I’ve smoked a couple of La Gloria Cubana Serie R Esteli No. 54 and, for me, it’s a winner. It was exactly what I was looking for Sunday afternoon in the pool. Of course, I’m a La Gloria fan, heck, I’ve dedicated the Adorini Cedro Deluxe humidor I got from Humidor Discount to the brand (OK, I may put a cigar in there for a while when I’m too lazy to put it in the proper humidor…there’s that CDO again!). I always seem to have a collection of “LGCs” of various lines, shapes and sizes. Anyway, this new addition to the Serie R line is the first La Gloria Cubana made in Nicaragua. The Serie N, which I also enjoyed, is made in the Dominican Republic with Nicaraguan tobaccos. The Serie R Esteli is a dark, cocoa/coffee beauty with a hint of sweetness. The Esteli is a Brick and Mortar exclusive, however they also released the Serie R Black which is an online exclusive. I look forward to trying that one too, and they are all fairly priced. Good stuff.
Sunday evening I grabbed a La Zona robusto I had bought a few weeks ago for a very reasonable sub-$5 price. This is made by Erik Espinosa in his La Zona factory in Esteli, and has a Nicaraguan grown Habano wrapper. It was a great tasting cigar, although the burn meandered a bit. For the price these are hard to beat. It was medium bodied and full of flavor, well worth the money and something to have on hand for sure. Sadly, every time I went by the Espinosa booth at the trade show it was busy. This cigar comes in a Connecticut version too.
Contests
Want a chance to win some cigars? I’m not giving them away this time, but head over to The Hoyo de Monterrey website and check out the contest they are running. The Hoyo Rothschild is a solid smoke in my book, I’ve smoked plenty of them, but haven’t had one in quite a while. I don’t know how they pair with beer, but they go great with a nice premium root beer or ginger brew! They are giving away a box a week, so head over and enter!
BACON!
Want a chance to win something from my site again? My good friend Bruce makes these awesome Bacon Jams, and he gave me a tasting sampler to give away to one of you lucky readers. Yes, I said Bacon. Bacon, bacon, bacon! Spread some on your ham sandwich if you want, everything goes with bacon! They have a Kickstarter campaign running right now to get this product to market. The website is www.TheBaconJams.com. Leave a comment for a chance to win a sampler of the Original, Red Chile and Garlic and Black Pepper and Honey flavors and I’ll pick a winner on Sunday! These are high quality Bacon Preserves that are awful good, they’d have to be right? They’re made with bacon! Leave a comment here to enter.
Monday night we went out to dinner with Bruce, of The Bacon Jams fame, and his wife, and afterwards retired to our deck for cigars afterward. Bruce very generously gifted me a Partagas Culebra from the ‘90s. Oddly, I’ve never smoked a culebra, I got my 24 year old son to join us and the three of us fired these bad boys up. I enjoy the Havana Partagas line quite a bit, and this was an excellent example of the fine flavors found in the brand. It burned as straight as a bent up, crooked cigar could be expected to, and the draw was perfect. These are awful neat cigars to share with two friends. It was a great smoking experience with great company.
Another IPCPR show release I smoked a few of this week was the CAO Flathead 554 Camshaft, the most recent of which I enjoyed Tuesday night. This cigar is square pressed and has a flat head. If you’ve ever noticed, just about every cigar made by General Cigar Company has a round head. It’s one of their hallmarks, this flat headed Flat Head is unique. The first one I smoked I tried to V-cut, which didn’t work out very well. The cap popped off completely when I cut it, which I’ve heard reported by others. The second example I used my Screwpop™ Cigar Punch, which has about a 7 millimeter diameter. This worked perfectly and provided a perfect draw and everything stayed where it belonged. 
This is a dark and rich smoke with some strength to it. I like it. I really look forward to trying the rest of the sizes in the line, as the smaller sizes were blended for strength and the larger sizes (maybe the 7”x70 is a little big, but the box press should make it feel more manageable) were blended for flavor. An odd approach, but Ricky Rodriguez and his staff are creative guys and I’m impressed with this Camshaft size. The packaging is really quite neat too.
Well, I was all over the place this week. Lots packed into this post. It’s time to find a cigar to celebrate the last couple hours in my 40s, perhaps something with a 49 ring gauge would be appropriate. I’ll smoke something with a 50 ring tomorrow.
Until the next time,
CigarCraig
