I have to admit I’m a bit of a newbie when it comes to the Zino Platinum cigars, the Z Class is the only cigar in their line-up that I’ve had. Now I have had myself a few Davidoff cigars and they are the creators of the Zino Platinum lineup. Davidoff is well known for producing high quality cigars so does the Zino Platinum Z Class live up to that name?

The Z Class is one of the newer lines in the Zino Platinum inventory and are claimed to be a smooth and spicy medium-full bodied cigar. One thing about the Z Class I really love is their packaging. The box is actually a sleek Gun Metal colored tin packed with 20 cigars each. It also rounds out the line-up with the fuller bodied profile and comes in 4 standard sizes, Toro, Robusto, Pyramide and Corona.

The name and the sleek box remind me of a Mercedes-esque imagery for this line-up of cigars. The whole package is fairly attractive and now it’s time to see if it lives up to the reputation of it’s parent company and the look and feel of the brand as a whole.

Cigar: Zino Platinum Z Class 643C
Drink: Southern Tier Brewing Company Imperial Choklat Stout
Vitola: Corona 643C (6 x 43)
Wrapper: Dominican
Binder: Peruvian Pelo de Oro
Filler: Nicaraguan and Honduran Ligeros
Price: MSRP $8.00
Burn Time: 1.5 hours

Construction:
• The Z Class presents with a dark cinnamon brown wrapper that is rugged and rough
• There are a fair bit of visible veins but none seem to be too large or concerning
• The weight of this cigar is fairly heavy compared to others in the same vitola
• The top of this cigar is finished with a clean double cap while the foot looks to be moderately packed, there are a couple of small visible caps
• From cap to foot, the whole cigar is fairly firm when squeezed
• The cap was very tough and took quite a bit of effort to clip off with my double bladed guillotine cutter
• Initial draw seems pretty tight as well, lets hope that opens up

Burn:
• Toasting took a good amount of time and left me with a fairly evenly glowing foot, just a couple dark spots that refused to catch until my first draw
• We’re off to a bit of a wavy start here, hope that doesn’t keep up for too long…
• The slight wave at the start never did correct itself so I needed to give it a small little touch up around the 1/3rd mark
• After that touch-up the Z Class is smoking much better with a fairly clean burn, there is a slight wave but nothing out of control as I pass the half-way point
• I also have to note that this cigar is burning very slowly, definitely giving you time to enjoy without having to draw too often

Smoke & Ash:
• Despite a pretty tight draw, I’m still getting a ton of smoke from this cigar
• Even while resting, the Z Class is pumping out a fair bit of smoke and giving off a burnt wood type of aroma
• The ash comes off with a nice light grey tone but it is flaking quite a bit
• Due to it’s visible weakness, I’m ashing this cigar at about a half-inch right now
• Ash seems to get pretty weak consistently around the half inch mark, so I’ve been ashing it to avoid any disasters

Tasting Notes:
• The wrapper on the Zino Platinum Z Class is fairly woodsy and musty, a pretty bold aroma
• The foot adds more of the mustiness and with that comes a touch of spice and sweetness
• First thing I noticed on the pre-light draw was a spicy tingle on my lips and tongue, beyond that I was met with a very pleasant sweet cedar flavor
• Initial draws are filled with the musty woodsiness I was picking up on the aroma, so far the spice and sweet cedar are no where to be found
• Within a few draws, the mustiness seems to have disappeared and I’m left with the woodsy flavors and a variety of spices, mostly like a mild or white pepper
• The spice has started to settle down as I reach the end of the first third, now I’m balancing out nicely with some woodsy and earthy flavors
• So far the body has been in the low end of medium and the small bite on the retrohale is combined with a somewhat dry spice finish
• The sweet cedar seems to be trying to make an appearance but the earthy and woodsy flavors are drowning it out, hopefully they will balance out a bit more although I am enjoying it as is so far
• The sweet cedar is putting up a good fight and starting to be more dominant, I’m really enjoying the balance here now
• The bite on the retrohale remains fairly tame but the dry finish has changed to a more smooth creamy finish, adding the the enjoyment factor on this cigar
• The last third is turning out to be a creamy and enjoyable finish, the balance is just right with the cedar, sweetness, earthy and spicy flavors
• The nub of the cigar was easy smoking with lots of flavor and no harshness, a good finish to a tasty cigar

Final Thoughts:
This was my first venture into Zino Platinum territory so I went in with an open mind and no biases for or against the brand. I didn’t really know much about the brand at all before I did research for this review. Turns out that the Z Class is a pretty tasty cigar. It had an interesting flavor profile and burned fairly well. There was nothing that really stood out too much but the whole experience was enjoyable and I don’t really have any complaints. The price was a tad bit higher than I would have liked for a corona sized cigar but the flavors were very enjoyable so I’m a bit torn here. Drop these to $6 for the corona and I’d be more interested. But having said that, if I saw them at a B&M I’d be curious to try some of the larger vitolas as there definitely is some potential here, I may enjoy those a lot more. I think some people would really enjoy these so I’d have to suggest giving a 5-pack a try, there is definitely a market for this profile. I think this cigar has definitely sparked in interest in trying more Zinos, they are very tough to find for me but maybe my next trip south or the border, these will be on my radar.

Pairings:
I believe this is the final brew I have remaining from the haul I brought back from Florida earlier in the summer. It is the Imperial Choklat Stout from Southern Tier Brewing Company. This brew pours super black but with surprisingly little foam in the glass. The flavors are pretty unique here and I wouldn’t compare this to a typical stout. It’s definitely got a lot of hoppy bitterness but it doesn’t have much of the creaminess I tend to find in a lot of stouts. It’s almost closer to a porter in my humble opinion, but I am no beer guru. But despite that, the beer has some very good flavors going on here. There is a ton of dark chocolate flavors in this brew and they pair amazingly well with the hoppy bitterness I mentioned. There’s also a hefty serving of malt making this taste almost like a non-creamy alcoholic milkshake? lol. I’m surprised to see it also clocks in at 11% Alc./vol., I can’t even tell it’s that strong since it’s so smooth. So did it pair well with the cigar? Indeed it did! The smooth and bold flavors on the Choklat Stout mixed nicely with the flavors of the Zino Platinum. Similar stouts and porters would do well here, and of course a nice Port would have been even better! haha

Avo Uvezian is the mastermind behind the AVO brand is also a very talented Jazz pianist. He was born into a family of musicians but he paved a different road for his family’s future when he began making cigars. It’s no secret that he has blended some very tasty sticks and for the last few years he has been blending a limited edition cigar to be released on his birthday.

Not long ago I reviewed the AVO 80th Anniversary which was released in 2006 to commemorate Avo’s 80th birthday. Tony also reviewed the AVO Limited Edition 2010 not long ago. Today’s cigar is called the Compañero and was released in 2009 to mark Avo’s 83rd birthday. On the cigar, you will find the classic and classy AVO logo with the name “Avo Uvezian” on one side and “LE09″ written on the the other. Below this band is another dark burgundy band with the “Compañero” name written on it.

The blend in the AVO Limited Editions change a bit each year and the Compañero is no different. This year the cigar comes wrapped with an Ecuadorian leaf and bound with Dominican leaf. The interesting part of the blend is the filler which is made up of a couple types of Ligero and some Peruvian Seco tobacco.

I’m interested to see how this blend will play out. On paper it seems a bit strong but with at least 2 years of age on it I’m hoping it smoothed out. Let’s get onto the review and find out.

Cigar: AVO Compañero Limited Edition 2009
Drink: The Singleton of Glendullan 12 Year Single Malt Scotch Whisky
Vitola: Toro (6 x 54)
Wrapper: Cuban Seed Ecuadorian
Binder: Dominican Republic
Filler: Criollo Ligero, Piloto Ligero, San Vicente Ligero, Peruvian Seco
Price: About $15
Burn Time: 1.5 hours

Construction:
• The AVO Companero is an oil and dark looking cigar that sports a slightly toothy wrapper with a goldish-brown glow
• There are some veins running down the side of the cigar but most are fairly small and don’t really pose any issues
• The top of the cigar is cleanly finished with an expertly applied single cap while the foot shows signs of a well packed long-filler cigar
• For the most part, the cigar is very firm to the touch with only a very minor give when squeezed
• I made the cut super shallow and just basically trimmed off the cap without cutting into the filler, left me with an easy and perfect draw
• I “may” have accidentally “dropped” the cigar right before lighting it up… I’ll take that into account for any burn issues

Burn:
• Toasting was easy and even, it left me with a nicely glowing foot
• Despite some cracks on the wrapper near the foot due to my dropping it, the cigar is burning beautifully through the first couple of inches
• The cigar burned through the cracked wrapper like it wasn’t even there and I’m still going strong with a razor sharp burn!
• Ran into a few more wrapper issues caused by my drop, they still didn’t affect the burn much but I really regret dropping it!
• My super fail of a drop had more consequences than I had hoped for, the wrapper pretty much came off at the end but it’s totally my fault, do NOT take this as the regular burn for this cigar. Other Companero’s I’ve had burned without any issues.

Smoke & Ash:
• The AVO Companero is producing a heft amount of smoke from each draw, it’s thick and billowy to boot
• At a resting position, the cigar is producing a comfortable amount of smoke, nothing overpowering and it has a nice burning cedar aroma
• The ash is starting off a bit flaky but that’s probably my fault…
• The color of the ash is a very nice and consistent light grey
• Even with a bit of flaking, the ash lasted just past an inch before I gently tapped it off
• Now that I’m passed the cracked wrapper the ash is staying clean and tight
• The next ash fell off after about an inch jsut before I was going to take a picture… bad luck for me tonight! lol

Tasting Notes:
• The wrapper of the cigars is hardly aromatic at all, it’s only a little bit woodsy and that’s it
• The foot on the other hand shows clear indications of spices, earthiness and a fresh cedar aroma
• The pre-light draw is very earthy and woodsy, with more of the fresh cedar from the foot
• Initial draws are filled with more earthy notes and little bit of the fresh peat flavor I’ve come to appreciate from most AVO cigars
• Some of the spice I picked up earlier is making a subtle appearance within the first inch, it’s just on the tip of my tongue making for an interesting touch to the profile
• The body of the AVO Companero is a smooth medium so far, well balanced and with a nice little bite on the retrohale
• The finish is also very tasting, coating my nasal passages with a fresh cedar touch
• I have to emphasize the “fresh” part of the cedar flavor, it’s not like a seasoned humidor smells but more like the aroma of a fresh, brand new humidor or freshly cut cedar plank, very pleasant!
• The woodsy and earthy notes are mixing so nicely and taking turns being prominent
• Along with those, the peat and freshness of the cedar add a very interesting and enjoyable flavor that I can’t get enough of
• Just past the halfway mark, the spices are coming in a little stronger and mixing perfectly with the fresh cedar and peat flavors, this cigar keeps getting better!
• The body has stayed more or less in the medium range and it’s still maintaining a very smooth retrohale
• Despite the wrapper pretty much falling off the cigar, I still managed to enjoy the last bit of spice, cedar and peat right to the end

Final Thoughts:
Right from the start, the AVO Companero was bringing me a bright and flavorful profile that instantly caught my attention. Each of the tastes were very full flavored and easily discernible making for a very enjoyable smoke. Even with my fat-fingered fall to the floor and some wrapper cracks, this cigar burned perfectly. I’m also very surprised to say the wrapper falling off didn’t change the cigars flavor too much and I was still able to enjoy it. That’s a sign of a well balanced cigar in my eyes, the flavor was not “all in the wrapper” as some people might think. This showed me that the cigar had a very good balance of wrapper, binder and filler. I’d actually even say this experience made me appreciate the blending that went into this cigar even more than I normally would have!

