Tag Archives: connecticut

by | May 16, 2012 · 6:09 pm

Three Cigars: An E Doble, a Casa de Ortez and an Avo LE12

Sunday afternoon was beautiful, and after over-indulging at a Mother’s Day brunch with my family, I sat down with a E Doble robusto courtesy of the folks at Smoke Inn. This reasonably priced robusto is made by Eric Espinosa of EO Brands fame exclusively for Smoke Inn. The cigar is a nice looking 5″ x 50 Nicaraguan puro, and starts out nice and spicy. I enjoyed it quite a bit, at under $4 each it isn’t a bad buy. I think if I were presented with a choice of this cigar or something else in the same price range, this one would be a satisfying choice. It was strong without being too strong and well made. It was a very nice cigar, I look forward to smoking another one.

 

I was feeling adventurous again Monday evening and came across a pair of Casa de Ortez robustos from the Altadis booth at last year’s IPCPR show. There was one with a Connecticut wrapper and one with a Ecuador Cubano wrapper, both of which looked very much alike. I chose the Connecticut, as that’s what I was in the mood for, and headed to the front porch. I really enjoyed this cigar. It burned well and had a pleasing flavor. I suspect it’s mixed filler, though, as I was constantly picking little tobacco bits out of my mouth. I did some research after smoking this and was surprised to find these sold in bundles for ridiculously low prices (in the under $25 range!). Certainly better than many bundled “sandwich” cigars in that price range and one that I’d smoke again. I’m now looking forward to trying the other wrapper.

 

Tuesday I felt like going in the completely opposite direction of the Casa de Ortez. I had been given an Avo LE12 La Trompeta by Tom Smith, our local Davidoff rep a few weeks ago and had been looking forward to smoking it. If I’ve smoked an Avo before, it’s been a very long time, and it wouldn’t have been one of his special annual releases like this one. This cigar was made to celebrate Avo’s 86th birthday, and is a pyramid shape with a lovely Habano wrapper adorned with three dots punched from Connecticut shade leaf to represent the valves on a trumpet. It’s a really cool presentation and it’s not an inexpensive cigar. It was OK. It didn’t burn particularly well, and, to my tastes, was really nothing spectacular. Perhaps my expectations were too high, or, more likely, it just wasn’t suited to my tastes, but I was disappointed by it. I certainly am glad that I had the opportunity to smoke this cigar. It relieves me of any desire to run out and spend a lot of money on these in the future. I has a similar experience with the Perdomo Champagne, I was expecting to be “wow’d” and wasn’t. This is why there are so many different cigars!. Just because I didn’t like the cigar doesn’t mean someone else won’t think it’s fantastic. The burn issues I had could easily be attributed to the damp, rainy evening.

 

What does that say about my tastes? Two budget cigars that I enjoyed more than a super premium? I admit, there are a ton of very reasonably priced cigars that I enjoy quite a bit, but there are plenty premium priced cigars that I love, I just don’t love them very often! I’m also a cheap bastard, I would sooner buy five National Brand Maduro robustos with the $10 it would cost to buy many super premium cigars.  I think I’ll go find something to smoke now, should I get something cheap and reliable or find a  rare, pricey cigar and risk disappointment?

 

Until the next time,

CigarCraig

 

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by | May 6, 2012 · 10:38 am

Brun Del Rè Cigars, a La Palina Cigar and a Little Rant

I was feeling adventurous again this week and reached for a Brun Del Rè Premium Robusto from last year’s IPCPR.  I had smoked a sample from their Don Corazza line a while ago and wasn’t very impressed.  I fell victim to one of  the classic blunders – The most famous of which is “never get involved in a land war in Asia”  but only slightly less well-known is this: “Never judge a cigar line based upon a single sample”. Based upon that one sample, I had been hesitant to invest my valuable cigar time in what might have been just another ho-hum, run of the mill trade show sample.   However, my faith has been restored with this cigar.  It was a beautiful Ecuador Connecticut shade wrapped 5″ x 50 robusto stuffed with Nicaraguan filer and made in Costa Rica .  It was well made, had a nice sweet flavor and was on the medium end of mild.  I’m very much looking forward to sampling the rest of this line and even re-visiting the Don Corazza.  This cigar is worth a try in my opinion.

