CigarCraig's Blog

by CigarCraig | October 8, 2014 · 9:00 pm

A Montecristo, a Gurkha and a Cohiba, and Some Cigar News

I’m sitting here watching the first Flyers game of the season, trying to write. Hockey is the only sport I have any interest in, so it’s nice that it’s back! Anyway, I stuck with some classic brands this week, starting off with a Montecristo which was given to me by Tom, our local Altadis rep a few weeks back at The Smokin Goose Festival. Goose’s Tobacco is a Montecristo Lounge, so they have the exclusive (and aptly named) Casa de Montecristo Exclusivo. Obviously, this cigar is only available at Montecristo lounges. This is a 6″ x 60 with an enormous band in addition to a black and silver Montecristo band. The wrapper is Ecuador Sumatra, with Nicaraguan binder and fillers. The cigar burned very nicely, and it had a reasonably sweet tobacco flavor. I enjoyed this cigar, I suspect I would smoke this again if I found myself in a Montecristo lounge and had $12 burning a hole in my pocket.

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Tuesday I heard the news that Carlos Llaca Toraño is now the Director of Operations at Gurkha Cigars. He was previously the Operations Director at Toraño Family cigars until their recent acquisition by General Cigar Co. This prompted me to select the newest offering from Gurkha’s East India Trading Co., The Classic Cigar – Havana Blend in the XO size. The square press on this 6″ x 60 makes it feel smaller than it is. This is another nice smoking cigar which I found to have a pleasing flavor on the light side. Once I realized that this wasn’t a powerful cigar I really enjoyed the delicate flavor. At right around $8 each, this is a nice smoke. I only had to touch it up once or twice, otherwise it burned quite well. This would probably be a nice morning cigar with a cup of coffee.

Tonight I went with the new Cohiba Nicaragua in the N50 robusto size. The samples I received from General Cigar Co. are cellophaned 5″ x 50, which only appear to be available in glass tubes commercially. This is the first Cohiba to be blended and handcrafted in Nicaragua. The fillers are from Esteli and Jalapa and the wrapper is listed as Colorado Oscuro, no mention of country of origin. Obviously the Cohiba name comes with some expectations, whether positive or not, so I was interested to see what this new Nicaraguan blend brought to the table. It started out very sweet, and developed very nicely. It burned like a super premium cigar should, a nice flat and even burn with a perfect draw through a V-cut. I suspect these will age nicely, but they are smoking well now.

As I was getting a lighter out the other day I realized that I have a few of them laying around. One thing that stands out to me is that the lighters I have range from a couple dollars to around $60, and with the proper care, the cheaper ones generally work as well as the expensive ones. In this picture you’ll notice that none of the three Blazer torches I’ve had over the last 17 years or so have survived. The Zippo with the z-Plus insert has been the most impressive, as well as the Ronson. The newest addition is the Jetline triple torch (at about 9 oclock) which came from the Rocky Mountain Festival goodie bag. This is a very nice lighter. The yellow one will be recognized by some of my blogger bretheren, it actually has what is basically a Cricket lighter inside of it and I have had good luck taking it apart and spreading it out through my luggage when I travel. Only the white La Gloria lighter is a soft flame, hence it gets very little use. I have some other ones here and there, I hate not having a lighter handy!

News

The first big news relates to my mention of Carlos Llaca Toraño joining Gurkha, his cousin Jack Toraño, who was also displaced in the acquisition, has joined Roberto P. Duran Premium Cigars. Look for a press release in the coming days announcing this. Anyone who knows Jack knows what a great guy he is, and I’m very glad to hear he’s re-joining the workforce after a reasonably short hiatus.

In other news, The Charlotte Observer reports that the JR Statesville store will be closing at the end of the year. There are three stores in North Carolina, and they are all large outlet stores with all kinds of merchandise from Jeans and toys, to cigarettes and premium cigars. If you ever drove down I-95 through North Carolina you can’t miss the entertaining billboards. Appar

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ently the owner of the property isn’t renewing their lease and has plans to re-develop the entire shopping center that is aging. Seventy-seven jobs will be lost, however JRs says they will open a cigar only store nearby in the future. The full story is here. This is the only North Carolina location I haven’t visited, I’ve stopped at the Selma store on the few trips I’ve made down I-95, and I had a tour of the massive distribution center in Burlington many years ago.

