I’ve been talking about having a contest for a while, and thinking about doing it for longer, and I finally have gotten around to it. My friends at Drew Estate sent me a really neat item that I think you’ll really like, and I have some other cool stuff to add too. I love stuff as much as the next guy, but I have an abundance of riches, and it’s much more fun to share. The main item is a Liga Privada Survival Kit! It’s a Tin containing a really cool folding knife, a tactical flashlight and a backpack (please note that I did not open. up the backpack to take a photo because I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to get it folded back up right. I’m sure it’s cool)! I’m going to add a camo Barnsmoker cap and some other DE odds and ends, and some assorted Drew Estate Cigars from my humidors! Those who have won my contests in the past can attest to the fact that when I say that I’m throwing some cigars in, I throw some cigars in! One cigar will be a new Year of the Rat, I’ll tell you that.
So if you don’t know the rules already, just leave a comment on this post, not on Facebook, Twitter or anywhere else, just this post! Just one comment per person please, and I’ll select a winner by random drawing next Wednesday, June 3, 2020. You must be 21 or older to win, so I don’t get in trouble, and I’ll request proof of age. I gotta CMA. Feel free to tell your friends, unless you’re afraid that will reduce your chances! Many thanks to Drew Estate for the goodies! Good Luck!
Edit: I poached a picture with the backpack:
Speaking of the Year of the Rat:
Liga Privada Unico “Year of the Rat” Heads to Drew Diplomat Retailer Virtual Events
Drew Estate announces today that the Liga Privada Unico Serie “Year of the Rat” is shipping to Drew Diplomat retailers hosting Virtual Events starting on June 1st. This release will be showcased on the upcoming Freestyle Live: Special Edition hosted on facebook.com/drewestatecigar on June 11th from 7:00-9:00pm EST, and includes special guests, surprise announcements, and giveaways.The Liga Privada Unico “Year of the Rat” cigars are presented in a 5 ½” x 46 vitola, featuring the iconic fan tail capa illustrated on select Unico Serie cigars. This commemorative cigar is highlighted and defined with a lush Connecticut Broadleaf wrapper, a dark, rich Brazilian binder and nasty, hearty Nicaraguan and Honduran fillers. Each “Year of the Rat” is wrapped in gold foil, packaged in a beautifully embossed, blue Liga Privada Unico box.
Liga Privada Unico Serie “Year of the Rat” will be available for purchase at Drew Diplomat retailers hosting Virtual Events starting June 1st. The list of upcoming Virtual Events hosted by Drew Estate can be found at www.drewestate.com/events which is continually updated.
From the Wynwood Safehouse, Jonathan Drew Founder and President of Drew Estate exclaims, “The Rats are coming June 1st … so we kindly ask you to welcome them with open arms during the planned virtual events that the team has been working on. Year of the Rats were first released many years ago in partnership with the Florida Panthers and were only available at their stadium in Miami. Later, I used them for some of my personal events until Willy and the Marketing dudes forced me to give em up. Frankly, me and the Rats are still kind of annoyed about it. I have a conference call with the Supreme Team Rat Lords to review how we will respond. Stay tuned …”
I’m back after a few days of smoking some favorites out of the humidors. I found a few old Joya de Nicaragua Antaño Dark Corojo El Martillos with the old bands, the first one I lit up just wasn’t drawing right, which irritated me. Usually I work my way through, but I wasn’t willing to aggravate myself on that particular day, so I set down the cigar after fighting with it for a third of the cigar, ran an errand, and came home and lit another one, and enjoyed the crap out of it. This has been a cigar I’ve been a fan of for a decade. I can remember smoking one of these when I first toured the Joy de Nicaragua factory in 2011, and with the heat and humidity there that day, I had to put it down or become overwhelmed. It’s a powerful smoke. I love it. I still have a few of these with the old band, and a few with the new. I had a Numero Uno last week which was exceptional also. Love the Joya cigars (I can do without the Red and Black oddly enough). A four year old La Gloria Cubana Serie RF, a Famous Smoke Shop Exclusive, was also smokes this week, and was also very good. It was strange when I looked back through “memories” and saw I smoked the same cigar four years prior almost to the day. It’s funny how often that happens!
