Tag Archives: Emilio

by CigarCraig | June 10, 2012 · 9:39 am

It’s Been a Long Week: J.Fuego, Partagas, My Own Blend, News, and a Contest Winner!

I had a long week! I worked at my second job last weekend, went to a one year old’s birthday party, we went to NYC on Tuesday, and my youngest son graduated from high school Friday night. I still managed to get a few cigars in though!

Going way back to Sunday, I sat down that afternoon with a J. Fuego 777 Zero robusto. Jesus gave me this cigar at the IPCPR show last year, and I’ve been looking forward to smoking it. I’ve really enjoyed the maduro and Corojo in the 777 line, so I was sure I’d like this one. Visually, the cigar is stunning. The wrapper is flawless and the triple cap was very prominent, a certain sign that it was the work of a skilled torcedor. I loved this cigar. Like many Ecuador Connecticut wrapped cigars these days, it leaned more to the side of medium than mild. As I suspected, it burned beautifully and was a perfect smoke for a fine Sunday afternoon after coming home from the birthday party. I can highly recommend the entire 777 line, give them a try.

I dug into the samples of the new Partagas 1845 cigars this week. these arrived just after Memorial Day, so I wanted to let them rest a little after spending the long weekend in the hands of the USPS. I couldn’t resist any longer and selected the robusto, which measures 5½ x 49, as it does in the regular Partagas line. I like the size quite a bit. A quick aside: the Partagas 1845 website is well done. It presents all the information, sizes, blend information, bios of the team, very well done. I was critical of the CAO website and was told it was a work in progress, but they still don’t have any size information and they should take a look at their sister site for some inspiration! The cigar is well done also. It’s a solid, satisfying medium smoke with loads of flavor. It’s reminiscent of the Partagas line, with a little something extra. A fine smoke and I look forward to working through the rest of the sizes.

Friday evening was my son’s graduation ceremony, and before we left I had time for a special smoke. I selected one of the cigars I blended on my Cigar Safari trip last March. I’ve smoked a couple of these and been really happy. For those who don’t recall, the blend was a Mexican Oscuro wrapper Indonesian binder, seco from both Esteli and Dominican Republic, half a leaf of Esteli ligero and filled it out with Brazilian Mata Fina viso. The size is 5×44, and they were rolled by the team that rolls that Liga Privadas. The construction was perfect, the flavor was dark and delicious and it was the perfect cigar to celebrate the end of an era, our participation in the public school system!

Yesterday I went back to Partagas, but this time it was a Partagas Black Magnifico. This is a big, ugly cigar, but boy, is it good! I love the Connecticut broadleaf wrapper, great smoke. I sat on my front porch for nearly 2 hours enjoying this cigar. I can’t actually recall a Partagas cigar I didn’t like, from either manufacturer, they all bring something a little special to the table. It’s an iconic brand, it’s usually reasonably priced and readily available.

News

I’ve received a ton of press releases this week, and everyone else has gotten them published, so here’s a little recap:

CAO Cigars and Two Foot Fred to Rock CMA Music Festival – TheCigarmy.com

Butthead’s Tobacco Presents a Virtual Cigar Workshop – Cigar-Coop.com

Dona Flor Cigars Reaady To Unveil Its “BRAZILIAN BLACK TREASURE” To The U.S. Market – ACigarSmoker.com

Emilio Cigars Upcoming Releases – Halfwheel.com

Thanks to all of my fellow bloggers for taking care of this so I don’t have to! 🙂

Contest!

Today is the day we announce the winner of the contest. The winner will receive a signed copy of the book “Once Upon a Time in Cuba” , by Mitchell Orchant and Micheal Mirecki. I’ll, no doubt, include some other goodies with the book as well. I return to Random.org to select a number between 1 and 31. The number is 28, which corresponds to the 28th comment which was made by “Tonbofrogman”. Please e-mail me your address so I can get this out to you! Thanks to Mitchell for contributing this great prize and for his support and kindness!

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

CigarCraig

2 Comments

Filed under Contest, News, Review

Tagged as 1845, 777, broadleaf, c-gars ltd, CAO, cigar, Cigar Safari, cigars, Contest, drew estate, Emilio, IPCPR, J. Fuego, Partagas

