What rolling papers use natural gum?

January 13, 2009 6:05 PM

Are there any rolling papers which use a natural gum to seal? And does anyone know what the gum on Rizlas is?
posted by gman to sports, hobbies, & recreation (9 comments total)

Modiano/Club use no glue at all.
posted by fixedgear at 6:30 PM on January 13

Apparently there are two kinds of natural gum for rolling papers: sugar and acacia, which extracted from the acacia tree. Those are the ones to look for, and I've heard Zen is a good brand. Regardless of what you may or may not be smoking in the papers in question, a head shop is probably your best bet for finding natural rolling papers...I imagine most people smoking roll-up tobacco probably don't care, so smoke shops may or may not carry them, but people frequenting head shops are likely to be more into "natural" goods. Otherwise, here's somebody selling a case of them for ~25 w/shipping.
posted by baphomet at 6:31 PM on January 13

uh, ungummed papers suck. I suggest using something with gum fo sho
posted by Black_Umbrella at 6:47 PM on January 13

uh, ungummed papers suck. I suggest using something with gum fo sho

Ungummed papers made of tree pulp do suck.

Ungummed papers made of hemp or cotton are awesome. The trick, however, is to tear a thin strip along the edge that would be gummed. This frees up a a whole bunch of little fibrous tendrils that, when judiciously licked, will stick far more strongly than any gum I've ever met.

My favorite of this variety is Jester. Or is it Joker? Don't remember.

(I wish I had something to roll up.)
posted by Netzapper at 7:19 PM on January 13 [1 favorite]

I came in here to say what netzapper said- tear it!

Just don't fall for the ones that use sugar. They're worse than anything.
posted by sunshinesky at 8:21 PM on January 13

Ungummed hemp is a-ok, so long as you give it a little tear. Also, you might be interested in an i-tal spliff (sorry, I couldn't find a link to the original illustrated article, but the excerpted text gives a good explanation).
posted by solipsophistocracy at 8:34 PM on January 13

Rizla uses gum arabic, which is vegetarian, if this matters.
posted by davemee at 12:16 AM on January 14 [2 favorites]

A favorite brand of mine is Smoking papers and they use natural gum. Consensus seems to be that the black and silver boxes are the best of regular papers and the "Eco" ones for hemp papers.

Are there supposed to be benefits to this torn-off hemp paper trick besides not smoking that little bit of gum? I just tried it tearing off the gum from my paper and found it worked almost but not quite as well as the gum I just tore off, and I can afford to spring for some gum arabic.
posted by Sockpuppet For Naughty Things at 12:22 AM on January 14

Are there supposed to be benefits to this torn-off hemp paper trick besides not smoking that little bit of gum?

Not really. I mostly did it because the tastiest papers I could easily find in Philly had no gum. Your preference might vary, though, and you may have a gummed paper that you think is tasty.
posted by Netzapper at 12:26 AM on January 14