Tag Archives: Asylum

by Craig Vanderslice | March 16, 2025 · 9:23 am

Serenity Now, Montecristo Exclusive, Hooten Young and Julius Caeser Cigars

Thursday night I went to a Flyers Game, their second meeting with the Tampa Lightning. You may recall that I went to Tampa last November to the game there, and they won in a shootout. It was a fantastic experience with the Diamond Crown cigar lounge and all, Kevin and I had a great time! This time I took my youngest son, and I smoked a Serenity Now from Asylum/CLE Cigars. I figured this would be an appropriate driving cigar! I got this at the TPE show, embarrassed to say I don’t remember the reps name who I talked to , but Tom Lazuka was there. This is a cigar that Christian Eiroa came up with, Tom is usually the idea man for the Asylum line. It’s my understanding that we wasn’t very happy with Christian at first. This comes in a box with a San Andrés sibling, the Insanity Later. Serenity Now uses a Connecticut-seed wrapper, which may or may not be grown in Honduras, over tobaccos from Honduras and an undisclosed South American country. There are a lot of references to CLE having a farm in South America, which is a big place. I thought this was a little bitey for a shade cigar, on the tannic side. It was a nice road cigar as it burned well and was inoffensive. Full flavor yet medium strength. I’d try it again, but am more interested in trying the maduro, which I would have called Profanity Later, but that’s just me.

Last week when I visited the Smoke Inn Casa de Montecristo lounge in West Palm Beach, one of the cigars I bought was a Montecristo Nicaragua Great Smoke 2023 Exclusive. This was priced higher than I usually like, but when in Rome (more on Rome, see below) you know! Yesterday was The Great Smoke put on by Abe at Smoke Inn, and it looks to have been a good time. In honor of that, I decided to smoke the Montecristo. This is a Nicaraguan puro, blended by Rafael Nodal and AJ Fernandez and made at the AJF factory. Montecristo (and a lot of Altadis cigars) aren’t generally my cup of tea, although the exceptions are the ones made by AJ Fernandez. This has a dark wrapper, is a 6″ x 52 Toro, and performed spectacularly. It has a distinctive flavor, I wonder if this is what people refer to as “black walnut”? I don’t like walnut, but this was a good tasting cigar. I didn’t regret dropping $20 on this cigar, it was a souvenir, of my trip, and I really enjoyed it. Once again, I can’t overstate how nice an experience my visit to the Smoke Inn shop was, I will have to get back down there and go to some of the other shops.

Another cigar I picked up on my recent travels was the Hooten Young Ma Deuce. I saw Jon Carney at the Cigar Circus event and he, apparently, had been working with the Hooten Young folks, and hooked me up with a couple of their cigars. I probably should have watched “Black Hawk Down” yesterday while I smoked this, but opted for something a little lighter. Norm Hooten, one of the co-founders of the company, is a Veteran of the mission in Somalia which the movie “Black Hawk Down” is about, and there’s also a connection to Jon Carney’s home town in Maine. This is an interesting vitola. It’s 6½” x 60, but it’s shaped like a .50 caliber cartridge. The Ecuadorian Connecticut and San Andres Maduro wrapper combo is arranged to emulate the different metals in the bullet and casing. It has a Nicaraguan binder and filler. They come in boxes that look like ammo cans. Everyone has a different palate, I got a sourdough flavor off the start, which continued through out. Of course, I like this flavor in a cigar, so it was good. I smoked it for the better part of two hours, and the tapered head makes it very much unlike a 60 ring cigar. It was fun to smoke. I’ll watch “Black Hawk Down” one of these days when I’m in the mood.

Finally, I couldn’t let March 15 go by without smoking a Diamond Crown Julius Caeser cigar. Here’s something I wrote last year that I was pretty proud of, although I might be the only one who was impressed with it…

We all know that March 15 marks the day that Julius Caesar was assassinated in 44 BC. We know the exact date because he invented the calendar we use. He instituted that just a year before his death. Anyway, he was a heck of an Emperor, but I guess his friends thought he was a dick, so they stabbed him. I may be oversimplifying things a little. A few millennia later some Hungarian folks named their son after him, and US immigration screwed up the spelling on his paperwork and Julius Caeser Newman started a cigar company that makes some great cigars.

