from another board...
I start all casings with a 1:1 Sugar Water mixture. I add 1 part sugar by weight to 1 part Water by weight and drop in a tablespoon of white vinegar per quart. You can use apple cider vinegar if you want a nice sort of fruity undertone. Then I just bring the stuff to a boil for about 10 minutes..and that’s it. That is a basic casing for blending tobacco. Now here’s the fun part...the part where you get to really steer your blend. You can add traditional casing materials to the mix to subtly accent a base tobacco. Traditionally, Virginia’s are grassy and citrusy and traditional casing materials for Virginia’s are
-Fresh citrus peel (lemon, orange, bergamot...whatever whacks yer noodle) (a tablespoon per quart of solution)
-lemongrass (1 stick per quart)
-prune Juice (3 or 4 Oz per quart )
-Red Wine (1 cup per quart)
-Honey (a teaspoon per quart. too much bites)
-Brown Sugar (use it in place of the white sugar in the base mix or add a 1/8th cup to the boil)
-cinnamon bark (1/2 to 1 full stick per quart)
-Coriander seed- (1 to 2 tsp. Per quart)
Etc...
Traditional Burley casings are
-Brewer’s licorice 2” to a quart of solution
-Molasses (1 tablespoon per quart)
Cocoa Hulls (good luck finding them...you can use cocoa powder but let it settle to the bottom of the solution overnight before draining off the liquid and throwing the “slurry” away. ( 1 -2 tablespoons per quart)
Rum (like an Oz to a quart of solution)
Anise seed (Tbsp. Per quart.) do NOT use anis Oil...or god forbid wintergreen oil or other so called essential oils.msome will make you cough and some will kill you.
Etc..
Now don’t go putting every one of these ingredients in the same solution. Smell and taste your base tobacco and then think about what might accent it. Get your water, sugar and vinegar on the stove and choose 1, 2 or, 3 of the other ingredients. Better off with one or two. Boil sugar water and vinegar together with whatever ingredients you choose and strain it if need be. Nothing is more annoying than getting your sprayer clogged.
Heat up your base tobacco. Do NOT case Latakia, Cavendish, Fire Cured or Perique. They have been taken care of already. Add them last after your base blend has rested. You can mix, say, several grades of Virginia together and case them at once, or, if you are feeling ambitious, case each one differently. Same with Burley. Put a pound of tobacco in the microwave in a ziplock with holes punched in it. Heat it for 2 -3 minutes. Get a spray bottle and put abou1 oz of warm casing it (that’s it...less is really more!. Store the rest in a mason jar in the fridge. If you leave it out of the fridge it may ferment and explode Dump the tobacco in one of your wife’s best bowls and spray it a few times. Mix it up. Get your hands dirty. Repeat. Seal the tobacco in Tupperware for a week. Take it out, add your Latakia, perique or other spice tobaccos as needed. dry it down to smokeable consistency if it isn’t already.