Hey all,

Toque snuffs are often touted as “all natural.” I love Toque and I super love that it is free of any artificial flavors or additives.

My question is - which snuffs DO contain artificial flavors and additives? And what are they? Can one “tell the difference” with their nose, or must we rely on manufacturers disclosures? Do the manufacturers even need to disclose the ingredients in their recipes? 

I’m particularly curious about McChrystals O&G because I mop up a ton of it.

I trust nature a hell of a lot more than I trust food scientists. 

Cheers

None of them publish the ingredients, so it’s completely subjective. The only rules around ingredients are the very occasional government act governing what goes in tobacco - and they don’t really cover flavouring as such, more the basics. So you are left with your own nose. I would be surprised if there is much truly synthetic stuff in any of them. Most of them contain salt, bicarbonate and base line ingredients like that. And then it gets completeley random: different companies make their snuff in different ways, some bake, some ferment, some toast, some add oil. Then the same amount of variables in the flavouring. To completly uravel the ingredients in a single snuff by nose is a gift given to very few. In short; no way of knowing, with certainty, what is in any snuff.

For what it’s worth, I think the following have a synthetic taste:

Wow, by Dholakia - the whole range

All the Dholakia ‘Western’  line

Some Poschl

Some WoS, Gawith etc.

They don’t need to disclose anything; nothing in snuff is harmfull in my view, all though I think the above taste very mass produced…

Oand G is a basic SP flour with medicating ingredients such as menthol etc etc. Most, if not all, snuff companies keep an eye on the competition and most popular snuffs have a version in the competition’s catalogue.

artifical and natural are pretty much the same thing. Let me explain one they both mean what a manufactuer wants them to mean. Then there is what we think of as natural and artifical. Well both have plenty of things you don’t want in your body and plenty that are fine in your body.

Trust nature? Sorry - not on your life. Trust things like belladonna and milk sickness from cows ingesting white snake-root? Would I trust a pack of arctic wolves with my lunch money?

I’m with Bob. Most of the time “Natural” and “Artificial” are marketing terms that mean what they want you think about a product. “It is a tale
told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, Signifying nothing.”

BTW: Aspirin is ‘artificial’ - and thank God for it.

a good example is synthetic banana flavour, it is chemically identical to natural banana, only given away as synthetic as the scent and taste can be made far stronger. it is far easier to make it concetrated by synthesising it than it is trying to cincentrate it from bananas.

Thanks for the responses guys!

While I certainly understand that descriptors like artificial and natural mean little, that is not because their aren’t very real differences between food additives that are chemically synthesized and additives that are derived from plants through steam distillation or solvent extraction. They mean little because the FDA draws no distinction and has been extremely generous in approving synthetic additives as “generally regarded as safe”.

Their is a growing body of evidence that artificial food additives (flavors, colorings, preservatives) contribute to a range of behavioral problems (especially in children) and immunological diseases. See http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/81599.php  

I’m not saying that nature doesn’t pose it’s threats. I’m saying that I’d prefer to indulge in plant essences that humans have enjoyed safely for thousands of years, rather than a synthetic analog created from natural gas stock, likely contaminated with byproducts of the manufacturing process. I’ve worked alongside chemical engineers and even they are nervous about the loose tolerances in production of products destined for human consumption.

I’m careful about what I put in my body and I’d prefer to snuff tobacco that contains only natural ingredients. Just my preference. I fully respect that others aren’t concerned because the risks are negligible (though not well understood).

The British purity laws were a good safeguard for snuff takers and other tobacco users for decades, but I understand they have been changed recently. I think that any British snuff that has been around very long would probably be formulated according to those laws, and more than likely even the new ones would conform because of the tradition which the snuff manufacturers have. Before the purity laws were enacted all kinds of adulterants were added to snuff.

The tobacco itself may be genetically modified and it is certainly hybridized. Not to mention fertilized and exposed to  pesticides. If you would like to go though the effort of obtaining organic tobacco and scenting it yourself it would be easier than figuring out what snuffs have “artificial” ingredients.

I have guaranteed to the FDA that all Toque and Silver Dollar snuffs do not contain any artificial ingredients and would dearly love to produce 100% organic snuff. The main barrier is not growing our own tobacco. I just don’t understand why a plant like tobacco, it’s own natural insecticide, has to be sprayed with insecticide?  

"I just don’t understand why a plant like tobacco, it’s own natural insecticide, has to be sprayed with insecticide? "

 Lasioderma serricorne, aka the tobacco beetle.

@ Toque, Hookworms. Evil vile little(huge) SOBs love nicotine. Make ugly holes in beautiful leaf. The cure is pesticides or picking them out one by one.

Nachman - thanks for the tip on the purity laws. Looks like US interests squashed them so we could sell our “unpure” tobacco in their markets. “Free trade!”

Sustainable agriculture folks have made huge progress in organic farm methods and technology in the last thirty years. Like intercropping (planting multiple species together to repel pests or sequester nutrients), hormone traps, natural insecticides, etc. I would bet that tobacco hasn’t received much of their attention though. But considering that American Spirit organics aren’t much more expensive than the rest of their line, I’m guessing the additional costs aren’t insurmountable if there was much demand for the product.

Seems like a lot of smokable tobacco and chew gets doused with propylene glycol (antifreeze…) to preserve moisture and prevent mold/fungus. I wonder if snuff gets it?

Actually, there is something called Neem’s Oil, that is (as far as I know) a “natural pesticide” .  But, then of course, you are “contaminating” the tobacco plant with something that is unnatural to its growth and what not .  But that’s just my thought, I could be totally off LOL

I have grown tobacco and had major problems with, of all things, aphids. They infested the underside of the leaves and the ladybug larvae couldn’t keep up with them. Don’t know what insects the nicotine in the leaves does kill.

I am just a very modest backyard gardener but I have found it’s very hard to grow anything without the use of some form of pesticide. Will suffer huge losses otherwise. Have used copper sulphate and other less harmful compounds and still can’t save the amount of crop that many FDA approved pesticides can.

Ladybugs are a Carnivorous insect, they would surely eat the aphids, correct?  :) .  Not sure how organized or effective that would be…  But I believe people have tried it, or do still use this method

EDIT : I just read again…  Sorry to hear that the larvae couldn’t keep up with them.  I hope you find a method to stop them