Category Archives: Review

by | August 5, 2010 · 4:28 pm

This Week’s Cigars: Liga Privada, Hoyo de Tradition – Thursday August 5, 2010

I’ll be taking a the weekend off, so I figured I’d better get a little something out before I go.

Since I gave away some Liga Privadas last time, I decided to smoke one on Sunday evening.  I lit up a No. 9 Parejo I purchased last November at a Drew Estate event at The Wooden Indian in Havertown PA.  These are easily in my top 10, if not top 5, for balance of flavor, construction and overall enjoyment.  I can see why Steve Saka, el Presidente of Drew Estate and the creator of this blend, can smoke these non-stop without getting tired of them.  Just a wonderful smoke.  I was very sad when I dropped the ½” butt in the ashtray.  Yummy!!

Tuesday I grabbed a Hoyo de Tradition Toro.  I really like these, but this one didn’t perform as well as I would have liked. It may have been that it was pretty

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humid and I took the cigar out of the humidor and let it sit out for a bit while I did something around the house, as others out of the same box haven’t

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burned this way.  It burned as if it were over-humidified, as a few I had a week or so ago did.  I love the flavor, but when it’s difficult to get the smoke out

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of the cigar and when you do, it’s what I would describe as steamy, it takes away from the experience.  Anyway, still a nice cigar, keep an eye open for a 5 pack contest for some of these in the not too distant future!

That’s it for now. I’ll post again sometime in the middle of next week.  Maybe I’ll come across something interesting to write about in my travels.

Until the next time,

CigarCraig

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by | August 1, 2010 · 12:00 pm

This Week’s Cigars and a Contest Winner! – Sunday, August 1, 2010

It’s been an exciting week.  Today I announce the winner of a 5 count box of Drew Estate Liga Privada No.9 cigars, and earlier this week I debuted the first in a series of celebrity interviews.  Before I get on with the contest announcement, I managed to smoke a few cigars this week.

Wednesday I lit up a Padron Fumas, a gifted cigar that was procured in Little Havana in Miami.  These are mixed filler cigars that are made especially for sale to the locals from the many cafeterias or coffee shops in the area.  Judging by the deep amber of the cellophane, this example must have been the better part of a decade old.  It was a terrific cigar.  I’m not going to compare it to a Padron Anniversario, but it certainly compared favorably with the regular line.  Perfect burn and draw.  I remember a few years back they released these commercially, but the couple examples I had were terribly plugged.

Thursday I went for a CAO LX2 Rob.  When these first hit the streets two years ago they were good and spicy and strong.  They were too strong for my tastes, which is odd, because I’ve never been one to shy away from strong cigars.  The recent trend toward the ligero heavy blends has been a little bit of a turn off for me. I like the flavor of cigars such as the Cain, and the LX2, but the nic-kick does me in.  Time has mellowed this LX2, as I was able to enjoy it without feeling woozy afterward.  These won’t enter my regular rotation, but it’s a nice cigar every now and then.

Friday I went with a new-to-me cigar that came from Jason of Rock’s Smoke Shop.  This was a toro sized cigar at 6″ x 50, with a plain paper strip for a band which has Renaissance printed on it.  A little research told me that this was from Rocky Patel and my suspicion is that this was a pre-release sample. It was a fantastic cigar.  It was well made, rich flavors, copious amounts of thick smoke.  A very nice cigar.  I’ll have to try to find the production version and see how it compares.  It was really a good cigar.

Winner Announcement!

Here’s what you’ve been waiting for, the winner of a box of 5 Drew Estate Liga Privada cigars.  The rules were simple, guess the number of bands my daughter used to create this great box that she gave me fo

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r Christmas a few years ago and use to hold my cigar accessories. I was surprised to see that quite a few people tried to count the bands and make a judgment based on the photo.  Most of the guesses were in the ballpark, but there was one clear winner.  Take a look at the video to see the hermetically sealed envelope opened.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y-aVtMYfxVY

There are 196 bands on the box.  The winner, with a guess of 195, is PatriotGeek.  Congrats Bill, Look for your prize in your mailbox this week.  The music featured on today’s video is “Blaming It All On You” from  Jim Babjak’s Buzzed Meg, Vol 1.  Thank yous to Drew Estate for providing the prize, and Jim Babjak for

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being my first celebrity interviewee and providing the music.

