Tag Archives: Boutique Blends

IPCPR Thoughts and Highlights – Part One

We got back from the IPCPR show yesterday, and it was a whirlwind 3 days at the show. I didn’t do the video interviews like I’ve done in the past, I figure other people are doing them and I don’t do what everyone else does. The only one I did I posted Sunday, and I’ll try to fix the audio when I get a chance. I will have a video montage of the “secret question” which I did for fun. Two years ago I put together the montage (here), and when I get the video put together I’ll post it. It’s a bit of fun and something different. I encourage you to visit my colleagues sites who did run around interviewing everyone, I just didn’t have it in me this time around. Obviously when I got Dunbarton Tobacco and Trust‘s Steve Saka alone at the end of the first day, and was the first blogger type to have talked to him, I had to scoop the competition. I’m not proud of my competitiveness in that regard, but I am proud to have gotten the first interview with Steve out. I asked some questions I’m sure nobody else did.  I’ve known Steve for nearly 20 years, which might have given me a little advantage. I’ve gt samples, and you’ll hear more about them as I smoke them. They are taking a rest in the humidor, and I even shipped a box back that’s due tomorrow.  Anyway, here’s the quick day by day recap.

 

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Friday we drove two hours to Newark, NJ for a 5am flight which took us through Chicago then finally to New Orleans.  Once checked into our hotel, the Hilton Riverside, which is next to the convention center, more or less, we walked to get our badges. This convention center had to have been nearly a mile long, it’s one enormous building, and the IPCPR was on the far end. We went to our hotel and took about a three-hour nap before heading back to the convention center for the gala grand opening reception, which followed the Government Affairs Briefing. This has been poorly attended in the past, and it was quite important to those who make a living in the cigar industry, so it was a stroke of genius offering cocktails to the attendees. The gala offered food and a cash bar, which was exorbitantly expensive. We caught up with quite a few old friends here, spending some time with the Two Guys Smoke Shop crew, as well as many others.  I had run into Scott Weeks of Recluse Cigars, who handed me a Recluse Amadeus in Connecticut and the new Habano, and I smoked the Connecticut at the event, which is a great Connecticut shade cigar, lots of flavor. I can’t wait to try the Habano version, as I’ve been a Recluse fan since their release.  I also smoked something else, but I can’t recall what it was. The evening was sponsored by Fratello Cigars. It was a fun evening, but even after the nap we were running at a sleep deficit, and wanted to be awake for the opening of the show.

 

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Saturday morning we arose refreshed and went to the opening breakfast at the convention center. Smoking is allowed at the breakfast, but I was holding off until we got to the show. There is a business meeting that takes place, with recognition of the outgoing and incoming presidents and the introduction of the new IPCPR IMG_1761CEO, as well as some industry awards. All quite uninteresting to the consumer, but the officers and board of directors do this in their spare time on a volunteer basis, so there behind the scenes work deserves recognition. They always have a keynote speaker, and this year it was Larry Winget, a motivational speaker who was quite insightful and entertaining. I bought his book. He and I have a similar sense of humor, and many of his observations were quite funny. Breakfast was good, the coffee was great and it was a nice way to spend the morning. The show floor opened to the masses at 10:30 and we ran into quite a few old friends on what seemed like a half mile walk to the entrance of the show.  Upon entering, IMG_1780Drew Estate‘s elaborate and expansive booth is straight ahead, so it was mobbed. We had a couple of appointments in the afternoon, so we went to the far end of the show floor and wandered, saying hello to friends, meeting up with fellow bloggers and media types, and getting the lay of the land ( taking note of where the food court was, bathrooms, etc. The first appointment was with Victor Vitale of Tortuga and Legacy brands, where I was reintroduced to IMG_1779the new Tortuga Connecticut, which was my first cigar of the show.  This is a very smooth, creamy cigar with great flavor. I have smoked it before, and it’s a very enjoyable Connecticut, not to be missed. You may begin to notice a trend, I do’t smoke a great many milder cigars, but I’ve been to enough events and trade shows that I know how much it can suck if you blow out your palate early with strong cigars. I typically don’t go through a ton of cigars on the show floor as it’s awkward talking to one manufacturer about his cigar with another manufacturers cigar in your mouth (in the interview with Steve Saka I was smoking the new Leccia Luchadore, more on that later, but I couldn’t put it down and Steve didn’t have any samples of the Sobremesa). Victor was struggling with having his display cases broken and not having the right furniture, so it was a rough show for him, but he kept a smile on his face. This is another trend we saw: broken displays and what appeared to be poor service by whoever was in charge of moving things around with at least one booth never receiving a couch or chairs.  I attended a media briefing at Rafael Nodal’s Boutique Blends/Aging Room booth with was informative, with Rafael telling us about his current selections.  This factory continues to put out some great cigars, I just enjoyed the joint venture between Rafael and Altadis, the Romeo by Romeo y Julieta Aging Room Small Batch F25 in the Cantoar belicoso size and it was very nice. Not a show sample, by the way.  After visiting with Rafael and his boys we went to the General Cigar booth for our traditional 3:00 on the first day of the show tour.  General always rolls out the red carpet for us, and we saw some great looking new products including new branding on the Macanudo line, a Partagas Aniversario which looks really tasty, Bolivar and Ramon Allones reboots from the Foundry division as well as the Leccia Luchador El Gringo line extension (I mentioned before that I smoked it and really liked it, despite the example I smoked being a 70 ring). CAO has the Pilon, Margaritaville and added a round cigar to their Flathead line, the Steel Horse, paying homage to the motorcycles as opposed to the automobile reference in the previous five sizes. More about all of these as I smoke them after the samples have a chance to rest. Cohiba has a new very expensive Luxury Selection No. 2, which is beautiful, and Dunhill has the Heritage and Seleccion Suprema. Finishing off the tour was the Toraño line with the repackaged Brick bundle brand. I like a lot of cigars in the General Cigar portfolio, so I am looking forward to trying a bunch of the new cigars. Stay tuned for a giveaway here in the near future so you too can try some!

