I continue to have trouble NOT reaching for maduros and darker wrapped cigars! I guess it’s a winter thing, I’ll try to reverse the trend, but, honestly, I’m loving most of the cigars I’m smoking lately! The My Father Connecticut I smoked a week or two ago was a really good change, but I have to wonder how I would have felt smoking it outdoors in the cold. The darker, heavier wrappers just seen to hold up better both structurally and in flavor, when the mercury drops.
Sunday’s cigar was a Brick House Mighty Mighty Maduro from the folks at JC Newman. This is a Nicaraguan puro, manufactured at their factory in Esteli. This is a large cigar, 6¼” x 60, and very well built. The burn and draw were perfect. I haven’t been screwing around lately experimenting with various cutters, I’ve been using a straight cut on most (exceptions being punching small ring cigars sometimes). I can’t tell you how tired I am of bundling up then making sure I have all the tools I need before I walk out the door to have a smoke. It’s taking me 15 minutes to do all the prep needed, grabbing a cigar, tools, taking a picture, posting on Instagram, then I always forget something….anyway, this was a good smoke, and these are reasonably priced. It’s got a thick, rich flavor of cocoa from the dark brown and oily Brazilian wrapper. I think it’s a darned good cigar.
The lure of the Luchador was too strong for me to resist this week, so Monday had to feature the Leccia Luchador El Hombre for my attempt at an evening walk. It’s still too cold, barely getting a mile in in this weather, but the porch provides shelter from the worst of the elements. This cigar is one of my absolute favorites from last year, and continues to be right up there on my list of favorite cigars. It’s not overpowering, but full of flavor, and I still get some jalapeño and dark chocolate in the flavor profile. It’s entertaining and satisfying and I dig it. Happy to say a box of these will be moving into the cabinet humidor when it finally shows up in a couple weeks.
A few weeks ago one of my vendors at work sent me a pile of cigars from Fuente. His story was that a friend or business associate of his is friends with someone in the Fuente family and regularly sends him care packages. This bag he sent me had some Opus, an Añejo Shark (a cigar I haven’t smoked yet) some Hemingways, a Don Carlos, and a couple Sungrowns. It was a very impressive selection, even for someone as jaded as myself. I figured I’d dig into the bag last night and came out with the 858 Sungrown. Of course, I’ve smoked a bunch of the 858 in natural and maduro, but it’s been a dozen years easily. I always enjoyed the cigars, so I was looking forward to this one. The difference is the Ecuador Sungrown wrapper with is nice and dark, and a cedar sleeve with a black band and ribbon (the regular line is still green on the band, right?). I love the size of this cigar too, 6” x 47, which makes it chunkier and longer than a corona gorda, but not quite as big as a toro. I ended up having a very nice time smoking this cigar. There was a nice sweetness and it burned pretty well. These tend to be in the $6-$7 range from what I can recall, and I think that’s a good price, or at least it’s a very good cigar for that price. It’s certainly a cigar I would revisit often if I had them in the humidor. Tasty!
That’s about it for today. Look forward to a contest in the near future, as well as some cool news next week. Until the next time,
CigarCraig
