What do Ya’ll use to grind your Make it Yourself snuff? Thanks for any suggestions!!!
I’m using a small electric coffee grinder at present. I’m thinking I may get one of the snuff mills that Snuff Store UK offers, though. Product from the coffee grinder is a little on the coarse side.
That is my problem also. I can not get it fine enough with a coffee grinder or food processor, or peanut butter maker.
When I use a coffee grinder, I shake it as you’re grinding. Else all the bigger flakes sit on the bottom of the grinder…maybe that will help Gimpy
I will try that shaking option! I typed in my browser just now and everything i find there is hand operated. Arthritis is one of my enemies. Maybe I will look for a heavy round river rock, attach it to a dremel tool and see what that does. wish I could find a corn meal mill somewhere.
I use a pestle and mortar.
Use a sieve to get fine snuff. Strech a piece of pantyhose over the “mouth” of a empty glass jar which holds your ground snuff. Hold the pantyhose in place with a rubberband. Turn upside down and shake. If you want to invest in a good grinder, buy a burr coffee grinder. It’s got different settings so you can choose how fine/course you want your snuff.
Well folks Pieter Claassen has done it again. A burr grinder is just what I need. They do not use a blade for grinding, istead they use a moving wheel against a non-moving surface for a even grind as fine as you are willing to go and create very little heat. Thanks Pieter Claassen Esquire
I use the shake while grind method as well. On a side note. I just tested my jim beam snuff i made. It is incredible! Im going to have to make a bunch of this. I used the Jim Beam Red Stag Whiskey, in-direct method, with American spirit original. It has a black cherry essence behind the whiskey. very smooth, very moist, high nic and very good! Im excited.
Pieter, Thanks for the tip, I tried the panty hose method, it works much better than the kitchen sieve. I’ve been thinking of making a new bourbon or scotch whiskey snuff with some toasted rustica.
With alchool I like the eye droper method. Seems to work wonders.
@bob, when I was still taking alcohol, I never liked the eye dropper method. I prefered drinking straight from the bottle. Thank you, everyone, for the compliments.
See that is just a misundertanding what do you think they call a bottle in america yup an eyedroper. Just kidding of course.
@Pieter Claassen I bought a burr grinder today. You were correct, it grinds dry tobacco just great. a little moisture and not so good. I’ll just have to toast the damp stuff. I ground up some SHPC VR Blend pipe tobacco (a little moist added some checkerberry) it’s pretty good! Thanks Ed
@Edwin, way to go! Check with your tobacconist, they often have damaged cigars which you can have for a song. Cigar on it’s own is not so nice but mixed with some strong pipe tobacco, it’s excellent.
I disagree Mr. Claasse. We (you and I) have only begun to experiment with cigars for snuff. I think with a few key additives or treatments a straight cigar snuff could be very nice. Some suggestions; alkalizing, toasting, steaming, stoving, oiling, stewing, scenting and / or flavoring.
The snuff Ive just made is 50% Havanna cigar leaf, toasted slightly it comes out like Latakia. The other half is 50% Rustica; after flavouring and maturing its pretty like Princes in colour. I used a standard home food blender, whilst it was very effective at reducing the bulk to a course snuff texture I couldn’t get it any finer and sieving didn’t help much - maybe the cigar leaf is tougher to reduce? In any case I’m reasonably happy with it.
@Juxtaposer, you are right of course! What I mean by “is not so nice” is straight cigar snuff. I thought I would get a rich tobacco flavour but it is in fact a musty “aroma”. I have 3 more Havanas waiting to be demolished plus a couple of my own grown Rustica leaves. I will try toasting this. I ground up some Pergamon pipe tobacco which has got a very strong flavour. I toned it down by adding about 30% straight cigar snuff. It’s been maturing for about a month now and it is very, very nice. Soft on the nose, rich tobacco flavour still there but the cigar comes through as CIGAR now! My snuffing buddy, who smoked a pipe for many years and still smokes a cigar sometimes, is just crazy about it.
A tip on the grinding is to pull the moisture of the tobacco way down before doing so. I don’t know real numbers but even “dry” cigar and cigarette tobacco still has a bunch of moisture in it. Some might have humectants put there to absorb moisture from the air as a way of preventing perceived staleness. I’ve tried oven, stove-top, microwave and convection oven. All work. Temp under 200 is okay if you aren’t trying to toast it (toasting makes it much milder but lowers vitamin N content). Microwave is very tough to judge. If it’s actively steaming you are toasting it. If it sets the paper plate on fire, you have a real problem :-). The end result is tobacco so dry that you could rub it between your hands and get very fine flakes and dust. In a coffee grinder it will powder very easily. Careful that you don’t turn it into fine dust unless that’s what you want. Once ground it can be stored for later processing, rehydrated so casing and flavoring can be done, or used directly (watch out for the sneeze if it’s very dry).
cheap electric coffee grinder… requires very dry tobacco or else it all just cakes to the side. I un-packed a Lucky Strike and made some snuff and even that needed a little more drying (which made a lovely snuff by the way!). does not make a consistent grind but whatever.