Pairings:
I’ve only ever come across the peat flavors in the AVO cigars so I knew heading into this review that I had to pair it with a nice Scotch. So I looked into what I had and decided to finish off this bottle of The Singleton 12 year Single Malt Scotch Whisky. Well, I was right! The smokey and peat flavors of the Scotch paired perfectly with the fresh cedar and matching peat flavors on the cigar. I would definitely recommend having a nice scotch with this cigar, so give it a try next time you pick up this cigar or pretty much anything in the AVO lineup.

The Late Harvest might sound familiar to any wine aficionados we have around here. In the wine world, some grapes are harvested later in the season to produce a slightly different type of wine typically called a Late Harvest. It’s even a popular method of making Ice Wine which is a very interesting dessert wine especially common to the Niagara region wineries up here in Ontario.

Contrary to what the name actually seems to mean, the Late Harvest cigar from Viaje is not actually produced with tobacco leaves harvested later in the season. It’s trademark is actually that the filler being used is sourced from the last priming’s of the tobacco plant. These last priming’s are left on the plant slightly longer and are also exposed to the sun longer, this produces a darker, thicker, oilier and stronger leaf. The blend is said to have about 90% of it’s filler from these last priming’s.

To put the limited blend into perspective, the Late Harvest is made in 125 boxes of 35 cigars each making a grand total of 4375 cigars(if my math is right). The Late Harvest was debuted at IPCPR 2011 and it seems like Andre is planning to make a yearly release of it, although the yield could change from year-to-year. The production factory of these cigars is located in Honduras, the popular Racines Cubanas factory which is part of Casa Fernandez Cigar company.

My one gripe here is that there’s no indication on the band of the production year. Although I know this one is a 2011 release since it’s brand new, I would have liked to see an indication for future years to compare with and keep track of when aging. I guess we’ll have to be vigilant and make note of them if you’re not buying a box. But before we get too far ahead of ourselves, lets see if these cigars are worth aging and worth trying out next year…

Cigar: Viaje Late Harvest
Drink: Wychwood Brewery Wychcraft Blonde Beer
Vitola: Toro (6 x 48)
Wrapper: Nicaraguan
Binder: Nicaraguan
Filler: Nicaraguan
Price: About $9.00
Burn Time: 1.5 hours

Construction:
• The Viaje Late Harvest is a bit of a rough looking cigar with a few medium sized veins running up and down along with some bumps here and there
• The wrapper presents with a medium cinnamon brown colour with some dark speckles here and there, it’s also fairly coarse
• The top of the cigar is finished with tight little pigtail on top of a triple cap that looks clean and well applied
• A little squeeze produces almost no give, the Viaje Late Harvest is fairly firm from foot to cap
• With a quick glance at the foot it’s easy to see this is a well filled cigar with almost no gaps to be seen
• Clipping off the cap with my double bladed guillotine cutter was fairly easy and left a nice clean cut

Burn:
• The foot of the cigar lit up very quickly and easily while toasting
• The initial burn has an interesting zig-zag pattern… let’s hope it tightens up
• Zig zag seemed to calm down and although it’s a bit wavy we’re off to a better start now
• A couple small corrections were needed in the first half but they were very minor and did not affect the flavor of the cigar
• A couple other small touch-ups through the cigar but nothing major, it burned very well for the most part

Smoke & Ash:
• The Viaje Late Harvest is producing a good amount of smoke from each draw, it’s not super-thick and billowy but it’s not light either
• Resting smoke is also fairly moderate, nothing over the top but it is notable
• The ash is looking to be a pretty dark tone of grey as I smoke through the cigar
• I’m also getting some flaking so I don’t think the ash is going to last too long
• It started to look really weak at about an inch so I tapped it off into the ashtray
• As I hit the halfway mark it seems the thickness of the smoke has been slowly increasing, getting a nice billowy thickness now

Tasting Notes:
• The wrapper of the Viaje Late Harvest has a fairly strong barnyard aroma to it, smells like it’s fresh from a farm!
• The foot, on the other hand, is strong with earthy and woodsy aromas followed by just a touch of peppery spice
• Pre-light draw brings an interesting mix of fresh cedar, earthiness and a touch of sweetness
• Initial draws bring more of the woodsy and earthy flavors I caught onto earlier, with a touch of very mild spices
• After a few draws there is a kick of pepper to this cigar, you can feel it on the back of your throat as well
• The Viaje Late Harvest is starting off in the mile-medium bodied range and the retrohale is giving a nice little bite with a smooth cedar finish
• The strong pepper faded as quickly as it appeared and I’m back to a nicely balanced cedar and earthy flavor profile
• There is a touch of tart sweetness that I’m picking up now and again although it’s not too strong right now
• The woodsy flavors are developing nicely and I’m getting a nice bready flavor coming in all wrapped up with a smooth and creamy finish
• The bite on the retrohale is pretty much gone now but it’s still giving me a smooth creamy cedar finish that I’m really enjoying
• As I creep into the final third, some of the spices are starting to make a comeback. It’s not the strong pepper like before but rather a more mild white pepper profile
• The Viaje Late Harvest finished on a smooth medium note with no harshness at all, I enjoyed it’s creamy finish and sweet tart cedar flavors right to the nub

Final Thoughts:
This was an interesting and unique cigar and I’m glad I was able to give it a try. As I mentioned, my access to Viaje cigars is pretty limited so it’s always a treat when I get a few sent to me in a package and this one was not a disappointment. It had an interesting variety of flavors that were very well balanced along with a smooth creamy finish to round it all out. The burn had a couple small touch ups but nothing worth complaining about. Considering the type of filler used here I was expecting a much stronger cigar but I ended up with a smooth medium bodied stick that I really enjoyed. The price on these is also fairly reasonable considering the limited production runs they are offered in. If you can track down some of these they are definitely worth a try. I’m curious to see if they change much from year-to-year…

Pairings:
Today I have another offering from Wychwood Breweries. Just recently, I tried out their winter ale called “Bah Humbug” with the Tatuaje TAA and I’ve also done a full review of their buby beer called Hobgoblin. This particular brew is their Blonde beer called Wychcraft. It clocks in at a light 4.5% alc./vol. and is triple hopped and filtered. It made for a perfect midday beer with lots of citrusy and malty flavors to it. An interesting combination since most blondes don’t carry too much of the malts with them, but I guess that’s where the triple hopped process makes a difference. I found that the Wychwood Breweries Wychcraft paried quite well with the Viaje Late Harvest. The cirtusy sweetness of the beer complimented that tart sweetness that sometimes made an appearance in the cigar and neither of them over-powered the other. I’d recomend sticking with a lighter pairing similar to the Wychcraft with the Viaje Late Harvest, choice such as a thick stout or strong coffee might drown out the cigars flavors.

Today’s review comes courtesy of Lou B. who you can find in the comments section every now and then. I met Lou at a herf a little while back and he’s been holding some awesome Cigar-B-Cue’s where we eat, smoke, drink and talk. At the last little gathering, Lou handed me a Rocky Patel Vintage 1990 and said that I had to try it and squeeze in a review if possible. We chatted a little about how my history with most Rocky Patel sticks is a little shaky but I would give it a shot.

So here I am today about to light up this cigar. I have had a few Vintage 1990′s a while ago but it’s been a rather long time so other than a few notes I made for myself I don’t have much to go on. I actually decided to ignore my old notes and go at this one blindly!

The Rocky Patel Vintage 1990 is the oldest cigar in his vintage line. This particular blend is made with Maduro Broadleaf wrapper dating back to 1990. So the wrapper on these cigars is near 12 Years old and apparently the filler is at least 5 years old before being rolled. That makes for a very well aged cigar right out of the box so let’s hope it has the smoothness you would expect on such a well aged smoke.

It seems that the Vintage 1990 line is also available in a wide variety of vitolas that come boxed in quantities of 20. I even stumbled upon some being sold as bundles so you can save a few dollars there too. The vitola Lou gifted me with happens to be their Churchill which also has a box-pressed look to it. The cigar also seems a lot smaller than the claimed 48 ring gauge, possibly due to the pressing. I’d say this cigar is almost around 42 or 44 ring gauge from a quick glance.

Now this cigar also has quite the reputation which can sometimes hinder a cigar. It’s been given a 92 rating by Cigar Aficionado and even been named to the Top 25 Cigars of the year twice. So this sets the bar fairly high when you read something like that before lighting up. But regardless of that, I’m going into this review with a clear mind and hoping for a good smoke. This one’s for you Lou!

Cigar: Rocky Patel Vintage 1990
Drink: Innis & Gunn Winter Beer 2011
Vitola: Churchill (7 x 48)
Wrapper: Honduran Maduro Broadleaf
Binder: Nicaraguan
Filler: Dominican/Nicaraguan
Price: About $8.00
Burn Time: Just short of 2 hours

Construction:
• The wrapper on this cigar is velvety smooth and has the color of milk chocolate bar, it’s actually quite appealing to look at
• There are some veins and seams running along it’s length but none of them look large enough to pose any problems
• The vitola on this cigar is pretty interesting, but despite that the single cap looks to be expertly applied and clean
• The foot follows in the same ‘footsteps’ (cheesy pun, I know…lol) and is very well packed
• That also links into the fairly firm feel of the whole cigar, there is a tiny give when squeezed but not much, I think I’ll blame that on the box pressing process
• The cap clipped off nice and easy but left me with a bit of a tight draw, hoping that doesn’t continue and it opens up soon
• Glad to report that the draw opened up nicely within the first inch

Burn:
• The toasting was easy and fairly even, getting me off to a good start easily
• I usually get some funky burn lines on box pressed cigars but through the first couple inches this one is flawless
• Not much to report here, as I get to the halfway mark I’m still moving along flawlessly
• Still more nothing to report, lol. No wavy lines, no canoes, no tunnels, just the way I like it!

Smoke & Ash:
• There is a ton of resting smoke coming off this cigar, could be a little too much if I were in an enclosed room
• Even with a tight draw, I’m still picking up a fairly good amount of smoke from each puff
• The ash on this cigar is a nice even tone of light gray and is keeping itself fairly clean and tight
• Got to just about an inch before the ash fell off
• Next ash got to about an inch again before I tapped it off cause it was looking ready to fall
• Seemed to get a pretty consistent 1 inch ash on these that stayed clean

Tasting Notes:
• Running the cigar under my nose gives an easily noticeable aroma of coffee, but mostly of cedar. It’s light and pleasant, not overpowering
• The foot does away with the coffee but does carry the aroma of cedar and maybe a little bit of greenery
• I get the same greenery and cedar flavor as I take a pre-light draw after clipping the cap. Also an odd liquor type of flavor, almost like infused but you can tell it isn’t, interesting to see if that will carry into the smoking experience
• Initial flavors are mostly woodsy and earthy notes, maybe with a hint of coffee in there
• The coffee flavors are developing a bit as the cigar burns, still very mellow but they are there, maybe with a bit of cocoa too
• The start of this cigar as been fairly mild for the most part, maybe just approaching medium and the retrohale has almost no bite but gives a smooth cedar and coffee finish
• The liquor flavor I was getting is making slight appearances here and there, I can’t quite put my finger on what it is but it’s keeping the experience interesting. It’s sort of sweet and mixed with the coffee flavors I guess my closest comparison would be Kahlua or something similar
• The whole cigar seems to be quite well balanced to me, I’m getting a good variety of flavors that keep changing up on me and keeping me interested, none of them are overpowering the others
• The array of flavors has stayed the same through to the last third but the fact that they keep taking turns being the dominant one has kept me interested and enjoying the whole cigar so far
• Flavors got a little more intense near the nub, but no harshness or bitterness so I got to enjoy it to the very end

Final Thoughts:
So I have to admit I came into this cigar with some hesitation due to my past experiences with Rocky Patel sticks. I’ve had a few good ones, but most were not in my flavor profile. Even with Lou’s claims of how much he enjoyed this I was a little worried. I’m happy to report that I enjoyed this cigar! I wouldn’t put it into my top 10 but I would keep it on regular rotation as a reliable mild/medium bodied stick if I can find it on sale or maybe in the bundles. It had an interesting set of flavors that were very well balanced and it burned superbly. I don’t really have anything negative to say. If there was one critique I could make it’s that the flavors were not very pronounced. They were there, but you really had to sit and concentrate to pick up on them. Maybe this is due to their extended aging? I’m not too sure… You could easily enjoy it’s smoothness without paying attention, but if the flavor were a little more intense, this might have been a top 10 contender for me.