 

Took a long walk on Friday evening and needed a little heftier cigar, so I selected a recently received La Palina Toro.  If I get a mile and a half from home and realize I’ve got a dud cigar I’m very unhappy, so cigar selection in this case is critical.  Of course, I have the foresight to carry a back-up, either to smoke if I get a less than satisfying cigar experience, or to share along the way if the need arises.  With the La Palina, I know I won’t need the back-up. These cigars are always perfectly constructed, they are made in the Raices Cubanas factory in Honduras, the same factory that produces such excellent and consistent lines as Alec Bradley and Illusione (the later of which I’ve never had, but heard good things!).  The La Palina Toro is a rich and tasty smoke, although still pricey at $10 each.  It’s a premium smoke that has never failed to deliver in all of the sizes I’ve tried, but I think I like this size and the robusto the best. Thank you to La Palina for providing the samples, and for their support of this site.

 

A Little Rant

This is probably the wrong time to type this. I tend to be the most curmudgeonly on Sunday mornings after I’ve worked at my part time job until 3 am, but I feel the need to vent.  A couple things annoy me when reading/listening to my contemporaries in what I’ll hesitantly call the cigar media.  My first beef involves basic writing skills.  My dear friend Barry Stein made a bit of a joke about his typos, and it annoyed me but I get it.  He had a wildly successful site, did a great job, and it was a bit of an inside joke.  I read other sites (and I’m going to be a wuss and not name names) and I’m appalled.  I’m no writer, but I take what I do here pretty seriously and try to present readable content.  Punctuation, run on sentences, misspelling, I feel like I’m reading something a 5th grader wrote (with apologies to most 5th graders).  Seriously, word processor programs will at least tell you most of this stuff is wrong!  I don’t know how people can put their names on some of the stuff I see.  It’s a blog. It’s not twitter or texting. Please write coherently.  Another thing that rankles me is when I’m listening to a podcast, and I listen to a bunch, and the presenters get basic information wrong.  I’m far from an expert, but after more than a decade and a half of being a crazy cigar fool, I think I can pretty much tell a cigars size on sight, or at least come close.  I also think it’s irresponsible to get the price-point wrong about a cigar, especially to represent it as a much cheaper cigar than it actually is.  Really, as much time as it must take to produce such high quality podcasts, and as readily available as the information is in most cases, I think it sloppy to leave out these little details.  People must think I’m nuts when I’m in the car or out for a walk and start talking back to the podcast trying to correct them!  Anyway, it all comes down to details in both cases. If you don’t have the details, don’t make them up or guess while presenting yourself as an authority.  As I said, I neither think myself an authority, nor any kind of writer, but I try to get the details right as I feel it’s my responsibility. Thanks for listening, and please leave a comment if there’s something I do repeatedly that annoys you.

 

Sometime during the week I smoked a Berger and Argenti Mooch Schnorr that was really good.  I love the size of this cigar, (it’s  5″ x 50 but it seems more like a corona gorda for some reason) and the name always makes me smile as much as the excellent flavor and construction.  This is a reasonably priced, medium bodied cigar that I think can be enjoyed by many different types of smokers.  In all honesty, I probably wouldn’t have mentioned this cigar as I’ve mentioned it before, but I spent a lot of time on the photo of the cigar and didn’t want it to go to waste :-).

