Snuff making 101

@lenezzz I have had the morgentau and the driesener. Morganteau seems to just be the scented version of the other. But this info may be misleading to @johano given the info that @volunge just presented.

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Only two out of five Rosinski’s greens are described as made from frost-affected leaf.

“Nordwind - the frosty snuff. An almost forgotten classical snuff as it used to be made by the cottagers in the fens of Eastern Germany - what leaves remained at the tobacco plant’s stem after the first sudden frosts was turned into a dark green snuff. The unmistakable scent of frozen green tobacco leaves, a touch of camphor and bay leave, and a dash of menthol. Moist, medium grind. Strong in nicotine, mentholated.”

Klippenritt contains frost leaf, too. “Klippenritt. The maritime snuff. The exhilerant fragrance of the waves breaking against a cliff. Mossy and earthy notes in the background, blended with fresh herbal scents. A frost green snuff with slight addition of a light Burley, coupled with wintergreen, incense, lime fruit an menthol. Medium grind, medium nicotine strength, fairly moist.”

Frost isn’t mentioned in the description of Driesener, Morgentau and Nordisch Grun.

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@volunge thank you for the great replie. For the information about the leaves as well as about the alkalis.

Much appreciated!

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Followed Juxtaposer recipe last week and made some homemilled from Canadian Classic I had in the freezer. I toasted before grinding. After a week, honestly not that bad.

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Im definitely going to pass it through a tea sieve in the next few days to get the much finer grind as this is a bit too coarse for ma nez. The nic is surprisingly on point with say toque quit, not a whole lot of burn and isnt acrid on the drip (which also wasnt that bad). Ive been homemilling lots of different tobaccos (not all brand), just for the heck of it and if you are gonna do up some Virginia just laying around, I find the toasting makes it more palatable. Whether you agree with homemilling brand tobacco or not, a fair amount of folks post this kinda question from titme to time, so thought Id mention it. 

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Nice snuff you made, @LeNezzz! Looks like Gekachelter Virginie.

Talking about brand tobacco, I tried a couple of volume aka DIET (dry ice expanded tobacco) MYOs - LD and Winston - and found them unsuitable for snuff. Too clogging and low in nicotine.

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You are right in that it looks a lot like Gekachelter Virgine. I havent had that one yet so I will put in my next order. I have watched a few reviews of it though. I have a weird thing for converting on brand tobacco, just cuz, if I run out, cant get it or what not I want to have a good recipe to get me by. We dont seem to have any mills in Canada that ive been able to find so I wonder if the tobacco brands we do have made snuff maybe this is what itd taste like if they did. Have folks been trading their homemills lately

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@LeNezzz, I would say, if brand tobacco is additives-free and doesn’t contain DIET tobacco, it’s on a par to whole leaf, when it comes to snuff making. I’ll make some small 10 g batches of snuff (a fine dry toast, medium grind medicated and moist coarse) from Poschl Pueblo RYO or RAW Organic later this summer and share the recipes and my thought about the end result here. Pueblo and RAW are widely available throughout Europe.

You might get disappointed by Gekachelter V. I can bet your homemade CC is more satisfying. GV is pretty mild snuff.

If you want to stick to a reliable (“tried and loved”) recipe and aim for stable result, you need to use scales. Going by volume is just a tad faster, but results may vary each time due to poor precision. There’s a sensible difference between, say, 3% and 5% alkalizer. Same goes for moisture content. Worth giving a glance at the spreadsheet and other info in this thread: https://snuffhouse.com/discussion/11859/spreadsheet-ingredients-of-poeschl-bernards-and-swedish-match

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@volunge I will look at the spread sheet. I am most definitely looking for a stable product. I have a small gram scale at home, so far Ive been going by volume, but as you mention that is definitely less precise. 

This batch here I used Juxtaposers recipe with some tweaking, one cup CC Virginia gold (im sure it has some additives, but I digress) flour which I toasted at 300c for 30mins, quarter tsp sodium carbonate,  eighth tsp salt, both sodium and salt independently dissolved in a tsp of distilled water. Left sit for a week in air tight  container opening occasionally to check on it and such. I want to sieve it again to get it much finer, but its still very flavourful and enjoyable. 