My wife has been sewing masks lately and sent some to a hospital, and made me a couple out of the cigar fabric that I have. She made a couple extras, and is having a raffle on Facebook to raise money for NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital. The raffle “tickets” are $1 each, and I’ll sweeten the deal by adding a few cigars to the winner. Click here (or on the picture) to make a donation and be entered. All the details are on the post. It’s only running until Saturday, so don’t delay.
Of course, I try to introduce something new in my Sunday posts, r at least new to me. This time it’s from Providencia Cigars. Ray at Providencia sent me some of their new cigars, so look forward to more featured in the coming days. One smells particularly boozy, not sure about that one…but anyway, this one caught my eye right off, and I had to smoke it. The cigar is called the Providencia Shenanigans, and it’s a barber pole style cigar. First off, it was a toro, 6″ x 50 or 52, I failed to measure it. Secondly, it’s a barber pole comprised of Candela and San Andrés Maduro, a striking contrast. The binder is Indonesian, and the fillers are Honduran with Nicaraguan Ligero. Naturally, this cigar seems to target a March 17 smoking date. I can’t help but draw comparisons to other cigars, not gonna lie. Since there’s no way I was going to wait almost a year to smoke it, I fired it up last night. Often barber pole cigars can have odd burns, not this one, it was perfect. Draw was perfect, combustion was perfect, all of the tobaccos burned at the same rate with a flat ember, no coning, no tunneling, absolute perfection. This is how every cigar should perform in a perfect world. The flavors were equally pleasing and entertaining. The interplay between the earthiness and espresso of the San Andrés and the refreshing chlorophyll of the candela was unique, and the spice from the ligero gave it some oomph. Overall, I very much enjoyed this cigar, it was really very good and entertained my for a good hour and a half. It was well worth missing the beginning of “The Ten Commandments”, which is only slightly longer than one of Coop’s podcasts! :-)_~.
That’s all for today. Don’t forget to keep up the social distancing, call your local tobacconist if you need cigars and try to keep them in business! Until the next time,
Yesterday I found myself wandering much further north in PA than I usually find myself. There was a seminar on Bees and Chickens that my wife and I attended, and I snuck off during the second half to do some of my own research. Twenty minutes away from the venue where the seminar was held happened to be the brand new Best Cigar Pub, and Best Cigar Prices headquarters. I figured this would be a good place to visit. Fortunately, the purchasing manager, Chris O’Neill, managed to arrange a tour for me. Katie (Katy? I forgot to clarify), the Finance/HR director, gave me a tour of the entire facility. Why do small companies always saddle the Finance director with HR responsibilities? Like they don’t have enough to worry about? I digress. I had already given myself a tour of the retail humidor, which has a very nice selection and courteous service. Katie showed me the bar, pointed out many of the little things like custom tables with actual tobacco leaves under acrylic, art on the wall done by a local artist, all of the ashtrays made by a local craftsman. She pointed out the excellent menu as well. She then waled me through the Best Cigar Prices operations, all of the offices, warehouse, shipping and all of the stuff I enjoy seeing as a guy who’s spent his professional career in operations. They run a very clean and efficient pick, pack, and ship operation from what I can see. All of the marketing, customer service, web design is all done there in Pennsylvania. I was quite impressed with the operation. I’ll get back to the Pub, which was even more impressive. Upstairs is a lounge with TVs and comfy chairs, wait-staff is attentive and the air handlers replace all the air in the place every three minutes, so it’s not smokey at all. They even have a coat closet in the entry that has an ozone generator so that your coat doesn’t smell smokey. They’ve really thought of everything to make this not just a place to come have a cigar, but a place that smokers and non-smokers alike can enjoy a meal or a beverage together. I enjoyed a 601 Pennsylvania Edition, which is an Espinosa exclusive for BCP. Chris happened to join me and interrupted me while I was taking in the museum portion of the upstairs lounge, which is an educational feature they’ve added. It has the origin story of cigars with a timeline and facts about cigars, infographics about the tobacco plant, how cigars are made, every conceivable detail. Chris tells me they plan to have monitors with video loops of various processes playing included in the wall as well. Best Cigar Pub is a beautiful place, it’s easy enough to find, although not exactly in the middle of anything. I can see it being amazing in the summer with the outdoor patios and putting green and nobody around to really complain! Certainly worth a visit if you are anywhere near north-east PA.