 

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

CigarCraig

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by | March 14, 2012 · 7:34 pm

A Para Japon, a La Gloria, a Gurkha, a Padilla and Some News

Sunday afternoon I was remembering a year ago walking into my room at Drew Estate Cigar Safari and seeing the news coverage of the terrible earthquake and tsunami in Japan.  I decided that the lone Para Japon I had in my humidor was the appropriate cigar to smoke.  I think nearly year’s age has done this cigar well, I enjoyed it quite a bit.  Thanks to Tony at CasasFumando.com for the opportunity to try these (and check out their contests currently under way to celebrate the 3rd anniversary of the site.  Keep up the good work, Tony and Daniel!).  The Para Japon was made by La Aurora with the proceeds benefiting the relief efforts in Japan.  I remember seeing a few boxes of these at Cigar-ette City in Newark, DE the last time I was there, so there may be some still in the marketplace. (late addition: Bonita Smoke Shop has them)

 

Monday I decided to walk to the shop to retrieve my car from it’s annual state inspection.  For those unfamiliar with the process, many states requite safety and emissions inspections every year in an effort to produce revenue for the state and the shops that are approved by the state to perform these inspections.  I manage to ease the financial impact a bit by having my cars inspected at the local Monro, which is attached to my local BJ’s Wholesale Club, where I work part time and get a healthy discount!  Ha! Anyway, the place is nearly three miles away, so a substantial cigar is in order for the walk.  I selected a Gurkha Cellar Reserve  Churchill, at 7″ x 54, due in part to it’s size, and the fact that my brother-in-law said that it was the best cigar he’d smoked out of a handful I had given him.  I had smoked one previously and it was pretty good, and this one was pretty good as well.  It certainly lasted to the shop, then back home for a good thirty minutes on the porch.  Burn was perfect, it could have been a little freer in the draw, but gave me nearly two hours of smoking time.  It was in the 60s and a beautiful evening for early March in PA.

 

Tuesday night I was visited by a high school buddy of mine and introduced him to taking a cigar for a walk.  Greg is a fellow cigar nut so I opened the box of La Gloria Cubana Artesanos Retro Especiale Cubano that I brought back from my visit to the DR and we fired them up.  This is another large cigar, 6½” x 58, with a golden Honduras/Connecticut wrapper.  These are a recent favorite and bring back a lot of fond memories of the trip where I smoked a fair amount of these.  It had been over a year since Greg and I last met up for a smoke, so we got caught up and enjoyed another terrific evening with temps around 70.  My wife teased me that it was a play date, but we just talked about mutual interests, cigars, drums, cycles, stuff like that.

 

As I’ve been typing this, I’ve been smoking a cigar that I picked up at Cigars International on Saturday.  I don’t think I’ve ever had a Padilla cigar, and the Habano Artisano intrigued me when I saw it on the shelf.  I have a hard time spending $8 on a cigar, what can I say…I’m cheap.  When I saw this cigar priced at $8 I wondered aloud how that can possibly make this for that price.  This perfecto shaped cigar starts out like any “barber pole” cigar, but they take it a step farther and adorn it with additional stripes of tobacco.  This has to be time consuming to do, and makes for a stunning presentation.  Much to my delight, it’s a delicious cigar!  It’s smooth, tasty and surprisingly even burning.  It’s nice, cool looking cigar, a fun smoke that’s tasty and satisfying!  The only complaint is that the ash is a little flakey.

 

In the News

News From the IPCPR and CRA:

Milestone Alert: IPCPR/CRA team achieves 160th co-sponsor for Traditional Cigar Manufacturing Small Business Jobs Preservation Act as Rep Jim Costa [CA-20] joins us!!

Sincerely,

Bill Spann, Chief Executive Officer, IPCPR

Please use the “Write to Congress” widget on the top left of this page and keep asking your elected officials to get behind these bills.  Our enjoyment of cigars depends upon the FDA not having regulatory control of premium cigars!

