Cigar Reviews and Panacea
Brazil, Cigar Review, Dominican Republic, Flatbed Cigar Company, Maduro, Nicaragua, Panacea, Pennsylvania Matt
10:03 am
Country: Dominican Republic
Wrapper: Brazilian Maduro
Binder: Dominican
Filler: Olor Dominicano & Nicaraguan
Size: Torpedo 6.0″ x 52 ring
Panacea cigars are a product from the Flatbed Cigar Company. I gave a rundown of the outfit recently in my review of the Panacea Black Natural that I posted recently. Give it a read if you need or want to know more about them, or just visit their website. The Black label line was their first, initially release with an Ecuadorian grown Connecticut Shade wrapper. The line was quickly expanded to include a maduro wrapped version of the blend. That is what I am smoking today.
This Panacea Black actually is a torpedo as opposed to the Natural I smoke in which I thought it was a torpedo, but in actuality it was their version of a perfecto. The Maduro is wrapped in a dark brown, mottled maduro leaf with some fine veins running across its surface. The Maduro wrapper doesn’t do much to bolden this blend but it does have a bit more body than the natural. What you end up with is a very nice, creamy, mild smoke. Notes of dark chocolate, coffee, and earth are complimented by a subtle sweetness typical of a maduro smoke. Again, like the natural it is a fairly simple and straight forward smoke with well defined and well balanced flavors. It is consistent from start to finish. There is a little spice that shows up in the last third giving the smoke a bit more oomph and that made for a very nice conclusion to what was a very good smoke. Construction was excellent with a great draw and an even burn.
I think the Panacea Black is another fine cigar from the Flatbed Cigar Company. I enjoyed it more than most maduros I’ve smoked, but of the two versions of the Black, I think I prefer the natural. That said, I would certainly enjoy smoking another maduro anytime.
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Cigar Reviews and Panacea
Cigar Review, Connecticut Shade, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Flatbed Cigar Company, Nicaragua, Panacea, Pennsylvania Matt
8:44 am
Country: Dominican Republic
Wrapper: Ecuadorian CT
Binder: Dominican
Filler: Olor Dominicano & Nicaraguan
Size: Perfecto 6.0″ x 51 ring
I was recently contacted by a gentleman named Paul Bush, owner of the Flatbed Cigar Company. He asked if I had heard of and/or tried any of his cigars. He also asked if I’d be interested in trying them if I hadn’t. Informed Paul that while I had indeed heard of his cigars, I hadn’t yet had the pleasure of trying any of them. He generously offered to remedy that and he sent me a sampler of his cigars.
The Flatbed Cigar Company is based in Bucks County, Pennsylvania and they make Panacea Cigars. There are currently three lines of Panacea cigars. The names are simple and direct and make it easy to know which cigars are which. They are simply named after the color of their bands. There is the Panacea Black which comes in a shade grown and maduro variety. The Panacea Red is a bolder blend which sports a Maduro wrapper around a Dominican grown Habano binder. Last but not least is the Flatbed Cigar Companies signature cigar, the Panacea Green which is finished off with a one of a kind Pennsylvania grown broadleaf wrapper. I will be reviewing each of these cigars in the coming weekes so there will be plenty of details to follow on each of these. Their very first cigar to market however was the Panacea Black Natural so I will be starting with this cigar first. Before we get into the smoke, here is just a bit more on the company behind it.
I won’t be able to tell their story better than they can so I recommend checking out their website to learn all about them. Just click here to read the story on how the Flatbed Cigar Company got started and what they are about. I will give you the highlights here though. They got started in 2007 with the Panacea Black. The company was founded on the philosophy that they would focus on a few really good blends and use the best tobacco they could. No gimmicks, no tricks, no fancy packaging. Just good cigars made with good tobacco that hasn’t been messed with. The cigars are made in the Dominican Republic, and Paul started off selling them out of the trunk of his car driving all over the northeast and mid-Atlantic building his client base. Pennsylvania has a rich tradition in the cigar industry the Flatbed Cigar Company pays homage to that history with their Pennsylvanian grown wrapper that they use on the Panacea Green Label cigars. The Green Label was a project that was a long time in the making that marries their heritage with their product.
As I mentioned earlier the Panacea Black was the Flatbed Cigar Companies very first cigar to market. It is a blend of Dominican and Nicaraguan tobacco wrapped in a dusky Ecuadorian grown, Connecticut Shade wrapper. This perfecto is very unique. I originally mistook it for a torpedo with an unusual tapered foot. I recently realized my mistake and updated this post. It isn’t your typical perfecto because the taper is only at the head and foot of the stogie. The body of the stick is straight like a standard parejo vitola. It’s shape is unique and unusual which makes it interesting to me. The cigar has an aroma of hay and tobacco and the draw seems to be just right.