Pairings:
It’s no secret that I’m a HUGE fan of the Innis & Gunn Brewery and everything I’ve tried from them to date. Their Oak Aged Beers are simply the best I’ve been able to find so far with a sweet caramely smoothness. Every year they also come out with a Winter Seasonal, and as I mentioned in my last review, I’m a bit of a sucker for Winter Seasonals. So I had to get this, their Winter Beer 2011! The crappy part is that it’s only available in a Sampler pack here. Although I really enjoy their other beers in the sampler, it comes with a glass. I think I’m up to 5 or 6 Innis & Gunn glasses now because I keep buying the sampler packs they have for their seasonal beers… lol. But enough about my ranting, this beer keeps to my expectations for this brewery and brings a TON of flavor to the table. Along with the classic Oaky notes, you can pick up some citrus, vanilla, toffee and the signature caramel smoothness. All of their beers seem to pair best with a good mild or medium bodied cigar, so it fit very well in with the Rocky Patel Vintage 1990. Other good pairing would be a similar beer like a blonde or amber, and possibly a nice cup of coffee.

So the pairing I decided on today to celebrate Halloween is the Grimalkin by Emilio Cigars. If you’ve been following our reviews over the last couple months you would have seen Tony post up two reviews from Emilio, the AF1 BMF and the AF2 Toro. If you take a glance through Tony’s reviews you’ll see that he enjoyed both of them quite a bit. I also had the chance to smoke them and thought they were both quite enjoyable. So does the Grimalkin continue that trend?

If you haven’t heard of Emilio Cigars don’t be surprised. They’ve been making a larger splash in the market recently but up until a few months ago I hadn’t really heard of them either. They are slowly expanding distribution and getting a name out for themselves. You can check the Emilio Cigars website for information on retailers near you that carry their products. Emilio Cigars is owned by Gary Griffiths and there isn’t too much info available on this cigar.

From what I can find, the Grimalkin is made in Esteli, Nicaragua from selected and limited tobaccos. The yield of this cigar is limited based on the harvest amounts of the various tobaccos. So what this basically means is that each year will have a different production amount based on the amount of required tobaccos they manage to harvest. I like this approach, it’s fairly practicle and it’s not limiting production to a set amount of boxes every year. A quick google search shows them available in a few shops so that’s a good sign as well.

Now I found the band here to be kind of interesting… The name “Grimalkin” seems sort of like some creepy monster, maybe like a more evil Gremlin, and it goes nicely with the ominous yellow cat-like eyes on the wrapper. What seems odd to me is that the text is printed in curved pattern which makes it look sort of like the cat is smiling at me? Am I crazy? It’s not really an evil smile either, it looks happy to me! Seemed to take away from the spooky aspect since it made me laugh, lol. But maybe it’s just me? I’ll stop talking now… let’s get to the review!

Cigar: Emilio Cigars Grimalkin
Drink: Huyghe Brewery Delirium Nocturnum
Vitola: Robusto (5 x 52)
Wrapper: Nicaraguan
Binder: Nicaraguan
Filler: Nicaraguan
Price: about $7.00
Burn Time: 1.5 Hours

Construction:
• The is a very nicely constructed cigar that is evenly round and has almost no veins on it at all
• The wrapper is smooth and oily which compliments its dark cinnamon brown color
• The Grimalkin actually feels a tad firm along it’s whole length, I’m hoping that doesn’t mean a tight draw
• The head of the cigar is finished with a triple cap, it’s not overly neat but not messy either
• Not the foot looks to be as tightly packed as could be possible, there are almost no gaps here at all
• The cut was pretty easy considering the firmness of the cigar but the draw was definitely suffering at the start
• Within an inch the draw definitely opened up which I wasn’t expecting but is a pleasant surprise

Burn:
• Toasting took a bit longer than I expected for this vitola and got a little messy as the wrapper edges started to burn a bit
• Got started off to wavy burn and it’s continued that way through the first inch or so, hasn’t gottne worse and seems to be nice and sharp
• Burn seems to be improving slowly, staying sharp and getting straighter
• It’s actually burning very slowly and easily too, no need to constant draws to keep it lit
• The burn did round out and burned razor sharp through to the end

Smoke & Ash:
• Despite a fairly tight draw I am getting a ton of smoke each time, really fills your mouth
• The resting smoke seems non-stop but at least it’s somewhat moderate, gives off a nice aroma too
• The ash is coming along nice and clean, looks to be strong but we’ll see how long it lasts
• White is the dominant color of the ash with some light grey tones, very nice
• I knocked the first ash off at just about an inch as I could see a crack forming along it but it stayed clean and strong
• The thick billowy smoke continued to the end and so did the nice looking ash

Tasting Notes:
• The wrapper aroma has an interesting cedar and grassy touch to it, I usually don’t get much grassy aromas on the wrapper
• The foot offers more woodsiness, but this time it’s just a generic chopped wood type of aroma, not really cedar. Along with that I’m getting some dirt-like earthiness and a bit of the grass aromas again
• The pre-light draw brought lots more interesting cedar and a bit of earthiness
• The initial few draws are very tasty, filled with a smooth cedar, some earthiness and a bit of a cinnamon/nutmeg/clove mixture
• The body seems to be in the low medium range at the start and comes with a small bit on the retrohale and a cedar finish
• The mixture of spices is really picking up in flavor intensity as I get near the halfway mark, I’m also picking up some coffee notes which are accenting very well
• Not sure if it was intentional at all but the mixture of flavors in this cigar seems to pair perfectly with this time of year
• As I continue, I got some toasted almond type of flavors mixing in, this keeps getting better
• The woodsiness made a big comeback in the last half, at times it seemed a little overpowering “roasted”. Not quite burnt though
• The spices, coffee and almonds are still around but with less intensity now
• The retrohale has pretty much remained the same and the body is gaining a bit of ground and more in the high range of medium now
• The general flavor profile didn’t change much in the last third and the flavors each took turns being the prominent flavor
• I was able to smoke the cigar down to my burning with almost no harshness at all, a nice finish

Final Thoughts:
I enjoyed this cigar quite a bit, not sure I would call it a top 10 or anything but it made for a good relaxing afternoon. It had a variety of flavors, burned well and kept me interested the whole time. I think the balance was a lot better in the first half but it wasn’t bad at all in the second half, just had a little more of the woodsiness versus the other flavors. The band still makes me laugh a little but oh well, lol. The flavors seemed to be perfect for fall for some reason, they reminded me of what you would find in pumpkin pie or something. I think I would definitely pick up a few more of these to keep in the humidor. The price is just a touch higher than I would want for this flavor profile, but considering it is a limited release it’s not over the top either.

Pairings:
This pairing was actually a recommendation I got from our resident Belgium beer connoisseur, Tony. I happened to find it down in Florida a couple months ago and finally decided to crack it open today. I thought the weird label fit well into the “silly spookiness” of the Grimalkin. There’s not much I can say about this label other than it looks like someone was high on something when they came up with the idea of a pink elephant dancing in a blue and yellow vortex type of thing… It is made in Belgium by the Huyghe Brewery and clocks in at a nice 8.5% alc./vol. The name itself is called the Delirium Nocturnum and claims itself to be simply a Belgian Ale. Now aside from the crazy label and interesting stone textured bottle, the brew is actually very good. It’s got a nice amount of hoppy bitterness on the finish and when it first hit’s your mouth you get a wake up call to your senses. There’s all kinds of flavors going on including a burst of fruitiness, a nice helping of malt and there’s even some roasted flavors in there. All in all, it’s a great brew and definitely worth trying if you can find it. I know they don’t sell it here in Ontario which is disappointing
Now did it pair well? Hell yes it did. Tony is lucky this time! lol. The fruit, malt and bitterness made an excellent pairing to the coffee and spices of the Grimalkin and I think it would pair excellently with a ton of different cigars and various strengths.

Courtesy of www.CigarsInternational.com

With Tony away this week I wanted to fill the week with at least two reviews. Seems that time was not on my side though as a co-worker has also been off all week and his workload got dumped on me. Yeay! But have no fear, I did some digging and found this blind review that I never had the chance to post. I think you all know how much I enjoy doing these blind reviews so I’m not sure how this one slipped through the cracks.

As a caution, this was done many moons ago so the pictures admittedly suck and I’m glad to see how much I’ve improved over time! lol. (I can’t believe I used to use the flash, I’m sorry about that! haha) So bear with me on that, I promise some better pictures next week! I’m not sure on the exact date that I wrote this but I believe it was at least a year and a half ago, somewhere in early 2010 or possibly even late 2009. I happened to find it on one of my hard-drives from a crashed laptop. Glad I’m a pack-rat when it comes to electronic junk!

The cigar ended up being a La Herencia Cubana Oscuro Fuerte which is one of the growing number of exclusive cigars from Cigars International. It is also another blend from the great AJ Fernandez who has turned out some excellent cigars lately such as the recently reviewed San Lotano Oval and the Man O’ War Armada. Both of which received excellent reviews from us. The cigar being reviewed today is a much older blend and packed with some Ligero long-filler. It’s currently offered in 4 vitolas at very fair prices. Let’s see how it faired in my blind impressions.

Cigar: La Herencia Cubana Oscuro Fuerte
Drink: Mill Street Brewery Coffee Porter
Vitola: Robusto (5.5 x 54)
Wrapper: Pennsylvania Broadleaf
Binder: Nicaraguan
Filler: Nicaraguan
Price: MSRP $4.20
Burn Time: A little under 1.5 hours

Construction:
• The cigar is wrapped in a very dark chocolate brown wrapper
• Lots of veins but none of them very large and don’t look to pose any potential problems
• Foot is soft and springy but head is fairly firm when squeezed lightly
• No oiliness on this wrapper, it actually appears a bit dry
• Clean triple cap to finish off the top of the cigar
• Foot looks graciously packed and full
• Cutting the cigar with my double bladed guillotine was a little messy, but nothing major
• Draw is good right off the start, I like that!