by CigarCraig | May 13, 2012 · 8:28 am

A Visit To Classic Cigar Parlor, an Emilio a NicaHabana and a J.C. Newman

Saturday was an absolutely stunning spring day, barely a cloud in the sky, and temps in the mid 70s. My wife had an event that she wanted to attend with one of her clients, the grand opening of Brad’s Raw Foods new facility in Pipersville, PA. Neither my wife nor I are vegetarian/vegan/raw food people, but we like to try things now and then, and I must admit I like Brad’s Leafy Kale chips to snack on from time to time, weird as it sounds. Anyway, that’s all beside the point. I dropped my wife off and back-tracked a couple miles to Doylestown, PA, where I had stumbled across the Classic Cigar Parlor last year. I wanted to get back to this shop and hang out and have a cigar, and this turned out to be the ideal opportunity. The shop is reasonably small, but it’s in the second oldest building in Doylestown, dating back to the 1700s. There are cabinet humidors lining the walls, and behind the counter is the original colonial style fireplace, and the ceiling has massive open beams. It’s a cool looking place. They have a hookah lounge upstairs, that I didn’t visit, as I just wanted to pick up a couple cigars and have a smoke. Frank was working in the store and was a pleasure to spend an hour or so chatting with. I shopped around a bit and decided to pick up a few Grimalkin toros, as I gave away my last Grimalkins a few months ago, and as I’m checking out, I see he last couple cigars in an Emilio AF1 box on the counter clearance priced at $5.00 each. Temptation got the best of me, and I had to buy them all. I fired up one of the AF1 toros and had a seat, enjoying the cigar, as well as talking with Frank and watching what the customers were purchasing. The Emilio AF1 is a favorite of mine, rich, dark and delicious! As I lit it I almost thought I was making a mistake, smoking this cigar in the afternoon, on a relatively empty stomach, but it turned out fine. It’s a nice, strong cigar, but not overwhelming. I did have to hold my tongue at one point, hearing Frank tell a customer who said he smoked Cohibas that they had the “original Cohiba family’s cigars that are involved in a trademark dispute” and showed him a box of Dominican, yellow band “Cohibas”. Can someone please introduce me to someone named “Cohiba”, or, better yet, show me a pre-embargo Cohiba? The word “cohiba” comes from the Taino Indian term for tobacco that Columbus heard them using 500 years ago, and the Dominican yellow band “Cohibas” have been a knock-off that General Cigar has been fighting with for, I’d guess, 15 years or more, and I’m surprised these still make it onto tobacconist’s shelves. I suppose I shouldn’t complain about a cigar I’ve never smoked, but I just don’t like to hear mis-information like that. In retrospect I should have tried to educate Frank after the customer left, but I’ve tried to do that in the past and it didn’t end as well as I had hoped. Still a nice visit to a cool little shop.

Earlier in the day we had met my brother-in-law for breakfast and he had just returned from a trip to Tampa, and gifted me a Robusto from Nicahabana Cigars. From what I gather from their website, they roll cigars on site, not unlike Cigar Factory New Orleans, and have a wide range of sizes and blends. This cigar was a pretty thing, with a nice, dark, oily wrapper. I probably should have let it rest in my humidor for a few weeks, but I impatiently fired it up. It was a beautiful evening and I just wanted to sit on my front porch and enjoy a cigar. Enjoy I did, although the wrapper turned out to be very fragile in the middle of the cigar and flaked away in spots. Still, the flavor had a nice zing and was pretty strong in flavor. It was rich and satisfying. Thanks to Jeff for thinking of me on his trip, it’s always fun to try a new cigar. Along the same lines, earlier in the week I had smoked another unbanded Nicaraguan maduro robusto that I picked up at my local shop, JM Cigars in Exton, PA. He had these enormous 100 count chests of cigars that I had never seen before, and Jeff, the owner, told me that they were made by J.C. Newman. It was a nice cigar, very well made and even flavored. For $3.75 it was a very nice cigar, and he said he’d been selling them like crazy.

That’s all for now, happy Mother’s Day. If you aren’t one, you probably have or had one, so do something special for one today!

Until the next time,

CigarCraig

1 Comment

Filed under Review, Stores

Tagged as af1, cigar, cigar store, cigars, Emilio, Grimalkin, JC Newman, JM Cigars, Nicahabana

by CigarCraig | April 22, 2012 · 10:36 am

An Emilio Draig K, a Diamondback, and a San Lotano

Thursday had turned into a stressful day, and when my wife suggested a walk into town, I knew I wanted a terrific cigar to take along. So many choices, so I came across a pre-release sample of the new cigar from Emilio Cigars and Gary Griffith, the Draig K. This dark, oily toro just looked like it was the cigar I was looking for. I had actually just about settled on a Liga Privada T52 when I was distracted by the Draig. Made in the Placencia factory, the only details I recall are that it features some Colombian tobacco in the filler. I love a maduro, and I loved this cigar. It was exactly the rich, satisfying smoking experience I had hoped for. There were a couple points where it stopped wanting to burn and needed a relight, and there was a small tunnel about 4 inches in, but the flavor and texture of the smoke kept me relighting it down to a ¾” nub. Yummy cigar. Yet another cigar I’m going to have to get my hands on when they hit the streets! Thank you, Gary, for the opportunity to sample this fine cigar.