Until the next time,

CigarCraig

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by | July 25, 2010 · 9:55 am

More Cigars: RyJ, Partagas, Fuente and a Contest! – Sunday July 25, 2010

We left off this week with a disappointing Maria Mancini, and pick up with a Romeo y Julietta Habana Reserve Torpedo which had a similar problem.  While this was a nice cigar with an appealing flavor, it behaved like an over humidified cigar.  This was puzzling to me in that other cigars are smoking well out of the same humidor.  This leads me to believe that some tobacco prefers different humidity than others.  Figuring this out is a crap shoot, and maintaining multiple humidors is a nuisance, so finding a happy medium is key.  I smoke right out of my coolerdor, with the cigars stored in boxes, if not their original, then another box.  Some of the singles boxes have been in there for year

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s with cigars rotating through them, so new additions shouldn’t make any big swings.  Point is, most cigars in the cooler are smoking nicely, so I’m not going to sweat a couple less than optimal cigars from time to time.  The Romeo y Julietta was nice anyway, and the cigar had an interesting box press which I found endearing for some reason.

Thursday evening I went with a Partagas Limited Reserve No. II, which was a 5½” x 50 robusto.  NICE cigar!!  Really smooth and rich without being strong.  Perfect burn, perfect draw (and from the same humidor as the last two!), what a delight.  Now, I hadn’t done any research on this except having smoked a Limited Reserve years ago, so I expected it was a pricey cigar, which was another from the collection my buddy Jason sent a while back.  I was pretty amazed to find out that these run around $17.50 by the box.  Considering  how much I enjoyed this cigar, I’m tempted to say it would be worth that price, but the cheap bastard in me, the one who thinks $17.50 is a little steep for a 5 pack, just couldn’t ever justify spending that kind of scratch on one cigar.  I really enjoyed it though and thank Jason again for sharing a bunch of cigars that I wouldn’t otherwise have tried on my own.  If you find yourself in the Pocono Mountains of Pennsylvania, look up Rock’s Smoke Shop and buy a bunch of cigars from Jason!

Saturday brought 100 degree temps to SE PA, so I waited until it cooled off to the 90s before popping outside with a Arturo Fuente Chateau Fuente.  This particular cedar wrapped beauty was given to me by a non-smoking friend who had been given the cigar by a friend.  It was claro almost to the point of candela, I actually had to dig around to try to see if Fuente ever made candela Chateaus. Their website is pretty cool looking, but woefully inadequate when it comes to technical data.  A perfect cigar for a hot evening sitting on the deck reading a biography.  Draw was great, burn wasn’t too bad and it was a flavorful medium bodied cigar.  There are so many great cigars out there, but sometimes the classics hit the spot. I enjoyed this cigar, as well as the Partagas, accompanied by a nice cold bottle of Reed’s Extra Ginger Beer, a ginger ale on steroids that goes great with cigars.

Contest Time!

Once again it’s time to give some stuff away!  Several years ago my daughter made this box for me for Christmas.  As you may recall from the contest back in March, I save my bands.  I used to have bags of them laying around before I  got my big-ass vase to keep them in.  Well, she got a hold of one of those bags and went

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to work, creating this great box, which I use to keep lighters, cutters and stuff like that in.  Guess how many bands adorn this box to win a box of 5 Liga Privada no.9 cigars courtesy of Drew Estate.  If someone guesses the exact number, I’ll include a Drew Estate cap.  So spread the word, leave your guess in the comments and good luck!  Someone is going to get 5 amazing cigars for nothing more than taking a couple seconds to leave a comment! I’ll open the envelope and announce the winner next Sunday, August 1.

That’s it for now, until the next time,

CigarCraig

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by | July 21, 2010 · 5:12 pm

Mid-week Cigar Post: Cohiba, Punch, Maria Mancini – Wednesday July 21, 2010

Saturday, after posting about the recent Cohiba judgment in favor of General Cigar, I pulled a Cohiba Puro Dominicana out of the box of goodies my friend Jason sent me some time ago. Cohibas, Dominican or Cuban, have never been in my regular rotation. I’ve always enjoyed them, but they just don’t really have the “bang for the buck” that falls into my comfort zone. I smoked this particular cigar, which measured about 5½ x 50 and it was OK…good cigar, but not mind-blowing. With about 2 inches or so left it didn’t want to stay lit. I was a little bored with it anyway so I let it go out. Since I couldn’t find this listed in my 2008 Perelman’s Guide, I assumed that it was a sample from last years IPCPR show. I looked on line and was stunned to find that these retail for between $13 and $16 each! Well, there are a lot of cigars that cost a lot less that I enjoy a lot more, heck, one can get very nice Cuban cigars for half that or better (not that I advocate any illegal activities such as purchasing contraband cigars). I would almost be more inclined to pay that much for a Havana Cohiba…almost. I would like to try the Lancero one of these days, but I’m not going to go out of my way to get one.

Sunday after grilling some very interesting seafood sausages we found at Trader Joes, I lit up a Punch Gran Puro Rancho. The sausages were interesting, a casing stuffed with shrimp, scallops and white fish which I grilled until they were nice and hot with grill marks. We ate them on some Amorosos rolls, but we just weren’t sure how to condimentize them. I suppose tartar sauce would have worked. Anyway, this isn’t a grilling blog, it’s about cigars. The Gran Puro was a nice cigar, not overpowering and it worked well after the seafood sausage. It had the consistency I expect from a Punch. Burned and drew nicely. A very pleasant hour or so spent smoking while I walked to the convenience store to collect my lottery winnings ($7 in the Powerball! Woohoo!).

