Tag Archives: Inspirado

by Craig Vanderslice | April 30, 2023 · 9:44 am

Nomad, Cert Maith Bruscar, La Gloria Cubana and Macanudo Cigars

This week was challenging. I had a tooth pulled on Monday, and I’m not altogether sure that one or more of the medications I’m taking isn’t affecting my palate. Let’s start out with my pre-procedure cigar, a Nomad SA-17 Shorty, which is 4″ x 56. I’m unsure of the provenance of these cigars, they were a generous gift from a friend, and I want to say that they are pre-Ezra Zion because they have Fred’s twitter name on the band, but anecdotal evidence would suggest that they were recently purchased. If I recall, these were made at A.J. Fernandez’ factory, and has a San Andrés wrapper over Nicaraguan guts. Perhaps it’s a bit uncool to smoke a cigar right before going to the oral surgeon, like eating Oreos before going in for a cleaning, but it is what it is. I knew I was going to be taking a few days off from cigars, nobody wants dry socket! This is a great cigar, loads of earthy, coffee and cocoa flavors. Burn was perfect, and this little cigar lasts almost an hour. Many thanks to Phil for sharing these with me!

On to some new stuff! Like I said, after a couple days off cigars, and between an antibiotic and a rinse, my palate may be off, or maybe not! I tested this theory by smoking a cigar from Kevin at Trash Panda Cigars, the Cert Maith Bruscar. I hope Kevin made sure this name wasn’t already trademarked before using it! Cert Maith Bruscar is Gaelic for “Real Good Trash”, in keeping with the Trash Panda theme, and is an homage to Kevin’s probably 8th or 9th great grandfather, who came to the US in 1679 from Ireland, around the same time my ancestor came from The Netherlands. This is a Connecticut Broadleaf wrapper cigar that has a Cameroon binder and fillers from Nicaragua, Dominican Republic and US. I typically like the combination of Broadleaf and Cameroon, this is an interesting blend. The first time I smoked this my wife commented on the aroma, which she characterized as fruity. This is consistent with what I perceived as the dominant flavor, which I called citrus. I struggled to gut much else around the citric tang, it was a good cigar, performed well, and certainly was unique. I smoked a couple of these (before and after dental work) and had the same experience. On paper I’d expect this to be a cigar for me, in practice, while it was a good cigar, I’m just not sure about the dominant citrus flavor. This just might be me, as Kevin said he didn’t get that from this cigar.

New from Forged Cigars is the La Gloria Cubana Corojo de Oro. Last year they had the Criollo de Oro, with a hybrid of Criollo and Pelo de Oro tobaccos. This has a hybrid of Corojo and Pelo de Oro (I think that means “golden hair”, it’s a narrow leaf if I remember correctly from my visit to the Garcia’s farm in 2011). I’m much more a fan of Corojo than Criollo, and I liked the Corojo de Oro much more than the Criollo de Oro. This was a 6″ x 50 toro, with a Ecuador Habano wrapper, the hybrid tobacco as the binder, and Brazilian Mata Fina, Dominican Piloto and Nicaraguan Ometepe in the filler blend. I found this to be a well balanced cigar, with some sweet earth, and some spice. I’m not sure how many La Gloria Cubana marques there are now, I like a lot of them (the Serie S was a miss for me, and I love San Andrés), but it just seems like I don’t see many of them in stores.

Finally, I tried a new Macanudo Inspirado, the Tercio-aged. Tercio refers to the practice of wrapping the bales in palm bark to age as opposed to burlap. In this case, the Dominican Piloto Cubano filler component is aged in Tercio, while (because they mention that specifically and omit the rest), the San Andrés wrapper, Indonesian binder and Columbian fillers are aged in burlap bales. For me, this cigar was a great representation of the concept of body vs. strength. The flavors were very interesting, some baking spice, sweet earth (again) and some pepper spice. The smoke was very thin, not a lot of body, but the flavor was there. It was a little strange, and I’ll have to revisit this again. Maybe it was just me. I liked the cigar overall, might me my 4th favorite Inspirado (another line with a lot of extensions!).

