Tag Archives: Alec Bradley

by | May 11, 2014 · 10:16 am

Cigar Rights and Some Alec Bradley Cigars

I usually present the cigars I’ve smoked over the last few days, but I had a weird experience this week, and I’m going to hold off on talking about those cigars until I give them some more humidor time and revisit them. All I’ll say is I smoked two cigars that had a really odd finish, and while they were from the same company,  they were made in completely different factories. Unless they had a common component that had a flavor that just didn’t play well with my chemistry,  I’m going to give them a do-over in a couple weeks. It was weird and had me second guessing myself! In other news, Cigar Rights of America has published a response to the FDA’s deeming document with excellent recommendations on how to respond, and we MUST respond in numbers, or life will change negatively for many thousands of people. Glynn Loope, the director of the CRA made a comment that no cigar related anything should be published without including a link to http://cigarrights.org/fda-response.php. I created a simple animated 125×125 graphic and included it at the top of the right-hand column on this site (scroll down for mobile users), I don’t think my advertisers will mind being bumped down a spot for this. Anyone who wants to use it is free to to so, and if someone with talent in creating graphics (I have none) wants to improve upon it, please do. We need to make an intelligent and unified response to the FDA’s proposed destruction of cigars as we know them.

 

JMs_AB_JLYesterday was Saturday, and I had received an email earlier in the week that one of my long time favorite local shops was having an Alec Bradley event. I’ve been begging to get email notices about JM Cigars events for years, and finally got on the list! I figured it would be rude if I didn’t stop in. Jonathan “The Player” Lipson, the local Alec Bradley rep, is a good guy and I like Alec Bradley cigars. I smoked a Nica Puro robusto, of course, one of my go-tos, mostly to see if that odd taste I was getting was me or not. It wasn’t, as the cigar was excellent as usual. The event was well attended for a spring Saturday afternoon. I’m not sure if it’s just that Jonathan does a lot of events or what, but I find myself going whenever I see one pop up, and, as a result, I seem to have quite a few Alec Bradley cigars in my humidors. I picked up a few American Sungrown torpedos too, for five bucks these are impossible to pass up!

 
AB_Maxx_RoboloAfter a blustery storm blew through,  I decided to keep with the Alec Bradley theme, and took a walk with an Alec Bradley MAXX Connecticut Robolo, which is a BestCigarPrices.com exclusive (the size, not the blend It turns out the Maxx Connecticut line is a BCP exclusive, thanks to Jason there for the update).  Something about the 4½x60 size appeals to me, not sure why that is.  This cigar has fillers from Nicaraguan, Colombian, Mexican, and Honduras, with a Connecticut wrapper, which I assume is Ecuador Connecticut judging by the flavor and the price point, however both BestCigarPrices and Alec Bradley’s sites just say Connecticut, so I could well be wrong. These can be had in the five dollar range. I found this to be a really nice, milder smoke with great flavors. The burn and draw were very good, and I burned my fingers a little finishing it up. It probably smoked for over an hour, not bad for a four and a half inch cigar. In the Maxx range, I’ve only had the Brazilian wrapped version, which is exclusive to another retailer, and I really liked that cigar. This one was tasty, perhaps a better choice for earlier in the day than I smoked it, but a very nice cigar. Thanks to Jason at BCP for providing this sample.

 

That’s all for now.  It’s Mother’s Day, so if you have one in your life, try to do something a little special for her today.  Until the next time,

 

CigarCraig

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by | April 6, 2014 · 3:54 pm

Arandoza, Rosalones, Nica Puro and an Asylum 13 Ogre Cigar

Arandoza_Blue_RobustoI started out the second half of the week revisiting the Arandoza Blue Label Robusto from Arandoza Cigars.  This brand is made at Erik Espinoza’s La Zona factory in Esteli, it’s a Nicaraguan puro with a Nicaraguan Habano wrapper and Nicaraguan binder and fillers. I smoked some of these last year and enjoyed them quite a bit, as I enjoyed this one again. They’ve fancied up the bands on these, making them harder to get a good picture, but the cigar is a really nice, well balanced smoke, with a little sweetness.  Now that I’ve smoked a few cigars from La Zona, I’m quite confident that I’ll enjoy just about anything made there.  The Arandoza is a little known gem.

