The Good Stuff:

El Galan Vegas Del Purial is the newest offering to make it’s way onto shelved from El Galan. The cigar is named to honor Felix A. Mesa’s family legacy as well as the name of the farm in Cuba where his grandparents grew tobacco. The El Galan Vegas Del Purial is composed of Nicaraguan filler, and Nicaraguan binder called FFMC96, warped in an Ecuadorian Sumatran wrapper. The cigars are produced at the El Galan Cigars S.A. factory in Esteli Nicaragua and come in four sizes: Robusto (5 x 50), Belicoso (5 1/2 x 52), Lancero (7 x 38), and Super Toro (6 3/4 x 52). All come packaged in 20 count boxes ranging between $8.90 and $10 a stick. Our great friends over at Cuenca Cigars sent a few of these our way to review and you can order them directly from the site here.

Size: 5 1/2 x 52
Wrapper: Ecuadorian Sumatra
Binder: Nicaraguan FFMC96
Filler: Nicaraguan
Body: Medium/Full
Strength: Medium
Price: $9.40
Pairing: Bruery Coconut Macadoom (Imperial Stout 19.3% ABV)

Prelight:

The wrapper on the El Galan Vegas Del Purial Gran Reserva is a beautifully consistent, milky brown with only some darker, more orangish areas around the cap. The wrapper is seamlessly laid over itself while it sports some minor tooth, a good amount of oil, very minor veining, and some natural leaf webbing. The cigar is packed generously as the cigar feels very thick and tough with no soft spots. The wrapper however feels very thin and delicate so I didn’t want to handle the cigar too much prior to smoking it. The cigar is polished off with a tapered, belicoso style cap, and an manilla band carrying the colorful Vegas del Purial crest along with a secondary maroon band with the words “Gran Reserva” spelled out across the front.

The wrapper on the Vegas Del Purial Gran Reserva gives off very sweet honey, oat, and cashew aromas while the foot of the cigar carries more earthiness, spice, and natural tobacco scents. The Cold draw produces some great honey, cashew, coffee, and natural tobacco flavors with just a hint of pepper. 

First Third:

The Vegas Del Purial Gran Reserva starts off with some very minor black pepper which faded pretty much completely after the first few puffs leaving behind some soft spice and vanilla with a good amount of creamed coffee, cashew, honey, and really nice natural tobacco flavors. As I smoke on a bit there is some interesting pine notes that pop in and out. The draw is slightly tight but opens up the more that I smoke the cigar. The burn line is razor thin and even for the most part leaving behind a trail of semi-compacted medium gray ash which held one or about an inch before falling into my ashtray.

Second Third:

Into the second third of the El Galan Vegas Del Purial Gran Reserva and the flavors have really balanced out. The cashew, honey, and earthiness lead the charge backed by spice, cedar, and some soft cinnamon. The retrohale really bings out the spice and cedar and I find myself retrohaling this bad boy quite often. The burn line is still slightly wavy but haven’t had to reach for my torch, the draw has completely opened up and have been smoking like a dream. I close out the second third with nothing in terms of a nicotine.

Finish:

Into the final half of the El Galan Vegas Del Purial Gran Reserva and this is where I believe the cigar really begins to shine. The body has ramped up to the medium/full arena while it lets loose a ton of cedar, honey, and earthiness backed by vanilla, spice, pine, and cinnamon. The flavor profile is really enjoyable and extremely well balanced. I feel only the slightest nicotine kick as it took me an hour and a half to smoke this cigar down to the nub. I experienced no harshness, nor extended heat. 

Overview:

The El Galan Vegas Del Purial Gran Reserva is a solid cigar. It offers a great profile, which isn’t the most complex but is perfectly balanced creating a fantastic experience. The burn was slightly wavy but I never once had to reach for my torch to touch up or relight the cigar. The price is spot-on for a cigar that preforms this way and the overall construction of the cigar was flawless. This is, and will be a solid addition to my everyday rotation.

Pairing:

Coconut Macadoom is a 19.3% Imperial Stout Aged in bourbon barrels with lactose, vanilla, and coconut. This is a Bruery Hoarders Society exclusive beer with only a couple hundred bottles ever produced. The beer leads with a ton of sweet vanilla, bold coconut, tangy cherry, caramel, roasted malt, and dark, rich chocolate and a very heavy mouthfeel before finishing even sweeter with a ton more vanilla and coconut, dark chocolate, boozy bourbon, oak, and coffee. What a flavor bomb. In most cases this beer could easily overpower a cigar but the El Galan Vegas Del Purial Gran Reserva held it’s own and the flavors really complimented each other.

The post El Galan Vegas Del Purial Gran Reserva Belicoso appeared first on Cigar Reviews | Beer Pairings | Casas Fumando.

In celebration of this day I thought it was fitting to dig something special out of my humidor and out of the fridge. The cigar of choice ended up being a fairly rare Cohiba. It is the Cohiba Edicion Limitada 2006. It’s a very nice looking Piramide shaped cigar. Apart from it’s normal Cohiba band, it’s also adorned with the standard Cuban limited release band. This second band is gold with raised black lettering and border which says “Edicion Limitada 2006”.

These limited edition Cuban cigars are usually fairly easy to track down when they are initially released but after a few years they become a well sought after cigar to add to any humidor. I was recently lucky enough to track down a few through a friend and I grabbed them to save for special occasions like this.

This Piramide vitola was also the vitola for Cohiba’s 2001 Edicion Limitada. It was met with such great fanfare and reviews that they decided to re-release a similar blend. Each of the leaves within the cigar were aged a minimum of 2 years before being rolled into these rare cigars. 2006 also marked the 5th year that Habanos S.A. began offering limited edition cigars on a regular basis.

Cigar: Cohiba Edicion Limitada 2006
Drink: Innis & Gunn Canadian Cask 2010
Vitola: Piramide (6.1 x 52)
Wrapper: Cuban
Binder: Cuban
Filler: Cuban
Price: Originally a little over $30. No idea on current value but it’s much higher!
Burn Time: 1.5 hours

Construction:
• This is a rough and oily looking cigar, the wrapper definitely has signs of bumps and veins
• The color on this cigar is a very dark chocolaty tone and has some nice bloom signs of aging
• The cap is finish with a single piece of tobacco that wraps around the cigar 3 times
• The foot appears to be fairly well packed
• A slight squeeze along the length of these cigars gives a mostly firm feel with some slightly soft and springy spots
• The cut was very clean using my double bladed guillotine and made no mess
• The pre-light draw is a tad tight but we’ll see how it goes

Burn:
• Toasting was nice and slow but perfectly even, had the foot glowing nicely
• Burn line stayed nice and straight through the first couple of inches, glad to see that!
• Immediately after I wrote the previous line I started getting a peninsula on one side that soon required a little encouragement from my lighter
• After that initial touch up a few more were required as the cigar burned, I’m always disappointed when this happens on such limited release cigars

Smoke & Ash:
• Despite the tight draw, I’m getting a nice mouthful of smoke from each puff
• There is only a light amount of resting smoke and seems to come and go, it gives off a nice toasted bread type of aroma
• The Ash is coming along nicely with an interesting deep ripple effect and ashes off a little past 1 inch
• The color on this ash is mostly a medium gray with some dark accents
• Subsequent ashes were a little messier and shorter due to the touch ups
• One of the last ashes managed to hang on for almost 2 inches

Tasting Notes:
• The wrapper on the Cohiba Edicion Limitada 2006 is mostly aroma-less, just a slight cedar touch, probably from the humidor
• The foot of the cigar has a nice spice note to it, maybe a mild white pepper, along with some cedar
• Pre-light draw brings more of the white pepper and cedar flavors
• Initial draws have an interesting combination of cedar, chocolate and espresso, great start!
• The retrohale on this cigar is just fantastic, a great array of coffee and chocolate notes hit my sinuses with no bite and a smooth creamy finish
• The coffee and chocolate flavors seemed to dominate through the first half with some minor appearances of white pepper and cedar
• The body on this cigar has been mild through the first half along with a great balance of flavors and a super smooth creamy finish
• Had a little tar buildup, probably due to my small cut on the cap. A little trim fixed that issue
• As I get the half way mark, there is a bit more spice and a bit more body in the cigar, bt the awesome espresso and chocolate mix is still there
• Now I’m getting something interesting, it’s a good mix of spice and chocolate, almost like a chili spice. If you’ve ever had those gourmet chocolates made with chili you’ll get an idea of how this tastes, very unique!
• The body of this cigar has also gone into the high medium range right now but still offers a smooth and creamy finish
• The cigar burned a little hot near the end and the coffee flavors developed back into a nice strong espresso flavor and kept the interesting chili chocolate notes

Final Thoughts:
The flavors on the Cohiba Edicion Limitada 2006 were extremely enjoyable right from the start to the finish. They offered some unique touches and kept me on my toes the whole time. There’s no doubt that they did a quality blending job on this cigar. I was obviously disappointed with the number of touch ups it needed but oddly enough it didn’t affect the flavors much at all. I keep all my limited edition and expensive cigars in a smaller humidor that has a perfect 65-67% humidity almost all the time. The smaller area gives me more control over it, but doesn’t seem like that made a difference. As with most limited editions it usually comes down to a matter of cost and if these are worth their dollar value. At the original price of $30 these were a hard pill to swallow and their value has only gone up since then. The closest cigar I can compare this to is Cohiba’s own Maduro 5 line which was very close in flavor profile, possible just with a bit more spice in the Edicion Limitada 2006. But for the cost, I’d rather pay for and enjoy 3 or 4 Maduro 5’s. See my review of the Cohiba Maduro 5 Magicos here. Of course, that doesn’t mean I didn’t thoroughly enjoy this rare piece of cigar history! The chocolate and chili combo was especially unique and enjoyable!

Pairings:
With my special cigar tonight I picked out a special brew and one that fit the Canada Day theme as well. It comes from one of my favorite breweries, Innis & Gunn. The beer is called “Canadian Cask 2010”. This brew was made specifically for Canada Day last year. I bought a few of them last year and had one left that I was saving for this year. I also reviewed it awhile back with the Camacho Liberty 2009. There’s not much I can say about this beer other than it is fantastic. Basically take their already fantastic Oak Aged Beer and add in some light whiskey barrel and rye flavors and you have an even better brew! Each batch is also aged a longer amount of time in the whiskey barrels, 54 days to be exact. The cigar was not over the top strong so it actually paired well with this full flavored beer. I’d also recommend a fine smooth scotch, cognac or port with this cigar. A nice coffee would also pair well here as a non-alcoholic alternative.

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