Cigar basics

Ok, I know that most non smokers prefer to be around people that smoke cigars over those that smoke cigarettes. But how do you hang around cigar smokers if you don't understand the whole 'Brotherhood of the Leaf' thing? Well, that's what this is for. This is for those of you that just do not understand cigars, but want to learn without having to look stupid for the first little while of smoking, or being around smokers. I have broken this up into three parts due to the fact that its freakin' Huge! There are links on the Left sidebar that you can use to navigate quickly between the three.


Lesson One - Humidors

Ok, first things first, The humidor! The staple of cigar smoking, If you don't quite understand it, your in luck, because this is the primer! Humidors should usually be made out of very mild and very dry wood, no Aromatic Ceder, and no Pine. Usually Spanish ceder is used for humidors due to the fact that it absorbs moisture and the smell of the tobacco, producing that wonderful tobacco smell every time you open the humidor, even if there are no cigars in it at the time, it will retain the scent of the cigars it had in there previously. If you are just starting out, I would recommend a 25-50 stick humidor, as they will be able to hold a decent variety, for the more experienced, as you can see in my blog post "Humidor Drama", we have over nine different humidors of varying size, and plans for more!

(Curing the humidor usually takes about five days for a good cure, So keep this in mind when you first start!)

As a General Rule of thumb (and a great way to fool the so called 'aficionados' if you have never smoked before), you will want to buy the humidor a week or two before buying cigars. Why you ask? Because then you have sufficient time to 'cure' the humidor. You see, brand new humidors have a tendency to have never had humidity in them before, so they are dry as a bone, not very conducive to cigars, which like 60-75% humidity. The trick you use to cure a humidor is to first take out the Hygrometer(There should be a little dial that actually says 'Hygrometer' on it, if you don't have one, you'll need one for watching the humidity in your Humidor, If you have a digital one, you will want to take it out for calibration anyway) and if the dial is on the outside, plug the hole with a wet rag so that the humidity doesn't change on the inside, and to get a wet rag and use distilled or pure water of some form on it, and wipe the sides and bottom of the inside of the humidor, if you have a solid lid humidor you will want to wipe that down as well. Next you will want to get some more pure water of some form in a shallow cup or bowl (We tend to use a sushi tray) and set it inside the humidor. Now you just sit and wait, and let the humidor soak up all the moisture it can, and make sure to wipe the inside of the humidor down with a wet rag every few days, and checking the water level of your shallow bowl to make sure that it stays full.

To calibrate your hygrometer you will want to start this about six hours before you finish curing on the last day of the process. First you will want to put about a teaspoon of salt into a 2-liter bottle lid, then wet it with a few drops of water and make sure that you don't dissolve the salt! if the salt dissolves you will not get an accurate reading. You will then want to put the hygrometer and salt inside a container that can tightly seal(we used a candy jar). Next you will have to wait roughly six hours to get your first basic read on it(We calibrated ours three times to make sure we had it perfect, just remember that not everyone is that desperate for perfection, if you feel the need, you can calibrate multiple times to make sure you have the proper read), it should be almost exactly 75%, if not, you can adjust the hygrometer by the little screwdriver slot on the back till it reaches 75% if you have an analog hygrometer. If you have a digital you will want to refer to the owners manual on how to calibrate it. Take the bowl out of your humidor, and Now you pop the Hygrometer into the humidor! Your humidor looks a lot better without a rag sticking out of it, this is a proven fact! Now all thats left is to fill your humidity pucks. These are the little plastic bits with florists sponge in them, if you can, you will want to take them out, but some pucks aren't designed for that, so you just set them in about a half inch to an inch of distilled or pure water of some form for about thirty minutes. Slide your pucks in, And Woohoo! Your ready for Storing Cigars! Just remember that about Once every one or two months you will want to refill your humidity pucks, and always make sure you are watching your humidity, Because if the humidity gets too high, you run the risk of tobacco beetles, which would love to devour any tobacco you have in there!

(In a pinch, you will want to use a Boveda packet to assure that you have exactly the right humidity percentage, these are great if your just

not quite sure that you did it right.)