 

JdN_Rosalones_448Friday evening I got off to a late start, so I went for something on the smaller site for my evening walk.  The Rosalones from Joya de Nicaragua was a surprise find last year at Cigar Safari. None of the assembled bloggers I was with had heard of this, and we were told it was for the European market.  Not too long after that these showed up at Cigars International, which is where I picked up a few of these well priced, really tasty little cigars. The 448 is 4¾” x 48 and it’s another Nicaraguan puro. The wrapper is a Nicaraguan Habano Criollo and it’s a medium bodied little flavor bomb. Of course, as just about everything from JdN, it’s perfectly constructed. For a couple bucks a piece, these are really quite excellent cigars, and if you look back at some of my blogger brethren’s trip reports from last May, you’ll see that these were the talk of the trip. These are a bargain, and I’m not sure, but they may be a CI exclusive.

 

AlecBradley_Nica Puro_ToroSaturday was a pretty nice, spring day, although a bit breezy.  After getting some much needed  yard work done (it’s never really done, but I was done!), I picked out an Alec Bradley Nica Puro for my afternoon walk.  I’ve exclusively smoked the robustos in this line up until now, and it’s one of those cigars that I can grab and enjoy the heck out of on those occasions where I need a solid, no-nonsense cigar that I can just love and not have to think about much. A few weeks ago at the Filthy Hooligan event at Cigar Mojo I picked up some toros just to change it up a little.  Lucky for me, it’s the same great tasting smoke in a longer format.  Unfortunately for me, it was a bear to keep lit, for some reason. I’ve had this happen in the past when I’ve picked out the cigar about an hour prior to smoking, took my pictures (because I’m nutty that way) and put it in an aluminum tube for a little later. Ironically, I’ve also had burn problems when I’ve taken a slightly different route than I normally take. It’s hard for me to believe that the route has any effect, but I’ll abandon the tube for the Black Delrin Transporter Tube  in the future (check out the Indiegogo campaign and get behind this guy, these are really nice tubes! Time is running out.). I remain a fan of the Nica Puro. It gives me a satisfying smoking experience the majority of the time, and the flavor is yummy.

 

Asylum13_Ogre_7x70Today I decided to pull out all the stops. Last June, on the occasion of our second granddaughter’s birth, we happened upon Black Cat Cigar‘s shop on our way home from the hospital. I picked up the Asylum 13 Ogre there, it was fairly new on the market, and I figured I should smoke it some day anyway. It’s an absurdly large cigar, 7″x70, and is a barber pole wrap of Habano maduro and Candela. I really like the green and brown appearance of this, but it’s size kept it buried in the humidor until such a time as I could devote a few hours to it’s smoking. For those who don’t know, this is made at Fabricas Unidas, which is Christian Eiroa’s factory in Honduras.  I’m thankful that these are being released in more manageable 6″ x 60 and 5″ x 50 sizes, because I really enjoyed the flavors in this cigar. The Candela gives it a little bit of that refreshing flavor, and the maduro (the best I can tell, the candela is an over wrap on top of a completed maduro cigar) gives it the coffee/cocoa flavor I like. The draw was very free, and it actuallly burned a bit quicker than I anticipated.  Apart from a little bit of flaking of the delicate candela leaf, the burn was pretty even. I used my Xikar MTX scissors on this, because I don’t think any of my cutters would accommodate the ridiculous girth of this cigar. As I said, I’ll be on the look out for the robusto size in this line.  I really got a lot more flavor than I thought and it certainly isn’t a novelty cigar. (note: The websites for Asylum Cigars, Fabricas Unidas and CLE Cigars all return a message stating that they “encountered a fatal error” at the time of publication, perhaps Christian forgot to pay the bill? 🙂 )

 

I’d also like to take this opportunity to welcome Black Cat Cigars to the CigarCraig family of supporters. Click the link on the right sidebar and check out their Mayhem Deals. The first time I came across Black Cat was an evening long ago when we met a friend in Philly for dinner.  We stopped in the little shop on Sansom Street on our way to the Sam Adams Brew pub, where we ended up running into another couple friends and smoking cigars with them all night. Their new shop in East Norriton, PA is pretty nice, stop in if you find yourself in that area.