Burn:
• Toasting was mostly even although there was one dark spot in the center that just wouldn’t catch
• As we progress, the burn has been dead on and razor sharp through the first-half
• Just past half-way got a slight wave in the burn that ended up correcting itself
• Had another peninsula form past the halfway mark that seems to be correcting itself slowly
• The last half of the cigar needed a few more draws to keep lit although the first half was burning nicely
• Burn took a turn for the worst near the last 3rd, hard to keep lit and very wavy

Smoke & Ash:
• Giving off a big mouthful of smoke from each draw
• Resting smoke is almost non-existent and a very light burning tobacco aroma
• Ash is light grey in color with the occasional darker streaks
• The ash is tightly packed and appears strong so far
• Each ash lasted a little short of 1 inch and made an explosion when they hit the ashtray, not sure why but it was definitely messy

Tasting Notes:
• Wrapper has aromas of cocoa and a barnyard/hay type of scent
• Foot aroma is of cocoa and a touch of spice on the nose, almost a mild pepper
• Pre-light draw is mostly the barnyard/hay type of flavor and a bit of the spice
• Initial draws are nutty, earthy and a touch of spice, it’s also very dry on the back of my throat
• Getting a toasted wood flavor about an inch in
• Retrohale is medium bodied with a barnyard flavor and a very mild kick
• The body has been medium right from the start
• Flavors haven’t changed much up to the half-way mark and its still very dry
• Passing the halfway mark, the only flavor left is burning wood and getting a bitterness here too
• The bland flavor and bitterness stuck through to the end, disappointing considering the first half was very good
• The bitterness got too powerful in the last 1.5 inches, had to put it down…
• I’m pretty sure the poor burn factored into the harsh flavors here since the good burning start had much more enjoyable flavors

Final Thoughts:
I think you can tell from my notes that I wasn’t too impressed by this cigar. It started off pretty decent but unfortunately the flavors didn’t change much and only dwindled away as the cigar progressed. The extreme bitterness at the end was also a big disappointment. I’m not sure if it was just a bad stick from the batch since I haven’t had this cigar before. That’s probably one of the main downsides of a blind review, a single bad stick could ruin your impressions on that cigar for the future. Even with it’s incredibly cheap price I think I’ll be avoiding this cigar in the future unless I get some glowing recommendations from a lot of people.

Pairings:
The brew I chose to pair today is from the local Toronto based brewery called Mill Street. This is their Coffee Porter which as the name implies, is a Coffee flavored Porter (Complicated, right? ). I’m a big fan of this brew to pair with cigars, it’s got a full feel to it and the coffee notes pair excellently with cigars. I wrote up a full review on the brew if you are interested, you can find it here. It’s also made locally and I love supporting local business whenever possible. This was probably the highlight of the review for me and I really enjoyed the brew. As I mentioned, it pairs excellently with a variety of cigars including full and mild. It paired well with the La Herencia Cubana Oscuro Fuerte and complimented the initial good notes I got from the cigar. I would definitely suggest a strong pairing with this cigar to combat the harshness I got on the end, something like a Porto, Stout of strong coffee would go well.

If you are a follower of ours on Twitter or Facebook, you will have seen recently that Tony is off slacking again. That’s right, again! lol. Ok maybe not. He’s actually on a trip to the Dominican Republic and visiting lots of people, cigar factories, and even some tobacco fields. I’m sure he’ll have lots to tell everyone when he gets back. In the meantime, keep up with what he’s doing by following him on Twitter or following the Casas Fumando Facebook Page.

So I’m still stuck at home and while Tony is probably burning up in the Dominican, and I’m pretty much freezing over here. Terrible forecast for the week full of rain and near freezing temps, winter is almost here! The summer flew by… So for no particular reason I made a mess in my humidor searching for my next review and what I came up with was my very last Oliva Serie V Maduro Especial from 2010.

Now Oliva should be a name most people know by now, they’ve been around for a long time and have a great reputation of turning over quality cigars year after year. They haven’t been much in the past for really branching out with drastic ideas but rather have been that “staple” cigar brand that you could always fall back on. Their 4 main lines are the Serie G, Serie O, Serie V and the Connecticut Reserve. Of their 4 lines mentioned, the Serie V is the fullest on the body scale.

If you have been keeping up with the cigar news, you would actually see that Oliva is starting to bring a lot more variety to their lines. They’ve had the Master Blend series for awhile now and are also hitting a few winners with the Studio Tobac project. Tony actually just recently posted a review of the cigar made by a joint venture of Studio Tobac and Padilla, appropriately named the Padilla – Studio Tobac Figurado. As you can see from his thoughts, Oliva is on the right track with their new project.

Oliva’s core lines don’t usually change much but a few years ago they decided to bring out a special edition of their Serie V. It was to be wrapped with a Maduro leaf, limited in production quantities and restricted to a single vitola. It’s full name is the Oliva Serie V Maduro Especial and usually a year is appended to that. In the case of today’s review it is the 2010 to mark the year it was released. Unfortunately, there is no easy way to distinguish some of the various years.

With regards to the 2009 and 2010, you will find 2 main differences, firstly, the 2010 is a slightly larger ring gauge than the 2009 even though it maintains the same vitola. Also, the 2010 is wrapped in a nice dark San Andreas wrapper versus the previous years Broadleaf wrappers. Looking a little forward to 2011, the vitola is changing to a 6×50 Toro and should actually be hitting shelves very soon. It also has the same San Andreas wrapper. The production for the 2011 is also the same as the 2010 I’m reviewing today which is 5000 boxes of 10 cigars.

With a price point of $10.70/cigar they aren’t that steep but aren’t cheap either. It seems to strike a nice balance of a slightly high end or limited production stick. I’m also told that the 2011 version is dropping the MSRP to $9 which is a welcome change. Each of the Oliva Serie V Maduro Especial cigars are packed with a Ligero longfiller from the Jalapa Valley in Nicaragua which is well known for producing tasty and quality leaves.

The band on this cigar is fairly unassuming and doesn’t venture far from the standard Oliva lines. It adds “Maduro” on one side and “Especial” on the other but I’m disappointed that it doesn’t include a year. Not a huge deal but it would be a nice touch. I’m sitting down to enjoy this cigar on a fairly chilly evening here. The cigar also has a fair bit of age on it so that will affect the flavors. I have smoked a few of these before so I’ll make a quick comparison to then and now in the summary. Enjoy!

Cigar: Oliva Serie V Maduro Especial 2010
Drink: Dow’s Late Bottled Vintage Port 2005
Vitola: Torpedo (6 x 54)
Wrapper: Mexican San Andreas Maduro
Binder: Nicaragua
Filler: Nicaragua
Price: MSRP $10.70
Burn Time: A little over 1.5 hours

Construction:
• The Oliva Serie V Maduro is surrounded by a dark chocolate brown wrapper that has a rough look to it and an oily finish
• The exposed edges of the wrapper jump off the cigar a bit, especially near the cap which is extremely firm to the touch, this worries me
• The rest of the cigar has a nice little spring and give to it when squeezed
• The foot of the cigar appears to be very well packed with almost no room left in there at all
• I started with a small cut which clipped off fairly easily but I was met with a pretty tight draw
• I cut just a bit more and got a good draw, we’ll start here with a little more than a half inch clipped off the cap

Burn:
• Toasting was nice and slow but it kept even and glowed nicely
• Unfortunately, the cigar started off with a pretty drastic canoe despite what seemed to be an even toasting, needed to be touched up fairly early on
• Another little touchup after about 2 inches as the cigar tried canoeing on me again
• The cigar requires a small touch up pretty much every inch or so, luckily it’s not ruining the flavors
• The last 2.5 inches of the cigar REALLY slowed down the burn, making the cigar last that extra special bit longer

Smoke & Ash:
• There is a good amount of smoke coming from each draw
• Even while resting the cigar is producing a decent amount of smoke
• The ash is coming out to be a wonderful white color when it’s burning properly, my touchups are turning the ash black in some spots
• Even though the ash was looking clean, neat and strong, it still fell off into the ashtray after just about an inch

Tasting Notes:
• I was surprised to notice that the wrapper had barely any aroma to it, maybe just a touch of hay and that’s all
• The foot is also not too strong of an aroma, just a slightly more concentrated hay-type of aroma with just a little touch of a peppery spice
• The pre-light draw is also pretty bland here with only hints of hay again, I really hope the full experience will be more than this
• The initial draws were much more enjoyable with some roasted dark chocolate almond type of flavor and a hint of spices, maybe some coffee tucked in there too
• The chocolate almond flavors dwindled down a bit and I’m left with mostly coffee, spices and now some cedar. It’s still good but the start was much more enjoyable, let’s hope it returns!
• The body started off in the low end of medium and the cigar has a soft bite on the retrohale with an interesting cedary/peppery finish
• The coffee notes are really developing nicely and I’m also getting some nice warm earthy notes in the mix
• All the flavors are balancing well and the cedar finish is a nice touch
• As the 2010 Oliva Serie V Maduro progressed into the last third the body is slowly building and I’m on the edge of full now
• The spices have remained fairly soft so far and the retrohale reflects that with a soft bite and retains the smooth cedar finish
• The last bit of the cigar was still enjoyable until my fingers were burning, a nice buildup of coffee, light spices and cedar rounded out the final flavors

Final Thoughts:
Overall this was a pretty good smoke that I enjoyed. I feel that it never really did recreate that initial awesome roasted almond flavor. The beginning of the cigar was great and the remainder was good. Nothing about it was really bad, my only complaint would be the burn issues. Thankfully they didn’t negatively affect the flavors but it did take away from the whole experience a bit. I think the cigar could have earned itself a few more points with a bit more age as it already has. The ones I smoked earlier this year were not as good as this one. So my suggestion, grab a few and let them sit a few more months and they should be excellent. If those roasted almond flavors can linger a bit longer this would have been a fantastic cigar. The little bit of body buildup at the end was a nice touch for me as well. The price is a little high at just over $10 but I’m excited to see what the upcoming 2011 release brings since it will have the same wrapper and be $1.70 cheaper!

Pairings:
Tonight’s pairing is a new Port wine that I picked up at the liquor store the other day. It’s from Dow’s Winery which comes from the Symington Family Estates in Portugal. The 2005 Late Bottled Vintage Tawny Port has a fairly light and fruity feel on the palate with some deep notes like a touch of chocolate and woodsiness. It’s probably not the best Port I’ve had but it’s not bad in it’s own right either. It paired excellently with the flavors of the 2010 Oliva Serie V Maduro Especial. Other than Port I think this cigar would pair wonderfully with a heft stout, a strong or chocolate flavored coffee or even a nice scotch.

Tonight I’m revisiting a cigar I got as part of a Mobster Movie blind review series not too long ago. If you take a look at that review you’ll see that I wasn’t overly impressed with the cigar. After talking to a few people it seems there are some mixed feelings about the Illusione ~mj12~ and I wanted to give it a full out review to see if my experience would be any different. So here it is finally, I made sure to let the ones I have rest and acclimate properly before this review since the blind stick might have been a little fresh from transit.

So after smoking a few more I’m lighting up one of the Illusione ~mj12~ cigars for review tonight. Now I’m a pretty big Illusione fan and I’ve also enjoyed a few of his other lines including the Cuchillos Cubanos and the Cruzado’s (Tony actual posted a review of the Cruzado Dantes awhile back). In case you didn’t know, the person behind the Illusione brand is Dion Giolitto. We also have a few reviews up for the Illusione line such as the ~88~, ~888~ “Slam”, Epernay Le Elegance, ~mk~, and Singulaire Phantom. Now you’ll see from those posts that both Tony and I really enjoyed the cigars. Knowing that, I have to admit I’m coming into this review with mixed expectations. I have high hopes due to other Illusione’s I’ve enjoyed but I also have concerns because of my experience with the blind version of the ~mj12~.

If you haven’t visited his website before I’d highly suggest checking it out over at www.illusionecigars.com. He has a great section called “The Illusione Story” where he talks about his personal history and a little bit about the meaning of the names behind each of the cigars. It makes for an interesting read. Now I was slightly disappointed to see that Dion did not include a little blurb about the meaning behind the ~mj12~ name. All I can find was it’s nickname which is “The Majestic”. On the section of the website for the ~mj12~ specifically the only information it offers up is the following paragraph:

“A classic connoisseurs’ cigar revealing hints of leather, cinnamon and a long finish.”

So of course I started scouring the web to see what else I could find cause I love learning more about the sticks I review.

What I did find was somewhat limited but still interesting. The cigar is a Nicaraguan Puro and the specific seeds used are Corojo ’99 and Criollo ’98 finished with a Cafe Colorado wrapper. Each of the cigars is also handmade in the Raices Cubanas factory which is located in Nicaragua of course. The cigars come in boxes of 20 and are surrounded by an interesting silver foil wrapper. Warning: You are supposed to remove the foil before smoking! Wanted to get that out there just in case, you never know sometimes!

