Category Archives: Stores

by CigarCraig | February 19, 2014 · 8:29 pm

A Shop Visit with a La Gloria Cubana, a Great Wall and a Monte Pascoal

As you well know, I’ve been tiring of smoking in the cold lately, so I paid a visit to a local shop on Sunday afternoon for a smoke. Lightn’Up in Glenmore, PA is only about 5 miles from home, and I pass i

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t just about every day. I haven’t made a habit of stopping there because the inventory has been quite thin over the last few years. I heard that the store, along with it’s sister store in nearby Frazer, PA, was recently purchased by the CigarCigars chain which is growing steadily in the south-east PA area. I wanted to see what had changed, and the inventory is vastly improved. I selected a couple La Gloria Cubana Serie R Esteli, a CAO Flathead V642 Piston and a huge Foundry Compounds, Elements and Musings U

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ranium (I have to admit to a fascination with the Foundry line, and I dig the skeleton band on the Uranium. When I’m smoking a 7×70 I can’t say. This, along with the Carbon, are going to be regular production cigars, the rest in the Compounds, Elements and Musings line are limited editions). I sat down and lit up the LGC Esteli, which I like quite a bit. I think it’s the best in the Serie R line. It was the typical cigar shop scene, a few guys sitting around shooting the bull while the History Channel is on the TV. Yes, I wondered why there wasn’t some Olympics on, but there was a show about the White House (actually history programming on that channel, who’d think it?). They close at 4 on Sundays, which isn’t a bad thing, I was there for two hours enjoying the smoke, and it was good. Glad to see the shop improving. It’s in a good spot and is certainly convenient to me. I need to go visit their other recent acquisitions in my county. I was not impressed with the Frazer location when I stopped in last year, and I haven’t visited G&G Cigars in West Chester since they took it over. I’ll be interested to see how they have changed.

After I got home and ran out for Chinese take-out, I figured it would be a reasonably good time to try a cigar I got at the IP

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CPR show. for the last several years I’ve seen the huge, elabo

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rate booth of the China Tobacco Chuanyu Industrial Co. Limited. I’ll admit that entering the booth held little interest to me. I guess I’m a little closed minded, I see premium cigars as a Latin American product, and it’s hard for me to associate cigars with anything else. I have to applaud the companies persistence, it has to cost a bundle to bring this enormous booth to the show every year, and I honestly don’t recall seeing a lot of traffic there. My friend Mitchell passed his bag from the booth on to me, and I’ve been passing up sampling the coronas that were in with the glossy 50+ page brochure. I figured I already had a great cigar earlier in the day so I figured this was the time to try something outside my comfort zone. Not many things bother me more than wasting quality cigar time on a sub-par cigar. The cigar is called the Great Wall Tudor No. 2, and is about 5 1/8″ x 42. It is described as having Indonesian wrapper and binder and “domestic” filler, which I assume is grown in China. I was expecting the worst, given I’m not a fan of Indonesian wrappers, but it wasn’t a terrible smoke. It was fairly neutral, with some interesting flavors. It burned and drew well, I should hope that a factory that turns out five billion cigars a year (I’m assuming that not all are handmade). I’ve smoked worse, and I have a couple more floating around including a Great Wall Flourishing Age III, which is cello wrapped with a handy pull tab that’s described as “sweet flavored”. This one may wait for a while.

Monday evening I selected a Monte Pascoal Belicoso for my evening walk. This 5½” x 52 cigar was given to me last year by a gentleman know as Matt Ross on Cigar Federation and Twitter. I met Matt up in New Jersey last year when we had a bit of a herf at Cigar Emporium in Lyndhurst, NJ. I figured I was meandering from the traditional tobacco regions with the Chinese cigar, so it wouldn’t hurt to smoke something from south of the equator. This is a Brazilian puro, wrapped in Mata Fina, but not a maduro Mata Fina like we are used to seeing. These are terribly tasty smokes, and I can’t recall smoking one that misbehaved. The laws are such in Brazil with their regulation that it’s costly and difficult to introduce new blends. This is precisely what the FDA would like to see happen here in the US, which will virtually eliminate the need to walk into your tobacconist and ask “what’s new?” Good reason to support all the efforts out there to keep the FDA out of our humidors (CRA). Many thanks to Matt for the cigar! It was greatly enjoyed.

