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Plume Bloom or Horse Feathers?

webmostwebmost Posts: 7,713 ✭✭✭✭✭
Dropped by the B&M and examined an Esteban Carreras Habano Robusto Maduro the other day just cause it had been demoted to the four buck section and looked yummy. Using my android pocket puter, I researched before buying. Guys spoke well of it, so I bought.

But one of these reviews remarked that he'd stored his stick some time before smoking, and that "you can see plume in the picture, so it's ready to smoke." Naturally, I had to research plume at that point. I find that it's a white excretion from aging oils. No where do I see that it indicates the stick is "ready".

Question: Does plume indicate that your sotweed cylinder is succulent, that it has set too long, or neither? Is it good, bad, or indifferent?

“It has been a source of great pain to me to have met with so many among [my] opponents who had not the liberality to distinguish between political and social opposition; who transferred at once to the person, the hatred they bore to his political opinions.” —Thomas Jefferson (1808)


Comments

  • Ken_LightKen_Light Posts: 3,537 ✭✭✭
    True plume is a decent indication that the cigar is not only aged, but aged in proper conditions. As for that being a criterion for when a cigar is "ready," to each his own but I'm leaning towards horse feathers.
    ^Troll: DO NOT FEED.
  • 0patience0patience Posts: 10,665 ✭✭✭✭✭
    Plume, while it is something that is desirable, I would have to say (in my own opinion) that it is hardly an indication as to whether a cigar is "ready" or not. If it were, then a lot of manufacturer's would be selling "premium" cigars with bloom/plume.

    As far as I'm concerned, it is a matter of opinion on what you think is ready. Just my opinion.
    In Fumo Pax
    Money can't buy happiness, but it can buy cigars and that's close enough.

    Wylaff said:
    Atmospheric pressure and crap.
  • catfishbluezzcatfishbluezz Posts: 7,000 ✭✭✭
    It's an indication that the tobacco is aged. Taste after that is subjective and if it is crappy tobacco then who cares. However, the few cigars I have smoked with plume were really good.
  • blurrblurr Posts: 962 ✭✭
    Too many B&Ms try to excuse their mold outbreaks with plume. True plume is so rare you will be lucky to see it, but I love my stash of fine smokes and not one is showing significant plume yet. That's after 5 years for some in flawless condition of rh and temp never varying more than maybe plus/minus 3 deg F and plus/minus 2rh. Smoke what you enjoy, plume is rare and I haven't seen it NC or CC brands after a few years. Just beware the scum B&M owners trying to get rid of moldy cigars saying "its plume means the cigars will smoke amazing" when its clearly a mold infestation.
  • Ken_LightKen_Light Posts: 3,537 ✭✭✭
    blurr:
    Too many B&Ms try to excuse their mold outbreaks with plume. True plume is so rare you will be lucky to see it, but I love my stash of fine smokes and not one is showing significant plume yet. That's after 5 years for some in flawless condition of rh and temp never varying more than maybe plus/minus 3 deg F and plus/minus 2rh. Smoke what you enjoy, plume is rare and I haven't seen it NC or CC brands after a few years. Just beware the scum B&M owners trying to get rid of moldy cigars saying "its plume means the cigars will smoke amazing" when its clearly a mold infestation.
    I read somewhere on here that if you handle the sticks a lot they will be far less likely to get plume than if you don't. I guess you inadvertently remove some invisible layer when you touch them or something. So this could be why you don't see it?
    ^Troll: DO NOT FEED.
  • Lee.mcglynnLee.mcglynn Posts: 5,960 ✭✭✭✭
    IMO plume is more of a novelty idea...yes it means your sticks have been well aged in the right conditions which is always a plus!! But at the same time it also means those flavorful oils that make a cigar what it is are leaving it!! I figure age cigars if they get plume your doing it right if they don't I won't lose sleep over it!! Especially since almost every great cigar I have ever smoked has not had plume on it
    Money can't buy taste
  • kuzi16kuzi16 Posts: 14,633 ✭✭✭✭
    Ken Light:
    blurr:
    Too many B&Ms try to excuse their mold outbreaks with plume. True plume is so rare you will be lucky to see it, but I love my stash of fine smokes and not one is showing significant plume yet. That's after 5 years for some in flawless condition of rh and temp never varying more than maybe plus/minus 3 deg F and plus/minus 2rh. Smoke what you enjoy, plume is rare and I haven't seen it NC or CC brands after a few years. Just beware the scum B&M owners trying to get rid of moldy cigars saying "its plume means the cigars will smoke amazing" when its clearly a mold infestation.
    I read somewhere on here that if you handle the sticks a lot they will be far less likely to get plume than if you don't. I guess you inadvertently remove some invisible layer when you touch them or something. So this could be why you don't see it?
    this is why many dont see it ever. i have had my humidors at ideal conditions and i have only once seen plume.
    i handle my cigars too much.
    cigars with plume have been aged but aged cigars wont always have plume.


