Herfin' USA - Making a Fine Cigar, Part 4
I hope you’re enjoying this mini-series on the making of a fine cigar. As I’ve said before, the process is long, laborious and considered an art form by cigar aficionados. It follows, then, that education and experience are essential to the full enjoyment of this fruit of a true master’s hand. And that, my friends, is the purpose of this series; to help you understand, appreciate and enjoy a truly fine cigar.
So let’s pick up where we left off. Our leaf has gone from seed, to plant, to the curing house and to the aging house. It’s been four to six long years since our journey began with a young plant in the fields. Now it’s time to take the leaf and do something with it!
Making the Cigar
The aging bales are brought into a rolling factory and placed in a climate controlled area. Tobacco is unpacked as needed and sometimes re-classified based on color, size and texture. The best of the leaves are moved to a blending room.
A Master Cigar Blender prepares the leaf for the roller and Master Roller team. Master rollers and buncher rollers work as a team to handcraft the cigar you hold in your hand. The Blender mixes enough tobacco for the daily production of each team.
Rollers, or “torcedores”, are highly trained and it can take twenty to thirty years to reach the Master level. The roller bunches the tobacco leaves and forms a cigar by taking a measured handful of long filler leaves and forming the desired shape. A binder leaf is then wrapped around the filler to hold it together before it’s pressed into a wooden mold. The press is turned by hand until the roller determines there’s enough pressure on the tobacco to properly form the cigar into whatever shape is needed.
When the press is released, the cigars are removed and passed to the Master Roller. The most experienced member of the pair carefully finishes forming the cigar and puts on the wrapper leaf. The head is placed and the finished cigars are inspected for imperfections.
So now it’s ready to smoke, right? Nope. The new cigar has to be aged again! That’s next!
Till then, keep Herfin’!
Doug
15 Comments
Reader Comments (15)
Nice article in the ongoing series. Thanks!
I always enjoy the cigar posts. Thanks for posting them.
Very informative. I looked back at the linked articles also. Thanks for the links, it makes more sense when I started from the beginning. I enjoy a cigar once in a while but I admit I don't know anything about them. Usually someone else has them and gives me one to smoke with a bunch of us and some Coronas. I see there are more articles so I plan to go back and read them also.
can't wait for the smoking part.
BTW the CAO Italia's are great!
Great series. Always enjoy.
All good. Keep them coming.
How do you get to the other installments?
Me and my wife both read your articles and have learned a lot about cigars. We smoke them a about once a week with some wine in our back yard. We have shared with our friends and they are impressed with the things we know and it is just from reading these aerticles. Thank you for sharing your cigar knowledge.
Barry,
Glad you enjoyed the Italia. For an interesting twist on that cigar, Oliveros makes a cigar called the El Padillo. A complex mix of tobacco's including some from the same area in Italy that CAO uses for it's Italia. The El Padillo has a large gaudy ring that is poorly designed, but this cigar is a "sleeper". Very enjoyable with a dark maduro wrapper. If you like the Italia, you'll enjoy this one. Cigars International carries them. Enjoy!
Thank you for the tip!!!
Whoops..
Barry, my bad. I meant to say El Padrino, not El Padillo.
I type faster than I think. Our illustrious webmaster had one of the El Padrino's this weekend and seemed to enjoy it.
Yes, I did, along with another of Michael's recommendations! Both paired well with the '05 Primus Zin we enjoyed for the evening. Definitely worth a try, Barry.
Doug
Where would I find them on line? I guess I am willing to try something new :)
Frank, Cigars International has them. The Oliveros El Padrino is not a well publicized cigar. That's sometimes good and sometimes indicates you're in "dog rocket" territory. In this case, it's the former rather than the latter. Look for the El Padrino made by Oliveros on Cigar International's website www.cigarinternational.com
The italian tobacco, coupled with the dark brazilian wrapper is a site to see...Hope you enjoy!
Found it, got it. Thanks.