That about concludes today’s journey around the world! Until the next time,

CigarCraig

6 Comments

Filed under Review, Stores

Tagged as CAO, China Tobacco Chuanyu Industrial Co. Limited, cigar, cigar store, cigars, Great Wall, La Gloria Cubana, Monte Pascoal

by CigarCraig | February 12, 2014 · 9:35 am

My Sunday Visit to The Cigar Inn in New York City

Sunday I found myself in New York City with a few hours to kill and made my way to The Cigar Inn on 2nd Avenue around 54th street. This place came highly recommended and I hadn’t been there before, so it seeme

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d like the right choice. I arrived at about 9:30 which was about an hour and a half early, so I wandered to a nearby McDonalds and had breakfast and sat down to fix Sunday’s post that I goofed up! That’s what happens when I deviate from my schedule and pre-write a post. I got it fixed for the most part, apologies to those who had to suffer through the less than optimally formatted post. Anyway, I headed back to The Cigar Inn right on time for their 11:00 opening time. If I have one complaint about this shop it was that it was late opening. It’s kind of a pet peeve of mine, if your sign says you open at a certain time, you should be open! I understand stuff happens, and the weather lately has not been exactly cooperating. I sucked it up and was happy to come in out of the cold when one of the owners arrived to open shop. As I had some time to look at the storefront while I waited, I noted that there

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small cigar store Indian, some shaving equipment, and some hats and shirts, no real evidence of cigars present, except for the name on the awning. Is this how the future may be?

Once inside, the store is really beautiful, lots of dark wood and leather. There’s a generously stocked walk in humidor to the left, and the counter on the right. Just past the humidor there is a fully appointed barbershop with two antique barber chairs and sinks. Just beyond that there’s a shoeshine stand on a raised platform. From there back there is a large bank of humidor lockers with tables and stools in front of them. The Cigar Aficionado branded lounge takes up the back of the store with comfy leather seating and several TVs. The back of the store has an atrium kind of feel with floor to ceiling windows looking out on a garden sort of area. Classical music is quietly playing in the background lending even more class to the place.

I bought my day’s supply of cigar from Bacz (I believe that was his name), who recommended their house brand and offered me the Brooklyn size to try. This is a 6″x60 with Nicaraguan fillers, a Honduran binder and a wrapper from Peru. This is a very nice smoke. It had a unique flavor, not your typical house blend, I think that the Peruvian wrapper really adds a flavor that sets it apart. It reminded me a little of the C-Gars Ltd. Inka Secret Blend from the UK. It was obviously my first cigar of the day and it wasn’t too heavy, but it wasn’t mild either. Loads of pleasant flavors, smokes very well with perfect construction and burn (I gave it a V-cut). I ended up going back and buying another Brooklyn and the 5″ x 60 Bronx. They were out of the smaller ring gauge sizes. At $9 in NYC, you have to try it if you find yourself in a Cigar Inn Shop.

I smoked a La Aroma de Cuba Monarch next, followed by the new Camacho Corojo Maduro toro, both I found to be pretty reasonable by NYC standards at around $8 each. Oddly, and I have to wonder if the first cigar may have had something to do with this, but both cigars had an “ashy” taste to them. I will need to revisit both of these because neither were very enjoyable, and they should have been. It’s a Winston cigarette kind of taste, which certainly may not be something everyone can relate to, but that’s how it struck me. I get the same sensation from Cuban Cuaba and Victor Sinclair cigars. I will say that it didn’t detract from the ambiance of the lounge, and I smoked the Camacho in the company of Matthias Clock, who writes the FineTobaccoNYC site. I had corresponded with him in the past and dropped him a note that I’d be in town. He was gracious enough to take some time to meet up with me and hang out for an hour or so. I always enjoy meeting peers in this endeavor of cigar smoking. Matthias organizes cigar events in New York City, so if you’re in the area check his site for the latest goings on. All in all, I had a nice, relaxing day in the big city, just hanging out and smoking cigars. If it hadn’t been so frigidly cold I might have been tempted to break some laws and have a cigar in Times Square or Central Park!