Now being the little investigator that I am, I curiously typed “MJ12″ into Google and came upon an interesting Wikipedia article. Apparently, “MJ12″, or “The Majestic 12″ is “the alleged code name of a secret committee of scientists, military leaders, and government officials, supposedly formed in 1947 by an executive order of U.S. President Harry S. Truman”. Now I’m not one for conspiracy theories or anythign so I’ll leave it at that, but interesting nonetheless!

Ok so enough of my detective work and blabbering away, let’s get down to the nitty gritty of the review before Tony comes back and cracks the whip!

Cigar: Illusione ~mj12~ “The Majestic”
Drink: Southbrook Wineries 2006 Triomphe Cabernet Merlot
Vitola: Toro Gordo (6 x 54)
Wrapper: Nicaraguan
Binder: Nicaraguan
Filler: Nicaraguan
Price: About $10
Burn Time: A little under 2 hours

Construction:
• The wrapper on this cigar has a wonderful dark chocolate brown tone with just a slight oily shimmer to it
• I did notice a few cosmetic imperfections such as a small knot and water spots but no major veins that look concerning
• Near the cap and foot, the cigar is fairly firm while being almost mushy in the middle. The softness there worries me and could produce some tunneling or a hot burning cigar
• The triple cap on the head of this cigar is applied with extreme precision, it is super smooth and blends right in
• From the foot’s perspective, all you see is well packed tobacco leaves
• The cap was pretty firm when clipped with my double bladed guillotine but it still left a clean cut

Burn:
• Toasting was a surprisingly long process but left me with an evenly glowing foot
• Unfortunately, the perfect toasting did not lead to a perfect burn, I’ve already had 2 canoeing issues within the first 1.5 inches
• Sadly, I’ve had 2 more relights before reaching the halfway mark
• More and more burn issues that needed correction throughout the cigar, looks like it did not differ much from the blind stick I received
• A little past half way the cigar actually went out completely, I took that opportunity to give it a nice complete re-light and lets hope we get a better burn now
• My hopes for a better burn were shattered quickly as it almost immediately started to tunnel…
• More constant relights as I get to the nub of this cigar

Smoke & Ash:
• Tons of smoke from each draw right from the start of this cigar
• The ash is looking to be moderately strong and holding together
• Fro a visual standpoint, the dark grey color of the ash is not very pleasing and it’s probably related to all the relights
• I was surprised to see very little resting smoke on the cigar, it all but disappears within seconds of laying it down
• The first ash lasted nearly 2 inches before I tapped it off
• Second ash got near 2 inches as well before tapping off to relight

Tasting Notes:
• The wrapper on this cigar has a super attractive bitter cocoa aroma to it
• The foot on the other hand carries more of a barnyard scent with a kick of spice on the nostrils
• The pre-light draw brings a little of the barnyard flavor but it mixing in some coffee adn woodsy notes
• The first few draws were not impressive to me at all, I got a heavy tobacco taste from them but luckily that went away quickly
• Afterwards, the profile is mostly in the burnt woodsy area with a touch of leather
• After about 2 inches the cigar is still mostly woodsy and leathery, I’m starting to pick up a touch of peppery spice now and then
• Retrohale is bringing a wonderful cedar finish and a small little bite, very nice
• Just like most Illusiones I’ve had the retrohale is always significantly more enjoyable than the smoke, I stand by my previous comments that if you don’t retrohale an Illusione you are probably missing out on a lot
• After each re-light I’m getting the expected harshness for a couple draws, it’s ruining the experience for me
• As I pass the halfway mark the profile is mostly the same although I am picking up a bit of sweetness when I’m not fighting the relight harshness
• For the most part this cigar stayed in the medium bodied range although it seems to be picking up a bit in the last third
• The sweetness I was picking up is turning into a sweet coffee type flavor which is a nice addition to the wood and leather, hoping it develops a bit more
• The only thing that really developed towards the end was a little more bite on the retrohale, which is still super good
• The rest of the cigar tapered off in sweetness and built up some harshness to the end, mostly due to the relights I’m sure
• Had to set the cigar to rest early, the harshness and relighting just got to be too much

Final Thoughts:
Let me start by saying I REALLY wanted to enjoy this cigar. It has a wonderful visual appeal to it and I’ve enjoyed mostly every Illusione I’ve had. Sadly though the ~mj12~ yet again failed to meet my expectations. I know it has potential though, the profile when I wasn’t relighting was pretty tasty. And the retrohale was very enjoyable. It’s the terrible burn that lost all the points on this cigar. It made it difficult to enjoy and ruined the flavors for the first couple draws after a relight. If I had this cigar without burn issues I probably would give it a glowing review but I’ve smoked through about 5 of these from different batches and I had the same issues every time. Maybe it’s just my luck cause I know a lot of people really enjoy them, but for me, I’ll stick to other vitolas in the Illusione line before looking at these again.

Pairings:
On the flip side, I happened to discover a wonderful wine last time I took a road trip to Niagara. The Southbrook name was actually a farm not far from my house many years ago. They used to do the typical fruits and vegetables with awesome fresh baked pies and a hay maze for the kids in the fall. Pumpkin picking too of course! When they closed the farm they opened a winery out in the Niagara region so I had to visit them. The wine I’m pairing with tonight is from 2006 and is a blend of a Cabernet and Merlot, which are 2 of my favorite wines from this region. It has a fantastic smooth flavor to it and a nice medium body. It’s got a surprising amount of fruity notes, in particular I’m getting black cherries and blackberries mostly. It also has a smooth oak finish to it from the barrel aging process that comes through very nicely. This is a great cigar pairing wine and would hold it’s ground against a variety of medium and full bodied smokes. It did very well with the Illusione ~mj12~. Other pairings with this cigar could be a coffee with milk, an brown ale and of course, Port!

Nestor Miranda is the founder of the Miami Cigars and Company and has recently started producing his own blends that come attached to his name. These include the Nestor Miranda Collection 1989, the newer Nestor Miranda Special Selection and the recent Casa Miranda. The Art Deco cigar also carries the Nestor Miranda blend and is currently sold in 3 vitolas, all of which are over 50 ring gauge.

The Art Deco is a joint effort effort between Nestor Miranda & José Pepin Garcia. I think we all know that Don Garcia is no stranger to success in the cigar industry and if he has a hand in the blending, you can usually be guaranteed it will be a quality cigar. The blend consists of 60% Nicaraguan Corojo 99 and 40% Dominican San Vicente, plus Dominican Criollo ’98 & Nicaraguan Habano 2000 binders rolled and triple-capped in dark, shimmering Nicaraguan Corojo ’06.

I actually picked up this cigar as part of a box set which included 4 Nestor Miranda Special Selection Ruky’s (2 Oscuro and 2 Rosado) along with an Art Deco. I’ve also enjoyed a few singles of the Robusto Grande vitola bought separately. I want to mention how awesome I think this band is. It’s so retro and different and the colors really pop. The cigars are also packaged in retro tins with the same neat design. But as they say, don’t judge a book by its cover! So I think that’s enough chatter, let’s get onto the review

Cigar: Nestor Miranda Art Deco
Drink: Unibroue Don De Dieu
Vitola: Robusto Grande (5.5 x 54)
Wrapper: Nicaraguan Corojo ’06
Binder: Dominican Criollo ’98 & Nicaraguan Habano ’00
Filler: Nicaraguan Corojo ’99 & Dominican San Vincente
Price: $8.50
Burn Time: 1.5 hours

Construction:
• This looks to be a wonderfully constructed cigar, very even in diameter with a dark golden brown wrapper
• The whole cigar is very firm when squeezed and has almost no bumps on the wrapper
• The head of the cigar is finished off with an extremely clean triple cap, it’s easy to see some extra care went into making this cigar
• The foot looks to be mostly well packed with a one gap that looks a bit under-filled
• The cut was fairly easy despite the firmness of the cigar
• The draw seems to be a bit more open than I’d typically like but it’s not terrible
• Seems that the draw tightened up a bit near the halfway mark making for a perfect draw each time

Burn:
• The cigar toasting was very easy with a short time frame to get the foot evenly glowing
• The initial burn was a bit wavy but it quickly corrected itself and started burning razor sharp after that
• Through the first half I have no complaints about the burn here, it’s still razor sharp and requires zero attention from me

Smoke & Ash:
• The smoke from each draw is fairly full but it’s actually not that thick in density
• The resting smoke here is almost non existent at times, it’s a very friendly cigar to have while non-smokers may be nearby
• The ash is starting off with a nice light gray color and looks to be tight and clean
• I’m getting some awesome striping on the ash and its staying clean and strong
• It lasted nearly 2 inches before making an awesome nosedive into the ashtray. A perfect 10 anyone???
• The next ash only lasted about an inch but it stayed clean and crisp and fell off easily into the ashtray

Tasting Notes:
• The wrapper on this cigar gives a strong earthy and barnyard aroma with a touch of cedar
• The aroma on the foot carries through with the earthy and cedar notes but adds in a slightly sweet spice, maybe of raw cinnamon
• The pre-light daw brings an interesting mix of sweet notes on top of the cedar, possibly some dried cherries
• Initial flavors are stong in the cedar department with that slightly dried cherry taste in there, very interesting!
• The cedar has stuck around through the first inch but the initial sweetness has tapered off a bit
• For the most part, the cigar has started off in the low end of the medium range with a small bite on the retrohale
• As I continue along, I’m getting a bit of leather and the initial earthy aromas are making an appearance in the flavor department now
• As I pass the halfway mark, the mix of cedar, leather and earth has me seeking a little something more. It’s not bad or harsh but I feel like there’s something missing since the sweetness disappeared…
• As the cigar continued I started getting a bit of the sweetness returning here and there along with some slight nuttiness
• The body is building ever so slowly in the last third, heading into the high medium range
• Some toasted nutty/almond flavors are making this last third a lot more interesting along with the dried cherry sweetness that keeps rearing it’s head here and there
• The nice final mixture of flavors stuck through to the nub with almost no harshness, a very nice finish

Final Thoughts:
As with all of the Miami Cigar offerings I seem to come into them with high hopes. They’ve had such a great track record recently that I only expect the best. The Nestor Miranda Art Deco is a well balanced cigar with a variety of flavors. The first and last 3rds of the cigar were interesting and kept me on my toes but the middle portion seemed to lack something. The burn was excellent the whole way through and overall construction was top notch. The price is also very reasonable so it’s something I would probably buy again, perhaps in the Coffee Break vitola (4.5 x 50). I think that size may be the sweet spot and keep the interesting flavors going from start to finish. If you like a good medium smoke with an interesting profile these are worth checking out.

Added note: I asked Tony his thoughts here and he’s only smoked the Coffee Break vitola and loved it. I’ve only had the Robusto Grande, so I think my guess that a smaller vitola would make this cigar great is probably a good guess!

Pairings:
So this beer comes with a funny sort of story.  I’ve done a few other reviews with Unibroue brews and always loved them, not to mention they are also Canadian which is a plus in my eyes!  Unfortunately, most of their brews are actually not even available for me to purchase cause of the ridiculous taxes and restrictions in my province. The brewery is only about a 5 hour drive away, but it’s in another province… So, I actually picked this bottle up in Florida. Yes, that’s right. I drove 1600 miles away from the brewery to actually buy it! I guess that speaks to the silliness of our taxes here! lol
Enough of my complaining, let’s move onto the actual beer. I had no idea what to expect from this as I’ve never had it before and the bottle doesn’t really explain what type of beer it is. The name of this beer, “Don De Dieu” literally translates to “Gift from God” so I figured it can’t be that bad!
After doing a bit of research, I found out this is a triple fermented wheat beer that is also unfiltered, giving it a cloudy appearance in the glass. The flavors in this brew are excellent, mixing a little bit of fruit, maybe some vanilla and very smooth malty finish. This is not your average wheat beer though, it packs in 9% ABV and the triple fermentation without filtration makes it feel a lot fuller bodied than you might expect. I found it to be an excellent pairing with the Nestor Miranda Art Deco as it offered up lots of interesting flavors. I think a fine tawny port would also be an excellent pairing here or perhaps keep it simple with a dark soda.