 

That’s it for today, back to enjoying a relaxing Spring Sunday. Until the next time,

 

CigarCraig

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by | March 19, 2014 · 8:27 pm

A Camacho Candela for St. Patrick’s Day

camacho_candela_2

While everyone was smoking Alec Bradley Filthy Hooligans on Monday, leave it to me to be different. Long before AB’s master stroke of marketing the candela wrapped Black Market (which I really like, and despite them being sold out at the event I went to, as well as at Holt’s, I grabbed a couple more at a local shop) I bought a box of Camacho Corojo Monarca (robusto) with candela wrappers. I believe it was 2008. I’ve been enjoying these sparingly over the years, and it was my usual St. Patrick’s Day smoke until last year’s Hooligan interceded. I dug into the depths of the humidor and came accross the last two of the Camacho, which are now lightly dusted with plume, giving them a very light, flat appearance. I noticed early on in this box that they were loosely rolled, so I’ve been punching these so that a too open draw isn’t overwhelming. These are the original Camacho Corojo blend, so they pack a punch, but I find that the candela wrapper tempers the blend a bit, while the heavy filler blend compensates for the grassiness of the candela, much like the Filthy Hooligan (as an aside, last week when my brother-in-law, Jeff, asked for a cigar recommendation as he was on his way to Holt’s, I texted him “Alec Bradley Filthy Hooligan” and he replied “OK, you dirty bastard”, which I thought was pretty funny). I enjoyed the Camacho down to the nub, it burned perfectly and was quite the satisfying smoke. Green cigars don’t have to be grassy, mild smokes. I am going to make an effort to try the La Flor Dominicana and Illusione candelas one of these days.

 

I have a question for all my readers: Do you want me to post the press releases I receive from the cigar companies? I know several of my blogger brethren do it, and I’m not in a position to be able to do it immediately as I receive them. I guess I just want to know if there’s a need for me to do it, or if you are getting information on other sites and don’t need the repetition. I ask in an effort to provide what the people want! Please let me know in the poll below.

 

[poll id=”4″]

 

I’ll leave the poll run until the end of the month.  In the mean time, here’s one of the press releases that came in today:

 

FRATELLO CIGARS ANNOUNCES 6 ¼ x 52 BOX PRESSED VITOLA

Springfield, VA (March 17, 2014) –Omar de Frias is proud to announce a new addition to the Fratello line of cigars. The new vitola will be a 6 ¼ x 52 Box Pressed Torpedo. “We are very excited about this new vitola, it has a punch of flavor thanks to its ring style and slightly modified blend but staying true to the Fratello flavor,” said de Frias.

 

The Fratello Box Pressed will debut in a 20-count box. Prices have not been set yet but it will be in the range of the current line. Please visit www.fratellocigar.com/thecigar for a description on the cigars.

 

The new vitola will have a soft launch at a Fratello Authorized retailer prior to this years IPCPR and readily available shortly after. “Fratello Cigar Company has grown exponentially since the IPCPR show and this new line will add to our calculated expansion in America’s humidors,” said de Frias. Fratello is currently being sold in 25 states. For the complete list of all our retailers please visit www.fratellocigar.com.

 

I’m hoping to catch up with Omar this weekend if all goes as planned. Omar makes some darned tasty cigars and I’m looking forward to smoking some again.  He makes me feel short (and I’m 6’0″) because hes exceptionally tall.  I also may be appearing once again on Kiss My Ash Radio Saturday morning.

