Tag Archives: JM Cigars

by CigarCraig | January 1, 2012 · 10:02 am

Happy New Cigar Year! A Macanudo, an Emilio and a Gurkha

Welcome to 2012 on CigarCraig.com! I can’t imagine that this year can be better than last year for me cigar-wise, but I’ll do my best to at least come close. 2011 saw trips to Nicaragua and The Dominican Republic, as well as a trip to the IPCPR show in Las Vegas. I made a lot of new friends in the industry, including a bunch of fellow blogger types. We culminated the year with a huge series of contests that broke all kinds of records here. Thank you all for a great 2011! Looking forward to seeing what the new year brings.

While I’ve had the week off this past week I’ve had a few occasions for a cigar, but I’ll just mention the notable ones. Most of them were good, most of them I’d smoked before and don’t want to be repetitive. I kinda wanted to take the week off from what passes as reviews around here after the rigors of posting 14 days in a row! Here’s a couple cigars that were notable, at least to me. First I had a Macanudo 1968 Robusto on Christmas Day, with my brother-in-law, who is finding that he enjoys good cigars. I set him up with a little travel humidor for Christmas and he seems to be getting a lot of use out of it. The 1968 was from a box that I brought back form my General Cigar visit. I’ve smoked a bunch of these over the past few years and I’m still surprised by how strong they are. The Macanudo name on the band always fools me. It was a notable cigar as much for the company and occasion as anything else, but I do enjoy the 1968 line quite a bit.

Friday I paid a visit to my local shop, JM Cigars in Exton. I met an old friend, Bruce, there for a smoke and to catch up. I had hope a few more friends would stop by, but was more than happy to while away the afternoon with Bruce and a Emilio AF2 BMF. I picked up a couple of these 6″ x 58 monsters because I hadn’t had the AF2 in this size, and I really liked the AF1 in the same vitola. These were very reasonably priced and I thoroughly enjoyed this cigar for 1½ to almost 2 hours. Loads of flavor and well made. I was really glad to see these in JM’s and wouldn’t have even thought to look if my wife hadn’t spied an empty box by the door on our last visit.

Saturday I took an uncustomary early walk so I selected a Gurkha Cellar Reserve Churchill, which came last month in a truly unexpected package from the manufacturer. This cigar boasts 15 year aged tobaccos and is a stunning cigar. I wonder why a 7″ x 54 feels so much more massive than a 6″ x 58 or 60? Does length play that much of a roll in our perception? Maybe….anyway, this was a nice enough cigar for a pre-lunch smoke, looking forward to seeing how some humidor time treats these, even though they have 15 years age on some of the leaf. I’m also not a huge Criollo wrapper fan, but this one was pretty good.. Not overpowering, enough flavor to maintain interest, and a perfect burn. Many thanks to Oliver at Beach CIgar Group for thinking of me.

I had another Berger and Argenti Mooch Loll Maduro this week which was really tasty too! I love this line. Also, Santa brought me a new video camera and an IPod Touch which have already been used for some of the pictures on this page, and will simplify things for me here and there.

That about wraps it up for today. Enjoy the holiday, watch the Winter Classic tomorrow and I hope 2012 can be even better thank 2011 was!

CigarCraig

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Filed under Review, Stores

Tagged as af2, Berger & Argenti, cigar, cigars, Emilio, general cigars, Gurkha, IPCPR, JM Cigars, macanudo, Mooch, Take A Cigar For A Walk

by CigarCraig | November 13, 2011 · 9:51 am

A 601 La Bomba, a San Lotano Oval, News and a Contest Winner!

While perusing CigarEvents.com it came to my attention that Eddie Ortega of EO Brands was going to be making an appearance at my local shop, JM Cigars, in Exton, PA. After dinner my son and I made our way over there. We promptly purchased some of the last 601 La Bombas that they had and fired one of these badboys up and visited with Eddie for a while. I have been patronizing this shop since the mid-90s and it’s one of the best around. The shop was packed and the LA Bomba was awesome. I had only previously had a pre-release sample, which I loved. These are terrific cigars with a little bit of strength. It’s always a good time hanging out with Eddie, and I got to catch up with an old friend, Rob, after the shop cleared out. Nice bunch of folks, and a fine way to spend a chilly Friday evening.