This mild smoke starts off very nicely with creamy flavors like butter and nuts as well as some paper and hay notes. All very typical of a a Connecticut shade wrapped cigar. Not typical was the complete lack of harshness or youth. The flavors while mild were well-defined and balanced. It is consistent from start to finish. Near the center there was the addition of some earthiness, and a bit of a barnyard? (hay and earth) aroma and in the last third there was some spice and black pepper that joined the party. The burn, while not razor-sharp, was always even and demanded no attention from me which is the way I like it. They claim to have the best rollers making their cigars and my sample lived up to that claim. It was very well made.
I admit I have a soft spot for small boutique cigar brands, so I also have to confess that I really wanted to like this cigar going in. I had concerns, because in my opinion there are a lot of sub par Connecticut Shade cigars out there and not many that I find to be good. I had no idea what to expect from the Panacea but was very pleasantly surprised by it. I found it be a very tasty, very well made, mild smoke that was really excellent from start to finish. It would be a great morning smoke with a cup of coffee or even serve as a nice easy going mid-day smoke. This one has me really looking forward to trying the other Panacea samples I have waiting for me. If you’d like to give them a try, you can either look for a shop local to you that carries these cigars or order them direct online from the Flatbed Cigar Company.
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Cigar Reviews and CigarsDirect.com and Misc and Pepin Garcia
Cigar Review, Cigars Direct, Cigars Online, CigarsDirect.com, Lancero, Nicaragua, Pepin Garcia Matt
8:54 am
Country: Nicaragua
Wrapper: Nicaraguan
Binder: Nicaraguan
Filler: Nicaraguan and Costa Rican
Size: Lancero 7.0″ x 38 ring
Courtesy of CigarsDirect.com
The fact that this line of cigars was re-blended by Don Pepin Garcia should leave it as no surprise that a Lancero was eventually added to the card. Pepin has a reputation for being partial the old-school Cuban way of doing things and he seems to have a love of the traditional connoisseur vitolas like the Lancero. Not only that, but he seems to have a special talent for masterfully blending for the Lancero as his Lanceros tend to be the best on the market in my opinion. That said I have been looking forward to trying this cigar given how much I have enjoyed the other larger sizes in the line.
Like a lot of Lanceros it isn’t the prettiest cigar. It is a bit bumpy and lumpy looking but the draw is excellent and the burn is razor sharp. It starts off a little peppery before falling into a woody/nutty core complimented with leather and occasional subtly sweet caramel notes. There weren’t any dramatic changes in flavors but rather shifts in intensity between the present flavors and a build up of black pepper near the end of the smoke. Watchout for the ash on this one. It is a little flaky and falls off easily. If you don’t pay attention you’ll be wearing it. All in all the Nestor Miranda Special Selection Lancero is an excellent cigar that I will smoke again.
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Cigar Reviews and CigarsDirect.com and Pepin Garcia
Cigar Review, Cigars Direct, Cigars Online, CigarsDirect.com, My Father Cigars, Nicaragua, Pepin Garcia, Toro Matt
2:21 pm
Country: Nicaragua
Wrapper: Ecuadorian Habano
Binder: Nicaraguan
Filler: Nicaraguan
Size: Cremas 6.0″ x 49 ring
Courtesy of CigarsDirect.com
So as the story goes, Pepin’s son Jamie had a secret project he was working on. He was creating a cigar in tribute to his father and he was doing it behind Pepin’s back. He managed to keep it a secret up until he was nearly finished with it and when Pepin found out about it he told his son to give him three cigars which he promptly smoked and loved. That is the Birth Story of My Father Cigars. The cigar is made up up of tobacco from the Garcia’s own farms for the binder and filler, and the wrapper is a lovely and oily Habano leaf grown in Ecuador by the Oliva Tobacco family.
The My Father line of cigars is available in four sizes:
- No.1 Robusto 5.2″ x 52
- No.2 Belicoso 5.2″ x 54
- No.3 Cremas 6.0″ x 49
- No.4 Lancero 7.5″ x 38
In addition to these cigars there have been a couple of line extensions added to the brand including the My Father Cedros Deluxe and Le Bijou 1922. The original My Father is an beautiful looking cigar with a large ornate band and a smooth and oily colorado claro wrapper. The No. 3 Cremas is an interesting vitola to be because of the unique style of the head of the cigar. It comes to a very short taper, almost like it was going to be a belicoso and then someone just stopped the taper and completed the cap. The result is reminiscent of the fumas style nipple but in truth this is quite different from that. I found I really like this style from both a look and feel perspective. The slight taper was comfortable when smoking and it thought it was unique and pleasant looking.
