A.Flores 1975 | CigarCraig's Blog

I smoked a few more new cigars this week, but I’ll revisit them another time because I was less than impressed with them. It’s not that they were bad, it’s just that either they needed more time, or weren’t the ideal size. I’ll get back to them eventually. I was really impressed with the Rojas Unfinished Business. I see where Rojas has been celebrating the grand opening of their factory in Esteli, I know a few people that were there. I’ve really enjoyed the recent Rojas cigars I’ve smoked. The Street Tacos, and the cigars by Stolen Throne have been impressive. There’s a few I need to smoke yet, but, overall, Noel is making great cigars. I night have an old Guayacan cigar in the humidor someplace! Anyway, I smoked the Unfinished Business Toro this week that Noel gave me at the PCA show and it was really to my liking. It has an Ecuadorian Sumatra wrapper, Nicaraguan binder and fillers from Nicaragua and Mexico. The blend hits a lot of “likes” for me. It was dark and rich, with all the flavors I like, espresso, a little spice, and some sweetness. I very much enjoyed this cigar. Definitely a future revisit.

I’m catching up on the PDR cigars, I think I only have one more in the queue for now. I actually need to organize the humidor I put these in to make sure I’m not missing any! I started with the A. Flores 1975 Serie Privada Maduro in Robusto. This is a 5″ x 50 robusto, and PDR has done a great job with consistency in branding with the little paper sleeves on each cigar and the name of each cigar on the band. The look is uniform and quite classy. This cigar has an Ecuadorian Habano Maduro wrapper, Nicaraguan Habano binder and Nicaraguan Habano and Dominican Corojo fillers. Oddly, this is not a sweet maduro, but more on the savory side. Burn and draw were acceptable and it was an enjoyable smoke. In the past few years I’ve gotten away from the Robusto size, but on a Saturday when I am going to smoke two cigars, this fit the bill.

I followed the Serie Privada Maduro with the A. Flores 1975 Gran Reserva Maduro, also in a robusto size, after dinner. This cigar has a Mexico San Andres Maduro wrapper, with Olor Dominican Republic binder and Dominican Corojo and Nicaraguan Habano fillers. It seems to go without saying that all of PDR cigars are made in the Dominican Republic. The PDR originally stood for “Pinar del Rio” after that region in Cuba, but they recently changed it to “Puros Dominican Republic” to better reflect the brand and factory. It was still on the savory side for a maduro, but had more spice and a hint of sweetness. It must be the Dominican Corojo that has the savory component. I enjoyed it while listening to Will Cooper guest on The Cigar Authority (I think he’s now one appearance behind me!). He gave me a shout-out and I appreciate that! He referenced my interview with George Hamilton (available here in the archives and still out there on my long defunct podcast, which is one of the few that Coop has never been on!). I always thought Hamilton missed the mark by not having a lighter wrapper under the band, so when you took the band off it looked like a tan line. The A. Flores 1975 Gran Reserva Maduro was good.