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Slow Cigar Week – Pollen Kills The Urge – Thursday April 8, 2010

My nice new black Toyota Yaris is dusted yellow from the pollen and my sinuses are a mess.  I managed to revisit a cigar on Monday that I really didn’t enjoy the first time around, but this time it wasn’t all that bad.  The cigar was a Rebel’s Choice corona that I had picked up at CigarCigars in Phoenixville, PA last October.  I can’t imagine that 6 months of age made any difference, I attribute the bad experience I had previously to a flue shot I had received.  This wasn’t a bad cigar, fairly mild, but well behaved and inoffensive. Not a bad $1.95 cigar, I retract my previous opinion that I wouldn’t recommend this at any price. Next time I get a flue shot I won’t waste five perfectly good cigars!

The current issue of Smoke Magazine arrived today and, while I haven’t had the chance to peruse it yet, I did notice an interview with Steve Saka of Drew Estate by noted cigar author Frank  Seltzer.  Like I said, haven’t read past the first page, but there’s a nice photo of Steve in the Gran Fabrica.  Cigar Safari is on my list of future vacation spots!

Don’t forget to enter the current contest!  The cats are looking forward to selecting the winner, and, if you have ever had a cat, you know how ridiculous a statement that is! Anyway, it’s a great Drew Estate hat and a really cool Liga Privada cutter, so get your name in the ring!

Until the next cigar, which will hopefully be soon,

CigarCraig

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A Camacho Corojo Candela for St. Patrick’s Day – March 17, 2010

I know, I just mentioned smoking a Camacho Corojo Candela Monarca last week, but it’s St. Patty’s Day!  This box of cigars has been very consistent.  The draw is very loose, so I started out piercing the cap with a Cigar Spike, then gave it a traditional cut after the hole started to tar up.  The same full flavor, with that tinge of chlorophyll from the emerald green wrapper.  Very heavy, yet refreshing at the same time. Sadly, I’m down to my last 5 or 6 of these.

There was a very good article on Cigar Aficionado‘s website from back in 2003 about candela cigars.  It’s worth a read: http://www.cigaraficionado.com/Cigar/CA_Archives/CA_Show_Article/0,2322,1251,00.html

I’ve been nursing a cold for the past few days, but it’s subsided a bit, at least enough to enjoy a cigar.  I got to thinking that I’ve never really celebrated St. Patty’s day.  I’m not particularly religious, and I’m not particularly Irish, but, as a huge snake hater, I have a great deal of respect for anyone who can clear an entire country of snakes.  I like that.

One last thing:  I’m still waiting to hear from this month’s contest winner, Sebastian.  If I don’t hear from him by March 31, I’ll have to award the prize to the runner-up.  Sebastian, please e-mail me your address!  There’s a fine 5 pack of JdN Antaños courtesy of Drew Estate on the line!

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

CigarCraig

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Rocky Patel Lancero Review and JdN Contest Winner Announcement! March 14, 2010

Last night I had the pleasure again of going to the cigar friendly Downingtown Hotel to see my good friend Greg’s band, Now and Then.  I took a bunch of cigars along, hoping that the few friends I’d invited would show up.  Unfortunately my friends were unable to make it,  but I was able to enjoy a terrific Rocky Patel The Edge Maduro Lancero while rocking to the band.  I love the lancero format, (7″ x 38) it really forces you to slow down and enjoy the pleasant cocoa and coffee flavors of this cigar. Lanceros need to be “sipped” to be enjoyed or one runs the risk of overheating the cigar.   I managed to nurse it through almost 3 sets before giving up. I believe this cigar to be a Famous Smoke Shop exclusive but I received it as a gift.  I haven’t really smoked a lot of the Rocky Patel offerings for no particular reason, but I very much enjoyed this particular cigar.

I’ve recently come across Cigar Films (cigarfilms.com) and started watching the videos.  I’ve only watched a couple so far but I’ve found them entertaining.  Give them a look if you are a fan of cigar related videos.

Now, what everyone has been waiting for: the announcement of the winner of the Joya de Nicaragua Antaño 5 pack.  Please watch this short video:

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jaz2wZ5RlQI

Congratulations to the winner, please e-mail me at craig@cigarcraig.com with your mailing address so that I can get your prize out this week!

Thanks to everyone for participating.  This is the first of many contests sponsored by my friends at Drew Estate!  I appreciate their support!