I found the cigar to be very pleasant and more mild than just about any other DPG smoke I’ve tried. There was lots of coffee bean and dry wood on the palate and the flavors had a creamy texture to them. The aroma produced by the smoke was elegant, and floral. The last third of the cigar was more robust with a mild spice and some leather and occasional flashes of black pepper. The burn was impeccable and the draw perfect. The ash was a little loose and flaky so I had to ash often, but otherwise I had no complaints for this excellent cigar.
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CAO and Cigar Reviews and CigarsDirect.com
Cameroon, CAO, Cigar Review, Cigars Direct, Cigars Online, CigarsDirect.com, Dominican Republic, Double Corona, Nicaragua Matt
11:40 am
Country: Nicaragua
Wrapper: Ecuadorian Habano
Binder: Cameroon
Filler: Nicaraguan and Dominican
Size: Double Corona 7.0″ x 54 ring
Courtesy of CigarsDirect.com
I don’t know about you, but over the past several years it seemed to me that everything CAO did was centered around some kind of gimmick. Neon lighted humidors, barber pole wrappers, car trunk cigar boxes, etc. The focus has been all on the marketing and gimmicks to the point it seemed as if they had lost touch with just making cigars. It showed in the quality of the smokes they were putting out too. Then the go and release the La Taviata. No gimmicks, no fancy boxes or over the top elaborate modernized bands. Just a classic style cigar with a classic looking band and even using an old classic Cuban brand name. Very un-CAO like really. I have to say they should concentrate on the cigar itself more often, but more on that soon.
The Intrépido is a BIG cigar. I called it a double corona in the stats list above, but with a 54 ring gauge it is one big ass DC. Perhaps calling it a Gigante would be more accurate. It has a good-looking Colorado wrapper, a little oily and a bit bumpy. It is finished off with a sloppy looking cap and moderately simple band. As big as this cigar is, it is packed full of tobacco. There were no soft spots to be found, the draw excellent and the burn was razor-sharp.
After a bit of a peppery start this cigar is very woodsy with lots of cedar and oak as the dominate flavors and just beneath the covers is a slightly sweet spice the balances it out nicely. I have to think that is courtesy of the Cameroon binder. At different times during this very long smoke (I smoked this a little north of two hours) I picked up some leather, coffee,and licorice. I found it to be a nicely balanced and decently complex smoke. It is a far better cigar than its very modest price tag would imply. The Intrépido is the largest size in the line and it only costs around $6. CAO departed from their glitzy high-priced and gimmicky approach with this cigar and it easily the best cigar they have made in the past decade and it is an inexpensive and economical smoke that far out-performs its price tag. I found it to be a very good medium bodied cigar. This size however is a bit too large for me. It was very hard pressed to finish it. I wouldn’t classify this as a strong cigar, but rather because of it size and the sheer volume of tobacco I had to smoke to get through it, I started to feel a little green towards the end. I think the shorter vitolas would suit me much better.
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Cigar Reviews and Pepin Garcia and Tatuaje
Cigar Review, Nicaragua, Pete Johnson, Tatuaje, Torpedo, Tubos Matt
9:09 am
Country: Nicaragua
Wrapper: Nicaraguan
Binder: Nicaraguan
Filler: Nicaraguan
Size: Torpedo 61/8″ x 52 ring
The Verocu extension of the Tatuaje Havana VI line was first introduced as a two vitola regional release. There was the West Coast version, the No. 1 Lado Occidental, and the East Coast’s No. 2 Zona del Este. Each was sold in cabinets of 50 cigars. They were a huge hit and remain a favorite of many Tatuaje fans. They were a limited release however, and much to the dismay of those fans, they are no longer made and extremely hard to find and generally unavailable. If you don’t already have some you aren’t likely to get any. But despair not, there have been subsequent releases of the Verocu blend like the No.9 which is a Holts exclusive. The most recent addition to the line is the Verocu Tubos, a tubed Torpedo measuring an ample six and one eighth inches in length and sporting a beefy 52 ring gauge. It comes armored in a very nice, bright red aluminum tube and is available in boxes of 10.
This torpedo is not a particularly pretty cigar but nor ugly or rustic either. The wrapper is dark, mottled, and slightly veiny. It is well filled with no soft spots and smells of cedar and leather. The draw is a little on the loose side but not too much so. The first draw has a predictable peppery bite to it before settling in to a spicy, earthy core with complimentary notes of cedar, leather, and tobacco which seem to come and go as I made my way through the smoke. The last third brought lots of earth and black pepper that over powered everything else and was a bit over the top even for me but didn’t really detract much from the rest of the experience. The Verocu Tubos is a fairly well-balanced, robust, and complex smoke with a sneaky bit of power to it.