On a related note, last night I smoked an Inferno Flashpoint, a Famous Smoke Shop exclusive made for them by Oliva. From the website:

Inferno Flashpoint cigars are the sister act to the original Inferno by Oliva. The core blend consists of perfectly fermented, estate-grown Nicaraguan ligero longfillers balanced by a healthy dose of sweeter Jalapa-grown leaves, deftly wrapped in an exquisite Sumatra leaf. Expect a medium start that blooms into a creamy, complex, full-bodied flavor bomb. Order a box now, or test drive a 5-pack and discover this affordably-priced selection that will spread like wildfire among cigar lovers.

This cigar is a winner. The flavor was very clean, that’s what kept coming to mind. I really enjoyed the creamy flavor and smoked it until I could no longer tolerate the juxtaposition of freezing/burning fingers. As it says above, it’s smooth and creamy, but loaded with flavor. The burn was perfect and I never had to touch flame to it after the initial lighting. From the name you might think this would be a knock your head off spice bomb, but it’s not. It’s a rich, satisfying experience. Thanks to Travis at Famous for allowing me to experience these!

That’s plenty for now. Heading out to NYC again tonight to attend “The Official Memorial Tribute To Sid Bernstein – Celebrating the 50th Anniversary of “The Beatles’ Historic First Concerts at Carnegie Hall” Presented by The Bernstein Family and Sid Bernstein Presents…” at The Cutting Room. Won’t be a cigar journey this time, but will be pretty incredible anyway. Hopefully the impending snow storm tomorrow doesn’t get in the way! Until the next time,

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CigarCraig

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Filed under Review, Stores, Trip Report

Tagged as Camacho, cigar, cigar store, cigars, Famous Smoke Shop, Flashpoint, Inferno, La Aroma de Cuba, oliva, The Cigar Inn

by CigarCraig | December 29, 2013 · 11:51 am

An Oliva, an Illusione, an Aging Room, a New Adorini Humidor and Elertus Monitor

Wow, it’s been a while since I put a real post together. As much work as it is putting the contest series together, it’s almost easier than droning on about this cigar and that accessory. But it’s fun, I can’t _not_ go on about cigars and their accouterments. It’s gotta come out somewhere, this is the logical place! I’ve smoked a bunch of cigars over the past weeks. It’s a little bit liberating to just be able to smoke whatever the heck I want without having to really write something about it. I revisited some old friends that I wouldn’t want to bore you with again, and took a few nights off here and there. What follows are some new to me cigars that I found interesting, along with a couple new products that I’m evaluating.

One day around Christmas I enjoyed an Oliva Masterblend 3, they mysteriously call it a Dbl Robusto, but it’s 5″ x 50, which puts it squarely in the Robusto category in my book. This cigar had an almost oval box press, which I only have really seen on the San Lotano Oval. It had a perfect burn with a nice, flat ember that I really appreciate. It gave me great flavor that left me wishing this IPCPR sample had been a Churchill. The website describes it this way: “Liga Maestra is specifically blended to deliver the richest characteristics of Nicaraguan ligero fillers and Broadleaf sun-grown wrappers. It is a complex cigar crafted for the most developed palate.” I liked it.

I also came across an old Arturo Fuente Don Carlos No.4 that a friend had sent me many moons ago. This is a corona sized cigar with a torpedo style head. It wouldn’t surprise me at all if it’s been a decade since I sampled from this line, but there was a time when the Don Carlos Robusto was my favorite cigar, along with the Hemingway Signature. It’s a cigar that I associate with a some great memories. This one was well aged and tasty. The Cameroon wrapper is flawless and it has that signature flavor that you only get from a well aged Cameroon cigar. It was very nice Christmas Day smoke.

A few days before Christmas I took delivery on a new humidor from HumidorDiscount.com. They offered to allow me to evaluate their newest Adorini humidor, the Carrera Grande Deluxe in black laquer. This is a huge 150 count humidor with a tray, humidifier and hygrometer. I have been really impressed with the Cedro Deluxe humidor from Adorini and this new Cerrera is built just as well. The walls are a good one inch thick and it’s solid as a rock. The lid closes with a nice, soft “whoosh”. It has the same magnetic plate hidden in the lid so the humidifier and hygrometer can be positioned however you like. I’m a little CDO, so I have then centered nicely. This one also has the same ventilation ribs in the Spanish Cedar lining that accept dividers, and it also came with the label clips if you have that need. I suppose these would be handy for unbanded cigars or to record dates, I’m lazy, I just dumped a few boxes worth of cigars in after a generous seasoning period. I haven’t decided on a theme for this one yet. I think it’s going to be for cigars that I plan to feature here, but I feature most everything here anyway, don’t I? Of course, this came a great time, as I had just mentioned the need to finally break down and get a 100+ quart cooler. This beauty will eliminate that “need” for the time being. I’ll periodically mention how this humidor is performing, so far I’ve been impressed. I need check on the hygrometers though, in both this one and the Cedro, as they were a little off of the digital. I had them all in the humidor with a tray of water for a few days and there was about a 5 point swing between the four. I don’t suppose that’s too bad.

I used another product I was sent to evaluate, the Elertus Smart Sensor, while setting up the new humidor. I mentioned this in a post a couple weeks ago (here). This is an impressive little gizmo and I’ll be sad to send this back. It connects to your home WiFi router and you can download apps for iPad/Phone/Pod or Android device to monitor several different things. I get text messages on my dumb phone when there is physical movement or the temperature or humidity deviated from my pre-selected guidelines. I can also check in on the website or the Apps to see what the temp and humidity are in real time. There’s sensor I could attach to tell me if the lid was opened, but I didn’t feel a need for that. This was the fourth humidity reading device I had in the new humidor while it was getting ready and it seemed to read about in the middle of the digital (which was on the low side) and the analog units. Point is, it seems to work well in humidors from what I can tell.

Friday afternoon my wife an I needed a relaxing day out of the house, so we ventured to Cigar Mojo in nearby King of Prussia to smoke some cigars and relax in their comfy leather chairs. Jenn wanted to get some reading done, so we parked in the seating area in the front of the store as opposed to going in the lounge with the TVs. There was a pretty good crowd in the lounge for a place that’s only been open for six weeks. I bought some cigars and lit up an Illusione Rothchildes. I had actually asked Trae a few weeks ago if he was getting these in because I wanted to try them. He ordered them on the spot and got them in. He should have no problem moving these well priced and exceptionally good smokes. I will smoke more of these without hesitation. The size is great at 4½ x 50 and the San Andrés wrapper while not as pungent as I expect, was delicious. For $4 and change this is a must try cigar.

After the Illusione I lit up an Aging Room M356 Rondo. This is a 5″ x 50 robusto that is the little brother of the No. 2 Cigar Aficionado Cigar of the Year. I wanted to see what all the hubbub was about. This was a good tasting cigar that I had some trouble keeping lit. I found this to be an overly strong cigar, but it was subtle, it snuck up! I had to stop for a Coke on the way home. Yeah, it was bad…but the cigar was tasty, and I have another one resting in the humidor that I’ll leave along for a while and try again when I work up the courage! I have a Quatro Fortissimo from the IPCPR show that I still have to get around to. I told Rafael Nodal Jr. it was too pretty to smoke in it’s little coffin box when he handed it to me, so he broke the seal on the box so I’d have to smoke it. It still looks too nice to smoke! I’ll get to it though, maybe it’ll help if I take it out of the coffin and put it on the top tray of the new humidor. We had a great afternoon hanging out at Cigar Mojo, talking to Alan Price, who has been helping out in the shop, and Trae, one of the owners. Certainly a great new shop in the Philly area that must be visited.