Appreciate the link. 

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Note also ive tried from not toasting to even adding in some tobacco ash in various other batches and I like this 300 at 30 mins the best so far. 

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@volunge

Another question about alkalos… I was just searching through my wife s household cabinet and found a package of natriumsesquicarbonate. It is a package of so called active soda - in german Aktiv Natron for washing and many other household things. It has citric scnet, not bad or a lot of it. But the scent is there.

Can this stuff being used as an alkali for snuff? IMO, I am just using a very short amount of it to alkalize the snuff.

I justr wnnted to know if this will cause any harm? Never hears about natriumsesquicarbonate, and so my question.

Or could baking powder also being used for it? Just took a look, it vontains natriumbarbonate E500. But also other ingredients I am not familiar with.

Sodium sesquicarbonate can be used for alkalizing snuff, it renders pretty high pH. It’s stronger alkali than sodium bicarbonate, but a tad weaker than sodium carbonate. However, I wouldn’t advice using the household product. Besides the flavouring agent, it might contain other impurities - many household chemistry is made from technical grade compounds. Opt for food/pharmacy/laboratory grade alkalizers, or even higher purity (99-99.5%) ones.

Baking powder is a no-go, it’s a mixture of sodium carbonate, starch (or flour) and acid salts. Food grade sodium bicarbonate (E500) is available in every supermarket or larger food store and is really cheap. You can easily convert it to sodium carbonate in an oven, it takes only 30 minutes at 200-220 C.

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Thanks for the replie, @volunge

I went through the supermarket this morning and didnt trust the stuff sold there. So I went to the local pharmacy and ordered pure NA2CO3 at about 7 EURO for 250 Gram. A little more expensive but it is pure without other ingredients. This ammount will last a long time as the content is only in percent stage.

Slowly Im getting my stuff ready. Ordered a hand grinder as well as some Viriginia Orange Leafes (200 gram for the start). Next weekend I sould be packed up with my basic equipment …

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Great choices! 250 g of carbonate is a lot, using it at 4-6%, you can make 4-6 kg of snuff.

4% gives medium, 6% - strong potency.

Virginia Orange was one of my interest as well. Aromatischer und wurziger sounds appetizing! When your leaves arrive, please check them carefully for sand/soil and other organic stuff, like other plants seeds, fluff, insects etc. Leaf often needs to be cleaned before processing it into snuff, soft / medium hard painter’s brush does the job. Before brushing off the sand (if any; check both sides of the leave, it tends to accumulate along the central vein), you need to condition (moisturize) leaves. It’s easily done, leaving carefully stringed dry leaves overnight, hanged outside (especially after rainy day). Hang the string with leaves under the roof, the firewood storing shed with open doors is ok. In the morning leaves will be elastic enough to unfold for cleaning without breaking them. It takes some time, but definitely worth doing. It’s a pleasant little job, very aromatic one. You don’t need to wear gloves, working with dried/conditioned leaf. If you want to make stronger snuff from pure lamina, strip the leaves from the midribs straight after cleaning, while they are still elastic. Save the midribs, you can make high dry snuff or toast from them. Then dry the lamina and midribs in a dry, warm place or in the warm (30-40 C) oven.

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Thanks again for the advice @volunge

I gonna check them as soon as they are here and brush them free of dust and dirt… and tiny animals sitting on there.

I am looking forward on getting my first order of tobacco and doing my first homemade snuff after 21 years of snuff taking.

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Anyone ever order tobacco stems used for pigeon nests? I wonder where they got theirs from and such.

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https://globalpigeonsupply.com/products/tobacco-stems-crumbles-15-lb

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I have stumbled upon similar Polish products recently, searching for whole leaf suppliers. Just one of many: https://zloty-lotnik.pl/shop/natural-lodygi-tytoniu/ Looks like central veins (midribs). It’s 2-6 times cheaper than EU-grown whole leaf (kg price). Not worth messing with, imo. Midribs/stems contain less nicotine. It’s clearly a by-product, waste of tobacco processing.

In some countries you can buy bags of tobacco dust, which can be used as fertilizer and insecticide.

Dang. I was like, maybe a source for a toast, but now I