There has been lots of talk about cracked and split wrappers with this cigar. I didn’t have any of those problems but I did have several burn issues. The cigar tunneled a bit at one point, then it started to canoe. It also went out on me three or four times. These burn issues are very uncommon in my experiences with Tatuaje cigars. Right now I am just going to chalk it all up to being a result of shipping conditions and I am hoping all that will work itself out with a few more months of rest in my humidor to acclimate and re-hydrate because the cigar did seem a touch dry to me. Time will tell and I will probably wait another 6 months before I try another one to see where they are at.
Overall I’d say this was an excellent smoke with great body and good flavors. If the burn issues do manage to work themselves out then I would rate this as an excellent cigar.
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Cigar Reviews and Pepin Garcia and Tatuaje
Cigar Review, Corojo, Nicaragua, Pete Johnson, Tatuaje, Torpedo Matt
7:05 pm
Country: Nicaragua
Wrapper: Nicaraguan Corojo Ligero
Binder: Nicaraguan
Filler: Nicaraguan
Size: Torpedo 6.75″ x 48 ring
The Tatuaje Cojonu 2009 is part of the Cojonu extension of the Tatuje Brown Label line. Also known as Tatuaje Miami, Tatuaje Classics, Tatuaje Cabinet series, and even more formally (and very rarely) as Tatuaje La Seleccion de Cazador. The Cojonu extension is a series of very strong cigars that are released in a new shape every three years. It started with the Cojonu 2003 which was a long toro, and that was followed by the Cojonu 2006; a belicoso. So 2009 predictably brought us the next installment which happens to be a very long torpedo with a very short and rounded taper at the head. As I have always understood it, each of these cigars is the same blend with the same binder and wrapper, the difference with each edition being the vitola. So it is good to note that the year on these cigars does not refer to what most cigar smokers normally associate a year with. It doesn’t have to do with the crop, or the year it was made. It is simply the name of the vitola. Much like the Lonsdale in the classic Brown label line is called a Havana Cazadore, this torpedo is called 2009. All three vitolas are regular production cigars and all three are still made and available today.
As I mentioned the Cojonu blend is much stronger in body and power than the already quite robust standard Brown Label blends. The story goes that the name of the line, Cojonu, is a play on a slang Spanish term meaning “ballsy”. An obvious reference to the strength of the blend. The Cojonu wrapper is an aged ligero leaf so it had plenty of time in the sun while it was growing and the result is a very dark and very rustic looking wrapper. The flash in my photo doesn’t do it justice as it sort of bleeds out the color making it appear a much lighter shade of brown than it appears in living color. It is well filled, and a pre-light test draw revealed a good but slightly lighter than expected draw.
It is commonly held that if you take what is essentially the same cigar and change the size, it changes the flavors and experience. I subscribe to this with the following assumption. When you change the size you are not merely changing the length but also the thickness, or ring gauge. I think that goes to explain why, in my opinion, there is virtually no difference at all between the Cojonu 2003 and the 2006. Both cigars are a 52 ring but the 2003 has about an inch on the ’06 in length. In that case there were no discernible differences in the two vitolas in my opinion. To me, they tasted and smoked identically. The 2009 stepped down a bit on the ring gauge to a 48 ring. This time I noticed a difference. A large one actually.
When a cigar gets smaller the blend has to change in some ways. While the percentages of the different filler types used in the blend may remain consistent, the simple fact is you cannot cram the same amount of tobacco, in the same configuration into a thinner cigar. So while you are smoking, the percentage of ligero to seco that is burning may be the same, in the thinner cigar there is simply less total ligero and less total seco burning at the same time than there is in the thicker cigar. So it just goes to figure that there would be a difference in how the cigar tastes and behaves in general.
So how does all this come into play with the Cojonu 2009. Well the first thing I noticed was that the 2009 is noticeably milder that it’s brothers. That is not in any way to suggest it is a mild cigar. It is still a full bodied smoke, but it doesn’t have the same “kick you in the head” effect that the other two seem to have. One thing I have always been impressed with when smoking the Cojonu cigars is how smooth they are despite their ample power. This is still true with the 2009, and the toned down power has another favorable side effect. I believe it allows some more of the subtitles of the blend to come through. The flavors are very similar to the previous two versions, they just come to play at different volumes now. The peppery start is there, just less overwhelming. The core of earth, hardwoods, and cocoa are there as well and seem to have a creamy texture to them. The most notable change however is the cherry notes. In the ’03 and ’06 I’d get fleeting hard to pin down flashes of cherry every once and a while as if it could only muster the strength to push past the other more robust flavors occasionally and only for a brief moment. With the 2009, the cherry notes are less subtle and easier to detect, balancing out the less sweet core flavors very nicely. I have smoked a couple of these cigars now and I can safely say the 2009 is my favorite Cojonu.