One other thing, real quick. If the winners of the 12 Days of Cigar Giveaways that already haven’t can confirm that they’ve received their goodies in the comments, I’d appreciate it! I want to make sure everyone is happy! Many thanks again for everyone for making it such a success!

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

CigarCraig

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Filed under Accessories, Review, Stores

by CigarCraig | December 8, 2013 · 9:48 am

Cigar Mojo Event, More Leaf by Oscar Cigars and the 12 Days of Spectacular Cigar Giveaways!

Photo courtesy of Chris Vuotto

Thursday evening I found myself back at Cigar Mojo in King of Prussia, PA for their inaugural event with Drew Estate. Drew sales rep Chri

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s Stone was there with my dear friend Pedro Gomez, the DE Factor

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y Ambassador and Cigar Safari ring leader. Trae and Wade had a full house and a load of great Drew Estate and Joya de Nicaragua product on hand. My brother-in-law Jeff came along with me and we spent the evening schmoozing and making some new friends. We smoked some Nica Rusticas and some MUWAT Baitfishes that were great! Considering this event happened at the same time as he Big Smoke in NYC, it was a great crowd. I know there are a bunch of folks who would probably have been there if they weren’t in New York. I personally preferred the smaller crowd here to the mayhem that I imagine Big Smoke to be. Once again, if you are in the Philadelphia area, seek out Cigar Mojo. It’s a great new shop with a good selection and a really nice lounge. Are massage chairs and pedicures in their future? 🙂

I’ve been working my way through Island Jim Robinson’s Leaf by Oscar sampler and smoked the Habano Friday evening. This one has an Ecuador Habano wrapper over binder and filler from Honduras. This is a sweet smoke! I very much enjoyed the well balanced flavor of this cigar. As I said, it had a delicious sweetness and smoked very well. Saturday I went with the Sumatra wrapped version, which uses a Ecuador Sumatra wrapper over the same Honduran filler. This was also a really tasty smoke, but didn’t excite me quite as much as the Habano. It also burned well. So far, I have to put the Habano first on my list, followed by the Maduro, then the Sumatra, which is surprising, because I usually prefer Maduros, but a great Habano wra

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pper always makes my taste buds dance. I’ll try to get to the Connecticut later today. I’ll leave an update in the comments when I smoke it. I can see picking up the Habano again for sure and they are all good in their own ways. It’s almost a shame the hide the really pretty wrappers un

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der the tobacco leaf outer wrapping. Thanks to George Rodriguez for passing these along for me to try! These are showing up all over the place, but are available on their site here. Now….what am I going to do with the tobacco leaves that these come packaged in?

Contest!

The next post you see here will be on Thursday, Dec 12, which will be Day One of this year’s 12 Spectacular Days of Cigar Giveaways! It will be the first time in a long time that I’ve skipped a Wednesday post but I think you’ll all be OK with it considering what’s to follow. For those who are new to this, here’s how it works: for 12 consecutive days I get up really early and post that day’s contest, along with the previous day’s winner (except for day 1, that would be silly). Your responsibility is to leave a comment which is your entry. One comment only please, and I can tell if multiple comments come from the same place! Please feel free to share on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, or whatever, but only comments left on that day’s post are counted (unless otherwise noted). Once you’ve won, you’re done, but we start out on the first day with everyone eligible. I use the random number generator at Random.org to select the winner and all decisions are final. Please be aware that I take great pains to ensure accuracy! So good luck. This is my way of saying “thanks” to my loyal readers and promoting some great cigar companies. Please try to visit the links to the vendors in each day’s post too, I want them to know that they aren’t giving away hundreds of dollars worth of stuff for nothing! It’s the winner’s responsibility to contact me with their shipping information and I’ll do my best to get your present to you before Christmas! I’m looking forward to getting this going!

