I had ordered a A L’Atelier La Mission 1959 from Scotty’s Cigars last week (unfortunately they only had one left in stock or I would have gotten more), and I’ve been trying to smoke some of the cigars on Cigar Aficionado’s list that I hadn’t smoked before. I must have smoked another La Mission somewhere along the line before, as I found a band while wading through thousands of bands for my wife who is working on a cigar band table project. More on that as it nears completion. I will say that going through all the bands I’ve saved it’s pretty amazing to see what cigars I’ve smoked. Some I don’t remember! I find a band and think, what the hell is this?
The L’Atelier La Mission 1959 is a 4¾” x 52 box pressed robusto-ish cigar with a pigtail cap. It has a San Andrés wrapper and Nicaraguan binder and fillers and is made at the My Father factory in Esteli. I had originally selected another cigar that was a toro size, as I thought that I wanted a longer cigar (as I usually do). To my great disappointment, when I checked the internal humidity with my Humidimeter, it had arrived a little on the humider (not a word, I know) side than I’d like, so I decided to let it (all three measured the same, by the way, and were the only these in the shipment of ten cigars that were high) sit in the humidor to dry out for a while. The Humidimeter has saved me from disappointment on many occasions. It turns out that the La Mission 1959 ended up burning for well over an hour and fifteen minutes, filling the time I had allotted for a cigar perfectly, allowing me to watch the Flyers game inside on the TV instead of on the iPad (it turned out to be a horrific game, my time would have been better spent having another cigar and playing solitaire). The La Mission 1959 was awesome. It has some strength, with rich cocoa and some spice, but it’s refined. I very much enjoyed it and it’s certainly worthy of mention on the CA list. I just wish Scotty’s had more in stock when I made my purchase!
Funny enough, a few of my cigar selections over the last few days were predicated on my wife’s table project, and her being short a band and it being easier for me to smoke a cigar rather than sifting through years worth of bands. At one time it was like archaeology, I put them in a vase, and based on the layers, if I had an idea when I smoked a cigar I could find a band. I’d periodically dump the vase, bag up the bands on the bottom, and try to maintain the integrity of the timeline. This project has disrupted the dig, and the spoils pile is all over the place. I’ve found bands from 15 years ago near bands from 
last week. It’s ridiculous. I don’t know what to do any more. I may have to start writing the date on the back of each band. The has been a small glimpse into my cigar pathology. That being said I smoked an Epic Corojo and a Freyja Valhalla that were outstanding. I need to find more Freyjas, they seem to be rare these days. There used to be a couple of local sources that had them, I’ll have to check around. Epic, of course, is now under the Zander-Greg company, but I only have a bunch of old cigars hanging around. I don’t expect they’ve changed, I believe they are still produced in the same factory, the factory that Kristoff Cigars are made in.
That’s about all for today. Until the next time,
CigarCraig