Friday night finally rolled around and I was in an experimental mood, so I reached for the IPCPR show sample of the Diamondback robusto from Altadis. First, from the department of cynicism, one can’t help but draw a comparison between this cigar and another 5″ x 54 shade wrapped cigar with “diamond” in it’s name. Pre-conceived notions aside, this was a very nice cigar. It was solidly constructed, burned even and cut cleanly. If you like shade wrapped cigars, you may want to try these out, considering you can get them by the box for under $50. Not a bad cigar at all. My only complaint was that the draw was a little tighter than I’d prefer, making me have to work a little harder than I’d like.

Saturday was another beautiful spring day. Showers were in the forecast for later, so I hit the back deck with a San Lotano Maduro lancero. I’ve very much enjoyed past San Lotano maduros, so expectations were high, as I love lancero format as well. This was a terrific cigar, although comparing it with its fatter brethren is a little unfair. Certainly, smoking the lancero is a little different experience, one cannot expect the same flavors as a toro or robusto due to the difference in the filler proportions. Where I find the larger ring gauges in this line to be rich and creamy like smoking a chocolate bar, the lancero was more like bittersweet chocolate. In no way do I mean to imply that this is a bad thing, as the lancero was a fantastic smoke. I spent nearly 2 hours nursing every last bit of tasty smoke from it, awfully sad to put it down when it decided it’s time had come. I had picked this up several months ago when I visited Gary Griffith at his People’s Plaza Cigar-ette City store.

News

I’m sure most of you have already done this, but if you haven’t, please head over the the White House website and sign the petition that’s there. Here’s a terrific video from Bill Spann outlining the importance of this fight to keep the FDA out of our humidors.

httpv://youtu.be/7bfqIFGu9WM

It looks like there should be no problem getting to 25,000 signatures, but I think we often over-estimate the number of internet cigar nuts out there. If cigar smokers are a small subset of the general population, and PREMIUM cigar smokers represent a very small subset of those, then those of us who carry our passion for cigars onto the internet are a VERY small part. It’s important to spread the word and get others on board with this. It will not be a happy day if the FDA is allowed to regulate premium cigars!

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

CigarCraig

1 Comment

Filed under Editorial, News, Review, Take a Cigar For a Walk

Tagged as altadis, cigar, cigar rights, cigar store, cigars, CRA, Diamondback, Draig, Emilio, IPCPR, lancero, maduro, san lotano, Take A Cigar For A Walk

by CigarCraig | March 4, 2012 · 3:13 pm

A.Fuente, an Emilio and a Sunday Morning Camacho Cigar with Family

Thursday evening I found myself on the phone with Verizon support. I had been fighting with them about the upstairs TVs that we were initially promised would work without a box, only to find that we needed a special box. Not that $4 a month is a lot for the box, but it was the principle of it, and they figured out a way to give me a box for free so we could have more than one TV in the house again. I had to call to get the box activated, and had been looking forward to an evening cigar. After several minutes listening to the planet’s worst hold music, I decided to grab a cigar and wait on the porch for them to pick up. I grabbed an Arturo Fuente Hemingway Best Seller, put the phone on speaker and fired it up. I’ve long been a fan of the Hemingway line, at least from the Signature down, as anything larger just doesn’t do it for me for some reason. I would have preferred a Short Story, since I didn’t know how long I’d have, but I didn’t have any on hand. The Best Seller is a great cigar. I love the “Camerooniness” of the line, that wrapper really really is delicious on these. It’s not too cheap of a cigar, but I had picked a few of these up last year with a Groupon for half off, so they weren’t too bad. I got about half way through before the representative picked up and I went inside to get squared away, which did eventually happen. I went back out and re-lit the cigar, but I didn’t get to smoke as much of it as I’d have liked. Still, a terrific way to temper the frustration of having to deal with phone support. I really think they want you to hang up, but I wasn’t giving them the satisfaction!

Friday evening’s walk called for a good smoke, so I grabbed an Emilio AF2 BMF and my elder son and I hit the bricks (concrete mostly, but actual bricks in a few places…it’s just an expression!). I had picked a few of these up at my local shop a few months back. Needless to say, this is a solid cigar, and sizable at 6″ x 58, truly a big MF! I find this to be milder than the AF1, but loaded with flavor, a little sweet, and delicious. I blame myself for this, but it’s a much better warm weather cigar than cold, but that’s my problem. I wanted to smoke it, and the colder weather wasn’t going to deter me. Still a solid smoke, highly recommended by me for whatever that’s worth!