 

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

 

CigarCraig

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by | March 16, 2014 · 9:12 pm

An Alec Bradley Event, THE Kind, an Aging Room and Cigar Transporter Tubes

Thursday there was an Alec Bradley event at the world famous Cigar Mojo in King of Prussia (that’s about 20 minutes outside Philadelphia for those who don’t know.  Ask your wives, they probably know the area for the enormous mall!) Jonathan Lipson was present and managed to sell through all of the Filthy Hooligans before I arrived.  Trae, the co-owner of the shop managed to find me one, so I picked up some Nica Puros too and settled in with the candela toro.  I enjoyed several of these last year, and still have one buried in the humidor someplace.  I think this is a great tasting smoke.  I like the way the candela wrapper tempers the Black Market blend.  The downside is that the use an inordinate amount of glue on the bands, which is understandable, they have to stay in place through a secondary sleeve, as ABEvent_CigarMojowell as cellophane. Removing the band does a number on the fragile wrapper. The flavor is refreshing to me, it’s clean and I like this cigar. I was unhappy that I couldn’t go home with a handful of these.  My brother-in-law was in Holts the previous evening and they had sold out there too.  The event was well attended, we even ran into those guys from The Cigar Lounger magazine again.  Always a pleasure having a cigar with Vince, Graham, Steve and Drew. Trae and Wade are consummate hosts, always checking in , emptying ashtrays and making sure all is well.  A good time was had by all, and I’m still looking for a few Hooligans!

 

THEKind_ToroFriday evenings I try to smoke something I know will be satisfying after a long work week, but I decided to try a new cigar that was sent to me by the folks at Nice Ash Cigars in New York State.  As it is,  THE Kind is an exclusive in their three stores (one of which is in North-western Pennsylvania), but they hope to distribute on a larger scale.  The cigar is the Toro, which is 5¾” x 56, is nicecly box pressed and has a closed foot and a pigtail cap.  It’s a very appealing looking cigar.  It’s made in Omar Ortez’s factory in Esteli, and has a Jalapa Corojo wrapper with Nicaraguan filler and binder.  I really enjoyed the cigar, it had a nice sweetness and was full of flavor, but was a solid medium in strength.  It burned fairly well, even though it had only been in my humidor for about a week. I’ll give the other sample a few months rest, but I’m sure it’ll be just as good.  My thanks to Andrew at Nice Ash Cigars for thinking of me.

 

transporter_tubeThis week I also received a prototype of a Cigar Transporter Tube from Kevin, the maker of these tubes and the gentleman behind the Indiegogo campaign to raise capital to purchase a lathe so he can produce these on his own.  The tube is a Dupont Delrin® plastic which is an industrial strength thermoplastic used to make precision parts.  He machines this to pretty tight tolerances and matches the top and bottom halves to insure a perfect fit. I had one of the machinists where I work take a look and he was impressed with the machining, and he’s a perfectionist.  I put a cigar in this tube and toted it around with me and it worked out very well.  Check out his Indiegogo campaign here and throw a couple bucks his way, he’s got some tubes listed as perks for donating, I am looking forward to seeing the aluminum version.

 

AgingRoomM21_FortissimoSaturday afternoon I took a nice, long walk with an Aging Room M21 Fortissimo that I received at the IPCPR show last July.  This was in a coffin box, and is a nice perfecto shape, probably around 5½ x 46, which is a great size. I’ve heard many great things about this cigar, so I had high hopes.  A few months ago I smoked an Aging Room M356 Rondo and it conspired to kick my ass, so I was a little worried.  Unfortunately, this cigar must have been stored in slightly higher humidity than it should have. Rafael Nodal, the principle at Aging Room told me directly just today that this cigar is all ligero, so it’s sensitive to higher humidity (the humidor reads in the low 60s, go figure). I had a heck of a time keeping it burning, and given my experience with the M356, I was hesitant to over smoke it to keep it burning.  The flavor was very good, and I will be looking for another sample to fully appreciate the cigar this is supposed to be.  Rafael generously offered to send me another, however I think I’ll try to find one in one of my local shops.  These guys are really making some great cigars, so I have every confidence that my experience was a fluke. The fact that the same factory is working with José Blanco speaks to the quality of their tobacco and production.

