There are many different methods for curing tobacco, but the easiest is to pick the leaves when they get a tinge of yellow on them, then hang them in an open shed or under the eaves. You can string them on a piece of bailing wire or strong string. Set it up so that the leaves dry out during the day and pick up moisture at night. This is how they cure.
Once the leaves have lost all green and are a golden brown (which takes a month or two), you wait until they are fle
xible some cloudy day or evening or early morning and lay them out on your knee (while you’re sitting down of course) alternating stem to tip for 7 leaves. Then you tightly roll them together like a big Cigar and then gently twist the cigar, each end in an opposite direction, which gives you the typical “twisty” or “plug.” This you hang to dry in the warm shade with good ventilation. It will take a few days to dry completely.
Don’t store the plug in plastic or glass until it is very dry or it will mold. If you cut through the plug with a razor blade, shaving off a little at a time, you make the typical crinkly product known as tobacco, which can be smoked in a pipe or rolled (and has no chemicals). Mighty smooth.
Going to try growing tobacco this year, will be using your suggestions, really appreciate your love of sharing what you love to do!
Hi Terry, In the year 1980 I was living in the coast mountains in Lincoln County. We liked to go down to Ona Beach and there was an incredible woman who lived near there. We got to know her, a single mom raising up 3 little boys. She was one of those people–I don’t know how they do it–perennially sunny and knew the best way to do everything. She won me over immediately with piece of soaked raisin coffee cake to die for. Anyway she lived in an old farmhouse a bit up from the beach, and you could see her garden from afar. When I viewed that garden from a distance, there was one plant that stood out and I couldn’t identify it, but it was strangely attractive. It was tobacco. Richo