What percent of flavor does wrapper add to cigar?

[BarryVT]

This is a topic that I have found varies widely depending on who you talk to or what you read. It's all over the board, anywhere from 10% to 90%. I can see a higher percent on smaller ring gauge and type of wrapper., but on average I lean more towards the 10 to 20%. Your thoughts?

[Wilzc]

I think the overall wrapper binder filler construction matters 100%.

I think when a wrapper is thick and ungainly it affects burn evenness which really affects flavour.

You want a nice cross sectional burn so that you’re sampling the blend as per intended rather than too much of this side of the filler and less of the other half. Or too much from the core of the cigar and less of the outer layers.


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[Edward7]

It’s a lot. I wanted to know for sure so on the rare time I didn’t want to finish a good cigar, I peeled the wrapper off and continued to smoke. It truly lost nearly all its flavor. Then I peeled off the binder and smoked the filler and that was even worse. It turns into a flat one dimensional tasteless smoke.

Logic says that smaller cigars have a higher ratio of wrapper to binder and filler versus larger ring gauge, but it won’t necessarily mean that it will have Moreno flavor. I think a lot of sub 48 RG cigars pack flavor but many can be pretty boring compared to some great thicker cigars. So it all depends, at least to me.

[Randy956]

48 minutes ago, BarryVT said:

This is a topic that I have found varies widely depending on who you talk to or what you read. It's all over the board, anywhere from 10% to 90%. I can see a higher percent on smaller ring gauge and type of wrapper., but on average I lean more towards the 10 to 20%. Your thoughts?

I roll my own cigars so I can speak with some authority on what the wrapper brings to the table.  It depends!  :)  There is no way to quantify an answer to your question.

The influence a wrapper has on a cigar depends on it's flavor/strength/body balance against the filler flavor/strength/body.  Some wrappers greatly influence the character of a cigar, others only slightly.  Wrapper selection is a continuum and different wrappers can be used on the same bunch (cigar core) to bring out different cigar flavors.

Make sense??

 

 

[BrightonCorgi]

Well the wrapper is on the only part of the cigar touching the lips, so there's flavor right there; some wrapper fermentation's give off more flavor to the mouth.  That alone has to be worth a couple of percent.  Add the percent volume the wrapper makes up for the rest of the cigar and there you.  Alter the final number based on quality (amount of flavor) for the binder and filler used.  My hunch is around 10-15% is flavor exclusive from the wrapper.

If you knew the weight of each component, you could smoke a little of each on its own and gauge how flavorful each component is.

[RijkdeGooier]

As an avid smoker of HUpmann Mag46 these came into my possesion.

 

Both clearly Mag46 and the darker wrapper noticeably stronger and earthy  

 

 

 

? I’d say the difference was around 11.78%

 

[Randy956]

A picture of wrapper relative to the volume of tobacco in a rubusto

Wrapper is about a third, perhaps less, of a full tobacco leaf for this size cigar.

[oliverdst]

according to that guy from that magazine, wrapper is 99% of the flavour lololol

[BrightonCorgi]

1 hour ago, Randy956 said:

A picture of wrapper relative to the volume of tobacco in a rubusto

Wrapper is about a third, perhaps less, of a full tobacco leaf for this size cigar.

can you weigh them both to know for sure?

[El Presidente]

On 10/17/2018 at 2:14 AM, BarryVT said:

This is a topic that I have found varies widely depending on who you talk to or what you read. It's all over the board, anywhere from 10% to 90%. I can see a higher percent on smaller ring gauge and type of wrapper., but on average I lean more towards the 10 to 20%. Your thoughts?

Wrapper changes flavour dramatically. 

if you can, swap wrappers. Put a rosado on a claro, a claro on a maduro, a maduro on a colorado. The cigar changes completely. 

We have done this many times in the past and those involved are always amazed. 

i made gambas al ajillo (garlic prawns) on Sunday. Let's assume I made two batches, one with garlic and one without. 

In terms of flavour is the one without 10.20.30,100% different?

I would argue 100%.   

[Nino]

1 hour ago, El Presidente said:

i made gambas al ajillo (garlic prawns) on Sunday. Let's assume I made two batches, one with garlic and one without. 

In terms of flavour is the one without 10.20.30,100% different?

I would argue 100%.   

Gambas al ajillo WITHOUT ajillo do not make much sense, Prez.

So, yes, you're right - no ajillo means 100% different and they would not be Gambas al Ajillo. ( Dreaming of Santys right now ...

My take is that wrapper does not add more than 10% of flavour to the cigar, while Ajillo adds 100% flavour to the Gambas

[99call]

1 minute ago, nino said:

Gambas al ajillo WITHOUT ajillo do not make much sense, Prez.

So, yes, you're right - no ajillo means 100% different and they would not be Gambas al Ajillo. ( Dreaming of Santys right now ...