 

On a related note, I received this press release today:

Midwest Smoke Out partners with Cigar Rights of America for exceptional evening

March 13, 2012—Hammond, Ind.–Midwest Smoke Out and Cigar Rights of America (CRA) are partnering for an evening of luxury, gourmet foods, live entertainment—and of course, cigars— Thursday, April 19 from 5-10 p.m., minutes from Chicago at The Venue at Horseshoe Casino, in Hammond, Ind.Since Illinois legislation banned smoking in Chicago, Midwest Smoke Out (MSO) is the only exposition to give cigar aficionados an evening of cigars and indoor smoking. Every year, MSO provides a free one-year CRA membership or renewal with every ticket, meaning that in only a few hours, CRA gains over 1,000 members whose average income is more than $160,000. These new members are often opinion leaders in their communities.“We at Midwest Smoke Out are privileged to partner with Cigar Rights of America,” said Andrea Pearman, Creative Commander of Diversified Marketing Strategies, Inc., which organizes the event. “At a time when so many cigar smokers have to gather—literally—out in the cold, we’re happy not only to welcome them inside but also provide them with the luxury experience of the year.”With FDA regulation looming and states still legislating, MSO is a key event for CRA membership growth, though the evening isn’t all business. It’s pleasure, too, with ticket-holders having the opportunity to meet Lou Rodriguez of the eponymous cigars, Tony Gomez of La Flor Dominicana, Cigar Master Alejandro Turrent, Victor Vitale of the Cigar Agency and Clay Roberts of A.J. Fernandez. Cigar god Carlito Fuentes is scheduled to greet all ticketholders. MSO is for everyone who enjoys luxury, with attendees receiving deluxe giveaways, complimentary massages, experiencing the latest in gaming, being dazzled by live entertainment, and enjoying gourmet food, wine, beer and spirits.

For tickets (and your paid membership to CRA) contact event director Jo Sutton at jo@3dms.com or 1-888-226-0330. For more information, visitwww.midwestsmokeout.com, like on Facebook, connect on LinkedIn, or follow on Twitter at @MidwestSmokeOut
.

Join the Cigar Rights of America, write to your elected officials, and save the cigars!

 

That’s all I got, until the next time,

CigarCraig

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by | March 7, 2012 · 8:43 pm

A La Gloria Cubana, a CAO and a Murcielago – Cigar Weather is Returning!

We left off on Sunday having had a nice Camacho Havana with my son and brother-in-law, and it seemed like a 2 cigar day, so I selected a La Gloria Cubana Artesanos de Tabaqueros Rothschild that I got last December when I went up to Famous Smoke Shop in Easton, PA to hang out with Michael Giannini.  This was the version that starts our with a delicious Connecticut shade wrapper, then transitions to the Ecuador Sumatra wrapper.  These are tasty little buggers, and I like them.  This is a size that I believe is only available at their events, and it’s a shame, because it’s a great size and fit the time I had available perfectly.  This unusual presentation really highlights the effect the wrapper has on the flavor of a cigar.  I normally wait to remove the band, but with this one I took it off before I started, since it’s located so close to the foot.  Expertly crafted, perfect burn, great smoke!

 

Monday evening I grabbed a few year old CAO Brazilia Gol.  A few years back my wife got me several samplers of CAO cigars, and this is about the last of them.  Really nice, dark, oily, sweet Brazilian wrapper surrounding tasty Nicaraguan fillers.  There’s a handful of CAO cigars that I have enjoyed over the years, and this is one of them.  Smoked this to a finger-burning nub.  This one pre-dated the acquisition of CAO by General, but I’m sure that the current offerings are just as tasty, something I will explore the next time I see these in the shop.

 

Today we had temperatures in the 60s, making for a fine evening to smoke a cigar without gloves, cold toes or shivering.  It was a very pleasant night for a walk with a nice, big cigar.  A few months back I won a beautiful Griffin’s humidor from a Facebook contest that I either forgot, or didn’t realize I had entered.  This is a lovely box, and I recently loaded it up for convenient upstairs storage, mostly with gifts, samples or singles purchases.  I had pretty much been smoking out of the coolerdors for the last bunch of years, which are kept in the basement.  I’m now fortunate enough to have two gorgeous desktop humidors, the first of which my wife had made for me for our tenth wedding anniversary, and it holds all those “special” cigars and doesn’t get opened very often.  I’m rather enjoying going to this new humidor to pick a cigar, and will keep rotating singles out of the coolers for daily smoking.  Tonight I selected a Murcielago Toro Grande that was basically a gift from my amigo Barry Stein on the DR trip last October.  I had given Barry a Hoyo de Monterrey when he was without a cigar, and he later responded with this cigar.  It’s among my favorite maduro cigars.  I can’t think of a San Andreas Maduro wrapped cigar I don’t enjoy, and this one has all the components that I enjoy, a little bit of strength, sweet where it needs to be sweet, with a fine balance.  Perfectly made, a great cigar.  I know this is one of Eddie Ortega‘s favorites, which is the reason I so look forward to trying his new Serie D line.  The Murcielago is a cigar well worth sampling.

