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Back in February, I spent 2 days on Hector Luis Prieto’s farm with Rob Fox and Punch Joe. As part of it, we did an interview with Hector. He gives a very interesting answer to the question “what makes Cuban cigar tobacco different to tobacco from other places?” I’ve never heard this reason given before, even Punch Joe was surprised, he hadn’t heard it before either, but it’s obvious when you think of it. Jose, Rob and I had been discussing wine growing the day before and how stressed vines produce better wine grapes. Jose told us that that’s not the way it is for tobacco, that it needs the best soil. This, it turns out, doesn’t happen to be the case.. Talking to a horticulturalist and a food scientist since, it turns out that stressed plants do produce more phytochemicals, such as terpenes and phenolics (which would affect flavour) as a defence mechanism. It’s one of the reasons home grown tomatoes taste better than cheap supermarket versions. Hope you enjoy the video, I think there's some good stuff in there.