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

CigarCraig

3 Comments

Filed under News, Review

Tagged as Casa de Montecristo, cigar, cigars, cohiba, East India Trading Co., general cigars, Gurkha, Lighter, Montecristo, Roberto Duran, Torch

by CigarCraig | October 5, 2014 · 9:13 am

A Tortuga Event, a Tatuaje and a San Cristobal

Thursday evening Victor Vitale had whiskey\espresso and cigar tasting event at Cigar Mojo. Of course, it’s not hard to convince me to pay Mojo a visit, and when someone of Victor’s stature is there it’s

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a no-brainer. Upon arrival I immediately purchased a handful of the Tortuga 215 Reserva Coyote Negro in the 600 and Belicoso sizes. I promptly lit up a 600, which is 6½” x 56, a reasonably large cigar. Obviously, the Tortuga line is one I’ve enjoyed over the years. Victor is a good friend, and we are lucky to have him living in the area. Over the course of the evening I enjoyed the heck out of the Coyote Negro, as well as an original 215 Reserva Alma box pressed robusto. The Brazilian Mata Fina wrapper on the Coyote ads a great sweetness that I love. The Reserva Alma (5″ x 54, named after my grandmother…not really…) I smoked was truly exceptional, well balanced, refined and delicious. Victor was offering whiskey and espresso, I had two espressos over the course of the evening which went well with both cigars I smoked. Victor’s Legacy Brands is making some great cigars, if you have a Tortuga Appointed Merchant in your area, give this line a try.

Friday I had a bit of a trying day, forgetting my wallet, having a migraine that would revisit me several times during the weekend…that sort of thing. I stopped by the Lightn’Up/CigarCigars shop on my way home and said hello to Chris Stone, who was having a Drew Estate event at the shop. Without a wallet I was able to resist the urge to buy any more cigars, and with the migraine I was anxious to get home, medicate and eat dinner. After doing that and recovering a little, I took a walk with a Tatuaje Black Corona Gorda which was a gift from a gentleman I met at the Casa de Montecr

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isto in Chicago on my recent visit. Connor was a gracious host while I visited the lounge there, many thanks for this beautiful cigar! This cigar in the classic 5 5/8″ x 46 corona gorda size has a closed foot and a fuma style cap. I rather expected a more “Cubanesque” experience from this, I got a pure Nicaraguan flavor bomb. This may have been one of the best Tatuaje cigars I’ve smoked, which isn’t say a lot since I haven’t smoked all that many. Very full flavored and well made. This is a great size, I wish it had been longer.

Saturday afternoon I took a walk with the dog and a San Cristobal Revelation Legend. This cigar came from the Rocky Mountain Cigar Festival goodie bag. The Legend is a 6 1/8″ x 52 Box Pressed Toro made in the My Father factory for Ashton Distributors. This uses the same wrapper as the Ashton VSG, and is a full flavored, spicy cigar. The band is beautiful as is the overall appearance of the cigar. I found this to be very enjoyable and wonder why it took me over a year to sample this line. Highly recommended if you like full bodied cigars.

On a related note, this morning we had an oracle come to the house to “smudge” or burn sage and give a traditional native american blessing to the house to encourage it to sell. We are settling on a house on Friday and life will be easier by several orders of magnitude when the house we are currently living in sells. One of the things Maxx, our oracle friend, asked was if we had any loose tobacco around so that she could bless the property outside. Oddly, I happened to have saved the outside leaves from the Leaf by Oscar cigars. She shredded the leaves and spread them around the periphery of the yard. She kindly sent me the following explanation:

Semah, or tobacco, is one of the four sacred plants. It represents the Eastern Direction and the mind a place of new beginnings. The Anishinaabe use a form of tobacco known as kinikinik, or a red willow mix. Because it opens the door to the creator, when tobacco is used to make smoke, it is one of the most sacred of plants for Native people. Some elders say that tobacco is used to connect the worlds since the plant’s roots go deep into the earth, and its smoke rises high into the sky. This plant is highly respected and highly honored. Giving to

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bacco is a beautiful way of our people. Ceremonies using tobacco invoke a relationship with the energies of the universe, and ultimately the Creator, and the bond made between earthly and spiritual realms is not to be broken.