I had heard of Blackbird Cigar Company, but hadn’t seen the cigars any where. When I walked past the booth and they weren’t busy, it seemed like a great time to stop in and see what it they were all about. Imagine my surprise when the owner and founder of the company, Jonas Santana, looked at me and said “I know who you are”. It seems he used to work for another company, and struck out on his own to start Blackbird. I think it was on CigarProp’s youtube channel that I remember hearing about the brand. Anyway, I asked Jonas to share the story of the brand with me on camera. have a look:
Over the course of the past several days I smoked a few of the Blackbird cigars offerings. I would have lined to have smoked them all, but I just couldn’t get to them. They have six cigars in the portfolio, and I can’t run down my smoking experience for six cigars in one post. They very cleverly make the bands on the cigars easy to remove, which is good because they are large bands and doo need to be removed to fully enjoy the cigar! They have two Sumatra wrapped offerings, and, as I’ve been on a Sumatra kick lately, and I smoked the Sumatra Rook with them at the TPE and really enjoyed it, I smoked the Finch this week. This was another excellent Sumatra wrapped cigar. It had the nice, sweet Sumatra wrapper flavor and a well-balanced core of tobacco goodness withinThis has an Indonesian binder, and Dominican and USA fillers. It was solidly medium bodied and a very nice cigar. Next I went with what you’d expect from me, the San Andrés wrapped Crow. It was Valentines Day, and I figured the red band would be appropriate. This cigar had a closed foot, and a dark, oily wrapper. The flavors were earthy and bakers chocolate, perhaps espresso, without sweetness. The internals on this one include a Habano binder and Nicaraguan, Pennsylvanian, and Corojo and Criollo 98 fillers. Very enjoyable. Finally, last night after a long day trip, I unwound with the Unkind, a Brazilian Cubra wrapped cigar. This was also a maduro cigar, and, like the rest, a 5″ x 50 robusto. The binder on this one is from the DR, with Criollo 09, HBA (not sure what this means), Corojo and Pennsylvania. One thing I can say about all of the Blackbird cigars I smoked was that that all were well made and burned right, an important consideration. It’s possible that the PA tobacco was a common flavor component that I picked up though the few cigar I smoked this week. You’ll see if you watch the video that some thought went into the brand, and the same attention went into the quality of materials and manufacture as well. The Unkind had a unique flavor, also an earthy maduro, not really sweet. It was very good though, I enjoyed it completely. I still have the Connecticut Jackdaw and Criollo Cuco yet to smoke, I kind of like those two wrapper varieties more in warmer weather for some reason. I’ll get to them and let you know.
Contest!
OK, so after a lot of money and aggravation, my site is clean. It’s time to pick a winner of the sampler of some of my favorite cigars, Don Juan Calavera, Flor Maya and Marchetti cigars from Danli Hondura Tabaco, and I had to collect entries from two different places. After collecting all of the names, and putting them into a bowl (OK, I put them into a spreadsheet and randomized the list to mix them up and assign them numbers), the random number generator picked Anthony C as the winner. Please email me your coordinates and proof that you are 21 or older so I can get these goodies to you. I have a KMA Talk Radio hat and shirt and a Stage V Clinger cigar holder to add as well (it’s a big shirt, do with it what you will, I take no responsibility. If it fits, great!).