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Cigar Reviews and CigarsDirect.com and Misc and Pepin Garcia
Cigar Review, Cigars Direct, Cigars Online, CigarsDirect.com, Dominican Republic, Honduras, Nestor Miranda, Nicaragua, Pepin Garcia, Robusto Matt
4:22 pm
Country: Nicaragua
Wrapper: Nicaraguan Habano
Binder: Nicaraguan
Filler: Nicaraguan, Honduran, and Dominican
Size: Rothschild 4.5″ x 50 ring
Courtesy of CigarsDirect.com
The Nestor Miranda Special Selection changed quite a bit from its original incarnation when Nestor Miranda of Miami Cigar & Co. asked Don Pepin Garcia to re-blend and make this cigar for him. I don’t know much about this cigar before Pepin got his hands on it. The coffee break is supposed to be a smaller more convenient format for the highly touted, and very large Danno which is Nestor’s 20th Anniversary cigar also blended and made by Pepin. Surprisingly, there is absolutely no mention what so ever of the Special Selection cigars on the Miami Cigar & Co. website. Why do so many cigar companies fail at the simple task of keeping their websites up to date? It seems to be an annoying fact of life for cigar lovers who crave information. Cigar companies seem loathe to part with it.
Dressed in a dark brown leather jacket of a wrapper leaf it looks grainy and has small veins spider-ing across its surface. The band is simple and elegant, and after clipping the excellently applied cap a quick test of the draw reveals perfection and a rich preview of whats to come. Although there is none of the infamous “Pepin Black Pepper”, the cigar is very Pepin-esque and leaves no doubt as to who blended this smoke. The Nicaraguan tobacco seems to dominate at the start with lots of rich earth notes complimented by leather and coffee. Once you get about half way in it starts to develop some Honduran spice and some nutty undertones of raw almond or maybe walnuts. The last third is spicy and earthy with a slightly sweet finish. I found this cigar to have an almost Tatuaje like nature to it which of course only makes me like it even more. It is an excellent smoke and I enjoyed the size. It is a convenient afternoon smoke and I plan to keep a handful of these in stock at all times. I can see me reaching for one of these whenever I can’t make up my mind on what I want to smoke. It will compete heavily with the Oliva V Belicoso in that role for me.
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Cigar Reviews and CigarsDirect.com and Perdomo
Cigar Review, Cigars Direct, Cigars Online, CigarsDirect.com, Maduro, Nicaragua, Perdomo, Torpedo Matt
10:20 am
Country: Nicaragua
Wrapper: Nicaraguan Maduro
Binder: Nicaraguan
Filler: Nicaraguan Long Filler
Size: Torpedo 6.0″ x 54 ring
Courtesy of CigarsDirect.com
This new offering from Perdomo is a Nicaraguan puro that is made with 100% Semilla Habano tobacco. Simply said, it is all Cuban-seed, Nicaraguan grown tobacco and they all happen to be selected from the same 2004 crop. It is offered in 4 run of the mill sizes and in three different wrappers. You can have it in a Connecticut Shade, Nicaraguan Corojo, and a Nicaraguan Maduro wrapper. I was curious when I saw it was available in a Connecticut Shade wrapper. Where was that particular wrapper grown? Do they grow that wrapper in Nicaragua? I’m not sure but I didn’t think that wrapper type is grown anywhere in that country. If it isn’t grown in Nicaragua, then that version obviously couldn’t be called a “Nicaraguan Puro” but I guess that doesn’t really matter. Back to the cigar at hand. For this review, I will be smoking the Maduro variety in the Torpedo format.
This one started off like another Perdomo cigar. One I don’t care for. There was a bitter and metallic flavor that reminds me of sucking on a penny. Unlike that other cigar though, this one improved quickly and dramatically. After a few puffs of that unpleasant metallic taste the cigar became very earthy and leathery with a slightly tannic finish. Although not a very dynamic smoke I found it to be enjoyable. The construction was impeccable which is typical of Perdomo cigars in my experience. The Grand Cru is a medium bodied smoke and easily the most robust offering I have ever tried from Perdomo but even still it falls well short of being full-bodied. Perdomo seems to be reluctant to make a truly full-bodied smoke, but they did seem to turn it up a notch for this blend. In the last third earth was still the dominant flavor complimented by notes of black coffee with the finish turning a bit peppery.
This was a good smoke and my hope is that the metallic start was just a fluke although it isn’t the first time I have gotten that from a Perdomo cigar. I plan to give this cigar another try soon. Outside the first few puffs I really enjoyed it.