The Diamond Crown Julius Caeser is made at Tabacalera A. Fuente, has an Ecuador Havana wrapper, Dominican binder and Caribbean and Central American fillers. I smoked the Pyramid vitola, which is 6½” x 52. I might have gotten this when I was in Tampa for the Heritage Festival in ’22. I was kind of hoping to smoke the new Trouble Maker vitola, but I didn’t end up getting my hands on any. This is a great cigar, with a woody profile that’s a nice change of pace for me. I probably don’t smoke this line as often as I should, there are some good memories associated with it, beyond the historical and literary tie-ins.

That’s all I have for today, no travel this weekend! until the next time,

CigarCraig

😃+

Asylum 13 Medulla Oblongata at the Humidour on the Hill

Yesterday I found myself in Cockeysville, Maryland so I stopped in the Humidour Cigar Shoppe on the Hill for a cigar or two. This is not my first visit, I was there six years ago and spent an afternoon there. As a matter of fact, last night when I got home, I smoked a Zorba corona that I had gotten there six years ago. They have three exclusive cigars that are made by Rocky Patel, the Zorba, the Zeus and the Bella Carmella. The Zorba was a nice smoke that kicked in nicely in the second half. Speaking of Zorba, the store recently rebranded their members lounge to the Zorba Lounge. I’m to deduce that “Zorba” is the nickname of the owner, Finnie Helmuth’s father, who apparently founded the shop. I managed a tour of the members lounge, which is very nice. First you need to know that the store is a large house, so the Zorba lounge is what might have been the parlor or living room and dining room of the house, with the foyer leading upstairs to a large room with the lockers and a wet bar area. Memberships include discounts and almost half the annual fee back in the form of a giftcard to the store as well as exclusive events. Like the public lounge, it’s very warm and inviting, like sitting in your living room, and some of us deny ourselves that luxury. I had hopes of smoking the Zeus I picked up while I wrote this over coffee this morning, but, alas, a weather induced migraine put the kibosh on that. I wondered about the Zeus, because SMōKE Manyunk had a Zeus cigar. It turns out that Chris Helmuth, one of the owners, and Kosta (who owns SMōKE) are buddies and conspired together in some way to bring this to the Humidour. It looks good, which is why I bought it. I passed on the Bella Carmella because it’s a Connecticut Shade and I have plenty of those in the humidor that I never get around to smoking. So, if you happen to be in the Cockeysville, MD area, stop in Humidour Cigar Shoppe on the Hill, buy some cigars and hang out for a bit. If your local to the area, check out the members lounge!

Before I move on to the cigars, the folks at The Humidour are involved with the Premium Cigar Retailers Association of Maryland, who fight against tax laws and whatever other ridiculous restrictions their governments try to throw at them to put them out of business. They are having an auction ending September 19 with bidding opening August 30th. It looks like they will have a lot of good stuff, so if you enjoy the excitement of auctions, and you like helping out good organizations, give this a look. Information can be found here.

I was looking through the Humidour’s humidor, which is large and well stocked, and decided on the Asylum 13 Medulla and Oblongata Maduro in the 6″ x 60, as I hadn’t smoked any of those to date. I actually would have gotten the toro size, but they were out of one or the other of them, I think the Medulla. After smoking both, this makes perfect sense to me. Because of my borderline CDO (which welve established over and over is OCD in alphabetical order as is proper), I was compelled to smoke the Medulla first, because it’s Medulla Oblongata, not the other way around, right? The Medulla is round and the Oblongata is box pressed, both have the same blend, I believe they have a San Andrés wrapper around authentic Corojo fillers made in Honduras. I smoked them one after the other, and was a little surprised that the Medulla was much richer in flavor than the Oblongata. First, the flavor was unique, there was a flavor that reminded me of Australian licorice. This is deeper and richer than say, Twizzlers (mass market licorice). It was very different from other maduros I have smoked. I’ll definitely get some more of these. The box press seemed to lack the richness and density of smoke, perhaps whatever leaf the removed from the blend to press it was the key. I would have smoked the box press first based on preference, and if they were named opposite, I certainly would have. I wonder how I would have perceived the difference. I wonder if my palate was fatigued. Now I need to get more and smoke them separately. More experimentation is needed. I love cigar research!

