One of my coffee shop buddies’ smokes cigars. He has what I think an odd habit of dipping the end of his cigar in coffee then spending the next 15 min or so trying to light it. Is this a real thing? or does my friend just have an odd habit? Not sure if it matters or not but he is Cuban. The cigars are smaller than normal cigars might be another point.
No but I’ve heard of people use moisture to control uneven burning in other smoking applications. In other words, use saliva to stop tracking on a joint or blunt.
I know he does it to keep the moisture high. He dips it for a couple of seconds and then spends several minutes just kind of sucking on it before he even attempts to light it. It is a long process. One day I may ask him about it. I have know him for more than 20 years and he has always done it. He will smoke an occasional cigarette and does the same thing.
(Emphasis mine)
We called that ‘canoeing’ back in my day 
I know that in the days before humidors, many people soaked their cigars in brandy.
Which end is he putting in coffee? I can maybe see putting the end you puff on in coffee to give it taste, but not the end you would light. Dipping the burning end would seem to be really counter productive and I’ve never heard of anyone doing that.
I smoke cigars, have for 25+ years on and off and I’ve not heard or seen anyone doing that. I also just asked my smoking buddy and he says people will sometime do the puffing side in to booze, but never the other end.
How about today?
Well, I had to call him because the coffee shop closed during covid. But his answer made sense. He is not doing exactly what I thought he was doing. His answer was that if he stored cigars at the moisture level, they taste best they would get moldy, so he carries a few with him and adds the moisture a day or two ahead of smoking them. I thought he was smoking the same cigar he was playing with. He actually puts it back in the box and grabs one a little drier. He puts fire to the ones he is playing with just to create a little steam to draw through it and assist in spreading the moisture. It is also pretty obvious that he seems to enjoy the ritual.
Yep. I know from my uncle that a good cigar just needs to be cut and smoked, and that’s the only kind of cigar he smokes.