Smoke Inn’s Microblend Series is aimed at reproducing the effects that Microbreweries have had in the beer industry. As many of you know, microbreweries have made a big impact in their industry and really opened up the market to new types of beers that a lot of larger breweries don’t seem to try. Stepping out of the comfort zone as some would say. Smoke Inn has done the same thing and is making use of smaller yield tobaccos to produce new blends that would previously not have been created. They have also utilized a variety of different manufacturers to achieve very different flavor profiles.

I’m not gonna lie here, Padron is a brand that I typically enjoy everything that they do. They clearly have a name in the industry that speaks to their high quality and excellent blending. Their 1964 Anniversary Series is part of their more premium line of cigars and with that they always carry a larger price tag. In my experience, the higher price tags on this line are usually justified by smooth, tasty cigars and perfectly burning tobacco leaves.

Converse to what you might expect from Padron, the SI-15 blend made form Smoke Inn is a huge vitola (6 x 60 to be exact). The Padron lines are usually available in a variety of smaller vitolas with the occasional larger ones and I found it odd to see a single blend made only in this larger vitola. I should make note that I’m not a huge fan of these large ring gauge cigars. It seems that I always run into burn issues, or draw issues or just a plain bland profile from too much filler. From what I could gather, the blend doesn’t really differ from other vitolas in the 1964 line but since there is so much more filler, the cigar has it’s own unique profile. Let see if that holds true and read on through my review! (Cheesy, I know… lol)

Cigar: Padron 1964 Anniversary Series SI-15 Natural – Smoke Inn Exclusive
Drink: Sierra Nevada Stout
Vitola: SI-15 (6 x 60)
Wrapper: Nicaraguan
Binder: Nicaraguan
Filler: Nicaraguan
Price: Gifted by Smoke Inn ($18.50 MSRP)
Burn Time: About 2 hours

Construction:
• This is a hefty looking cigar with a significant ring gauge and a slightly box pressed look
• There are quite a few visible veins along the length of the wrapper but none seem to e large enough to cause any burn issues
• The color of the wrapper is a very soft medium brown and gives off a slight shimmer in the light, showing some of it’s nice oily qualities
• Surprisingly, the top of this massive cigar is covered by only a single cap, and it does a good clean job of it too!
• The whole cigar is consistently firm when squeezed with very little give
• From the foot, you can see some gaps in the filler, hopefully this won’t lead to any tunnel issues which I seem to run into often with larger ring gauge cigars
• My double bladed guillotine cutter was barely able to fit on this huge ring gauge, but it managed to get a nice clean cut
• The draw is very open even with my small cut

Burn:
• Toasting was a bit uneven as can be expected with larger ring gauge cigars
• Burn is going very well through the first inch, it was a messy start but I’m happy to see a good auto-correction!
• The cigar is also allowing me to smoke it slowly without any problems or worries about it going out
• Through to the half way marked I’m impressed by a razor sharp burn
• I started to get some wavy burn in the last couple of inches which needed a couple small corrections

Smoke & Ash:
• I’m getting surprisingly less smoke than I was expecting, perhaps a downside of the very open draw
• In hindsight, I think I should have gone with a V-Cut or Punch with this cigar
• The resting smoke on this Smoke Inn Padron 1964 SI-15 is fairly minimal and gives off a pleasant woodsy aroma
• The ash has a very nice white color to it with only a few spots of black here and there
• It’s also holding on strongly with no flaking or curving
• First ash lasted nearly two inches before gently being tapped off into the ashtray
• The smoke picked up thickness around the halfway mark and now I’m getting a big mouthful from each draw
• Second ash also held nice and clean for nearly two inches, great construction as I would expect from Padron

Tasting Notes:
• The wrapper on this cigar has a typical Padron aroma, giving off slight hints of coffee and some tobacco sweetness
• The foot seems to tell a bit of a different story, it had a lot more sweetness to it, mixed with some cocoa and a touch of spice
• The pre-light draw tastes mostly of tobacco and a bit of earthy notes, nothing exciting about this part of the cigar
• Right off the initial draw I get a very interesting baked bread type of flavor
• I have to note that this cigar is extremely awkward for me to hold and smoke, it’s just too large of a ring gauge than what I’m used to
• Along with the baked bread flavors, the Smoke Inn Exclusive Padron 1964 SI-15 has some mildly bitter coffee flavors and slight hint of sweetness once in a while
• The body of this cigar is starting off in the higher end of mild, it’s not quite medium. From the retrohale I get a small bite a smooth cedar finish
• The bitter coffee flavors continue to develop nicely and I’m really enjoying them. There is also some cedar and spice sneaking in as the sweetness disappears
• The body is slowly creeping into the medium category as the coffee flavors turn into the wonderful bittersweet espresso flavors I’ve come to love from most Padrons
• The bitter espresso notes have really taken control with about 2 inches left to go
• I’m also getting hints of a strong bitter chocolate here and there along with some cedar, a very tasty profile I must say!
• The bitterness turned a tad harsh in the last inch, but nothing terrible

Final Thoughts:
I’m pleasantly surprised to say I really enjoyed this cigar. I came into this with some serious skepticism about the vitola as my experiences with 6 x 60′s has been fairly poor. This cigar did not suffer from those same problems! The flavors were not muted by all the filler and the burn was spot-on even after a poor toasting (for the most part). Despite the larger ring gauge, the Padron 1964 Anniversary Series SI-15 kept the signature flavors I’ve come to enjoy in all the Padrons I’ve smoked. I think Smoke Inn has a definite winner of an exclusive on their hands here. Be sure to check out their website and order some to try if you can. They are a bit on the high scale in terms of pricing but if you compare to other Padron 1964′s it’s on par, and so is the flavor! If you are a fan of 6×60′s this is definitely something to add to your wishlist! You can buy there here from the Smoke Inn eShop.

Pairings:
Sierra Nevada is a brand that I can’t get locally, it seems they have absolutely no distribution in Ontario that I know of. So I picked this up along with the rest of my beer haul from Florida. I’m a big fan of stouts and porters and in general, they are hard for me to find locally. As you might guess from it’s name, the Sierra Nevada brewery is located in California and today Im enjoying their Stout with my Smoke Inn Exclusive Padron 1964 SI-15. The Sierra Nevada Stout is surprisingly smooth with a slightly bitter and full flavored maltiness. I was actually expecting this brew to be a bit thicker but it’s not as thick as other stouts while still maintaining a nice full flavor. It has a very long finish on the palate and leaves some bitter chocolate and coffee notes. This was an excellent pairing for the Padron 1964 SI-15 and complimented the flavors so well since they actually had similar flavor profiles. I would also recommend a strong coffee or port with this cigar, I think both would match nicely!

The wrapper on this cigar seems is very pretty, it’s got a very fresh and organic feel to it. At the same time it’s also pretty cryptic. On the front form top to bottom, you see “CAO”, “OSA” and “SOL” while on each side there are the words “San Agustin” and “Olancho”. Also in the white section it appears to be a map type of image with some names and rivers or roads on it. To help break the encryption for everyone, the “OSA” is simply the first initials of the regions where the tobaccos for this cigar were harvested. In this case it’s from ‘O’lancho, and ‘S’an ‘A’gustin.

I’m not sure exactly what the map is supposed to mean, possibly just tying into how the name is connected to it’s area of origin. The “Sol” in the name simply translates to “Sun” from Spanish. Likely signifying the Sungrown wrapper that surrounds the cigar. It’s also interesting to see that General Cigar kept the trend of naming the cigar after the location of it’s wrapper like CAO did. Although CAO usually named it after the wrappers after their country rather than region, such as the “Italia” or “Brazilia”

The blender for this new cigar is Rick Rodriguez of General Cigar. According to General/CAO, the leaves were chosen from the above mentioned regions in Honduras because of their unique weather conditions that result in some extra natural oils. I can’t say I noticed any excess of oils but it had a nice sheen to it. I will also say that General has some big shoes to fill after the massive success of CAO’s La Traviata and La Traviata Maduro.

I have to admit I’m coming into this cigar review with mixed feelings. I’ve enjoyed many of CAO’s offerings but now that they’ve been acquired by General Cigar I have some concerns since I’ve not had a good track record with General’s offerings. Maybe I just haven’t found the line they make that appeals to me. So here I guess we will find if the acquisition worked out in favor of the CAO line or not…

A quick disclaimer, this cigar was sent as a sample from General Cigar but I can assure you my review and opinions are my own and are completely honest. Now with that out of the way, let’s get to the “Good Stuff” as Tony would say!

Cigar: CAO OSA SOL
Drink: Innia & Gunn Rum Cask Oak Aged Beer
Vitola: ”Lot 50” Robusto (5 x 50)
Wrapper: Honduran Sungrown
Binder: Connecticut Broadleaf
Filler: Nicaraguan/Honduran
Price: About $5.50 – $6
Burn Time: A little over an hour

Construction:
• The CAO OSA has a very velvety smooth wrapper that has a warm cinnamon color to it
• There are some visible veins along the wrapper but they are not bumpy at all
• The head of the cigar is finished with a very clean double cap
• The foot of the cigar seems a bit messy, it looks well packed but some of the leaves seem sort of folded in and not really cleanly cut
• From the cap to the foot, the entire cigar is very firm with very little give when squeezed, let’s hope that doesn’t translate to a tight draw…
• The cut was very easy and clean and left me with a slightly tight draw. It’s not overly difficult to draw so I’ll stick with it for now

Burn:
• Toasting was a little bit tedious and there were some dark spots near the center that would just not glow properly, but after a few puffs I think I’m well on my way
• The cigar has a slight wave to it within the first inch, we’ll see if the burn corrects itself or gets worse…
• The wave is slowly getting worse as the cigar progresses, I’ve made it to the half way mark without correction but it may need a touch up soon
• As predicted, I needed a hefty touch up shortly after the halfway point and it continue to go downhill after that…

Smoke & Ash:
• The first few draws were a little weak in the smoke department but it got going to a moderate amount per draw shortly after
• There is initially a lot of resting smoke after putting the cigar down but within a couple seconds it’s pretty much no resting smoke at all
• The ash on this cigar is looking to be very clean and strong with a medium gray and black color to it
• Ash held on nicely for about an inch before falling into the ashtray, still remaining tightly bound

Tasting Notes:
• The aroma on the wrapper of the CAO OSA has an interesting tart sweetness to it and a bit of a mild tobacco touch
• The foot keeps the slight tartness to it and adds a bit of spice and a dry foliage type of aroma
• The tartness makes another appearance in the pre-light draw, along with more of the dry foliage earthiness
• Within the first few puffs I get a very interesting spicy bite, it’s not quite pepper, maybe something like a chili flake. Mix that in with the sweetness that’s still around and this is making for a very tasty start!
• Sweet Chili Doritos come to mind as I continue smoking this… wow! Maybe even with a little dirt thrown in the bag for the earthy flavors! lol
• The chili flavors have settled down a bit and translated to a mild white pepper, the earthiness has taken it’s place mixed with some cedar. Seems the sweetness is mostly gone now
• The retrohale up to now has been pretty uneventful with almost no bite and a bland finish
• Body for the most part has been in the low end of medium for the first half
• The flavors have settled into a mostly plain cedar and earthy mix and the finish has gotten slightly dry, a HUGE change from my initial impression
• Sadly, the blandness continues as I smoke the cigar, the flavors are turning into an almost charred wood type of flavor
• After my touch up past the halfway point the flavors took another downward turn and really turned more into the charred zone. I’m hoping it picks up…
• After another touch-up I couldn’t smoke this one anymore. I was trying to take one for the team here and hoping for the best but it’s just not happening, setting it down early…

Final Thoughts:
I REALLY had some hope for this cigar after seeing it’s construction, aroma and interesting initial flavors. That wicked sweet chili start really got my attention but it sadly tapered off quickly after that. The sweetness and chili got replaced by some plain cedar and earthy flavors that did not compare at all, it was if I started smoking a whole different cigar. I have to say I can’t remember the last time I had such a huge difference of opinion from start to finish on the same cigar. If the initial flavors on this cigar continued, I would have given this a glowing review for it’s uniqueness and delicious profile, but sadly that didn’t happen. The price point on these is accessible but it doesn’t come close to comparing to CAO’s old flagship La Traviata which was at the same price or even cheaper.