That’s more than enough for me today. Next Sunday may be tricky, as we are taking a weekend road trip. Until the next time,

CigarCraig

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Tagged as Cert Maich Bruscar, cigar, cigars, Corojo, Inspirado, La Gloria Cubana, macanudo, Nomad, SA-17, Tercio, Trash Panda

by Craig Vanderslice | September 18, 2022 · 9:56 am

El Baton Cigars and a Macanudo Inspirado Jamao

I’m, once again, writing from the back porch while I enjoy a new Macanudo cigar. I’m desperately hanging on to summer! It’s technically the last weekend of summer, cigars are one of the coping mechanisms I have to avoid slipping into depression. I’ll stop whining about this eventually! I had a few cigars this week, one that I planned to feature today, but burned so badly it was a pain in the ass and I decided to see if I can get another to try. It’s a shame too, because I really was looking forward to the cigar. I did smoke two cigars last night that I wanted to talk about. J.C. Newman Cigars was kind enough to share a couple of the new El Baton Belicosos with me. This is a cigar that’s been around for a while, so I dug out one of the old ones and smoked both to compare. The Belicoso is 5″ x 56, with an Ecuador “Havana” wrapper, and Nicaraguan binder and fillers. These are supposed to retail in the $8-9 range, I want to say that they were more of a budget brand in previous iterations, but maybe this is the new budget range? I won’t begrudge them the price, as this new offering is really quite good. It has a pleasing flavor, not too mild, nor too strong, with some nice sweet wood and spice. I followed it with an older robusto. I can’t recall how long I’ve had this cigar, but it has to be close to 7 or 8 years. The old version was nowhere near as refined as the new. There were similarities, but, even after years in the humidor, there were rough edges. I might even say there were some “off” flavors, but it’s so hard to really judge a cigar when it’s the second cigar of the evening. It seems to me that the new version is far superior, and well worth the money.

I’m smoking the Macadudo Inspirado Jamao as I type. Clearly I’m not writing with the cigar, as another writer pointed out on my Instagram post. It was semantics, and I’m anti-semantic. This is something like the sixth cigar in the Inspirado line. I really like the White, Black, and Red, with the Green being pretty good and I never took a shine to the Orange. There’s another Connecticut in the lineup too, the Brazilian Shade, with was pretty good. This Jamao is pretty good, especially first thing in the morning. The wrapper is the interesting part, being a hybrid of Handuran (Jamatran) and Dominican (Mao) tobacco, a Habano varietal. It’s very good, but to my very basic palate, isn’t every distinctive. It’s a good tasting cigar, on my ranking of Inspirados it’s right above the Orange. I feel like the should have put “Jamao” on the band somewhere. Good smoke, don’t avoid trying it! Inspirados are generally reasonably priced. As I sit here smoking it, it’s definitely good way to start a Sunday.

That’s all for today, I hope we have a few more nice Sunday mornings before I have to get the heater out and close in the porch. Until the next time,

CigarCraig

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by Craig Vanderslice | June 22, 2022 · 7:11 am

News: Macanudo Inspirado Jamao Due Next Month

Here’s some news from Macanudo, another Inspirado line extension. I’ve been to General’s farm in Mao, it’s a beautiful place. I’ve never been to Honduras! It sounds like an interesting cigar!

The second limited-edition blend of Macanudo Inspirado will be released in July. Called “Jamao” the new expression gets its name from a proprietary wrapper grown on a network of fincas in the Northwestern Dominican Republic.

Macanudo’s team of agronomists has been experimenting with tobacco cultivation and seed acclimation in Mao, D.R. for decades. There, in the Cibao Valley, the agronomists also work with a collective of independent local growers to cultivate and cure experimental tobaccos. With Macanudo Inspirado Jamao, one such sungrown tobacco is being brought to life as a wrapper.

“For this limited edition expression of Macanudo Inspirado, we acclimated a Habano seed varietal from Jamastran, Honduras to Mao, DR and ultimately produced a beautiful wrapper. To honor the many people who worked hard to produce this wrapper for the first time, we named the release ‘Jamao’ which represents the blending of Jamastran and Mao,” said Jhonys Diaz, General Cigar’s senior vice president of leaf operations.

