill. 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
https://goo.gl/maps/sqMd1YLqExwwJctn9
Posted on:
July 11, 2019