Pairings:
Innis & Gunn, what can I say? It’s still one of my favorite breweries. I enjoy everything I’ve had from them and I continue to seek them out every time I go to the store. Today’s choice was their Rum Cask Oak Aged Beer which is a fantastic brew. It’s got some very tasty fruity sweetness and malty flavors mixed in with their trademark wonderful oaky notes. You can even catch some spicy flavors in there if you really pay attention. It’s got a fairly dark and full body on it so it can stand up to many fuller cigars including the CAO OSA. It made for a good pairing and added some interesting flavors to what ended up being a straightforward cigar. Other good pairings with this cigar would probably be some flavorful or full bodied beers or wines to keep your palate interested. Possiby a nice stout, Port or a strong cup of coffee to overpower the cigar… lol

Before heading down south for a couple weeks I picked out a cigar to review that recently made an appearance at the IPCPR show in July 2011. It’s not the first report of this cigar though as is was initially released in limited quantities back in May of this year. Originally it was released to be sold in singles and 5-packs along with the purchase of other EO Brands cigars and is soon to be available in boxes of 10. I’ve already seen them posted up on some online cigar retailers who seem to be taking pre-orders.

The La Bomba is one of the first new cigars coming from EO Brands since they merged with Rocky Patel not long ago. There seemed to be a lot of criticism and concern over the direction of the company after that merger and I think they can be put to bed after the news of this release. The cigar is still blended by Erik Espinosa and Eddie Ortega of the original EO Brands company and also continues to be rolled at the My Father Cigars factory in Nicaragua.

From some web research, it seems the official name of the cigar is the 601 La Bomba. As you can see from the picture, it will be a yellow 601 label placed at the foot of the cigar with an interesting warning. I like the comedic side! The La Bomba has an interesting appearence with it’s “fuse” like pig tail on the cap. It’s been touted as a pepper and spice ‘blast’ no less, so let’s see if the imagery coincides with the experience. Will I be “blown away”? (Sorry, I couldn’t resist! haha)

Cigar: EO Brands 601 La Bomba (Yellow Label)
Drink: Delaforce 2005 Late Bottled Vintage Tawny Port
Vitola: “Atom” Corona (5.5 x46)
Wrapper: Nicaraguan Habano
Binder: Nicaragua
Filler: Nicaragua
Price: About $8
Burn Time: 1.5 hours

Construction:
• A fairly rough looking wrapper with lots of veins surrounds with cigar, none of them are over sized but they are noticeable
• The dark chocolate brown color shines in the light due to it’s oiliness, very appealing look
• The top of the cigar is finished with a triple cap that flows into a long pig tail, making this look sort of like a stick of dynamite
• The cigar has a nice firmness with a slight spring which is petty even throughout
• The foot of the cigar looks to be mostly well packed with a couple spots that seem a little open
• The cap clipped off easily and left me with a great draw

Burn:
• Toasting was just about spot on, taking a bit of time but not too long before my culinary torch had it glowing evenly
• The La Bomba started burning great right off the start and is staying lit with minimal draws
• At first the cigar seemed to be burning quickly but it slowed down and is burning super slow now
• Burnline is razor sharp through the first half and still burning slowly
• Razor sharp burn continue to the end but it got a little hot at the nub

Smoke & Ash:
• This cigar started out with a huge burst of smoke, very thick and full
• Despite the ton of smoke from each draw, the resting smoke is very minimal going almost unnoticeable after a few seconds in the ashtray
• The ash is a little uneven and rough around the edges but it’s producing a very nice white color. It’s not flaking but doesn’t look too strong
• First ash lasted a little over an inch and fell softly into the ashtray
• Nice ashes continued for the remainder or the cigar, very nice construction!

Tasting Notes:
• The wrapper of the cigar gives off a spicy and woodsy aroma, actually made me sneeze! lol
• The foot brings more spice and wood, along with a bit of earthy or barnyard aroma
• The pre-light draw is very interesting bringing some sweet tartness on top of the woodsy and spicy burst
• The initial draws are packed with pepper spice that makes you tongue and lips tingle, along with a smooth woodsy undertone
• The cigar started off in the medium bodied range and the retrohale already has a hefty bite to it.
• The finish has been somewhat dry and mostly with a flavor of wood
• Within the first inch the pepper blast laid back a bit, its still there but now it’s more of a compliment rather than the major player
• The woodsy and earthy notes have taken center stage and now I’m getting some leather mixed in there as well
• The cigar really balances out nicely and gets much smoother after the first third, the flavors haven’t changed much but they are brighter and the finish isn’t dry anymore
• As I pass the halfway point the body and spice are building up, definitely lots more pepper in the mix now with a biting raw nutmeg
• The spice and body continue to build in the the last couple inches, definitely into the full range
• The overall profile is still smooth but the dryness on the finish is slowly creeping up again
• Only minor harshness at the nub but the heat of the cigar had me lay it down just a bit early cause my fingers were burning, lol

Final Thoughts:
The EO Brands La Bomba is all in all and enjoyable smoke. It’s flavor profile will definitely cater towards those who like some bite and kick in their cigar. Usually that’s not my favorite profile but this one had a good balance to it through most of the cigar. The burnline was spot on the entire time and that always grants extra points in my mind. I don’t think I would offer this cigar up to a new cigar smoker but most regular cigar lovers will find the cigar interesting and it will keep you on your toes.
Let me add that this cigar had some punch to it that I didn’t realize until I stood up, a definite nicotine kick here and a powerful little cigar!

Pairings:
Not doing anything new in this department today, sorry! lol. I like my Port and I stand by it, especially when I’m heading into a cigar I know is higher up in the full range. The Delaforce 2005 Late Bottled Vintage Tawny Port is a great drink that fits me perfectly. Price, flavor and smooth texture make it a great pairing to many cigars. I recently reviewed the Perdomo Grand Cru Maduro and the Pinar Del Rio 1878 Cubano Especial Capa Madura with this pairing. I found the Port to be an excellent match for the EO Brands 601 La Bomba’s peppery spice and power. The sweet and boldness of the port really stands up to it while complimenting it as well. I think a careful pairing will make or break this cigar so make sure to reach for something a little fuller. Other possible pairings could include a nice scotch or maybe a strong and bitter Belgian ale.

But despite my silly oversight, I managed to get one to review for everyone’s enjoyment! The cigar I’m referring to happens to be an Illusione ‘888’ Slam. This particular cigar is not entirely full production at the time I write this. Dion Giolitto, of Illusione Cigars, released this as a prototype blend and it seems it was well received all around!

Although the name is mostly the same, the Illusione ‘888’ Slam is not the exact same blend as the Illusione ‘888’. The main difference is a single type of filler leaf that was removed to help make the “bench” press process possible. The bench press style of this cigar is where the “Slam” in the title comes from. The Illusione ‘888’ Slam is a Nicaraguan Puro, meaning all the leaf in the blend is sourced from Nicaraguan tobacco. The one thing that doesn’t come from Nicaragua in this cigar is the production, it’s actually rolled in the Honduras factory.

As with each of the Illusione blends, they have a little catchphrase associated with each blend. In this case, the catch phrase is “Neccesary and Sufficient”. The name and numbers have roots in Dion’s faith and I would recommend reading about the meaning on his website. The addition of the meaning behind each name is a very interesting addition in the cigar world.

Cigar: Illusione ‘888’ Slam
Drink: Wychwood Brewery Hobgoblin
Vitola: (6.75 x 48)
Wrapper: Nicaragua
Binder: Nicaragua
Filler: Nicaragua
Price: About $11.00
Burn Time: A little over 1.5 hours

Construction:
• This is a long bench-pressed cigar with an appealing cinnamon brown wrapper
• The wrapper appears to have a couple of small water spots but there are no substantial veins to be seen anywhere, it’s very smooth
• The cigar has a soft feel to it when squeezed but it’s nicely consistent from end to end
• The top is finished with a clean triple cap while the foot appears very well packed
• The cut was pretty easy although it made a bit of a mess in the ashtray

Burn:
• The toasting on this cigar was super easy, the smaller ring gauge and bench pressed shape helped it to glow evenly with little effort
• Through the first bit the cigar is burning razor sharp as well as nice and slow
• May have spoke too soon once again, started getting some very slanted burn now
• I let it go for a bit hoping for a self correction but it needed a little intimidation from my lighter
• Had another lopsided burn situation that needed correction just past the halfway mark
• In the last third the wrapper actually stopped burning and I needed to touch it up a couple times, this might have been due to the 94% humidity outside?

Smoke & Ash:
• Lots of smoke coming off each draw, very full and enjoyable
• The ash is a very light grey and has some dark black zebra striping
• It only lasted about an inch, started to go all lopsided so I decided to tap it off
• Despite it’s weakness, the ash stays nice and clean with no flaking
• Ashes continue to be about an inch but the few touchups made it weaker and I had a few miss the ashtray and go for a dive to the floor
• I had pure butter fingers with this cigar tonight and kept losing my ash! Oops!

Tasting Notes:
• The wrapper has a light and sweet aroma to it, maybe a touch of cocoa in there
• Pre-light draw brings a heavy flavor of cedar and earthiness
• Right from the initial draw I’m getting a big burst of spice on each draw with an earthy undertone
• The retrohale right off the bat here is fantastic! It’s got a nice helping of cedar, a mall bite of spice and the finish is super unique. The closest I can compare it to is the type of grapes used to make wine with. A very unique tarty sweetness that I’ve never found in a cigar before
• Body is starting off in the low end of medium so far
• The spice settles down after a couple inches and left me with mostly earthiness and some cedar, the retrohale remains super tasty!
• As I get to the halfway mark I’m getting a nice roasted coffee flavor that’s balancing very nicely with the cedar and spice
• The finish throughout this cigar has been extremely smooth and not drying at all, you could probably smoke this whole cigar without a drink, it’s that smooth
• Getting into the last third that tarty sweetness I’m getting on the retrohale is making an appearance in the normal draw, very nice touch
• As I get into the last couple of inches the spice is making a big comeback, each draw gives a very interesting texture on my tongue, it’s thick and chewy and almost feels like I just sprinkled black pepper right on my tongue. Very cool!
• The cigar did not get harsh at all near the end, just some huge bursts of spice and still a smooth finish

Final Thoughts:
The Illusione ‘888’ Slam was awesome! That just about sums it up! Do I need to continue? ok fine… The most enjoyable part of this cigar that I can’t emphasize enough is the retrohale. If you don’t run the smoke through your nasal passages I think you would be missing out on a huge part of this cigar. You would probably think that I’m crazy and the cigar was just ok. Without the retrohale, it’s an ok cigar. But with it, it’s fantastic. The burn was nice and even for the most part and draw was spot on. The price is a tad high but this is a long vitola and makes for a fully enjoyable experience. the price may make it hard for a lot of people to opt for a full box, but definitely reach for a 5-pack if you can, they are worth it in my opinion.