The wrapper was selected as the most prominent aspect of the blend’s profile. A masterful composition of tobaccos that includes a Honduran binder and fillers from Honduras, Nicaragua and the Dominican Republic together enhance the wrapper to create a medium-bodied smoking experience that is rich, creamy and dimensional, with herbal, woody, and salty notes.

Handcrafted at General Cigar Dominicana in Santiago, DR, Macanudo Inspirado Jamao will ship to retailers in July. A total of 2,300 boxes, each containing 20 cigars, will be released exclusively in the U.S.

Macanudo Inspirado Jamao Toro (5.75” x 52); SRP per cigar $10.49
Macanudo Inspirado Jamao Churchill (7” x 49); SRP per cigar $10.99

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by Craig Vanderslice | May 11, 2021 · 9:40 pm

Macanudo Inspirado Brazilian Shade, Cohiba Serie M and Some News

I am going to try to rewrite the post that I lost Sunday, it probably won’t be as fantastic as that one, but who will know? It’s always the brilliant posts that disappear! I should learn to write my posts in Notes or something other than directly in WordPress, but I never learn. It’s supposed to autosave, and usually does, but every now and then there’s a glitch that is irritating (OK, it makes me nearly lose my mind). Anyway, I was writing about the new Macanudo Inspirado Brazilian Shade, a cigar I smoked last week. I posted about this in the middle of April (HERE). This is the sixth Macanudo Inspirado, There’s the Orange, White, Black, Red, and Green, the last of which is the Brazilian Maduro. Oddly, the Red is my favorite of the bunch, although I bought some of the Orange in a small torpedo shape in Iceland, where Thulin, who owns the cigar shop in Reykjavik, told me was his best seller. It was a little over $8, which was inexpensive by Icelandic standards, where the Cuban cigars, and most everything else, were very expensive. By the way, fun fact, if you Google “cigars in Iceland my article is still one of the top search results. Clearly there isn’t a lot written about cigars in Iceland. The Inspirado Brazilian Shade is an interesting cigar. I admit to shade cigars not being my first choice, but this one was delicious. I like the fact that the toro size is 6½” x 52, and I would certainly smoke the Churchill size too. It was a nice, long, cool smoke, with rich, sweet, creamy flavor. I found it to be quite enjoyable. While I do enjoy the Macanudo Inspirado White (for a Connecticut Shade cigar), I liked this one quite a bit more, much like I enjoy the Green Brazilian maduro over the Inspirado Black, which, oddly enough for a Maduro lover, is my least favorite in the range.

Last week I also smoked a couple of the new Cohiba Serie M, the new Cohiba made at El Titan de Bronze in Miami. As I posted In the press release in early April (HERE), This is the first Cohiba made in the U.S., of course Sean Williams had cigars made at El Titan de Bronze for his company El Primer Mundo in the past, so he’s familiar with the factory. I first met Sean at the 2011 IPCPR show, along with his buddy, and El Titan’s owner, Sandy Cobas’ son-in-law Willy Herrera, before he went to work for Drew Estate. I’m 6′ tall and felt short with those two, by the way. Anyway, I guess I’ve known Sean a long time, I consider him a friend, and I’m so happy he’s been able to make this cigar. Another first for Cohiba is the Nicaraguan Corojo wrapper, which is closed at the food and finished with a fan at the head. It’s a fairly delicate leaf, and the cigar is very good. It’s a sophisticated cigar. as a $30 should be. I’m reminded of another favorite cigar of mine which was also made at the same factory, of which I am hoarding a small stash. It’s a smooth, delicious cigar, with some sweet wood and spice.

It’s old news now, but I was going to include it in Sunday’s post, so I might as well include it here, as it fits in with the theme of this post. I don’t think I’ve had a Macanudo Gold Label since my visit to the General Cigar factory back in 2011. I can’t believe it’s been nearly ten years! Is it time for a reunion?

MACANUDO GOLD LABEL RETURNS TO RETAIL

Macanudo Gold Label is making its annual return for a limited time only and is marking the occasion with a new, limited edition parejo.

Originally released in 2002, the line was inspired by a special golden Connecticut Shade leaf and has, for nearly two decades, remained a perennial favorite among discerning cigar aficionados.

