Adventures in home rolling
- Thread starter BrewinHooligan
- Start date
If you are a DIY guy, you need to give it a try. I just ordered a few of the blend packs from WholeLeaf and found a nice cigar mold locally. It is fun, but messy.
Got to see my first tobacco beetles, dead of course because I froze everything when I arrived, but I made sure to smash'um anyway. Just a few. Man they are tiny!!
They are fast as hell too! Good work brother and keep us updated with what you roll
Smoqman
BoM Aug. 2014
Oh, but you DO!!
So I'm prepping some of my new PA broadleaf from leafonly, it is very different from the same I have been getting from Whole Leaf Tobacco. It plays a huge part I have found in the flavors of my Marshmallow blend. A little panicked the leaf from the new source isn't gonna give the results I want. I will try and get some rolled up tonight to test out and see. Here's hoping for the best
The largest lesson I keep learning with home rolling is that patience is a virtue and prep work needs to be done well in advance. I got 5 bunches in the mold tonight and wrapped 2 before calling it quits. The wrapper leaf wasn't up to full case and the 2 I wrapped were not up to my standards. The Leafonly PA broadleaf is thinner than wholeleaftobbacos offering. It also seems to have a more oily sheen to it. I think I prefer the look and feel of what LO sells, and also think it will have better combustion, but will reserve judgement for when the leaf is actually ready to work with. Hoping the dry air here works in my favor so I can try the new wrapper and see how the flavor compares sooner than later.
I need to decide what to get from leaf only this weekend with their sale going on. This is where my indecisiveness really pains me. I don't know enough about what I want to order so get major analysis paralysis and end up spending way too much time making my mind up, second guessing myself, etc. Add to that the fact that I'm not sure how to describe the flavors I enjoy, I'll spend days on this lol
I learned this with my first rolling experience this week. I was ready to go but the leaf wasn't. So I split all the leaf and got to proper case before starting. It took me a few extra days to start, but made the process much easier, faster and enjoyable.
Get 1/4lb samples of wrapper to try new things without being stuck with large quantities. A corojo/criollo filler combo gives a nice natural sweetness with some spice and cream. Make sure you get seco, viso, and ligero for balanced blends. I highly recommend their Ecuadorian Habano ligero wrapper.
Great idea @BrewinHooligan I didn't realize you could get 1/4 pound lots. That'll work great for me.
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So I finished wrapping the bunches I rolled last night. The two on the left were wrapped last night and one of them won't make it to tomorrow since I'm dying to try the new wrapper out. Gonna go fill up the mold again in the meantime
That is freaking beautiful.The 4 on the right are wrapped with Ecuadorian Habano, the rest are wrapped with PA broadleaf. A few segundos in the batch but those are the ones the roller burns
While the texture and thickness of the LO leaf is way different from what I have been using from WLT, the flavors are still similar enough to call this a win, especially since I like the look and feel of the LO leaf better.
Damn, Jonathan. Those are looking good and that burn looks perfect. Great job, brother.While the texture and thickness of the LO leaf is way different from what I have been using from WLT, the flavors are still similar enough to call this a win, especially since I like the look and feel of the LO leaf better.
Thank you! While my methods are far from conventional, I have found what works well for me and always seem to get a nice even burn. One day I will put together a better pictorial of my process.