The background music on the video is “Redemption” from the 25 Smokin’ Figurados album “Divine Spirits, Holy Smoke”.  Great stuff! Thanks Gregg and Tim!

That’s it for now!  Until the next cigar,

CigarCraig

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Mahogany, Diesel and the Weekend – March 7, 2010

Friday evening I had the opportunity to visit Mahogany on Walnut in Philadelphia. I had dropped my wife off at the Franklin Institute to see Philadelphia TV news legend Larry Kane give the first of a series of presentations on his time spent with the Beatles.  She said after that the lecture was outstanding.

Mahogany is a cigar bar conveniently located over top of Holt’s flagship store.  I arrived and found a seat at the corner of the bar with a view of the Flyers /Sabres game on the television.  I chose a Don Lino Africa Kifaro, which smoked very nicely.  Soon I was joined by my old friend Doc, who I haven’t seen in several years.  Doc and I have logged hundreds of herf-miles….we’ve been many places between the Jersey Shore and Las Vegas, from Buffalo to North Carolina,  it borders on the insane.  I think Doc and I “met” on a cigar IRC chat back in 1996.  It was great to get together with him again and share some cigars.  Doc had some very well aged goodies with him, one of which was a delicious un-banded petite corona which he didn’t know what exactly it was, and the other he shared with me was a Hoyo de Monterrey Epicure no.2.  Both cigars were at least 10 years old and both were outstanding examples of great cigars that you just can’t get around here.  Since Doc hasn’t been keeping up with all of the great cigars that have come on the market in the last several years, I gave him a Liga Privada T52, which he enjoyed.  I had selected this particular cigar because we are both acquainted with the blender of this line.  All in all a great evening except for losing my wife in the Franklin Institute, which worked out for her because she got to talk to Larry Kane one on one in the parking garage.

Last night, after a beautiful day here that made me get the bike out of the shed and take it out for a spin, I smoked a Diesel Unholy Cocktail on my evening walk.  This is a 5″ x 56 torpedo dressed in a dark, Pennsylvania broadleaf wrapper, made by A.J. Fernandez in Nicaragua.  This cigar started out quite spicy, and had an even burn and held the ash for almost half the length of the cigar.  The spiceyness eased up and delivered very dense mouthfuls of flavorful smoke.  If I had to rate this by my friend Doc’s scale, it gets a “I would smoke this again”, and I will since I have another in the humidor.  These are very reasonably priced at $4 for a single and around $100 for a box of 30. A very nice cigar and and proof that great cigars are being produced at a good price,although I think the name is kind of dumb.

Don’t forget to enter our contest by leaving your guess in the comments of my last post! There’s a whole week to go and there are some pretty good guesses.

Until the next cigar,

CigarCraig

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This Week’s Cigars: CAO, La Aurora – Friday Feb 26, 2010

More snow this week in PA, so my cigar consumption had been fairly light.  I started out with a CAO Gold robusto which had a good draw, a nice amount of smoke, but really didn’t have a flavor I’m overly fond of.  It was sort of grassy, and didn’t really hit the spot for me.  I enjoy a great many of the CAO lines, I’m hoping this one was an anomaly.  As I mentioned in a previous post, I recently received a bunch of various CAO cigars as a gift from my wife, and I have a few various singles floating around.

The next cigar I had was a La Aurora Barrel aged robusto, which I got at the 2008 IPCPR tradeshow, so it was at least a year and a half old.  This looked like it should be a tasty cigar, it had a very dark and rustic wrapper that just wouldn’t burn.  I tried relighting it over and over to no avail.   It had some nice flavors on the odd occasion that I got some flavor, it refused to give me enough smoke to make a good judgment. I was very disappointed with this as I had high hopes for it.

I have a soft spot for the La Aurora brand for personal reasons but have been let down frequently.  As a matter of fact, the first box of cigars I ever purchased was a box of La Aurora Bristol Especiales back in 1996 for around $35.  While the cigars tasted good, they had very fragile Cameroon wrappers and exploded more times than not.

In that spirit, tonight’s cigar was a LA Aurora 1495 Corona, again from the 2008 IPCPR show.  The 1495 was an even burning, medium bodied, tasty treat.  At 5.2″ x 42, it gave me a very pleasant 45 minutes of cigar happiness.  I still have a couple assorted La Auroras in the humidor, including an old Bristol Especiale, and one of the beautiful Perferidos.  I’ll likely smoke them sometime in the coming months.

That’s it for now, have a great weekend!

CigarCraig

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