CigarCraig's Blog

by CigarCraig | April 20, 2014 · 3:46 pm

Chateau Real, Flor de Nicaragua, Nestor Miranda and Draig Cigars

I honestly cant recall the circumstances on Thursday that led me to a short smoke, but I dipped into my dwindling supply of Chateau Real Small Club Corona Maduros for a quick, but delicious smoke. Sadly, Drew Estate discontinued this line, I suppose because everyone didn’t like them as much as I did. I personally believe the price point was a little high for a mild to medium traditional cigar from a company who, at the time, was known for their infused cigars. I bought a box of these and the Gran Cru Perfectos several years ago on clearance and still have a few of each left. The San Andres maduro wrapper is dark and oily, and it’s a mocha flavor bomb. It sets a benchmark for how a cigar should burn and draw too, as they are always perfect in that regard. These are great little 30 minute smokes, and I’ll be sad when they are gone. I think these were Drew Estate’s second foray into the traditional cigar market, that is if you count La Vieja Habana The Early Years in with the regular La Vieja line.

Friday evening I grabbed a cigar that I had seen in the same box the Chateau Reals were in, and I couldn’t really recall where it came from. The cigar was a toro called Flor De Nicaragua, and I had a suspicion it was from Joya de Nicaragua, which was confirmed through Instagram correspondence. Apparently, this is made for the European market and must have followed me home from Nicaragua lat year. This size is called the Magnum 52, and is 6″ x 52, with a light wrapper with a reddish tint. The website lists this as colorado claro, and I’m always concerned that people will think the wrapper was grown in Colorado. Not the case, of course, as colorado is another word for red in Spanish. The cigar was a treat to smoke, I found it to be milder than many of the Joya offerings, but loaded with flavor. This is a cigar that I’d love to get my hands on again. They offer it in some excellent sizes, a traditional corona gorda and a 4 ½ x 56 Grand Cańon specifically pique my curiosity. This is a nice smoke, perhaps we’ll see these in the USA like the Rosalones last year.

Saturday afternoon I selected a cigar that Will Cooper (Cigar-Coop.com) sent me last year around my birthday. He sent a far nicer selection than I deserve, and included in this was a Nestor Miranda Grand Reserve 2011. Since is was a special occasion (Saturday, nice weather, done working in the yard, you know…), I decided this one was the next up for the afternoon walk. This has a Nicaraguan Habano Oscuro wrapper, although some older reviews list it as Conecticut Broadleaf, I’m inclined to think is was the former based on the flavor. I have smoked the 2012 which has the Connecticut Broadleaf wrapper and it was decidedly different. These were made in the My Father factory in Esteli, and it certainly smoked like a cigar that would be made there. It’s also noteworthy that this is a box pressed torpedo, which is neat. It was a really good smoke, lots of rich flavors with the pepper you’d expect and some sweetness. I enjoyed this cigar until I burned my fingers. Thank you, Will, I wouldn’t have otherwise had the chance to smoke this rare gem.

When Gary Griffith of Emilio Cigars comes across a really special tobacco, he creates a blend around it and releases it in his limited Draig line. It’s a shame that he mis-spelled Craig, but I appreciate the sentiment. Seriously, Draig is the Welsh word for Dragon, and there’s a dragon on the bands of the cigars in this line. I had the good fortune of smoking a couple of the Draig K a while back, and didn’t really “get” the blend. There was an inflammability in the wrapper, and what looked like it should be a cigar I’d like, wasn’t. So the Draig Cayaquero sat on the top shelf of my humidor for a while, begging to be smoked, yet scaring me a little, would I like this iteration of the Draig? Like it’s predecessor, this cigar had a unique flavor, unlike anything I can remember. Unlike the Draig K, I liked it and it burned perfectly. It was savory, meaty, and different. I don;t know how many of these are out in the market place, but if you see them, give one a try.

OK, I’ve just listed four cigars that are hard to find, sorry about that. I’ll try this week to stick to new and/or readily available cigars. Please bear with me if I smoke something that I’ve featured here before (I do that from time to time anyway). Now, it’s a beautiful Sunday, time to find something for today’s after brunch and hockey walk.

Until the next time,

CigarCraig

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Filed under Review

Tagged as chateau real, cigar, cigars, Draig, drew estate, Emilio, Flor de Nicaragua, joya de nicaragua, Nestor Miranda

by CigarCraig | April 16, 2014 · 10:06 pm

Three Toros: Gurkha, Nica Rustica and Tortuga Cigars

The weather here in PA is all over the place! Sunday it was darned near 80, and today it snowed in some places and the temps didn’t get too far out of the 40s. This didn’t stop me from smoking what used to be considered larger cigars. The Toro has been among my favorite sizes since I started smoking cigars in the 90s. Six inches by 50, 52 or 56 is in the ballpark, not as fat as the 60 ring gauge cigars, nor as long as a Churchill or double corona. They are usually good for an hour to an hour and a half. I like Robustos too, but the Toro is a great size.

The first toro I smoked this week was a Gurkha Ghost Asura, at 6″ x 54. I bought a couple of these at a shop in New Jersey, and they’ve taken some time to grow on me, the first few I smoked I didn’t quite get. I figured I should like this cigar, it has a maduro Brazilian Arapiraca wrapper (interestingly mispelled on the Gurkha website), and I usually like that wrapper. Eventually, I’ve come to enjoy this cigar, it’s on the rustic side, appearance wise, and it’s got a nice, fairly heavy flavor of dark roast coffee that I like. This one burned well with a dark grey ash that hung on pretty well. Lots of people think Gurkha cigars are all hype, but they have a bunch of cigars that are really very good.

Last night I grabbed a Drew Estate Nica Rustica El Brujito for my evening walk. This 6″ x 52 toro has a closed foot so you get a nice blast of flavor from the Connecticut Broadleaf maduro wrapper. the fist time I tried this it was a pre-release sample from the factory, and it had a half a leaf of a “wild” Esteli tobacco that added a real special little zing to the blend. I suppose the availability of this tobacco wasn’t in keeping with the idea to make an affordable and sustainable blend, so it was replaced with something more available. The cigar is still a winner, it’s got some strength and good, hearty flavor. The reason I grabbed this was that I was thinking about the recent earthquakes in Nicaragua. I happened to see a comment on a cigar makers post asking for positive thoughts and prayers for the Nicaraguan people and someone responded with something along the lines of “keep the cigars safe”, which I thought was about the most selfish comment. Really? Losing a few cigars is more important that people dying? We all love cigars, but are they more important than lives? I don’t think so. I haven’t heard anything more about the earthquakes, except they were preparing for “the big one”, like the one in 1972 that pretty much leveled Managua. Let’s hope that the seismic activity settles down in that part of the world, they have it bad enough. Anyway, the El Brujito is one of my favorite new cigars in the last year. For around $6, if you like stronger cigars these are worth a try.

A sign from the elevators in the Crown Plaza Hotel in Managua

Tonight I dug deep into one of the coolers and selected a Tortuga 215 Edición Limitada 2011 Toro. This is a 6″ x 50 traditional toro that’s made in the Dominican Republic with Dominican and Nicaraguan tobaccos. This is from a ten count box that was a generous gift from Victor Vitale a few years ago. These are aging very nicely. It’s a cigar with a lot of balance and class. Where the Ghost and the Nica Rustica are pretty brash, in your face kind of cigars, this one is loaded with flavors that are delicate and refined. It’s no secret that I’m a fan of Victor Vitale‘s cigars, and I only have a few of these left, which I’ll savor slowly because I don’t think there’s many of these left in the market. I know I have one enormous double corona that was a gift from a great friend in New York State that will be a great pool cigar this summer! Keep up the great work Victor!

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

CigarCraig

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Tagged as cigar, cigars, drew estate, El Brujito, Ghost, Gurkha, Nica Rustica, Tortuga, Victor Vitale

by CigarCraig | April 13, 2014 · 1:12 pm

A Toraño, an Undercrown, a Cain and Hockey With No Cigars!

Thursday I took a half day at work because I won tickets to the NCAA Frozen Four at the Wells Fargo center in Philly from our local NBC TV Station. So, in preparation, I took a walk with the dog and a Toraño Vault A-008 toro thst I believe came out of the 90+ sampler that Jack Toraño sent me last year (many thanks again, Jack!). The cigar has a flawless shade grown Nicaraguan wrapper, and there’s some filler from Ometepe that gives it a distictive flavor. The cigar lit and burned perfectly and was an excellent after lunch smoke. These Vault releases are unique in that they are blends that the Toraño family have had tucked away for years. This one is a really nice smoke and I give this a 98 on the new CigarCraig scoring scale (more on that later).

I had expected to have a cigar in the cigar bar at the Wells Fargo Center, but apparently you can’t have indoor smoking in a CIGAR Bar at a NCAA event. Sell all the beer you want, but smokers are relegated to a fenced off area outside, which is where I enjoyed a PDR A. Flores Gran Reserva Half Corona between games (a 97 on my scale, a great short smoke). I also was able to prevent a horrific injustice from happening. As we were standing there, a couple guys walked out with BSB#1 Bernie Parent by Rocky Patel HOF 84 torpedos and started lighting them up. These are expensive cigars, in the $12 range in a shop, if they bought them at the arena they would have been nearly double that. Much like the Toraño Vault, they have a foot band, and I had a feeling the one guy was going to try lightning his without removing the band. It turns out, I was right, and I intervened at the last second, yelling “wait!” (imagine it in slow motion for dramatic effect), and telling him that smoking the band isn’t the best way to appreciate the flavor of that particular cigar. Meanwhile, his buddy smoking a cigarette was howling with laughter as he apparently had told the guy that lighting the cigar that way was the right way to do it. I chastised him for his transgressions and finished my smoke. All the games were great, I hadn’t paid any attention to college hockey and it was really entertaining. We also went to the finals last night and saw a really good game. Too bad the cigar bar was no smoking, it was packed with people drinking though!

Friday evening I decided to break out one of the samples of the Drew Estate Undercrown Dogma, which was recently released in very limited quantities and celebrates the one year anniversary of the Cigar Dojo Community app and website. Sadly, I just can’t seem to find the time to dig into another cigar community, and I’ve never been a big fan of web forums. The time required to keep up with them is more than I care to spend. So the Undercrown Dogma is a 6″ x 56 box pressed toro that is based upon the blend for the Corona Viva, which is slightly different than the regular Undercrown line in that the ratios of the fillers were tweaked to fit into the corona gorda format, resulting in a little different taste. I personally like the Corona Viva the best of the line and have smoked them the most. So, I was interested in trying this new size. This is a spectacular cigar, and I hope they broaden the distribution of these, and make them a regular product. It’s rich and delicious, with a little bit of power. I don’t know hw Eric, Master Sensei at the Dojo, manged to pull this off with Drew Estate, but I’m glad to have had the opportunity to try this (Thanks to JB at DE), although it bums me out a little that I won’t be able to get my hands on them easily! This is a 99 on my new scoring scale.

I few weeks ago I was interviewed by a gentleman for an article on SpareFoot about cigar storage. I didn’t make a big deal about it at the time, as it happened to be published about the same time I made a little rant about “experts” and I certainly don’t consider myself one. However, I find myself in good company in the article, with Patrick Ashby of StogieGuys.com and Tad Gage, author of “The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Cigars”. The article is at www.SpareFoot.com and you can also read it below.

[pageview url=”http://www.sparefoot.com/storage-tips/how-to-store-cigars/” title=”Tips From the Experts on How to Store Cigars” border=”yes” scrolling=”yes”]

Yesterday, before the Flyers beat the Penguins, and I went to the NCAA Finals game, I slipped in a Cain Daytona Lancero on a nice, Saturday afternoon walk. This is a cigar that’s hard to get a hold of, and I was the fortunate recipient of a couple of these from my formerly local, former Oliva rep a couple years ago. The Daytona blend is probably about my favorite of the line, although I do enjoy most of them for one reason or another. I find the Dayona to be slight

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ly more refined than the rest of the line, and this Lancero is probably the most refined of the bunch. Great burn and draw, outstanding flavors and lasted a good hour and a half. I’ve long held the belief that the length of a cig

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ar is more of a determining factor in the smoking time than the ring gauge. This burned for easily an hour and a half, straight as an arrow and perfect from start to finish. If you see these, snag them up. I think the No. 4 corona is a reasonable substitute, as it’s right up there. Definitely a 98 on the scale.

I’ve decided to play around with a scoring scale. My scale will be a little different as it will be a 10 point scale from 91 to 100, with a 91 being a really terrible cigar to a 100 with is the pinnacle of perfection in all aspects. I can hear you now, “CigarCraig, that’s the biggest bunch of BS I’ve ever heard! Why not just do a 1-10?” Well, I hear you, and all I can say is that for one person to assign a score to a cigar, however arbitrary the method, is relatively useless, so I’m just making my useless scoring look really good to whoever happens to look at it at with pre-conceived notions. So, if you see someone advertising that “CigarCraig gave our Perro Cohete Gran Reserva a 91!”, you’ll know to stay away!

That should make up for Wednesday’s weak post! Enjoy the day! Un til the next time,

CigarCraig

6 Comments

Filed under Editorial, Review

Tagged as cain, cigar, Cigar Dojo, cigars, drew estate, Frozen Four, SpareFoot, Toraño

by CigarCraig | April 9, 2014 · 9:20 pm

A Hex From Sindicato and an Ora Vivo from Legacy Brands

It seems like only yesterday I was posting about smoking that enormous 7” x 70 Asylum 13 Ogre, and here it is Wednesday already and I find myself with little to report! Yesterday I revisited the Hex from Sindicato Cigars in the Figurado (5¼” x52) size. Honestly, I wasn’t certain what I wanted to smoke, and this was on the top of the humidor and I grabbed it and lit it up. This is from a batch I bought on National Hex Day back in January. These are made at the Ortez factory in Condega, Nicaragua, and use a dark, almost maduro, Ecuador Habano wrapper over Nicaraguan binder and filler. What they ended up with was a really sweet, rich smoke that is very satisfying. When I smoked this on Hex Day the example I smoked was on the wet side, and wasn’t the best representation of the blend. After some humidor time, it was a really tasty, well behaved smoke. The perfecto shape and the curly-cue pigtail cap are visually appealing details. I like these, and I look forward to trying their new eponymous line (called Sindicato) in the near future.

Tonight I selected an Ora Vivo 5 x 54 that I got at the Ora Vivo dinner I attended last fall in New Jersey (story here). I only have one or two left, and I would have had a box of them, but at the event they were only taking cash and I came woefully unprepared. Helpful hint for those hosting cigar events where cigars are for sale, if you can’t accept credit cards remotely, please let people know before hand that you are only taking cash so we can be prepared! Anyway, I’ve smoked several of these cigars and find them to be exceptional cigars. These are made in Honduras by Victor Vitale’s Legacy Brands, but are Nicaraguan puros. This certainly isn’t a powerful cigar, it’s refined, smooth and well balanced. This is a cigar that’s on a par with the best out there. It’s not an inexpensive cigar, I think I paid $9 for one when I bought one on my New Hampshire trip last fall. It’s a cigar that’s not heavy on the palate, you could, theoretically, smoke these one after the other. One of the reasons I had this cigar on my mind was that Armand Assante was a guest on The Cigar Authority last Saturday. If you have a podcast habit, like I do, give it a listen.

Getting a late post out on Sunday and skipping my evening cigar on Monday for various reasons makes for a short installment tonight, my apologies. I’ll endeavor to do better in the future. Until the next time,

CigarCraig

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Tagged as cigar, cigars, Hex, Ora Vivo Armand Assante, Sindicato, Victor Vitale

by CigarCraig | April 6, 2014 · 3:54 pm

Arandoza, Rosalones, Nica Puro and an Asylum 13 Ogre Cigar

I started out the second half of the week revisiting the Arandoza Blue Label Robusto from Arandoza Cigars. This brand is made at Erik Espinoza’s La Zona factory in Esteli, it’s a Nicaraguan puro with a Nicaraguan Habano wrapper and Nicaraguan binder and fillers. I smoked some of these last year and enjoyed them quite a bit, as I enjoyed this one again. They’ve fancied up the bands on these, making them harder to get a good picture, but the cigar is a really nice, well balanced smoke, with a little sweetness. Now that I’ve smoked a few cigars from La Zona, I’m quite confident that I’ll enjoy just about anything made there. The Arandoza is a little known gem.

Friday evening I got off to a late start, so I went for something on the smaller site for my evening walk. The Rosalones from Joya de Nicaragua was a surprise find last year at Cigar Safari. None of the assembled bloggers I was with had heard of this, and we were told it was for the European market. Not too long after that these showed up at Cigars International, which is where I picked up a few of these well priced, really tasty little cigars. The 448 is 4¾” x 48 and it’s another Nicaraguan puro. The wrapper is a Nicaraguan Habano Criollo and it’s a medium bodied little flavor bomb. Of course, as just about everything from JdN, it’s perfectly constructed. For a couple bucks a piece, these are really quite excellent cigars, and if you look back at some of my blogger brethren’s trip reports from last May, you’ll see that these were the talk of the trip. These are a bargain, and I’m not sure, but they may be a CI exclusive.

Saturday was a pretty nice, spring day, although a bit breezy. After getting some much needed yard work done (it’s never really done, but I was done!), I picked out an Alec Bradley Nica Puro for my afternoon walk. I’ve exclusively smoked the robustos in this line up until now, and it’s one of those cigars that I can grab and enjoy the heck out of on those occasions where I need a solid, no-nonsense cigar that I can just love and not have to think about much. A few weeks ago at the Filthy Hooligan event at Cigar Mojo I picked up some toros just to change it up a little. Lucky for me, it’s the same great tasting smoke in a longer format. Unfortunately for me, it was a bear to keep lit, for some reason. I’ve had this happen in the past when I’ve picked out the cigar about an hour prior to smoking, took my pictures (because I’m nutty that way) and put it in an aluminum tube for a little later. Ironically, I’ve also had burn problems when I’ve taken a slightly different route than I normally take. It’s hard for me to believe that the route has any effect, but I’ll abandon the tube for the Black Delrin Transporter Tube in the future (check out the Indiegogo campaign and get behind this guy, these are really nice tubes! Time is running out.). I remain a fan of the Nica Puro. It gives me a satisfying smoking experience the majority of the time, and the flavor is yummy.

Today I decided to pull out all the stops. Last June, on the occasion of our second granddaughter’s birth, we happened upon Black Cat Cigar‘s shop on our way home from the hospital. I picked up the Asylum 13 Ogre there, it was fairly new on the market, and I figured I should smoke it some day anyway. It’s an absurdly large cigar, 7″x70, and is a barber pole wrap of Habano maduro and Candela. I really like the green and brown appearance of this, but it’s size kept it buried in the humidor until such a time as I could devote a few hours to it’s smoking. For those who don’t know, this is made at Fabricas Unidas, which is Christian Eiroa’s factory in Honduras. I’m thankful that these are being released in more manageable 6″ x 60 and 5″ x 50 sizes, because I really enjoyed the flavors in this cigar. The Candela gives it a little bit of that refreshing flavor, and the maduro (the best I can tell, the candela is an over wrap on top of a completed maduro cigar) gives it the coffee/cocoa flavor I like. The draw was very free, and it actuallly burned a bit quicker than I anticipated. Apart from a little bit of flaking of the delicate candela leaf, the burn was pretty even. I used my Xikar MTX scissors on this, because I don’t think any of my cutters would accommodate the ridiculous girth of this cigar. As I said, I’ll be on the look out for the robusto size in this line. I really got a lot more flavor than I thought and it certainly isn’t a novelty cigar. (note: The websites for Asylum Cigars, Fabricas Unidas and CLE Cigars all return a message stating that they “encountered a fatal error” at the time of publication, perhaps Christian forgot to pay the bill? 🙂 )

I’d also like to take this opportunity to welcome Black Cat Cigars to the CigarCraig family of supporters. Click the link on the right sidebar and check out their Mayhem Deals. The first time I came across Black Cat was an evening long ago when we met a friend in Philly for dinner. We stopped in the little shop on Sansom Street on our way to the Sam Adams Brew pub, where we ended up running into another couple friends and smoking cigars with them all night. Their new shop in East Norriton, PA is pretty nice, stop in if you find yourself in that area.