That’s all for today, until the next time,

CigarCraig

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Tagged as Asylum, Asylum 13, cigar, cigar store, cigars, Humidour, Medulla, Oblongata, Zorba

by Craig Vanderslice | March 20, 2021 · 10:26 am

UPDATED News: United Cigars Celebrates Our Beloved Sports Stadiums

I’m disappointed in this news for a few reasons. I was looking forward to the cigars, and I feel like the reasoning is pretty weak. I think it’s pretty safe to assume this was killed due to the word “Monstah” infringing on Pete Johnson’s “Monster” trademark, but I fail to see how there could be any confusion. The only thing I can understand is that the trademark has to be defended in an evenhanded manner, if he allows one person to get away with one permutation of the word, someone else can find another loophole. It seems crappy, but I suppose the owners of United would defend their trademarks as well (and probably have).

United Cigar is disappointed to announce that its 1st Stadium Series releases has been halted. The Asylum Green Monstah, a collaboration with CLE Cigars and United Cigars, was due to ship to United retail partners just in time for opening day of baseball scheduled for April 1, 2021. This limited release was produced in two vitolas packaged in 9 count boxes representing the nine innings of baseball. The box is shaped as home plate with both sides fashioned after the iconic left field wall of Fenway Park: The Green Monstah.

“This project meant more than cigars,” said Oliver Nivaud, Director of Operations at United Cigar. “Baseball is America’s pass-time; stadiums delivered sports, music and life before the pandemic and we wanted to share our passion with other enthusiasts. My connection to Boston’s Fenway Park is deeper than just a cigar project, I named my son after the park in 2004. I never expected the cancel culture to show itself in the cigar industry, especially not because we named our first series after a green wall that was built in 1912.”

United Cigars is regretfully pulling the Stadium Series Green Monstah from the market for now until a direction is decided upon. This decision was made after another cigar brand owner reached out to CLE directly and said that a portion of the name of would need to be concealed. As this was not an option United Cigars wanted to accommodate, the decision was made to pull the series to avoid further distress to their friends at CLE.

This will not stop the Series Unidas Stadium Series however, United Cigars has new plans for this annual release and has begun the early steps for the next one which should be announced by this Fall.

A rare Saturday morning post, I was going to do this one last night, but I didn’t get around to it. Funny, because I had candela on my mind, but that’s a story for another day. I like a candela, and Christian Eiroa made one of my favorite Candelas when he made the Camacho Monarca in Candela years ago. I really miss that cigar, I smoked through a box of them a dozen years ago or so. Maybe this will be similar blend? I guess I’ll have to get my hands on some and see (if my memory holds up). As far as the stadium series goes, I can only hope they don’t do one for Vet Stadium, as many great memories I have of that stadium, it really wasn’t what I’d call a great baseball stadium (and there’s already a Phillies cigar, and I ain’t smoking it)!

With nearly a year behind us since we have had the opportunity to visit a stadium to cheer on our favorite athletes, United Cigars has decided to bring the stadium to you. Teaming up with Christian Eiroa and Tom Lazuka of Asylum Cigars, United Cigars is launching a new line as part of their Series Unidas collection and will ship to retailers next week in time for baseball’s opening day. The Green Monstah cigar release will pay tribute to the Boston Red Sox and Fenway Park as the launch of a planned United Cigars Limited Edition Stadium Series line.

A collectible series honoring America’s beloved stadiums, the Green Monstah boxes will showcase the iconic scoreboard and celebrate our love of the game. Available in two classic Asylum Cigar vitolas, 6 x 60 and 7 x 70, the Green Monstah limited series features an Ecuadorian candela wrapper, Nicaraguan binder and fillers from Esteli and Jalapa. This Limited Edition Stadium Series production was kept to 250 boxes of each size and will be available in boxes of 9 cigars for 9 innings of baseball. The boxes were constructed to resemble home plate, so this is perfect for every baseball enthusiast’s collection and cigar lover’s humidor.

“The sounds at the ballpark have always been a part of my Spring,” said Oliver Nivaud Director of Operations for United Cigars. “Now we have an Asylum cigar to smoke for opening day. Fenway Park is my Holy Cathedral, but we have a few more stadiums in mind for this stadium series.”