That’s all for today, and way more than I had planned! Until the next time,
Since I’ve had so much trouble this week that resulted in some significant downtime, as well as maybe some reluctance to visit due to the threat of infection, I figure it’s best to extend the contest until Sunday. Everything is cleaned up now thanks to an investment in SiteLock, lots of aggravation and communication with my host and the folks at Sitelock to get things cleaned up and back in business. So here’s the deal: There are 19 entries on the original contest post (here) I will combine entries there along with entries here (no duplicates please), and pick a winner on Sunday, February 16, 2020. Here is the current prize:
There are two of each of each cigar in the Danli Honduras Tabaco portfolio that I have in my possession. I haven’t gotten my hands on the new Clown barber pole, and I think there’s a natural wrapper Marchetti. This is 14 cigars from my humidor, all cigars that I would happily smoke myself, and do frequently. As a matter of fact, Sunday I stopped by Cigar Mojo and picked up the Flor Maya Maduros, and bought a Don Juan Calavera Sumatra to smoke there, even though I have a box in my humidor at home. Cigar Mojo is one of three retailers that I know of in the country that carries these, so give them a call if you want to get some! I also have some other swag to throw in with the cigars! So leave a comment here, or on the other post!
I spent this morning cleaning up a malware/phishing situation on my site for which my host suspended my account. If you happened to visit and got a screen saying the account was suspended, that’s why. I only have opt-in email alerts, so don’t say yes to any other prompts for notifications if you get any! I’m working on getting it figured out. I don’t know if I picked up more than a head cold in Vegas or what. Anyway, I wanted to share with you the video walk through of the Vape/ alternative portion of the Tobacco Plus Expo. I’ll be honest, the first few times I ventured onto the blue carpet, I freaked out a little and made a hasty retreat to the safety of the red area. I supposed it validated my old-fuddyduddyness a little. I noticed a great many disposable vape products, which was a surprise to me. The first reason it was a surprise was that I thought the target market for this sort of product was supposed to be more socially conscious and recycling minded. In a world where we have people carrying stainless steel drinking straws, using a disposable vape with a battery seems counterintuitive. That being said, I was approached by a young man who offered me samples, and as I explained my cigar passion and how it doesn’t involve getting a quick fix, I did accept one for my cousin who is a cigarette smoker, and I had observed smoking about half a cigarette at a time. The product was from a company called Hitt, and I mention it here as a courtesy to them as they were kind enough to provide me with samples when I tried to talk them out of it. My cousin, a long time Marlboro Red, and formerly Winston smoker, found that he liked the flavor, and liked that he could just take a few hits and put it down. He was going to experiment with it and see if it could wean if off cigarettes. I hope it works for him as he’s recently lost weight through diet and exercise and quitting cigarettes would be one more thing to help him lead a healthier life (he’s ten years my senior). Anyway, not cigar related, but I wanted to mention that since they were nice enough to force samples on me 🙂 . Enjoy the walk through. If there’s an interest, I’ll put the 20 minute real-time version up on YouTube.
Contest!
I’ve been threatening this for a while. As you well know, I’ve become a huge fan of Danli Honduras Tobacco’s cigars. It’s come to my attention that one of my local shops, Cigar Mojo in King of Prussia, PA, has started carrying the line. I have a feeling that Trae might have gotten the idea to bring them in from me, but I haven’t confirmed that. I need everyone to call or e-mail Trae (610-564-2471 or@CIGAR-MOJOTRAE.COM) and order some Don Juan Calavera or Flor Maya cigars from him! You don’t even have to tell him I sent ya. Anyway, to celebrate another place to buy these great cigars in the US, I’m going to give some of mine away. I’ve assembled a sampler. I have everything in the line except the Flor Maya Maduro and the Clown, the latter of which I haven’t even smoked yet. There’s Don Juan Calavera Connecticut, Maduro and Sumarta, Flor Maya Habano and Connecticut, and Marchitti. If I can get my hands on the other ones they will be included. The prize with include two of each cigar pictured, and there will be other swag included at my whim! That’s a minimum of a dozen cigars, and some other goodies. Usual rules apply. one entry per person, must be over twenty one to win, and I’ll pick a winner next Wednesday, February 12, 2020. Only comments on this site will count as entries. Good luck! The winner will enjoy these cigars!
It’s already been a long day, I hope nonsense is behind me! Anyway, until the next time,
Edit: I poached a picture with the backpack:
