Los Caidos, The Duke Cigars and a Charter Oak Habano and a Rant

Let’s just get past the fact that I slacked off on my Wednesday post and substituted two news pieces instead. Pure laziness on my part. I did smoke a few new to me cigars this week, so let’s focus on those here! First off was a cigar that was generously shared with my by my amigo Adam a while ago. This was a Los Caidos, which is made at Aganorsa and a dollar from each cigar goes to a charity to help the families of fallen police and firefighters. There are red and blue bands so the consumer can choose which department they wish to support, but both cigars are the same. It’s a tasty smoke, with some pepper spice, wood and earthiness. It burned well and provided a great smoking experience. If you bought these only to support the cause it would be OK, but you’d be getting a great cigar too. I think there’s a good message of unity on the band design as well. As always, thank you to Adam for sharing this with me!

A while ago Kevin at Cigar Prop (TY!) had shared some cigars with me and one of those was a large torpedo that had a cedar sleeve stamped “ The Duke Cigars First Edition”. This looked a lot like the presentation of the Green Grass Gringo by Kerr Viajante’s Stogie Road Cigars, so I jumped to the incorrect conclusion that it had something to do with him, but the correct conclusion that it originated from the house of Dr. Gabby Kafie. Dr. Kafie was kind enough to point me in the right direction, with was to Duke Cigars, which I should have figured out, I guess. Other than the cigar was a large torpedo, probably 6.5” x 52ish (I failed to measure), wrapped in a cedar sleeve, I know nothing about it. There’s no information anywhere I can find. One can assume it has some Honduran tobacco, and it had a really nice looking milk chocolate brown wrapper. Unsurprisingly, the predominant flavor note was cedar, but it was a nice, sweet cedar and I enjoyed it. It was a very nice cigar and I’d love to know more about it. From what Dr. Kafie indicated in his comments, it seemed to be an ongoing concern, but who knows in 2020. If you come across it and like cedar medium bodied cigars, grab one and give it a try!

I had heard about Foundation Cigar Co. releasing the Charter Oak Habano, and saw that they had been landing in some of my local CigarCigars shops, so I stopped in to the closest one to my house yesterday and grabbed a few. I don’t generally speak ill of these shops, but, having worked retail myself, and been a customer for even longer, I have a bit of a pet peeve about providing customer service, and I wasn’t really happy with what transpired (Steve, Art, Scott, Tom even, if you’re reading, pay attention!) I know that I’m not the typical consumer, but I’m not certain that the gentleman working the shop knows me, and when I walked in he was in one of the comfy chairs with the TV on with another patron (who was familiar to me and greeted me). I asked if they had the new cigar I was s looking for, and his response, without getting up, was something along the lines of “beats me”. I don’t think this response is ever OK. Now, I’m familiar enough to go look myself. If it were me working and anyone walked in I would be out of the chair asking “can I help you”, walking into the humidor if I was asked a question, especially if I didn’t know the answer. As a consumer, and former retailer, it pissed me off, frankly, and I hope someone from CigarCigars reads this, because I heard about a similar situation at one of the other stores (in Bucks County? Can’t remember, a co-worker mentioned it). In the challenging environment we live in, customer service is what’s keeping the doors open for you. Another customer would have walked out faced with that sort of reception. There are too many options. Enough of my rant, I bought Toros and Grandes (6″ x 60) and smoked the Grande last night. For a $7 cigar it’s fantastic, heck, it’s fantastic regardless of price. The Habano wrapper is sweet, reminiscent of a Sumatra, and maybe it’s a varietal and I’m forgetting. It’s good, real good. I would have gotten the torpedo, which is exclusive to this wrapper, but they only had the two sizes I got. I may have to smoke a Toro today. Honestly, you could have a box of these, the maduro and Connecticut in your humidor and have something for everyone and every situation, for a small investment. So the takeaway here is customer service is key and Charter Oak cigars are awesome. 

Enough for today, until the next time,

CigarCraig