My take is that wrapper does not add more than 10% of flavour to the cigar, while Ajillo adds 100% flavour to the Gambas

Having eaten some simple salt baked Carabinero Prawns recently, I would also suggest, that whilst a nice marinade, rub, dipping sauce may elevate any given prawn wonderfully well...........without the baseline quality of the prawn, then all is lost

[luckme10]

If so much flavor comes from the wrapper, why not just take a cigar and make it out of 100% wrapper? Wouldn't that be the ultimate flavor experience?

[Monterey]

17 minutes ago, luckme10 said:

If so much flavor comes from the wrapper, why not just take a cigar and make it out of 100% wrapper? Wouldn't that be the ultimate flavor experience?

Because it wouldn't burn right.  Plenty of articles online about what type of tobacco is in the cigar and how it relates to the whole process of smoking.

[toto]

Someone should do another experiment.  Using a long cigar, only swapping half a wrapper.  Front half maduro, back half claro.  Maybe a good experiment. I'll volunteer a few cigars to Prez for this.

[Randy956]

All of this chatter about a wrapper makes me chuckle.  Of course a wrapper will burn just fine if one rolls a cheroot with it, as long as it's good tobacco.  We rollers do it all of the time to sample individual tobacco leaf.

Take any single leaf away from the cigar be it, wrapper, binder, seco, viso, or ligero and it's a totally different cigar.

Every leaf contributes it's own thing to the overall cigar smoking experience.  Then one could say that any one leaf contributes 100 percent to the flavor profile according to the theories on flavor posited here.

You cannot say a wrapper contributes X percent to the cigar without eliminating the other leaf in the stick one leaf at a time.

Cigar blending is an art.  A leaf on it's own has a unique flavor yet when combined with other leaf the flavor profile becomes something entirely different.

[Colt45]

1 hour ago, Randy956 said:

Every leaf contributes it's own thing to the overall cigar smoking experience.  Then one could say that any one leaf contributes 100 percent to the flavor profile according to the theories on flavor posited here.

When Habanos themselves say the wrapper contributes little to the flavor, that the wrapper is eye candy, it doesn't help matters much. It's easy enough for anyone here to try (I've done it and reported here). Take a cigar or a couple of cigars that you are familiar with, that have been consistent for you. Smoke until about halfway, then remove the wrapper and smoke the rest. Come to your own conclusions.

 

[Riverstyx]

Has anyone tried smoking a cigar with only wrapper used?

[Randy956]

36 minutes ago, Colt45 said:

When Habanos themselves say the wrapper contributes little to the flavor, that the wrapper is eye candy, it doesn't help matters much. It's easy enough for anyone here to try (I've done it and reported here). Take a cigar or a couple of cigars that you are familiar with, that have been consistent for you. Smoke until about halfway, then remove the wrapper and smoke the rest. Come to your own conclusions.

 

Yep.  And the results on flavor of removing the wrapper depend on the cigar and it's blend.  Some sticks it has a huge affect, others not so much.

One cannot say that the wrapper provides X percent of flavor to the a blend on all cigars.   The answer.. it depends on the cigar blend.  

 

[Randy956]

19 minutes ago, Riverstyx said:

Has anyone tried smoking a cigar with only wrapper used?

Yes sir, do it all of the time.  Especially when trying out a new wrapper leaf.

[Monterey]

2 hours ago, Randy956 said:

All of this chatter about a wrapper makes me chuckle.  Of course a wrapper will burn just fine if one rolls a cheroot with it, as long as it's good tobacco.  We rollers do it all of the time to sample individual tobacco leaf.

 

Chuckle all you want.  You are not getting my point.

[Randy956]

19 minutes ago, Monterey said:

Chuckle all you want.  You are not getting my point.

Ahhh, could be.   Help me out here then. 

I can be dense from time to time, so says my wife.

[Kitchen]

If you look at the typical 50 ring gauge cigar, it is made with 6 leaves, or 12 halves.  The wrapper is half a leaf, or 1/12 of the overall construction, so it is at least that amount.  However, half the filler used is usually Volado and Seco, which burns easily and keeps the cigar lit but has very little flavor.  So, really probably only 5 to 7 halves of the 12 halves used are for flavor, with the wrapper being one of those.  

So, depending on the blend, the wrapper effects the flavor from 15 to 30%.  Or at least this is my guess.  

[BarryVT]

Ok, everyone agrees a cigar would taste dramatically different if one component was to be removed from cigar. You have wrapper, binder, valado , seco and ligero. So that being said, mathmatically, wouldn't each contribute equally at 20%?

[Riverstyx]

2 hours ago, Randy956 said:

Yes sir, do it all of the time.  Especially when trying out a new wrapper leaf.

How is it?  More flavorful than a typical cigar?  Burn issues?