 

In the News

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Just for fun, here’s another clipping from the archives of the Philadelphia Inquirer.  This article is from the June 28, 1835 edition.  It’s not easy to read, so click on the image to make it a little bigger.  If only this attitude continued today!

 

 

 

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

 

CigarCraig

 

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by | February 29, 2012 · 7:18 pm

Macanudo, Partagas and CAO Cigars – Maduro Week

A few weeks ago I received some samples from General Cigar Co, including the new Macanudo and Macanudo Maduro Gigantes, measuring 6″x60. I’ve become a fan of the Macanudo maduros, sure they are a mild cigar, but they have a load of flavors that I like. When I was visiting the factory in Santiago last fall, by the 3rd day I had smoked so many cigars, and I lit up a Macanudo maduro and first, I could taste it, and second, it tasted good. I probably smoked nothing but the Mac Maduros for the rest of the day. So, I was excited to try the 6″x 60 Gigante. Many say that this format waters down the blends, but I haven’t really found that to be the case.  I admit to really enjoying the 60 ring cigars, I feel like it’s a guilty pleasure, but I haven’t really had a bad 60 ring cigar.  I’ve mentioned before that 50 ring feels puny now, a robusto feels like a quick smoke.  The Macanudo was a very tasty cigar that was good to the last drop and had the exceptional construction one would expect.

 

I sometimes get in a bit of a rut, and smoke a few related cigars in a row, and this was one of those weeks.  Monday’s cigar was a Partagas Black Label Magnifico.  This a jet black 6″x54 toro that I revisited in the DR, and remembered how much I enjoyed them.  The dark, Connecticut Broadleaf wrapper is oily and beautiful.  It is a bit stronger than the Macanudo, of course, but packed with flavor.  Of course it was perfectly made, as I witnessed first hand at the factory, they can’t seem to make a bad cigar there.  Partagas Black Label=yummy smoke!

 

Last night I was in the mood for something a little smaller, so I once again dug into the General Cigar Co. samples and picked out a CAO La Traviata Maduro Luminoso.  This is a newly released size in the Maduro line, measuring 4.5″ x 50.  I’ve smoked the La Traviata Maduro before and was quite unimpressed.  It was one of those cigars that everyone raved about, but I just didn’t get.  It seems like I had a dud (I think it was a trade show sample from a couple years ago), because this Rothschild was delicious.   It was just about the perfect size for my one-plus mile walk and held the ash for almost half of the cigar.  Another Connecticut Broadleaf, I know….I love that wrapper leaf, and combined with a Cameroon binder it was very surprising to me that I didn’t like the first ones I smoked.  This one’s back on my radar and one I’ll pick up the next time I see them.  I do have a complaint about the CAO website though.  It’s really slick, but one thing it lacks is a listing of the sizes of the cigars in each line.  If you want to know where the events are, it’s great, but if you’re looking for the sizes and names of the various cigars, one should be able to find it without having to go to retailers sites.  It’s a surprising omission, Rick? Ed?  Please feel free to comment on this and set me straight!

 

News

Once again, from the pages of history, this newspaper clipping appears in the October 18, 1838 Philadelphia Inquirer. It seems to be a mouthpiece for a cigar with a cotton filter.  Pretty cool to go back 175 years and see the new inventions of the times!  Obviously this modern development caught on in other areas of tobacco consumption, but when was the last time you saw a cigar holder or mouthpiece, let alone a filter?

 

That’s all I got!  Until the next time,

CigarCraig

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