That’s it for today, until the next time (when things go CRAZY!),

CigarCraig

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by CigarCraig | December 4, 2013 · 8:09 pm

A UF-13 in Atlantic City, Leaf by Oscar, and a Tatuaje at Cigar Mojo with Victor Vitale

From the “I’m not as young as I used to be” file, I’ve been paying for having some fun on Sunday. Sunday my wife and I decided to pay a visit to Atlantic City for some fun. We played some slot machines and I enjoyed the heck out of a Drew Estate Liga Privada Serie Unico UF-13 Dark while playing. It’s nice to smoke a great cigar indoors once in a while! There was even a nice little cigar shop in Resorts International that had a decent selection. By the way, one way to feel young is to go to the buffet at 5:30. We were well below the median age there. We ended up leaving AC at 5 am so I could get to work more or less on time, which made for a long day.

Monday evening, with my butt dragging, I fired up a cigar from “Island Jim” of Leaf and Bean in Pittsburgh. This cigar is called “Leaf by Oscar” and has been getting a lot of buzz lately. These are presented wrapped in a tobacco leaf as opposed to tissue or cello. They have a unique look on the shelf. George Rodriguez of Rodrigo cigars (who is partnered with Jim) sent me one of each wrapper and I (of course) selected the maduro first. My apologies for not taking a better photo of this cigar. Under that outer leaf is a beautiful dark wrapper. It’s the color of semi-sweet chocolate (ironically, I think semi-sweet chocolate is contributing to my migraines lately…). The wrapper is Nicaraguan maduro and the guts are Honduran. This cigar was very tasty and burned perfectly, as straight and even as any cigar I’ve ever smoked, with a nice, flat ember. It started off with a nice spice and mellowed to a rich, chocolaty experience. I enjoyed the heck out of this and had planned to move on to one of the others Tuesday.

However, Tuesday I left work and drove down to Cigar Mojo in King of Prussia, PA to meet Victor Vitale of Legacy Brands for a smoke. In the month or so since I first visited this shop Trae and Wade have done a great job stocking the humidor and getting some displays and furniture in. It’s becoming a very nice shop with a great selection. The lounge is comfortable and the clientele seems to be friendly. They already have a good number of lounge members. I picked out a cigar I hadn’t tried before, the Tatuaje Havana VI Artistas torpedo and chatted with Trae until Victor arrived. I don’t smoke a lot of Tatuajes for some reason. Maybe because I’m afraid I’ll find yet another cigar that I love, but is priced higher than I like. This Havana VI is a little more reasonably priced, about $7 here for the classic torpedo size. I found that the ash dropped easily, much to the proprietor’s dismay. It had a nice flavor and burned well. I’ll smoke it again after some humidor time (I always buy two). I had a great visit with Victor, and smoked another of his new Tortuga Reserva Cedros which was really, really good. I have it on good authority that the Reserva Cedro line will be out soon in three sizes, if you can find some, give them a try. They aren’t a typical Nicaraguan puro. It’s a refined smoke that exudes quality. I’d say that even if Victor wasn’t a friend, and I’m glad he’s back in Philly so we get to see him a little more often! I’ll probably be back at Cigar Mojo soon, it’s not really close to home, but it’s a nice place, and Trae and his Dad, Wade are doing it right. Good stock, nice atmosphere.

I just started evaluating a device from Elertus that wirelessly monitors my humidor. I placed the Smart Sensor in my Adorini humidor in the living room for now, but I’ll try it out in the coolers eventually. This is a neat device. It monitors temperature and humidity, and sends alerts to my cell phone and e-mail if conditions change outside the limits I set. It also senses movement and alerts me (someone moved my humidor while I was at work today!). This would be a reasonable investment for a store owner who wants to know if his walk in humidor needed attention. It’s got features I don’t really have use for, like door sensors, light sensors, and it will even alert you if the WiFi loses connection. You can monitor the status on the website, or on iOS or Android apps. It’s pretty spiffy. I’ll report later on how it works over the course of a few weeks in a few different humidors.

That’s it for today, until the next time,

CigarCraig