Tom Lazuka, Co-Founder of Asylum Cigars added, “This was an exciting project as both Christian and I are huge baseball fans. We worked hard to have a candela in a large format, turned out to be an amazing cigar that has filled a few of my ashtrays.”

The Green Monstah will begin shipping to retailers on March 22nd in limited quantities. MSRP on the 6 x 60 is $79.99/$8.88 and the 7 x 70 will retail for $89.99/$9.99.

About United Cigars

United Cigar began as a US based cigar store chain in 1901 growing to nearly 3,000 shops. United Cigar eventually became part of the corporation that bought Marvel Comics in 1968. The United Cigar chain represented the interests of the Consolidated Tobacco Company, the tobacco trust that controlled the American Tobacco Company.

Today United Cigars distributes and manufactures premium cigars within the United States. Distribution agreements with Selected Tobacco (Atabey, Byron & Bandolero) as well as Jose Dominguez cigars. United Cigars has its own brands including the quick-selling bundle line Classic, La Gianna Havana, and our flagship brand United to name a few. United Cigar Series Unidas, a collaboration with respected manufacturers, provides premium cigar retailers with Limited Release productions.

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Tagged as Asylum, candela, cigar, cigars, CLE, Green Monstah, United Cigars

by CigarCraig | September 14, 2016 · 9:38 pm

Psyko Seven Psunday and Insane Cigars

A few months ago my wife entered a contest on Best Cigar Prices Facebook page and managed to win a box of Psyko Seven Tubos and a Psyko Seven Humidor. I’ve mentioned the humidor before, I’m impressed with this budget friendly box, it’s large, it holds humidity well, and it’s not unattractive. It came in very handy as a place for IPCPR samples so I can keep them segregated and not forget where they came from! By the way, since I know people at Best Cigar Prices, I checked and everything was above-board and my wife truly won this random drawing. I, personally refrain from entering contests, I prefer to have contests. We figured we’d have another herf at the house to share some of the Psyko Seven Tubos, but I guess it wasn’t a great night to do it as we had one guest, my friend Mike, who is a local reader and I met because he won one of the days of last year’s 12 Spectacular Days of Cigar Giveaways. To those who couldn’t make it, we missed you. Mike and I spent a couple of hours enjoying these fine cigars from Ventura Cigar Company, made at the Kelner Boutique factory in the Dominican Republic. These are wrapped in a Dominican wrapper, and they boast a six country blend, including Peruvian and Pennsylvanian tobaccos, as well as Mexican, Honduran and Nicaraguan. I found this to be a nice, mild, complex cigar, with a nice burn. It was a very nice smoke. Mike had this to say: “I enjoyed this cigar! The Psyko Seven Toro Tubo was the perfect cigar for a two-hour conversation with Craig. It was a well-made, even-burning mild stick that offered some nice, sweet flavors, while not getting in my face with too much power. While I did not pick up on any specific and easily identifiable flavors, I did like the overall taste and smoked it down to the nub. Would definitely smoke another one!” It was a tasty cigar, made better by good company. Thanks to the folks at Best Cigar Prices for the contest, Mike for joining me, and my wife for winning and sharing the cigars and humidor with me!

I felt a theme week with the Psyko Sevens, so I had an Asylum Premium short torpedo that was in the humidor for a while and was very good. I actually couldn’t find this size listed anywhere, so maybe I’ve had it in the humidor for a couple years. Monday I went with another Asylum, the Famous Smoke Shop Exclusive Asylum Lobotomy in the toro size. I really enjoy this cigar, it’s on the stronger side, and loaded with deep, dark, lush flavor. Nicely priced under $5 too. I went Psyko again last night with the Psyko Seven MADuro in the robusto size. This is another Kelner made cigar with a San Andrés wrapper. Fantastic smoke with the same filler blend as the natural version, and equally as complex, with more power and sweetness. Tonight I went nuts with an Asylum Straight Jacket, the top of the line Asylum. I won an auction for a box (10) of these a few years back, and haven’t smoked one in a while. I forgot how really great these cigar are. Really good tasting, and good to a very small nub. Its a shame these were robustos as I was sad when it started to burn my fingers.