    im over it. you should be too.
  • blurrblurr Posts: 962 ✭✭
    Ken Light:
    blurr:
    Too many B&Ms try to excuse their mold outbreaks with plume. True plume is so rare you will be lucky to see it, but I love my stash of fine smokes and not one is showing significant plume yet. That's after 5 years for some in flawless condition of rh and temp never varying more than maybe plus/minus 3 deg F and plus/minus 2rh. Smoke what you enjoy, plume is rare and I haven't seen it NC or CC brands after a few years. Just beware the scum B&M owners trying to get rid of moldy cigars saying "its plume means the cigars will smoke amazing" when its clearly a mold infestation.
    I read somewhere on here that if you handle the sticks a lot they will be far less likely to get plume than if you don't. I guess you inadvertently remove some invisible layer when you touch them or something. So this could be why you don't see it?

    I've heard the same thing, guess it makes sense. However I have a 2 yr old son...so my smoking time for over 2 yrs now has been like 1 cigar a week, and because of this I have 2 full humis that NEVER get handled or moved, they literally sit and age. Not sure, maybe I have a few cigars in there with plume, could be hiding down in the bottom or inside their original boxes. I just don't rotate very often since I have a small circulation fan in 2 of them. But I've heard the same thing, so I handle or move my smokes as little as possible, which is always good advice because I don't want anything contaminating them.
  • skweekzskweekz Posts: 2,279 ✭✭✭
    kuzi16:
    im over it. you should be too.

    Agreed. I've never seen/smoked plume and I sleep just fine at night.
  • webmostwebmost Posts: 7,713 ✭✭✭✭✭
    image Funny ... I scored a Carreras Habano maduro robusto which had been in the store some years. Sparked it up tonight. Noticed these tiny white spots. Is this plume? Dampened my finger and wiped them right off. Didn't smell bad. Smoked good.
    “It has been a source of great pain to me to have met with so many among [my] opponents who had not the liberality to distinguish between political and social opposition; who transferred at once to the person, the hatred they bore to his political opinions.” —Thomas Jefferson (1808)


  • blurrblurr Posts: 962 ✭✭
    No plume, just a few tiny white imperfections which could possibly be the beginnings of mold but its just a tiny spot. Do a google search for "plume cigar pics" and its funny. I can tell you the first page all pics were mold outbreaks. Now maybe my tablet shows different pics but those are ALL mold. Its so rare you probably won't see it and to be honest when someone gives you the plume sorry its most likely mold. Tomorrow if I have time on my desktop I'll try to post some interwebs pictures of true plume. If I can find any that is, because 99 percent of them are clear white mold outbreaks.
  • kuzi16kuzi16 Posts: 14,633 ✭✭✭✭
    plume has a crystalline quality to it. mold wont.
  • Roberto99Roberto99 Posts: 1,077
    So if plume is crystallization from the oils, then would it generally cover the whole cigar like a crystalline powder? Versus mold growing into clumpy spots??
  • webmostwebmost Posts: 7,713 ✭✭✭✭✭
    Okay. I'm looking through that box minutely next time I am in that B&M. If there's another with tiny white specks, I am taking a magnifying glass to it, to see if it looks like crystals.

    Who'd a thunk cigars were so much more than smoke?
    What's life without curiosity?

    “It has been a source of great pain to me to have met with so many among [my] opponents who had not the liberality to distinguish between political and social opposition; who transferred at once to the person, the hatred they bore to his political opinions.” —Thomas Jefferson (1808)


  • catfishbluezzcatfishbluezz Posts: 7,000 ✭✭✭
    Roberto99:
    So if plume is crystallization from the oils, then would it generally cover the whole cigar like a crystalline powder? Versus mold growing into clumpy spots??
    yup
  • blurrblurr Posts: 962 ✭✭
    Roberto99:
    So if plume is crystallization from the oils, then would it generally cover the whole cigar like a crystalline powder? Versus mold growing into clumpy spots??

    I've never seen it up close, like real life, just pictures, but yes. ANY time you see those little round circles of white, growing in clumps, and most of all growing vertically out from the surface of the wrapper you KNOW its mold. Think of it like if you spilled a glass of sugar-water, and it evaporated leaving behind a crystalline sparkly snail track looking surface. Thats my way of imagining it.