I had picked up an odd cigar at my local shop, JM Cigars in Exton. It was labeled with the shop owners name, and I was told that it was made by Rocky Patel (but I bought one anyway!). This was a 6½” x 48 cigar, with what looked like a dark Habano wrapper. Unfortunately, it burned a little crappy and was pretty ho-hum in flavor to me. I don’t smoke a lot of RP cigars anyway, as they don’t really suit my palate for whatever reason. Maybe I don’t smoke the right ones, maybe the breadth of his lines confuses me and is a pit of a turn off, I don’t know. I still like to try peoples house or personal blends, and this experience won’t stop me from picking up the occasional oddball cigar when I see one. I was told at the shop that this batch wasn’t as good as the first batch, but just because I didn’t care for it doesn’t mean that it isn’t someones favorite cigar, and for around $4 it was worth trying.

Sunday morning my wife, youngest son and I went out to breakfast with my brother-in-law, who was in town visiting. My son, Christian, recently turned 18 and has been enjoying the occasional cigar, sometimes with me, sometimes with his friends. As can be expected from someone in his demographic, he’s been digging the Acid line, trying a few here and there. So Christian, my Bro-in-law Jeff and I stopped at JM Cigars for a post breakfast digestif. Jeff had asked me to recommend an inexpensive daily smoke a while back and I told him to try the National Brand robustos from Camacho, which he loves (and he’s from New Jersey, so he gets a real good deal purchasing in PA because of the taxes). I wanted something all three of us would appreciate so I grabbed a handful of Camacho Habana Monarcas. I’ve loved this line for years, and haven’t had one in forever. Even though I typically don’t care for Criollo wrapped cigars, this one works really well, I thoroughly enjoyed it from start to finish. The cigar is light enough for the novice and has enough flavor and body for someone who has a cigar or two a day or a long-time cigar nut like myself. It was nice to sit in the lounge and chat for a while. Myson and his uncle share the rock climbing gene, so they have a lot in common, and Jeff and I are roughly the same age and have known one another for 26 or so years, so the three of us, despite the disparity of ages, were able to have a nice, relaxing hour or so with a fine cigar and one-another’s company. It also went a long way toward aiding in the digestion of an over-indulgent breakfast!

News

The annual Habanos Festival just ended, and I wasn’t there. I did notice an interesting press release about the lots in the auction that is held every year. Looks like a nice box, but the price is a little steep for me!

Cohiba Cigar Humidor Sold for 475,500 USD, Equipped With Microprocessor-Controlled Adorini Humidifiers.

Humidor bought by Italian entrepreneur at 14th Habanos Festival in Cuba. The humidor comes with microprocessor controlled adorini humidifiers, 520 Cohiba cigars, and remote-controlled hydraulic system to open the humidor.

Why the heck you’d need to open your humidor from across the room is beyond me, but it sure sounds cool! I guess you have to let those 520 Cohibas living inside get a breath of fresh air once in a while.

Anyway, that’s it for today, until the next time,

CigarCraig

2 Comments

Filed under Review, Stores, Take a Cigar For a Walk

Tagged as af2, Camacho, cigar, cigar store, cigars, Emilio, fuente, habana, Habanos, Hemingway, JR Cigars, Monarca, rocky patel, Take A Cigar For A Walk

by CigarCraig | February 8, 2012 · 7:02 pm

The Grimalkin Contest Winner Announcement, Maria Mancini and a Hoyo de Monterrey Cigars

I haven’t really smoked anything unusual this week, opting instead for some old favorites. One of those was a Maria Mancini Robusto Larga from a couple of five-packs I picked up on a visit to JR Cigars in Whippany, NJ. Anyone who has been following me for any period of time will know that this is a stand bye for me, if not this particular size, the marque in general. I’ve had some of these in my humidor at all times since my first purchase of them in 1999. They remain consistent, usually burn well, and almost always taste great. For a cigar that runs under $3, this is fairly remarkable. The Maria Mancini won Cigar Journal‘s award for Best Value Honduran cigar at their award ceremony in Vegas at the IPCPR show last summer. Great cigars for a little money.

Last night I need something small to just last me the mile or so walk to the convenience store and back. I grabbed one of my favorite winter walk smokes, a Hoyo de Monterrey Sabroso Maduro. This 5″x 40 petite corona fit the bill, loads of deep, dark flavor, well made, and just about the right size. Again, this is not an expensive cigar, a couple bucks each by the box. It may not be the most refined cigar, but on a cold winters night, hoofing it to the store, it satisfies. It was a toss up between this and a Chateau Real Small Club maduro, which I really like, but are becoming quite rare.

Contest!

On to what you’ve been waiting for, the announcement of the winner of these super cool Grimalkin mugs, a Grimalkin robusto, and whatever else happens to fall into the box when I pack it up! As usual, I’ve assigned a number to each comment based upon how they appear on the post, and utilized the Random Number Generator at Random.org. The winner is comment number 9, which corresponds to George Satterfield! Congrats George! Please send me your contact info so I can ship these goodies to you! Many thanks to Gary Griffith for supplying these cool mugs, and making great cigars! Stay tuned, you never know when the next contest might pop up!