Traditional Use
Itis wise to burn tobacco before storms. It is used to pray that powerful storms won’t hurt our families. To pray with tobacco in your Native language is very powerful. It can make a difference in the physical world.

Purification

Tobacco is used in the offering of prayer to the Creator, acting as a medium for communication. It is either offered to the fire, so the smoke can lift the prayers to the Creator, or it is set on the ground in a nice, clean place. It means we come humbly to our creator. We proclaim our innocence. When you want to speak to the creator, we are told to make an offering of the tobacco plant.An Elder will take tobacco ties and offer them to the fire or offer it back to Mother Earth on behalf of the Sacred Circle

I have been burning tobacco here for some time now, and I thought it was for my pleasure, but it seems to have a deeper meaning. Hopefully the house sells soon!

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

CigarCraig

3 Comments

Filed under Editorial, Events, Review

Tagged as cigar, cigar store, cigars, drew estate, San Cristobal, tatuaje, tobacco, Tortuga

by CigarCraig | October 1, 2014 · 9:56 pm

Roberto P. Duran and Azan, La Flor Dominicana and Quesada Oktoberfest Cigars and News

It’s October, hard to believe it’s autumn already and summer is gone. I’ve been all over the place in my cigar selections this week, only one minor theme this week, and that was sampling some of the new cigars from Roberto P. Duran. Last year I smoked a couple of the Azan line last year and was enthralled with the White, very high quality and unique flavor. I was excited when Gabriel Piñeres of Creativas, who is the PR firm for Azan/Roberto P Duran, sent me the new Roberto P. Duran cigars, along with the Azan Maduro Natural. The cigar I smoked was the Cacique Guama (6×60), which has a beautiful light brown Ecuador Criollo 99 wrapper, with Nicaraguan and Central American fillers. Cacique Guama was a Tainos Chief from Baracoa and great fighter against the Spanish occupation of their land, the line pays homage to Roberto Duran’s family and his family’s city of origin in Cuba. This cigar smoked very well, although some humidor time will benefit the samples I received. It’s apparent that quality materials were used, it’s a very smooth and flavorful smoke with a hint of strength. I thoroughly enjoyed it, this company is making some very nice cigars.

Monday I selected a cigar that came from the Rocky Mountain Cigar Festival that I haven’t smoked before, but has been on the market for a while. The La Flor Dominicana Air Bender Torpedo appears to be a Tobacconists’ Association of America (TAA) exclusive shape, as I don’t see this shape listed in the regular production. This is listed as a strong cigar, as many in the LFD lines are, but I found it to be reasonably mild for some reason. It had a really nice flavor, and burned perfectly. I’m a reasonably recent convert to the LFDs, and I’ll be interested in trying other sizes in the Air Bender line, as I enjoyed the flavor, but maybe this size, ot this particular example, just wasn’t ideal for me. I generally like shaped cigars (actually, I don’t really discriminate), perhaps the chisel shape or a robusto will be a better fit for me.

Tuesday I took my evening walk with the Azan Maduro Natural Campaña. The Campaña size is a traditional Cuban vitola, the Bolivar Belicoso Fino, the Romeo y Julieta and Sancho Panza Belicosos fall onto this category. It’s 5½ x 52 with a tapered head. The Azan line began in Cuba in the 1920s by a Chinese immigrant,Kwan Ben Sen, who adopted the Cuban name Domingo Azan. Roberto Duran is descended from this family. As I said before, I loved the Azan White, and given my affinity for maduros I was excited to try this cigar.
The wrapper is a high priming Corojo grown in Ecuador, with Nicaraguan binder and fillers from Esteli, Jalapa and selected tobaccos from other Latin American regions. This cigar was a treat. It was solidly medium bodied and had very nice flavors of cocoa, coffee and earth. It burned well and should age well. This cigar exceeded my expectations.

Tonight, since it’s October first, I thought I’d smoke the Quesada Oktoberfest Krone, a 5″ x 43 corona. Now, I know I haven’t been a beer drinker for the better part of 25 years, but I do know that Oktoberfest is in September, but it still seemed appropriate. This cigar is blended to pair with Marzen style beers, I chose a root beer as usual. This is a strong Dominican cigar that’s loaded with flavor. The only other Quesada Oktoberfest cigar I’ve smoked was the Smoke Inn Microblend Dunkel, which was excellent. This corona was equallly excellent. It had bold flavors, burned perfectly, and my only complaint was that it was too small, I would have liked to have smoked it longer. Still, it was good for an hour or more, and look forward to smoking this line again.