It was a crazy week, and I smoked some insanely good cigars. I wonder what I should smoke for the rest of the week? Until the next time,

CigarCraig

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Tagged as Asylum, cigar, cigars, Lobotomy, Psyko Seven, Straight Jacket

by CigarCraig | February 28, 2016 · 10:10 am

An Asylum and a La Gloria Cubana from Famous, Along With Some Other Cigars

The problem with taking Wednesdays off is that I have to decide which of the cigars I’ve smoked during the week to talk about on Sunday. The reason I skipped my midweek post was that I had a Prime Living magazine article deadline, and I wanted to get that taken care of. I have a calendar of the due dates for the rest f the year, let’s see if I can use that to plan ahead so I’m not waiting until the last minute every time! I think it’s been about two years that I’ve been writing the Cigar Notes feature in Prime Living, it’s still crazy to me when I see my name in the byline. I did smoke some really interesting cigar this week, I’m going to touch on these four briefly.

First off I smoked a Swag SoBe Lavish, which is a robusto from Boutique Blends. This was part of the Cigar Authority Care Package and I smoked it while listening to the show in podcast form. This cigar really surprised me in that it had distinctive flavor, I want to say it was like a green tea maybe, and I tasted it for hours after I was done. I’ll be looking for more of these. Yesterday I took a long walk with what I believe to have been a Perdomo 20th Anniversary Sun Grown Churchill, I didn’t take any measurements, but I swear it was larger at the foot than the head. I know it wasn’t a torpedo because Perdomo torps are pretty distinctive in their pointyness. For you cigar walkers, this size is good for five miles. Very tasty, but I prefer the Maduro in this line. The Cohiba Luxury Edition is a stupidly expensive cigar, I can’t imagine dropping $38 on one cigar, but it was an exceptional example of cigar making and blending, and it was very good. This was the subject of my Prime Living piece, so you’ll have to wait until the May/June issue drops to read more about this. Finally, and these were in no particular order by the way, there was one day this week that I was in the mood for an Epic Maduro, so I grabbed a Double Corona, which is really a gordo, for my evening walk. This line is rising to the top of my go-to list, and it takes quite a bit of will power not to just grab one the few of these I have on hand every day. These are frickin delicious and Dean Parsons is a really cool dude. There were others, but these were the ones I had some thoughts on off the top of my head.

A couple of weeks back I received some cigars from Famous Smoke Shop, cigars that are made exclusively for them. One of them was the Asylum Lobotomy in the toro size. Thank goodness they didn’t send the 770, that’s too darned large for winter smoking, shivering knocks the ash everywhere! These are a value priced take on the Asylum line, with a Maduro Nicaraguan Habano wrapper. This is a really nice cigar for under $5 if you like a strong, bold flavored cigar that has enough changes to keep things interesting. The burn on the samples I smoked was pretty good, I had to touch up a few times, but aging will certainly fix this. I imagine these will age well too, although they are good pretty much off the truck. These come in the toro, 770 Double Toro (6×60) and a 4×44 “corona”, so there’s something for everyone. I half expected this to be a lot stronger than it was given the name.

The other new offering in Famous’ exclusives line is from La Gloria Cubana. This is a take on the Serie R line, called the La Gloria Cubana Serie RF (I’m guessing the “F” is for Famous…ya think?). As much as I love just about all things La Gloria Cubana, I haven’t had the greatest experiences with the regular Serie R line. These were really one of the first large ring gauge cigars back in the early 2000s, and I really wanted to like them, but they always came up short for me. I love the Serie R Esteli, and to a lesser extent the Serie R Black (I find the Brick and Mortar exclusive Esteli a bit richer than the catalog/internet exclusive Black). So I went into the Serie RF with a cautious optimism. I smoked the No. 13, which is a 5½x54 robusto. The blend is a Ecuador Habano wrapper, Connecticut Havano binder and Dominican and Nicaraguan fillers. I need to smoke some more of these, because I really enjoyed the crap put of the one I smoked. It was smooth, sweet and full of flavor. These are a priced in the mid $8 range, but worth it, in my opinion.

That’s all I can manage this morning. It’s supposed to be a beautiful day, so I need to get something done around here, including getting a nice, long cigar walk in. Until the next time,

CigarCraig