Laurel Tilley, Macanudo’s brand ambassador said, “Year after year, anticipation for the annual release of Macanudo Gold Label continues to build. The brand boldly bucks the trend for powerhouse smokes with its alluringly mellow, creamy notes, offering cigar lovers the opportunity to create indulgent, memorable moments. I’m looking forward to enjoying this amazing smoke with cigar lovers across the country.”

Macanudo Gold Label will be available for shipment to retailers between today and July 30, 2021 or until this year’s allotment has been depleted. A total of eight frontmarks will be available, including the Gold Label “Gigante” which is a new, limited edition release for the 2021 season.

Macanudo Gold Label cigars are named for the brand’s golden wrapper leaves harvested from the first and second primings of the Connecticut Shade tobacco plant. Exposed to less sunlight which allows more natural sugars to remain, each leaf is extremely thin and remarkably supple with barely visible veins. The result is a texture that is especially smooth and silky, and a subtle hint of sweetness on the palate.

The Capa Especial (special wrapper) is combined with the first and second primings of Mexican San Andreas tobacco which is used as the binder, and features a blend of Dominican Piloto Cubano and Mexican tobaccos. The result is an extraordinary cigar with the traditional smoothness of a Macanudo and a unique note of sweet earth not found in any other cigar on the market.

Presented in boxes with gold foil accents, Macanudo Gold Label is available in these large-cigar sizes:

Hampton Court Tubo (5.5” x 42); SRP per cigar $10.29
Lord Nelson (7” x 49); SRP per cigar $10.79
Tudor (6” x 52); SRP per cigar $10.49
Duke of York (5.25” x 54); SRP per cigar $9.99
Gold Pyramid (5” x 54); SRP per cigar $10.49
Shakespeare (6.5” x 45); SRP per cigar $9.79
Crystal (5.5 x 50); SRP per cigar $10.79
*New for 2021* Gold Gigante: (6” x 60); SRP per cigar $10.49

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

CigarCraig

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Tagged as Brazilian Shade, cigar, cigars, cohiba, Gold Label, Inspirado, macanudo, Serie M

by Craig Vanderslice | April 14, 2021 · 9:27 pm

News: Macanudo Inspirado Introduces Brazilian Shade

Here’s some news from General Cigar about a new cigar in the Macanudo Inspirado line. I smoked the Inspirado Brazilian Maduro Toro last night and it’s a different maduro than I’m used to. It’s more savory than sweet, which is odd to me. Still a delicious cigar. This new one sounds interesting, I wonder how it will compare to the maduro, and to other shade cigars.

MACANUDO INSPIRADO TO LAUNCH BRAZILIAN SHADE

Macanudo will soon debut a new Inspirado collection featuring a rare Brazilian wrapper and a proprietary Cuban-seed filler, marking the first time these tobaccos have been used with Macanudo. Called Macanudo Inspirado Brazilian Shade, the limited-edition line brings together masterful blending with expert agronomy for a one-of-a-kind smoking experience.

Steve Abbot, senior brand manager of Macanudo said, “Macanudo Inspirado Brazilian Shade required a significant investment in agronomy, spanning Central and South America. This blend speaks to the lengths that we as a brand will go to in order to bring excitement to premium cigar smokers, and we’re confident that cigar lovers will be drawn to the singular experience this blend delivers.”

Grown in the lush tropical Bahia region of Brazil according to the exact specifications of Macanudo’s agronomists, the proprietary Connecticut Shade wrapper is golden with a silky sheen. It crowns a Mexican San Andrean binder and a blend that features “Dominican Cubita,” a unique and proprietary sungrown tobacco cultivated on a one-acre plot in the bucolic region of Mao, Dominican Republic. This special tobacco lends a unique aroma and spicy notes to the smoking experience. When surrounded by Brazilian tobacco, Dominican Piloto Cubano and Nicaraguan Jalapa, the tobaccos come together to deliver a layered, medium-bodied smoke that hints of toasted nuts, cocoa and sweet earth.

Handmade by artisans at the General Cigar Dominicana factory in Santiago, Dominican Republic, Macanudo Inspirado Brazilian Shade will ship to retailers on May 4th and will be available in two sizes. The cigars will be presented in ten-count boxes designed to pay homage to the Brazilian flag.