I’m r

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unning out of videos from the Rocky Mountain Cigar Festival. Here’s on with Terence Reilly of Quesada Cigars:

News

Travis Lord, formerly of Famous Smoke Shop, Best Cigar Prices and PipesandCigars.com launched a new website called www.Cigar.Careers which is a Monster.com, if you will, for the cigar industry. You can submit a resume and look at available job postings.

In other news, Facebook has b

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een abuzz with rumors of a major announcement today. Jonathan Drew posted his press release on his Facebook timeline tonight: “HERE IS MY PRESS RELEASE: “I’m back on Weight Watchers” – JD” Good luck to JD on his future endeavors.

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

CigarCraig

2 Comments

Filed under News, Review, Video

Tagged as Azan, cigar, Cigar Careers, cigars, LFD, Oktoberfest, Quesada, Roberto Duran, Rocky Mountain Cigar Festival

by CigarCraig | September 28, 2014 · 12:44 pm

Busy Cigar Weekend: Lunch with Herrera and The Smokin Goose Festival

I took a much needed vacation day on Friday to go hang out with Willie Herrera and Chris Stone of Drew Estate Cigars. Cigar Mojo was the scene of the event, as

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Chris and Willie were making stops throughout the area. In True Mojo style, Trae provided pizza, and

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offered a Buy 5 and one is free special on Drew Estate and Joya de Nicaragua cigars. Sadly, they had sold out of the new Norteño, which was the whole reason I took the day off! Trae was kind enough to find a Norteño in the Coronita size, which is a nice little pressed 4″ x 46. This is right up my alley with the San Andrès wrapper. It was full of dark, rich flavors, this is a winner and I can’t wait to get some more of these and sample the range of sizes. Hopefully Cigar Mojo gets them back in again soon! It’s always fun hanging out at Mojo especially with Willie and Chris. There’s a reason this new shop placed highly in the recent “Philly Hot List” poll.

The Smokin Goose is a multi-vendor event put on by Goose’s Tobacco Outlet and Cafe in Limerick, PA. This was their first event of this kind and was held at the historic Sunnybrook Ballroom in Pottstown, PA. The event featured twenty or so premium cigar brands, including a couple reasonably local small brands. It was held in a pavilion outside of the ballroom building, which, of course, is smoke free and the weather was a beautiful 80 degree day. Late September can be hit or miss in this part of the world, it can be cold and windy, or a great day like yesterday was. Attendees received a goodie bag with a bunch of cigars, a Xikar travel humidor and assorted swag. There was food available all day in the pavilion, and the admission price included a meal at the restaurant too. I didn’t see people leaving the event to eat at the restaurant, which was across the parking lot, but as we were leaving it occurred to me that people were waiting until the event wrapped up (with the raffle prize announcements, as usual) and went to eat after. Makes sense so people didn’t miss any of the festivities. For an inaugural event, it seemed to go well. The 75 or so attendees seemed to have smiles on their faces. Operation: Cigars for Warriors was there and was the beneficiary of the proceeds of the raffles. I am going to have to pay a visit to Goose’s shop sometime in the near future, because I think I won one of the silent auctions. It was a good event, John and Joanne Giese and their team did a nice job putting all together, I’m sure it was worth all the stress and anxiety that goes into putting something like this together. All the vendors and manufacturers who were there are to be commended as well. I’ll be interested to see next year’s version of The Smokin Goose! I enjoyed making some new friends and catching up with some old ones. I appreciate being included.

The event space

Arielle from La Sirena Cigars

The goodie bag (thanks Jay)

It was Bianca from Gurkha’s birthday!

Jon “The Player” from Alec Bradley

The silent auction table

The Goosemobile

Alex of Evil Genius Cigars

Cigar Art by Eric Whitfield

Some of the brands represented there were La Sirena, Villiger, My Father, Altadis, Alec Bradley, Blanco Cigars, Gurkha, CLE/Asylum, Dominican Big Leager, Jenneff and Evil Genius Cigars from the Lehigh Vallley area in PA, Jason Alexander, John Hay, and Al Capone, as well as The Cigartist, Eric Whitfield. Also, thanks to Joe K for introducing himself! Once again, it was a great way to spend an afternoon, and I’m certain all the attendees got more than their money’s worth.

