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Curing containers: what are you actually using these days?
Been running mason jars since before most of you were born and i'm not religious about it, but i'm curious what's settled out there. Grove bags have been around long enough now that people should have real opinions. So what's working, what's not, and are you getting results you can defend.
My hesitation with the bags is the burping question. Jars you know what you're dealing with, you open it, you smell it, you make a call. Bag gives you less feedback, or at least that's been my experience on a few runs.
Not looking for brand loyalty, looking for honest outcomes. If your cure came out right and you can describe why, that's the post i want to read.
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Grove bags have their place but i think people are overselling the "set it and forget it" angle. The terp expression i get from a proper jar cure, opened daily for the first week and then dialed back, is just different. Better, in my experience. More complexity, more layering in the smell. The bags feel like they round off the edges somehow.
That said the burping issue you raised is actually the biggest thing for me. Not because it's labor, i don't mind that. Because the daily sniff IS the feedback loop. You're smelling where the cure is at. You catch the green hay note fading, you catch when that first hint of the actual terp profile starts pushing through. Bag just doesn't give you that same window.
Where i do reach for bags is long term storage, like 3 months plus after the cure is already done in jars. That's where the humidity regulation earns its keep and i'm not worried about losing nuance at that point.
What i'd push back on is anyone saying bags are objectively inferior or objectively better. I've seen beautiful cures come out of both. It's really about what you're optimizing for, shelf life and ease versus active feedback and dialing in peak flavor. For terp hunting those two goals are genuinely different, and for me jars win that conversation every time.
The long term storage angle is the one thing I'd actually push back on slightly. Up here in the PNW my concern going into bags after a jar cure is that if there's any residual moisture variation left in the flower, the bag will equilibrate everything to the average and you can lose that last bit of dryness you worked for. Not saying it's wrong, just that environment matters and my environment is unforgiving enough that I keep jars all the way through unless I'm vacuum sealing.
The sniff-as-feedback thing is real, I won't argue that. But I'd push back a little on the idea that jars always win on terp expression. I've had runs where I got lazy with burping, missed a day or two, and the cure actually stalled on me. Bag probably would have been more forgiving in those moments.
My honest take after messing around with both for a couple years is that the jar cure is better IF you're disciplined. The bag cure is better if you're a regular human with a job and kids who just called asking for money again.
The piece nobody seems to mention is that starting moisture matters more than the container choice either way. I've pulled mediocre cures from both jars and bags because I cut a little wet or a little dry going in. Get that dialed and honestly either method gets you somewhere decent. The container is the last 20% of the problem, not the first.
What are you typically hitting for moisture before you jar up?
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