Pairings:
Tonight’s pairing choice is from Wychwood Brewery in Oxfordshire England and is called Hobgoblin. Seems I’m picking up a lot of English brews lately, not on purpose though, it just seems to be what I find at the store. I actually posted up a full review of this beer awhile ago during the colder months, you can read it here. The beer has some seriously tasty hoppy bitterness and lots of malt. On top of that you can pick up some light berry flavors. It’s definitely enjoyable on it’s own and I’ve found it to be an excellent pairing with quite a few cigars as well. It paired nicely with the Illusione ‘888’ Slam and I think the main reason for this is because of it’s straightforward profile. It doesn’t have too much in the way of other sweet flavors and prides itself as a traditional Ruby Beer. This makes it a good palate cleanser and doesn’t mess with the cigars flavors very much, allowing you to enjoy the cigar for what it is. Other great pairings here would be a full stout, my favorite tawny port or a nice cup of coffee.

Prelight: Cigar #9 starts out with a very smooth, consistent, yellowish brown wrapper. This could be some good Connecticut, Ecuadorian, Sumatran, or maybe even Cuban. The construction on this cigar is spot on bearing only one large vein between the body and the seamless, round double cap. And I use the term “double cap” loosely cause quite frankly, I can’t even tell if it’s double or triple. The cigar feels extremely hard when compressed. All except the foot which is very squishy. The wrapper feels really delicate and I am scared to handle it too much for fear of tearing or breakage.

This cigar is really holding back on its prelight aroma. I can barely get a slight cedar scent from the wrapper. So light that I can’t tell if it’s the actual cigar, or just some aroma it picked up from my humidor. The foot give off a very interesting sweet smell. It’s not something I smell too often in cigars. It’s a lot lighter and I can’t really smell much of the tobacco. It almost smells like sweet bread mixed with clean sheets or something. Really strange I know, and I am pulling really far its true. But, it’s worth noting that the small amount of aroma that I am pulling from this cigar isn’t one that I come across too often. The cap of this cigar cut super easy. Like, crazy easy. It felt as if I didn’t even need a cutter. The cold draw is really dry, and gives off an almost mossy leather type flavor. Don’t be turned off by that though. I picked up the same flavor in my review of the AVO LE10 and absolutely loved the cigar.

First Smoke: Lighting of the cigar was cake. And what some REALLY strange flavors I am pulling out of this thing. First, it started off with a really strange Marijuana type flavor (no joke). After the first few draws that changed into a charred, burn type flavor. All that before balancing out to a mossy, leather, creamy woodsy flavor with this neat little kick of spice that I can only feel during the aftertaste. The cigar gives off some slight stationary smoke, but it’s VERY pungent with a strong woodsy and spice aroma.  The burnline is a very sharp, but wavy at times. Nothing too concerning though as it leaves behind a very light grey trail of flaky ash. Remarkably, the ash held on well over an inch before giving way.

Halfway There: Interesting enough, the second third of this blind cigar is being totally dominated by this strong cashew flavor. My mouth seriously tastes like I have been smoking cigars and eating mixed nuts for the last 3 hours.  Outside of that I am still getting the same mossy, wet wood flavors I was getting in the first third and just a pinch of the spice on the aftertaste along with this slight metallic taste. The retrohale on this cigar is strange to me. I’m not really pulling strong spice and cedar from this cigar, but the retrohale is just that. It’s enjoyable though and gives a nice change up in the cigar’s profile. I am not feeling much of any nicotine at all from this cigar. The burnline still has some slight waves, but is overall doing a good job correcting itself. Believe it or not, I am actually feeling a little nicotine kick from this cigar.

Finish:  Down to the last third of this blind cigar, and overall it’s been very interesting. The flavor mash-ups while, not ideal, really keep you on your toes. The main flavor now has resolved to the mossy wet wood flavor more than the cashew. The cashew is still in there, but it’s really toned down a lot as the body began to ramp up. I am not finally getting some of the cedar flavor too, but it may be too little too late. I would have liked this a lot more upfront to balance out the moss taste. This cigar really took a lot longer then I thought to burn, ending up at a total of an hour and a half smoking time. Burnline was dead even by the end of the experience and required no touch ups, or relights what so ever.

Overview: Overall this was a good cigar. It’s definitely a departure from what I am used to smoking, but that doesn’t make it a bad cigar. The flavors aren’t something you come across everyday which made me really want to smoke more of the cigar and really pull to see what else I could pick up. The body ramp up at the end was really nice, but like I said, I really wish some of the cedar flavors came though a little more. It’s almost as if the cigar never really got it’s chance to shine.

So what did I think it was? PSh, who knows. I really had a hard time with this one as it probably isn’t anything that I have ever smoked before and if it is, it’s not anything I have had in while. My first guess would have to be a Tatuaje Ambos Mundos Sumatran. The wrapper on this cigar really had the characteristics of Sumatran Tobacco. Plus, I don’t smoke those often enough to be able to pull them out of a crowd. Second guess? Man, I really don’t know. Maybe a Bolivar Cuban? I haven’t had one of those in a while either, but I do remember them having a little kick of strength with an overall mild composure. Either way, my guesses are swayed very heavily on overall appearance of the cigar cause quite frankly, I really don’t think I have ever smoked this cigar before.

The Reveal: Turns out this cigar was far from my predictions. The Zino Chateau.

First of all. Let me start off by thanking Brooks for honesty. Why you may ask? Well, if any of you have read Brook’s review on this cigar you would know his thoughts on this. I remember reading it when he posted it and being BLOWN away by how honest, and upfront his opinions where on this cigar. In fact, I remember him actually saying “While I have loved a few and have been disappointed by a few (Dominican) Davidoffs in the past, to say this is a “Shitty” cigar would be slandering shit” Woah right? He then goes on to say: “I was going to give one of these away, but decided that would be torture to whoever received it, so count yourselves lucky.”  That’s where his honesty about me comes into play. He obviously sees me as an enemy.

All kidding aside, I am really glad that he sent this stick. As you can read above you can tell I didn’t think this was a great stick. But I also didn’t think it was that bad either. What this does is really confirm two things. 1) That taste is purely subjective. and 2) that I am a complete idiot for my guesses. Both the Tatuaje and the Bolivar didn’t deserve that.

Well, I wont really go into specifics about this cigar. I will say this, it’s probably may more pricey than it’s worth. To read Brook’s full review (which I strongly suggest you do, you’ll get a kick out of it) follow this link.

Today I reached into my Cuban humidor to pick out a stick from a box I recently ordered. I hadn’t tried a Hoyo de Monterrey Spicure Especial prior to this little box purchase so I started off with a 10 count box to see how I would like them before I bought a larger box. The cigars have the standard Hoyo De Monterrey bands with an additional white band below that with the “Epicure Especial” name on it,

Hoyo De Monterrey is one of the many cigar manufacturers from Cuba and they offer a fair variety of cigars. I’ve dabbled in some of their other vitolas and heard good things about this one, especially considering their fair price tag. So I bit the bullet and grabbed a box. The cigars come in a cedar box of 10 with a sliding lid. This damn lid practically required a vice grip to get off! Needless to say, the lid never went back on the box after that… So after prying the lid off I got to see my cigars.

The Hoyo De Monterrey Epicure Especial come bound together with a nice golden yellow ribbon adorned with the cigar name. The name of the cigar is very misleading considering it’s actual vitola. A typical epicure is much smaller but this cigar is almost a full toro size! As I smoke this I’m sitting outside enjoying some awesome sunny weather. Let’s see how this cigar stacks up!

Cigar: Hoyo De Monterrey Epicure Especial
Drink: Unibroue Brewery Maudite
Vitola: Epicure Especial (5.8 x 50)
Wrapper: Cuban
Binder: Cuban
Filler: Cuban
Price: About $8
Burn Time: 1.5 hours

Construction:
• The wrapper on this cigar is fairly rough looking with quite a few bumps and some medium sized veins running along it
• The color of the wrapper is a nice deep brown, almost chocolate and shines with it’s oiliness
• The top of the Epicure Especial is finished with a triple cap, not messy but not perfectly clean either
• The foot of the cigar looks fairly well packed with no gaps to be seen
• A slight squeeze reveals a fairly firm cigar with just a little springiness to it
• The cut on this cigar was super easy and fell off in one clean piece

Burn:
• Toasting was very simple, the tobacco started glowing quickly
• Turns out the toasting wasn’t too even so I needed a little touch up shortly after lighting
• After that minor correction we’ve be running in auto-pilot! No problem for the first couple of inches at all
• Discovered a little tunnel after the first ash and it’s making the burn a little lopsided now, will need a touch up
• Cigar actually went out a bit early

Smoke & Ash:
• Right off the bat I’m getting a ton of smoke from each draw
• The resting smoke is fairly minimal and gives off an almost campfire type of aroma, like burning wood
• Ash is a little rough looking but it’s staying compact and clean
• The color on the ash is a fairly light grey with some spots being nearly white
• I started to get a bit of flaking on the ash as it grew to almost 2 inches in length
• First ash fell calmly into the ashtray just short of 2 inches

Tasting Notes:
• The wrapper of the Epicure Especial gives off a nice cedar aroma with a slight nuttiness to it
• Pre-light draw is very woodsy and has some nice spice added into the mix, a bit of white pepper and some raw nutmeg
• Initial draws bring more of the woodsy notes and a very creamy undertone, I’m very surprised to see the pre-light spice is almost completely gone
• So far the body is fairly mild but smooth and creamy, retrohale has almost no bite to it with a cedar finish
• I’m getting a little bit of the saltiness that Tony always mentions in his Cuban reviews
• There are some slight hints of leather here and there along with some bits of roasted coffee
• There’s a lot going on the the flavor department, very complex but it’s very smooth, balanced and tasty so I’m enjoying it quite a bit
• As the cigar hits the half-way mark, some of the initial spice is making a comeback with a bit of nutmeg and clove
• All the flavors seemed to slowly intensify as I passed the halfway mark with the coffee and woody notes still being the most prominent
• As I approach the nub I’m getting some interesting earthy and vegetal flavors I wasn’t expecting
• The body had a nice buildup to the finish and started to turn a tad bitter with under an inch to go

Final Thoughts:
Well there’s not much I can say about this stick other than I really liked it! What a great and relaxing experience! The cigar had a nice variety of flavors that were always well balanced and enjoyable. The smooth and creamy aspects made it a pleasure to smoke along with a great burnline. The price of these is also very fair coming in at around $8. It’s not an “in-your-face” cigar and if you prefer a lot of strength you won’t find it here. The little bit of build-up near the end was a nice turn as I was expecting it to be mild the whole way through. Considering the age of this cigar being only from 2009 I think another year would make the last bit just as smooth but it’s still a tasty cigar.

Pairings:
Another Canadian craft brew for me today. The Maudite from Unibroue Brewery! I’ve had this one with quite a few other reviews including the Alec Bradley Family Blend, La Aurora 1495 and My Father Le Bijou 1922. It’s a very tasty and smooth strong beer with an 8% alc/vol. I’ve sai it before and I’ll say it again, this does not taste like a strong beer AT ALL! It’s so smooth and light tasting. you get some fruity/tart undertones with a slight malty bitterness and a clean finish. Very enjoyable and seems to pair well with a lot of cigars. It did pair fairly well here although I think a nice porter or stout would have gone better from the brew category. Port of course would have been perfect and a strong coffee would have been excellent as well.