Tag Archives: altadis

A Trip to the Wooden Indian, a Cain, an A.Turrent and a Monte Pascoal

Sunday afternoon I decided to take a ride to see my daughter and son-in-law and my 5 month old grand-daughter.  I visited with them until it was nap time (the baby’s, although I could have taken one myself!).  Anyway, they happen to live in the same town as one of my favorite area cigar shops, the Wooden Indian.  I got there within a half hour of their closing, so I took a look through the humidor to see what was new.  They have a very nice stock, which includes a smattering of nice boutique brands that aren’t always available in stores closer to home.  Normally I’ve visited this store on days when they are having events, and haven’t really taken a close look at their stock.  Neither needing more cigars, or wanting to spend a lot of money, I settled on a pair of Cain Daytona coronas, which ended up under $5 each.  I hadn’t yet smoked the Daytona, although I do have a couple lanceros in the humidor at home.  I had a nice ride home and after dinner I sparked one up.  This is now my favorite Cain.  I love the flavors in the line, but the Maduro and Habano and “F” series tend to be stronger than I prefer.  Somehow nausea detracts from the cigar experience.  Anyway, the Daytona is full flavored, yet not so strong as to cause the world to spin.  Top notch cigar and priced fairly.  It’s all I can do to not smoke the lanceros now!

 

Monday was a long day at work so my evening was slightly shortened.  I grabbed a shorter smoke in an A. Turrent Tripple Play Robusto.  I had the good fortune of meeting Enrique Seijas at the Altadis booth at the IPCPR show and he gave me a thorough tour of the booth.  One of the sample pack s he gave me included this cigar.  The Triple Play is an all maduro cigar, with a San Andreas wrapper, a  Connecticut Broadleaf binder, and fillers from Nicaragua, Mexico and Honduras.  Since I love Mexican maduro, and broadleaf, I figured this would be a good fit for me.  I did enjoy the cigar quite a bit, although I had to touch up the burn a few times.  Nice cigar that I look forward to trying again, although I can see where it may not be for everyone.

 

Tuesday evening I grabbed a Monte Pascoal  Minuto on the heels of an e-mail from Wesley Gensel announcing an article in Smokeshop Magazine about the brand.  I met Wes at the IPCPR show in New Orleans and spent some time with him at the show this year, where I first enjoyed this cigars.  The Monte Pascoal was also awarded the best Brazilian cigar by Cigar Journal magazine at an awards ceremony at this years show in Las Vegas, which I was privileged to attend.  These cigars are Brazilian puros, made with Mata Fina and Mata Norte tobaccos.  I really enjoy this little 4 3/8″ x 42 petit corona.  It had a very rich flavor and was quite satisfying.  I look forward to trying the larger sizes, but this Minuto is a very nice little smoke.

 

Here is a video of Wes from the IPCPR show last July:

 

 

That’s it for now!  Don’t forget to enter this weeks contest to win a Macanudo Millionaire 4-pack!  Leave a comment on my last post to enter.  I failed to mention that there would be TWO winners again!

Until the next time,

CigarCraig

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The Week So Far, A Romeo y Julieta, a Hoyo de Monterrey, and an El Credito

My mother-in-law passed away last week, so in deference to the family, I concentrated on doing my best to be a comfort and a help to my wife and her family. Cigars took a back seat to common sense and courtesy, so I don’t have a lot to report on this time. She lived a long and active life, but the last year was hard, with a diagnosis of mesothelioma and a stroke. When I smoked cigarettes she would bum one off me once a year, probably did that for almost 20 years. It was just one of those funny little things…never could get her to switch to a cigar, although she used to say that she once used cigars to break her cigarette habit, since she hated cigars!

 

I did manage to take a cigar for a walk Sunday morning, and I chose a Romeo y Julieta Habana Reserve that I bought last year when they had an offer for a sampler for something like $8 delivered. I like these cigars, but they sometimes aren’t the fist cigar I gravitate to if I’m cigar shopping. I opted for this cigar since I figured it was one of the better selections I had on hand for an early in the day smoke. It was quite a nice, mild and flavorful cigar that fit the bill nicely. It was a robusto that measured 5” x 54. If I were buying a RyJ, and it wasn’t one from an island we aren’t supposed to buy cigars from, I’d choose this line again.

 

Just a quick note about cigar smokers doing nice things for the community, a store local to me, although I don’t visit there nearly enough for whatever reason, recently held a golf outing and sent me the following in an e-mail:

 

Golf Outing Raises $13,240 for Fox Chase Cancer Center

G&G Cigar Company‘s 2nd Annual Golf Outing raised $13,240 for Fox Chase Cancer center for funding cancer research. The event was held at Downingtown Country Club. This check brings G&G’s total donations to over $43,000 to various charities.

We’d like to thank all of you for your support of this important event.

G&G Cigar Company Thanks you for your business.

I think it’s pretty cool when folks who are looked down upon by the more prudish in society do something nice, and it deserves recognition.