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Cigar Reviews and CigarsDirect.com and Perdomo
Cigar Review, Cigars Direct, Cigars Online, Criollo, Nicaragua, Perdomo, Robusto Matt
9:17 pm
Country: Nicaragua
Wrapper: Cuban-Seed Criollo
Binder: Nicaraguan
Filler: Nicaraguan
Size: Robusto 5.0″ x 54 ring
Courtesy of CigarsDirect.com
Celebrating 10 years of the Perdomo Reserve line of cigars, Tabacalera Perdomo released the 10th Anniversary Edition sometime last year (if memory serves). Dressed in a smooth and oily cuban-seed Criollo wrapper the 10th Anniversary is a good looking cigar. They are available in five sizes:
- Figurado 5.75″ x 56
- Robusto 5.0″ x 54
- Epicure 6.0″ x 54
- Churchill 7.0″ x 54
- Torpedo 7.0″ x 54
Today I am smoking the beefy little robusto. The ring gauge is a little large for my tastes and feel awkward to smoke, but the draw was excellent. I don’t normally think of a five inch cigar as being all that short, but this one felt shorter than it was because of the HUGE 10th anniversary band. It was so big I had to take it off before I started smoking it. Luckily it came off very easily and did no damage ot the wrapper. Upon lighting the cigar I am greeted by a creamy and decadent aroma the goes perfectly with the smooth, creamy, and buttery flavors of toasted almond, cafe au lait and wood. The flavors were a contradiction, rich yet at the same time mild in body. All this was nicely balanced with a light spice on the finish. The smoke builds in body as I progressed through the cigar. Eventually the creaminess subsided replaced by more woodsy flavors and spice. Disaster struck in the last third when I heard a “crack” and the saw the wrapper begin to fall apart. I don’t know what happened because up to this point the smoke was perfect in almost every way, draw, burn, ash, flavors, you name it. I did what I could to hold the cigar together so I could finish it. I was really enjoying it and I managed to keep it smokable until I was done with it. I have smoked my share of Perdomo cigars and construction has never been an issue so I’d just chalk this incident up to a bit of bad luck and I consider it a fluke.
There have been a few occasions lately where I have found myself very pleasantly surprised by Criollo cigars and I can add this one to that list. I thought it was an excellent, very smooth and enjoyable cigar that starts off mild and builds into a nice medium bodied smoke. This one is definitely worth a try.
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Cigar Reviews and CigarsDirect.com and Pepin Garcia
Cigar Review, Cigars Direct, Cigars Online, CigarsDirect.com, Nicaragua, Pepin Garcia, Robusto Matt
9:50 am
Country: Nicaraguan
Wrapper: Nicaraguan Habano Oscuro
Binder: Nicaraguan
Filler: Nicaraguan
Size: Petite Robusto 4.5″ x 50 ring
Courtesy of CigarsDirect.com
The My Father Le Bijou 1922 is an extension of the My Father line which was created by Jose Pepin Garcia’s Son Jamie to honor his father Pepin. Well Pepin created the Le Bijou himself to honor his father, Jamie’s grand father. Le Bijou means The Jewel and the 1922 is Pepin’s father’s birth year. It is a good looking cigar. The wrapper has a dry matte finish to it and it looks like a carved piece of dark wood. This is another cigar that sports 2 cigar bands. They are ornate, and beautiful, and large which is odd looking on this petite robusto as most of its length is covered up by the two bands. Though dual bands have become a bit of an annoyance for me lately as they have become more commonplace; on a positive note the bands on the Le bijou always come off very easily and I have not had one yet that damaged the wrapper. Because this vitola is so short and the bands are so large, you really need to remove one if not both of the bands before you smoke it. Again, annoying but not too much so since they do come off easily.
All of the minor annoyances with the bands are quickly forgotten when you light this little “jewel” up. It starts off with very full and robust, meaty flavors and a peppery kick. It then mellows out a bit and there are notes of wood and earth balanced nicely with a bit of mocha and subtle fruit notes. There is a creamy characteristic to the flavors as well. As the smoke progressed into the nub (flavor country) there is lots of spice and those rich meaty flavors return as well. I literally burned my fingertips a little smoking this cigar down as far as I could before it just started to hurt a little too much.
The cigar smoked well with a good draw and a nice even burn though I did need to make one small correction. After that the burn was problem free. The ash held well but was a bit papery on the edges and it produced lots and lots of thick white smoke and a strong room bouquet that I found very pleasant. This full bodied little cigar has earned a spot on my list of box purchase worthy smokes.