    Also I just LOL'd. If you search "plume cigar pics" on the "images" tab in google and see that guy holding an Arturo Fuente I'm guessing 858 by the window, saying about how wonderfully they are aging because they have plume. And you look at the pic and its a serious OUTBREAK of mold, like I would NOT smoke that cigar. Just makes you laugh people are that blind to mold sometimes. ANd I'm sorry if that pic belongs to someone on here, and I just broke their bubble about their "plumey" Arturo Fuente green bands.
  • catfishbluezzcatfishbluezz Posts: 7,000 ✭✭✭
    I've only seen it a few times, here are some examples...
    Plume...look at Issac's cigars, not going to comment on the others really.
    http://www.cigar.com/cs/forums/3/131180/ShowThread.aspx
    http://www.cigargeeks.com/community/boxx/knowledgebase.asp?iid=51&Cat=1


    I have seen some newer cigars have it, recently Curivari and Oktoberfest, but it is very slight. I did find some smokes at a little hole in the wall that had plume, and you could tell as it was crystal like and dusty. Really....if you want to know 100%, grab a magnifying glass, and if it is growing off the cigar and not a crystal...then there you go.
  • kuzi16kuzi16 Posts: 14,633 ✭✭✭✭
    blurr:
    Roberto99:
    So if plume is crystallization from the oils, then would it generally cover the whole cigar like a crystalline powder? Versus mold growing into clumpy spots??

    I've never seen it up close, like real life, just pictures, but yes. ANY time you see those little round circles of white, growing in clumps, and most of all growing vertically out from the surface of the wrapper you KNOW its mold. Think of it like if you spilled a glass of sugar-water, and it evaporated leaving behind a crystalline sparkly snail track looking surface. Thats my way of imagining it.

    Also I just LOL'd. If you search "plume cigar pics" on the "images" tab in google and see that guy holding an Arturo Fuente I'm guessing 858 by the window, saying about how wonderfully they are aging because they have plume. And you look at the pic and its a serious OUTBREAK of mold, like I would NOT smoke that cigar. Just makes you laugh people are that blind to mold sometimes. ANd I'm sorry if that pic belongs to someone on here, and I just broke their bubble about their "plumey" Arturo Fuente green bands.
    that is 100% mold.
  • 0patience0patience Posts: 10,665 ✭✭✭✭✭
    One of the cigar guys at one of those cigar shows (don't recall who it was) made a comment that if it didn't look similar to a coarse powder sugar or fine sugar crystals and was even along the cigar, then it is probably mold. He said that it will often look like very small grains of sugar crystals and are not bunched together. That often in good sunlight, you can see the sparkle of the crystals.

    I've only seen it a couple times and how mold gets confused with it, I'm not certain. Mold is very "hairy" and clumpy. The ones I have seen were like someone dusted it with small crystals. The entire cigar sparkled in the sunlight. With a magnifying glass, the crystals became quite evident, while mold under a magnifying glass clearly shows the "hairy" configuration of it.

    All I can go by is what I have personally seen and explained by folks I would consider knowledgeable, as they were in the industry.
    In Fumo Pax
    Money can't buy happiness, but it can buy cigars and that's close enough.

    Wylaff said:
    Atmospheric pressure and crap.
  • blurrblurr Posts: 962 ✭✭
    After digging thru my entire stash, even the stuff that has been gifted and/or hiding for years I did find several that had light plume. The most recognizable was gifted by my first bomb at Puff, from the master Shuckins, its a Padron maduro (looks like robusto) that seriously has to be a decade old, its OLD. A few other maduros have a lot of sparkly twinkling going on, but you have to really look and I don't consider it plume unless its like popping out everywhere. Really when you see what plume is you will never mistake it for the lumpy white mold clumps in those pics.
  • Steve2010Steve2010 Posts: 1,036
    One of my favorite things to see is when the occasional Camacho Triple Maduro glistens and sparkles in the sunlight.
  • catfishbluezzcatfishbluezz Posts: 7,000 ✭✭✭
    blurr:
    Really when you see what plume is you will never mistake it for the lumpy white mold clumps in those pics.
    Yup... i got burned on the mold once. Ccom brothers saved me.... I remember seeing plume for the first time after, very different.
  • musicman3musicman3 Posts: 622
    At my local B&M I noticed something on a some Namakubi sticks. I wanted to buy a few to try but couldn't tell if it was mold or plume. My guess is mold. It wiped off real easy on one I picked up but I wasn't going to buy a stick that looked like it did. If I go in this weekend I will take a picture. I would love to see what you guys think.
  • musicman3musicman3 Posts: 622
    So i went in today and noticed on the Namakubi the mold in question had been wiped off. But now on all the daruma's there is this.....image. I don't know what's going on cause it is only happening on these Room 101 sticks. Nothing else in the walk in has it. But now that I think about it, all the other Camacho's are in cellophane. Anyway, I am really disappointed because I really like the Daruma's and can only find them there.
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