@Johano, @faktiheiny, I think that the smell of Neffa originates from the particular variety of rustica used for this snuff. I have no idea, which variety they use, but I would assume they use one of the “yellow” varieties, which changes colour during drying/“colour curing”. Tunisian farmers grow Souffi variety exclusively for snuff, which is called Neffa Souffi (seeds of one Souffi rustica variety is available at Souffii Setif | Сорта табака и махорки).
MdK use wine lees for St. Omer No. 1 (along other standard ingredients, like potash, salmiak and salt). I’m not sure if wine lees contain any live yeast, or it was used only as a source of bitartrate salts / tartaric acid (the latter, reacting with potash, probably forms tartrate salts). This snuff is sour (tart), for what it’s worth. Besides, it’s made of tobacco, fermented in carrot, and contains some flavourings. The use of tartaric acid salts (cream of tartar aka wine stone) and salmiak for snuff was prevalent in 18-19 centuries in continental Europe, but diminished when high purity potash, ammonium and sodium carbonate became cheaper and widely available. English snuff makers traditionally used calcium hydroxide (aka slaked lime, in the form of lime water), potash and ammonium carbonate.
Now back to Neffa Ifrikia ingredients. The composition, pH, tobacco and nicotine content are publicised on anses.fr website Les produits du tabac et produits connexes | Anses - Agence nationale de sécurité sanitaire de l’alimentation, de l’environnement et du travail and can be accessed, clicking “Donnees de composition des produits du tabac et a base de plantes” and “Liste des autres produits du tabac et produits a base de plantes” (right-click these links and select “Open file…” to download .xls files; open the files and using Ctrl + f, search for “Neffa”, there are two of them there, Sifaco Neffa Ifrikia and Poschl Neffa Bledi).
Neffa Ifrikia composition (ingredients in mg per 1000 mg snuff):
Water 167.5
Sodium carbonate 51.25
Sodium bicarbonate 25.31
Calcium hydroxide 10
Calcium carbonate 8.75
The rest is tobacco.
pH 8, nicotine - 10.
Neffa Bledi composition (ingredients in mg per 1000 mg snuff):
Water 62.7623
Sodium carbonate 10-hydrate 28.4843
Calcium hydroxide 19.3114
Potassium carbonate 8.5453
The rest is tobacco.
pH 8.5, nicotine - 38 mg/g.
Moroccan homemade nefha:
4 parts rustica
1 part wood ash
a splash of water.
Tunisian Neffa Souffi:
Tobacco 92%
Carbonate (cation not specified)
Sodium bicarbonate
Water.
The amounts are not specified.
Nicotine - 2%.
(28.48 mg sodium carbonate 10-hydrate can be substituted with 11.40 mg regular sodium carbonate (i. e. sodium carbonate anhydrous, which you end up with after running sodium bicarbonate conversion to sodium carbonate in an oven).