Long Way to go before it's ready

After the harvest, yet a long way to go and none to be hurried. The harvested leaves are rested in time according to its purpose in the farmer's barn then going to the sorting house and last but not least, aged in the warehouse.

Air Curing in the Traditional Barn
is a process of a slow and careful period which removes the moisture in the leaves and turns the them by stages to golden brown.

Traditional way - Most leaves are cured in the traditional curing barn (casa de tabaco) that depend entirely on the nature effect of the climate. The leaves are sewn in pairs and hung astride poles on racks in the barn. As the leaf cures, the pole is raised progressively higher in the racks. Ventilation and light must be constantly adjusted for the variation of humidity and temperature.

Controlled curing for shade-grown leaves (wrapper leaves)
The 1990s saw a major investment in temperature and humidity control for the curing of precious wrapper leaves, to overcome the unpredictable conditions in a conventional barn. This is air curing at its most refined, with optimum conditions replicated around the clock, full pace day and night.

Fermentation in the Escogida - Sorting House
Once the leaves are cured, the farmers job is done and the task passes to the Empresa de Acopio y Beneficido del Tabaco - the organization for the gathering and improvement of tobacco who buys the leaves from the farmer. The cured leaf, separated picking by picking, is now ready to go to the sorting house for the fermentation steps.

First fermentation
The cured leaves are tied in bunches called gavillas are placed in cloth-covered piles and undergo an entirely natural process of fermentation, triggered by the moisture in the leaf. Fermentation is essential to the smoking quality. It sweats out impurities in the leaf, reducing acid, tar, nicotine. It smooth the flavour of the filler and the colour of the wrapper. Leaves that grown higher up the plant need a longer period of fermentation because they are thicker and richer in oil. The fermentation process is same as the process in a garden compost heap. Constant supervision is required to ensure that things do not go far.

Sorting and classification
The time to sort the leaves for their roles in the making of a Habano. Size, colour and texture are the criteria that guides the sorters. Wrappers get the closest attention. They are moistened and aired to prepare them for handling. Then they are classified into a bewildering array of some 50 different categories designed to ensure that only the most perfect will dress a Habano. Levaes below the standard are aside for making non Habano cigars and cigarettes. Once sorted and rested, the wrapper leaves are ready to be packed in bales known as tercios for to be transferred to the warehouse, aged like a fine wine.
Sun-grown leaves are sorted into 3 essential categories of flavour or tiempos that come in the blend as the filler: ligero, seco and volado also known as fortaleza.
Leaves picked from lower level of a plant supply the light flavour, volado or fortaleza 1, the largest and best of these are selected for the binders. Leaves from the meddle of a plant provide the medium flavour, seco or fortaleza 2. Leaves from the top provide the full flavour, ligero or fortaleza 3.

Stripping and final classification
The sorted filler and binder leaves are transferred to the Stripping House (Despallilo) where the first process is moistening (moja) that makes the leaves pliable for stripping and gives the moisture for the second fermentation. The fingers of Despalilladoras strip out the lower part of central vein in each leaf and classify them into 3 categories of fortaleza (ligero, seco, volado) at the same time. Again, the leaves below the standard are not for a Habano. Then the leaves are stacked in small piles and pressed between boards.

Second fermentation
Filler and binder leaves are fermented for the second time. The piles are larger and this fermentation is longer than the first one. The thicker, full flavour, leaves fermented longer than the thinner, light flavour, leaves. The temp of the fermentation has to be monitored, if it's too hot, the piles will be opened up letting the leaves cooling down and the stack is rebuilt as the leaves at the top will be put at the bottom and the ones at the bottom will be on top. This might happen several times during the fermentation.

Ageing
After second fermentation, the filler and binder leaves are aired on racks for few days then packed in bales (pacas) and transferred to the warehouse for ageing.
The full flavour leaves, ligero, are aged longest and the light flavour ones are the least.
Filler and binder leaves are packed in hessian bales called pacas. Wrapper leaves are packed in tercios made from Yagua which is the loose bark of the royal palm tree, a material used for many purposes in Cuba. Every bale carries a label of information of the sizes, year of harvest and packing date. Tercios are also marked with the code of the escogida where the wrappers were sorted. Labels of Pacas (bales of fillers and binders) indicate their tiempos, escogida and despalillo where they were processed. This makes the indicator of distinctive blend of each Habano brand.