Tobacco seeds were brought to Virginia around 400 years ago and formed a variety of the Nicotiana Tabacum tobacco plant. Due to the soil the leaves grew thinner and had a lighter taste than the “Spanish tobacco” growing in the Caribbean area. It became an instant hit among pipe smokers and production constantly increased. Today Virginia tobacco is a component of pipe tobacco, cigarettes and Roll Your Own tobacco, which qualifies Virginia tobacco to be the most smoked tobacco in the world.
When you look at Virginia tobacco today it can be recognised by the bright yellow colour, but this was not always the case. From the start the Virginia tobacco was an Air-Cured tobacco, which means that the leaves were hung under a roof for drying. The period was normally 40 to 60 days before the leaves were completely dry. But this changed in the middle of the 19th Century. Around 1850 the concept of Flue-Curing was discovered and the new variant of Virginia tobacco was smoked with great pleasure. The success was so great that the Flue-Curing method rapidly spread among the farmers, and within just a few decades the traditional Air-Curing of Virginia tobacco was replaced with the new Flue-Curing. Flue-curing takes place after the ripe tobacco is harvested and – by controlling both heat and humidity in the drying barn – the tobacco will be dried out in about 5 days.
The curing methods are different, but how does that influence the taste of the Virginia tobacco? The Air-Cured tobacco did not contain any sugar which gave a slightly, dry mouthfeel, whereas the Flue-Curing secured the natural sugar to remain in the leaf. Sugar provides a natural sweet note to the Virginia tobacco, however, if the temperature by smoking rises too much, the sugar converts into acid. For both the pipe and cigarette smoker, this means that the smoke will be sharper and slightly irritating in the mouth.