Saturday’s walk cigar was a San Lotano Oval which I received from Clay at AJ Fernandez a few months ago. These cigars are unique in the fact that they, as the name implies, are oval shaped. I smoked the 6 x 54 toro, which looks like it was squished. The shape is very comfortable to smoke, and, like a box press, it doesn’t roll off the table when you set it down. there’s a bright flavor in this cigar that I enjoy but can’t put a finger on. All I know is that this is a tasty, well made and interesting cigar! I look forward to a maduro version one day!

News

There were two new entries into the blogosphere recently that I think are notable. First, Frank Seltzer, who you see writing in all the big cigar magazines and around the web, is now contributing to the JR Cigars blog. Frank is a real journalist, and I’m proud to say he’s an old friend. He has a couple articles in the latest JR catalog as well. Also breaking into the blog world is Gary Griffith of Emilio Cigars, with “From Seed To Smoke“. Gary’s pretty prolific on Twitter and he’s making some outstanding cigars and is a heck of a nice guy who I’m also proud to call friend. I look forward to reading what he has to say. I HAVE to get down to Delaware and visit him at his shop one of these days!

Contest!

Let’s get to the part you’ve all been waiting for, the selection of this month’s contest winner. The prize consists of the following: a Drew Estate cap and a Liga Privada cutter, a Stogieboys.com Cigar Journal, a C-Gars Ltd. ring gauge card, a Liga Privada T52 Belicoso, a Monte Pascoal Belicoso and a American Eagles Half Corona. Thank you to all of the generous sponsors of this contest. As usual, I created a spreadsheet of the eligible entries and assigned them numbers based upon the time of the entry. I consulted with the Random.Org True Random Number Generator for the winning number. The number 19 came up, which corresponds to an entry via Twitter by @s5592c, aka Steve Christopher. Congrats to Steve and thanks for reading! Please e-mail me your contact info so I can ship this stuff out to you! Thanks to everyone for entering, and keep an eye out for next months contest!

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

CigarCraig

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

Tagged as aj fernandez, American Eagles, Brazil, c-gars ltd, camouflage, cigar, cigars, Contest, drew estate, Eddie Ortega, Emilio, EO Brands, Frank Seltzer, Gary Griffith, JM Cigars, JR Cigars, La Bomba, Monte Pascoal, oval, san lotano, Stogie Boys, Take A Cigar For A Walk, twitter

by CigarCraig | December 28, 2010 · 10:48 pm

A Couple of Cigars With an Old Friend – Tuesday December 27, 2010

In the midst of the Holiday hubbub I had the opportunity to sit down for a few cigars with an old high school friend who lives close by, but we never seem to get the time to hang out and smoke some cigars. I caught up with Greg about a year and a half ago after 25 years or so and was delighted to find that we lived a couple miles apart, and that he shared a love of fine cigars. We’ve gotten together a few times over the last 18 months, but this is the fist time we’ve had the chance to just sit an catch up over cigars. We met at our local cigar shop, JM Cigars in Exton, PA. JM’s is one of the best shops in the area in my opinion. Although the selection is fairly “classic”, the pricing is reasonable (for instance, a Hoyo de Monterrey Excalibur No. 1 is under $6 last I looked). You won’t find Tatuaje’s or Illusione or a lot of Pepin Garcia cigars, but he did have a wide selection of Lito Gomez cigars and Cains, as well as quite a few Fuente lines. I grabbed a couple of the Jesus Fuego 777 maduro coronas that I have enjoyed in the past and met Greg in the lounge and parked my ass in a oversized leather chair for the afternoon. As Greg’s birthday was coming up I provided some of what I thought of as special cigars to mark the occasion.

We started the afternoon with a pair of La Gloria Cubana Artesanos de Tabaqueros 650s that were sent to me some time ago by General Cigar. These are a “dos capas” cigar that start with a Connecticut Shade wrapper for the first couple inches, then moved to a darker Ecuadoran Sumatra wrapper. This is really a nice cigar, very rich in flavor and perfectly constructed. The transition from one wrapper to the other is subtle but noticeable. All in all I cigar I will happily smoke again.

Next cigars up were some Ramon Allones Specially Selected Havanas that had been kicking around the humidor for quite a few years. I honestly don’t remember where these came from or exactly how old they were, but they were at least 5 years old and probably older. These particular cigars were nice, firm cigars that were well packed. They burned dead even and tasted fantastic. Greg commented that there was a flavor that he couldn’t put a finger on, and I suggested that my guess was that it was that trademark Cuban flavor that makes Havana cigars distinctly different. These were fantastic examples of the Cuban cigar rollers art and are a benchmark robusto that is a must try if you ever have the opportunity.