Tuesday brought the first really disappointing cigar I’ve had in a while. I was in the mood for a Maria Mancini, and grabbed a Robusto Larga. These are stored in the same humidor as the rest of the cigars I have been smoking, but this cigar seemed like it was over-humidified. It tasted fine, but the smoke took some effort to get to and just felt damp. It wasn’t plugged, nor did it have any wrapper flaws, it just seemed too wet. I stuck with it for a while, but did put it down sooner than I would normally. I shouldn’t be to upset that a $2 cigar wasn’t great, but I’ve had a lot of luck with thi

s line. I have so little time in my day to enjoy a cigar that when I get a dud it hurts a little.

Blowing Off Steam

It seems that rants have become fashionable in the cigar blogosphere, so here’s mine:   Foot bands.  I don’t like ’em.  They make the first part of the cigar taste funny….ok, kidding here, I do take them off before I light ’em, but that’s a

pain as far as I’m concerned.  If I have a cigar with a normal band I leave it on until I get to the point where it’s going to be in the way, unless it’s coming off by itself. Foot bands have to be removed, no ifs, ands or buts.  Sorry Rocky, Sam, whoever else uses foot bands, if I’m cigar shopping I’ll probably pass unless it’s a single I really want to try.  I wouldn’t buy a box of foot banded cigars as that would just drive me insane.  Since I have to take the band off to light it, besides possibly damaging the foot of the cigar, I sometimes forget what it is I’m smoking!   And how are my pretentious friends supposed to know that I’m smoking?  Where’s the fun in that? So if you are coming out with a new cigar, skip the foot band, stick with the traditional placement. While your at it, don’t pattern the band after the Cuban Cohiba either, that’s just cliche and hokey.

That’s all I got for now,Time to go smoke a cigar.

CigarCraig

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by | July 17, 2010 · 5:06 pm

The Week’s Cigars: Flor de Gonzales, Cain F – Saturday July 17, 2010

Not too much going on around here cigar-wise this week, but I did manage to get a couple in.  Wednesday I grabbed a Flor de Gonzales 90 Miles Robusto.  I had won a 5 pack of these in a contest on the My Cigar Ashes blog a while back and have been enjoying them here and there.  These are really nice medium cigar that’s quite well made. I only have a couple left from the 5 pack and look forward to seeing how they age.  I looked on the Flor de Gonzalez website and oddly couldn’t find a mention of this relatively new cigar.  I’ll drop them a note to see what’s going on.

Last night, after a really aggravating day at work, I decided to punish….er, treat myself (?) to a Cain F.  I’ve smoked a few of the Cain range, and they all seem to be just too strong for my liking.  I like the flavor, they are

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very well made, but they just always seem to overwhelm me.  I remember last year stopping into my local tobacconist, JM Cigars, after the IPCPR show and Jeff, the proprietor just couldn’t say enough about these cigars. He said to get rid of all your Cubans, because the Cain is better.  I was dubious at the time, and when I did treat myself to one a month later I could understand the appeal, but it was just too much of a nicotine kick.  I have been a fan of stronger cigars, but Cains are just too much for me.  That being said, I very carefully smoked and enjoyed the Cain F, which had been given to me a few weeks back by Dave Weber, the Oliva National Sales Manager.  It didn’t get to me, but I smoked it almost hesitantly.

In the News

There were several news-worthy events this week that were the subject of just about every blog out there, so I sill only give them a brief mention.

Toraño Cigars have separated from C.A.O. International and is re-taking control of their distribution and re-emerging as Toraño Family Cigars. I always liked the cigars from Toraño, especially the Roots Run Deep cigars that Felipe Sosa rolled at t

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heir events.

Also in the news,  the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit ruled in favor of General Cigar in the latest round of litigation in the Cohiba® trademark case, affirming that General Cigar is the rightful owner of the Cohiba trademark in the U.S.    I may have to grab a Cohiba for this evening’s walk.  I haven’t smoked very many Cohibas from either party, they always seemed to be priced beyond my comfort level, but I have a couple floating around the humidors.  The question will become which version to grab?

That’s all I got for now!  I’m working on a couple of new ideas that I hope will be entertaining and enlightening, so stay tuned.  Also, I imagine it will be contest time again soon.  By the way, any of my prior contest winners that want to send a photo or leave a comment about your winnings, please feel free.  I may even put up a page with the winners, sort of a hall of fame (which will be as much for me to keep track as anything…)

Until the next time,

CigarCraig

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