Last night I lit up a Hoyo de Monterrey Reposado en Cedros that I received at the IPCPR show last July when General Cigar announced the release. It should come as no surprise that the predominant flavor of the cigar is wood. Sweet wood.  Lots of wood.  Obviously (or not) this was to be expected given the cedar sleeve and the special “Immersion” process in which they age the cigars in cedar.  Don’t misunderstand, I really enjoyed the cigar, it was very enjoyable and different from what I usually select.  I’ve always enjoyed the Hoyo de Monterrey line and most of it’s extensions, and this one is pleasantly different.

 

Tonight I grabbed one of General Cigars new El Credito El Perrito War of Flavors, a cheroot-like cigar that’s made without a mold.  These are rustic little cigars that was created by two supervisors in the El Credito factory in the DR.  There’s lots of information out there on these, so I won’t regurgitate it here.  It was a good cigar for a mile walk.  It wasn’t particularly elegant, but it had a good flavor that will benefit from some age.  If these are priced right they will be a nice shorter smoke, although it burned roughly the same amount of time as a robusto for me. Don’t wear a good shirt either as the ash was prone to dropping without notice!  Thanks to General Cigars for providing me with samples to smoke!

That’s it for now, hopefully this weekend being Memorial Day weekend will give me an opportunity to have a couple cigars.

Until the next time,

CigarCraig

Watch for a new discount code from StogieBoys.com coming soon.

 

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Weekend Cigar Post: Romeo y Julieta, Padron – Sunday April 11, 2010

Beautiful weather this weekend, I managed to get in a couple cigars.  Last night, after spending all day putting down hardwood flooring on a staircase landing, I fired up a Romeo y Julieta Reserve Maduro Robusto.  This was a well made  cigar that was fairly mild, with flavor reminiscent of  bitter chocolate.  The afternoon’s worth of sawdust didn’t exactly compliment the cigar. Nice cigar for a beginner.  I don’t understand the wording on the website about the wrapper, they call it a “Blackened Connecticut Broadleaf”, what does “blackened” mean?  Could it be that the largest cigar company in the world takes shortcuts with their maduro wrapper?

Today, after going to a local restaurant with my son to watch the Flyers game, which was a “do or die” game, I felt the need to celebrate with a very old Padron Anniversario Principe.  This cigar must have been in my humidor for close to 10 years.  It burned perfectly and tasted great.  It had a really nice long finish that just clung to the tongue. I smoked it down to about a half an inch.  The Flyers game was quite exciting, it ended in the shoot-out, and if they hadn’t won it would have been the end of the season.  Now they move on the the play-offs.  It was fun to see the game with my son in a restaurant with a crowd of enthusiastic fans.

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A New Look and a New Home for the CigarCraig.com Blog!

As you may have noticed, I’ve made some changes to the CigarCraig.com blog.  I’m still using the WordPress platform, but instead of using the free WordPress.com blog, I’m running the WordPress software on the CigarCraig.com servers.  This gives me some more flexibility regarding embedding videos, as I did on my last post (starring our cat Max making the contest winner selection), as well as embedding some widget based content in the right column.  Just like any website, this one is a work in progress.  I’m toying with the idea of making this blog the front page of the site and building the additional pages around it.  I’m on the fence as to whether to use the Worpress templates to maintain a consistent theme, or to continue writing my own HTML for the additional pages.  I’ve already put up  “about” and  “links” pages to see hoe it looks, please let me know what you think.  The lazy bastard in me leans toward using the template,  but I kind of like the format of the main site.  I will have to have a cigar and ponder all the ramifications of these decisions.  The old blog, cigarcraig.wordpress.com,  will remain in place for posterity (there is a widget that links to the content housed there).

Something I recently found out about the cigarcraig.wordpress.com blog is that, by default, WordPress has a “feature” called mShots, which pops up a screenshot of any links in your blog.  This can be turned off in the appearance section of the WordPress dashboard under Extras. I never even noticed this until it was pointed out to me by a reader who said it disuaded him from reading my posts.  I wanted to mention this to others using WordPress.com so they know that this is occurring, it came as a surprise to me!  The wordpress.org software doesn’t appear to have this “feature”. Many thanks to Ted for pointing this out to me.

To keep this on topic, I enjoyed a Romeo y Julieta Habana Reserve Toro last night.  It was smooth and creamy and burned perfectly. Altadis’ website categorizes it as “a medium to full body smoke”, but I find these on the mild side.  Maybe I’m just a little jaded.  I would recommend these to someone who likes milder cigars as a step up, but, to me at least, these are medium at best.  Not that this is a bad thing, I would hate for someone to avoid these based on the manufacturers characterization of these as a medium to full body smoke.

Don’t forget to follow me on Twitter (@cigarcraig) if you’re so inclined, and keep an eye out in the next few weeks for the March contest.  I’ve received some amazing stuff to give away!  You don’t want to miss out on the chance to win.

Until the next cigar,

CigarCraig


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