Here are a few more takes on this smoke from the blogsphere…
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Cigar Reviews and CigarsDirect.com and Misc
Cigar Review, Cigars Direct, Cigars Online, CigarsDirect.com, Honduras, Nicaragua, Robusto, Romeo y Julieta Matt
11:40 am
Country: Nicaragua
Wrapper: Nicaraguan
Binder: Nicaraguan
Filler: Nicaraguan and Honduran
Size: Robusto 5.0″x54 Ring
Courtesy of CigarsDirect.com
Made in Honduras with mostly Nicaraguan tobacco, the Habana Reserve is unique in the prolific number of lines in the Romeo y Julieta portfolio. I believe, but am admittedly not certain, that this is the only one that is not made in the Dominican Republic. It is a handsome cigar with a good looking oily wrapper that has the look of leather. Constrction of the cigar seems to be high quality. The wrapper is neatly applied as is the double cap. The draw is ideal and the cigar is firm and well filled.
The Habana Reserve is purported to be RyJ’s most robust offering. That may well be the case but it is far from being a full bodied smoke and perhaps speaks to just how mild the other lines are. I am ok with calling it a medium bodied smoke, but it lacks a lot of the oomph I expect from a cigar made of mostly Nicaraguan tobacco. I am just not getting that Nicaraguan earthiness. If i didn’t know there was Nicaraguan tobacco in the cigar and was smoking it blind, I’d probably guess it was a Dominican cigar. The flavors are pleasant enough, woody and floral, but they are a little thin. As the smoke progressed it developed a little more body making it more enjoyable if not any more interesting. Towards the end it developed a bit of a peppery bite and a hint of that earthiness I was looking for but was missing almost the entire time.
This smoke is a bit one dimensional and doesn’t hold much for the seasoned smoker. However, it is a smooth pleasant cigar that could be enjoyed by the beginner or occasional smoker.
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Cigar Reviews and CigarsDirect.com and Drew Estate and Matt's Favs
Cigar Review, Cigars Direct, Cigars Online, CigarsDirect.com, Connecticut, Drew Estate, Habano, Nicaragua, Sun Grown, Toro Matt
12:52 pm
Country: Nicaragua
Wrapper: Stalk Cut Sungrown Habano
Binder: Brazilian
Filler: Dominican, Nicaraguan, and Honduran
Size: Toro 6.0″x52 Ring
Courtesy of CigarsDirect.com
Drew Estate has been making quite the splash as of late on the cigar world and especially in the online cigar community and it is not for a type of cigar you would typically associate with the brand. Recently they have had two very successful and very well received lines of cigars and they are not flavored or infused in any way. They are traditional cigars and they are sold under the name Liga Privada. First came the No.9 and most recently the T52 which a lot of cigar smokers are raving about. Not that long ago I was able to smoke and review a pre-production version of the T52. Specifically “blend #3″ which was supposedly selected as the final blend for what would become the production version of the T52. Now I have heard second and third had, that Drew Estate actually tweaked that final blend a bit at the last minute using a hybrid of the pre-production blends #3 and #4. I have no idea how accurate that is if at all but I heard it said often enough that I thought it worth mentioning.
Since I smoked that pre-production version of the T52 I have been looking forward to revisiting the smoke in its final off the shelf incarnation. I was very surprised by that first T52 and thought it to be a stellar cigar. You can read my review of it by clicking here. One of the unique features of this cigar is it’s wrapper. It is a one of kind wrapper leaf not used on any other cigar. It is grown in Connecticut and it is harvested in a unique fashion. You can read all about it in that review of the pre-production stick.
Visually this cigar is just as beautiful as the pre-production version. Dark and oily, and virtually flawless. This one was a little different in the flavor department though, and that is not a bad thing. This T52 starts off with very full and robust meaty flavors. You feel like you just sat down and began eating a four course meal. It was wonderful, but I knew if it kept up for the entire smoke it would be too much. Thankfully it calmed down a bit after the first inch or two. The I was treated to rich and decadent notes of chocolate and espresso with the occasional flash of licorice. I don’t recall ever smoking a cigar with such a distinct chocolaty flavor to it. It would switch back and forth between the thick meaty flavors and the slightly lighter chocolate and espresso. Towards the end it became very full and robust again with a bit of black pepper on the finish. I smoked this one down to the nub. Construction was absolute perfection . Perfect burn, perfect draw, perfect ash. I don’t think you could construct a cigar any better than this. I have to say I enjoyed the T52 immensely and found it to be even better than I remember the pre-production blend #3 to be. This is a must try for any lover of stout, full bodied cigars. It has earned a spot on my “Matt’s Favs” list.
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Cigar Reviews and Tatuaje
Cigar Review, Monster, Nicaragua, Pete Johnson, Torpedo Matt
1:04 pm
Country: Nicaragua
Wrapper: Nicaraguan Habano Maduro
Binder: Nicaraguan
Filler: Nicaraguan
Size: Torpedo 63/4 x 52 ring
Plenty has been said already about the Tatuaje Drac and the rest of the monster series. I have talked about them at length in my posts on The Frank and Boris. I’ll just do a quick summary here. The Drac is the 2nd in a limited edition series of cigars by Tatuaje that is release around Halloween every year. they are extremely limited and highly sought after making for an extremely hard to find cigar. Last year I was lucky enough to get a whole box of The Frank. This year I wasn’t so lucky but I did manage to get my hands on two of The Drac cigars.