That’s it for now, I’ve got some catching up to do after goofing off for the last couple days! Until the next time,

CigarCraig

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Tagged as Alec Bradley, Asylum, cigar, Cigar Mojo, cigars, Dominican Big Leager, drew estate, Goose's, La Sirena, Montecristo, Smokin Goose, Villiger

by CigarCraig | September 24, 2014 · 9:37 pm

Smoking Some Assorted Foundry and Michael Giannini Cigars

After hearing the news last week of Sam Leccia joining General Cigar Co., and his lines being absorbed into the Foundry Tobacco division, and having spent some time with Michael Giannini at the Rocky Mountain Cigar Festival, I decided to spend the first part of the week, at least, smoking some cigars from the Foundry line. I started out Sunday afternoon with a Compounds, Elements and Musings Titanium Torpedo that I bought a few months back on clearance at a local shop. I’m kicking myself for not buying more of them, as I found it to be a really enjoyable cigar. The blend is listed simply as Nicaraguan and “Smoke it”, so there’s not a lot of information about this cigar. I can almost guarantee that the wrapper is a Connecticut shade wrapper of some sort, my guess is Ecuadoran. This was a nice, smooth cigar, on the mild side, but loaded with creamy flavors. The construction was perfect, and it really was a nice, mellow, Sunday afternoon smoke. I don’t know how many of these are still in circulation, but these are not to be avoided!

I followed the Titanium with the first of a new Foundry series, The Worm Hole 1964 Blend. In the video below Michael tells us about the concept behind the cigars. The 1964, like the rest of the line, is a mystery as far as the blend goes. General Cigar Co. had an enormous library of tobacco, and Michael finds unique and rare tobaccos and makes the Foundry cigars. This was another milder cigar, but with a ton of flavor. Initially, I thought the size was the same as the Partagas Robusto, 5 ½ x 49, and I even measured with an aluminum ring gauge checker I have, but they list these at 5½ x 50. It’s still a great size, regardless oif the ring gauge. This was a nice smoke.

Monday I took a break from the Foundry line to smoke the joint venture between Michael Giannini and his mentor, Ernesto Perez Carillo, the Re+United. This was a limited edition made at EPC’s Tabacalera La Alianza S.A., around the corner from General Cigar’s factory in Santiago, DR. The wrapper is a high priming Ecuador Havana leaf from General’s library, the binder a Connecticut broadleaf from EPCs inventory, and a mix of fillers from both companies. This is a large cigar, 6½ x 54, and was difficult to find. I bought two from Serious Cigars in Texas last week. This was a stronger cigar, very different from the Foundry and Compounds, Elements and Musings cigars I smoked this week. I found it very interesting and satisfying, and look forward to smoking the other one I have after a nice long rest.

Tuesday I chose the present in the Worm Hole series, the 2014. You know me well enough by now to know that unless there’s a maduro in a series, I have to smoke them in order. It’s a CDO thing (which of course is OCD, in alphabetical order like it should be). This was another beautiful cigar, in the 5½ x 50 format, that burned perfectly. I like the copper colored band on this one, with out the band it would be very hard to differentiate between the three cigars. The wrapper is smooth and without blemish, and, once again ,the burn was very good. It may have had a bit more strength than the 1964, but was still on the milder side with a nice, clean flavor.

Tonight I went with the 2064. This is meant to represent the future, and is reported to contain Martian tobacco. Of course, this would involve time travel, which reminds me of a recent conversation I overheard and chimed in on. We were at the Fest for Beatles Fans back on August and while eating breakfast a couple next to us was speculating about going back in time and writing all of the Beatles’ songs and selling them to the Beatles and I suggested that maybe Paul McCartney had actually done that, I mean, if anyone could afford a time machine, it would be Sir Paul! Anyway, this cigar really smoked well. I also have some of these in the larger 6 x 52 size that I can’t wait to smoke. There is a common thread among the three of these cigars, they are all on the milder side, but are all packed with flavor and made with quality ingredients. Like the previous Foundry lines, the original line with the gears on the band and the War Of Currents line, this line has unique and interesting flavors that are different from other cigars in the marketplace. I look forward to smoking more and really concentrating on the flavors. My La Gloria Cubana humidor is now more than half filled with Foundry cigars!