 

That’s all for today, apologies for not getting this out this morning, but other projects took precedence.  Until the next time,

 

Cigar Craig

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by | March 5, 2014 · 8:20 pm

A Partagas, a Star Insignia, a Cain and a Cigar Rights Video

Partagas1845_RobustoMonday evening I came across a Partagas 1845 Robusto in a box buried in one of the coolerdors. I forget what I was on the hunt for, but as soon as I saw that I had to smoke it. I’ve had a few of the 1845 line in various sizes, and I really like this particular take on the robusto format, 5½ x 49 is a very cool size to me for some reason. They use this size in the regular “yellow box” line as well, and I’m pretty sure I’ve had the Limited Reserve in that same size. The wrapper is Ecuadoran Habano Viso, the binder is Connecticut Habano and the fillers are Dominican & Nicaraguan Ligero & Seco, and there’s some aging in rum barrels that goes on too. It’s a darned good tasting cigar. I’m looking forward to the upcoming release of the 1845 Extra Fuerte (see Coop’s piece on this at www.cigar-coop.com/) featuring higher primings (and therefor stronger and more flavorful) of the same tobaccos used in the 1845. I also seem to recall something about an Oscuro coming out, but I’ll have to do some more digging. Partagas has always been a preferred line for me, there seems to be a little something for everyone in the portfolio.

 

AB_StarInsignia_RoboloTuesday I tried a new (to me) cigar that is a house blend for Best Cigar Prices called the Star Insignia Robolo by Alec Bradley. This is a box pressed robusto with a nice dark wrapper from the Jalapa region, a Sumatra binder and fillers from Honduras, Nicaragua, and secret tobaccos. Despite a slightly uneven burn this is a very nice smoke. It’s unlike any other Alec Bradley cigar I’ve smoked. It has a flavor I can only characterize as steak cooked on a mesquite fire. There’s a smokey meatiness that stands out to me. It was a nice surprise and I liked it quite a bit. Sure, I had to touch up the burn a few times and the draw was a tad snug, but it tasted really good. Best Cigar Prices sent me samples of this and I appreciate it as I might have passed it by otherwise. Worth the time to try something this unique, I think, as they aren’t cheap, but they aren’t unfairly high priced either. Interesting side note about Best CigarPrices: I remember years ago, in the early days of the World Wide Web, we got our cigar specials via the FujiPub E-mail listserve.  Before they were called Best Cigar Prices, they were New Global Marketing, and would include a lengthy test list of their specials, easily several pages long.  So they’ve been around a long time, they aren’t just some new outfit.  They are located in the north east part of PA, I need to take a drive up there one of these days, I understand they have a lounge.

 

CainF_550Tonight I grabbed one of the last Cain F 550s I had floating around, and smoked it on my walk.  This is a powerhouse cigar, all ligero from Esteli, Condega and Jalapa in Nicaragua. The wrapper is also Nicaraguan and really tasty.  The Cain line is a favorite of mine, but it took me a while to really appreciate the bold flavors. I really believe some age smooths these out a lot.  As I said before, this is one lone that the maduro is my least favorite in the bunch.  In the Cain F line, the tubed lancero is the cream of the crop, but this 5¾ x 50 was really quite good. It seems more like a 46 ring for some reason, perhaps it’s that it’s a little longer than a robusto, yet not as long as a toro.  It’s among my favorites whatever the size.  I’ll have to track down some more (as if I need more cigars…).

 

I’ve changed one of the videos in my left hand sidebar because Tommy Zman of Famous Smoke Shop released a new video this week regarding the FDA and CRA and the importance of  fighting for our rights as users of a legal product. Here is is again, in case you’ve missed it (even though it’s right there on the side bar!).

 

httpv://youtu.be/1uAEfPX__u4

Life will be really difficult for us as smokers, but it’ll be even worse for all of the people who feed their families by working in the cigar industry. At the risk of sounding like a broken record (a bit of a dated cliché, when is someone going to update it to the digital age?), not only are jobs at stake in the US, but in Central America and the Caribbean, where it will be economically devastating and those countries will look to the US for financial support. Nobody wins, except for the fun police who aren’t happy if they see someone enjoying themselves in a way that they don’t approve of.  Support Cigar Rights of America and write to your elected officials.  FDA regulation of premium cigars is unnecessary and  oppressive.

That’s enough out of me, until the next time,

CigarCraig

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