The Drac is a large Torpedo that comes in a shiny black lacquered, coffin-shaped box. The torpedo shape imparts a fang like or stake like image either of which is appropriate for a cigar named after the worlds most famous vampire. It has a black and red band at the foot and is stored in its coffin upside down with the foot of the cigar at the top of the coffin just as Dracula was reported to sleep in his coffin upside down.
The Drac delivers pleasant medium bodied flavors of wood, earth, and leather with subtle sweetness on the finish. The draw was excellent, but the burn on my first sample was not good at all. It required constant attention continually becoming uneven. The ash was very flaky and did not hold well at all. The cigar also went out on me twice during the last half of the smoke and it wasn’t due to inattention as I was trying very hard to keep the thing burning right and lit. These kind of construction issues are not at all typical of Tatuaje cigars and based on what I have read about The Drac, they really aren’t at all typical of this smoke either. I think maybe I just got a bum stick or maybe I didn’t give it enough time in the humidor to settle in.
I have one more Drac and I am going to give it some significant time to rest in my humidor before I revisit this cigar. Flavor wise it was a very good and very enjoyable smoke if not as complex as most other Tatuajes, but the burn issues really detracted from my enjoyment of it. Whenever I have a cigar that performs this way I chalk it up to a likely fluke and I make plans to revisit the cigar in the future. That is exactly what I plan to do with The Drac.
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Cigar Reviews and Tatuaje
Churchill, Cigar Review, Ecuador, Nicaragua, Pete Johnson, Tatuaje Matt
9:01 am
Country: Nicaragua
Wrapper: Sumatra Ecuador Rosado
Binder: Nicaraguan
Filler: Nicaraguan
Size: Churchill 7.0″ x 49 ring
By now most every avid cigar smoker knows about Tatuaje Cigars and the Monster Series of cigar release by Tatuaje every October around Halloween. The Monster Series Started in 2008 with the release of #1 The Frank, a box pressed Double Corona in a blood spattered coffin. In 2009 #2 The Drac, a dark torpedo in a shiny black coffin was released to an absolute frenzy of fans trying to get a hold of the very limited cigar. 2009 also marked the first edition of the Monster “Out-of-Costume” Series of cigars. This first edition is a Churchill called Boris, named after the actor Boris Karloff who made Frankenstein’s Monster famous in his portrayal of the role in the classic 1931 film Frankenstein. It is a very clever marketing scheme that i think is a lot of fun. Pete Johnson may not be finding it as fun as he had envisioned. The limited nature of the cigars and the resulting difficulty in obtaining these cigars have cause Pete to be bombarded by complaints by frustrated and angry customers and tobacconists. It is a shame I think. People seem to lose perspective and they get angry over something that the should not be angry about. They are limited cigars and not everyone will be able to get them every time. I really wanted a box of the Dracs. I was lucky enough to get a box of the Franks in 2008 and hoped to add the Dracs to my collection. I wasn’t so lucky this time and I did not get a box. In fact I didn’t get any initially. The only reason I have two of the Dracs in my humidor now was that I had a friend who was lucky enough to get some and was willing to trade for a couple with me. I didn’t write an angry letter to Tatuaje cigars. That’s just the way it goes, the nature of a highly sought after limited edition cigar. I hope peoples’ unreasonable anger doesn’t discourage Pete from continuing with this fun and unique series of cigars.
While I had to go the trade route for my Dracs, I did manage to purchase a couple of the the Boris from my local cigar retailer, Empire Cigars. The Boris was cleverly thought out keeping with the motif of the series. It is slightly shorter than the Frank and it is not box pressed, the idea being this cigar represents the actor Boris when he was out of his monster costume. Like I said, very clever and well thought out.
This is probably the most unique Tatuaje I have smoked. It is completely unlike any other Tatuaje I’ve tried and unlike any Pepin Garcia smoke I can think of as well. Completely absent of any black pepper notes, this cigar has a very unique and very distinctive sweetness to it that is present from the first puff to the last. It is a full flavored though not very strong cigar. Complimenting the remarkable sweetness of the cigar are creamy notes of almond and espresso. There were occasional flashes of leather on the finish.
Overall it was a smooth, creamy, and flavorful smoke. Excellent from start to finish. The natural question is how does it rate compared to its costumed counterpart The Frank? I have to say my personal preference is for the Frank. But to use an analogy to clarify, that is like me saying I prefer a 16oz aged black angus filet over an 10oz cut.
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