 

We free-ranged around the show floor some more until getting to sit down with Steve Saka after the show closed. I had to get the video interview out, which meant napping in between video processing, editing, and uploading over hotel WiFi so I could publish it for you first thing Sunday morning.  Needless to say, the first day was fun, exciting and tiring, and I’m going to Post about days three and four on Sunday.  Lots of great cigars and great people.

 

Until the next time,

CigarCraig`

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Aging Room, Liga Privada and Royal Gold Kismet and Casino Gold Cigars

Thank you all for the kind words about my deer/car incident. There’s a lot of ways it could have turned out much worse, and it sounds like the car will get fixed so I’ll have my sexy black Toyota Yaris back in a few weeks!  I was ready to shop for a used car, something I could pay cash for, but I’d rather have MY used car back, I know where it’s been! I’d have a hard time replacing my Undercrown window sticker anyway!  In other news, this week the announcement came that Swisher International is purchasing Drew Estate, which caused quite a stir in the cigar community. All the folks analyzing this who have no idea about the inner workings drive me a little crazy. As far as I’m concerned, Jonathan Drew and Marvin Samel are very intelligent business men, they wouldn’t have built what they have if they weren’t, and if they are happy, I’m happy. If nothing else, it gives them the ability to do the things they do best without having to worry about the business side as much. The people criticizing this don’t want anything to do with Swisher’s products for the most part. My only concern is the fact that Swisher may not have as big an interest in seeing premium cigars separated from non-premium cigars as far as the FDA is concerned, however now they have a greater interest in doing so. It will be interesting to see what other business moves happen in the cigar industry.

 

AgingRoom_QuatroF55_ConcertoSunday I selected a Aging Room Quatro F55 Concerto, a nice Churchill from Boutique Blends.  I’ve had trouble with many cigars in this line, they tend to put a physical hurtin on me!  I love the flavor, but more times than not they overwhelm me for some reason. Very few cigar get to me the way Aging Room cigars have recently!  this is doubly interesting since it’s a Dominican cigar. I had no such trouble with this size, it was delicious and perfectly behaved.  I’m not surprised that this was the number two cigar of the year last year in Cigar Aficionado, it was a very nice way to finish the weekend. I’ll not be afraid to smoke this line again.

 

LigaPrivadaNo9_CoronaMonday, after hearing the Drew Estate news, I figured I’d smoke something interesting from the Liga Privada line.  Last year around my 50th birthday I received a very generous package from my friend Will Cooper, whom you may know from Cigar-Coop.com and StogieGeeks.com.  In this package was a corona sized Liga Privada No.9, with the story that Steve Saka had these made for his own consumption and shared some with Will. The question is how it compared to the Dirty Rat, which is a similar size. Certainly the Dirty Rat is a stronger cigar, however this No.9 had some age, and the Dirty Rats I’ve had recently also were four or five years old. It’s hard to compare under those circumstances, but the No.9 in the corona size was very nice, although I think the toro size remains my favorite in the line.

 

Royal Gold_Kismet_ChanceI had a couple cigars from Royal Gold, which, ironically, is reasonably new premium cigar division of Swisher International, from when I talked to Alex Goldman at the Famous Smoke Shop Cigarnival back in June. I had smoked and enjoyed the Cameroon wrapped Nirvana, which is made by Drew Estate a couple months ago and had the Casino Gold and the Kismet in the humidor. The Kismet Chance is a 5½” x 46 corona gorda, although thinking back I thought it was a robusto. This is a Dominican puro made at Agusto Reyes factory in Santiago.  I found this to be a very mild and well made cigar, but it was fairly unremarkable. It burned nicely and wasn’t offensive, just didn’t really stand out to me in any way.

 

Tonight I smoked the Royal Gold  in the Queen size. This is a 5¾x52 cigar made by Placencia in Honduras.  I don’t know if it’s because I have a cold coming on or what, but this one fell flat for me too.  Ever have a cigar that isn’t plugged, but draws poorly? Ever wonder why you can blow through a cigar and produce tons of smoke, but drawing produces very little?  I wonder that all the time, and I wondered this again tonight.  It did open up in the second half, and I wonder if the very damp evening air had something to do with it. Chalk it up to experience.  I smoked these this week because I wonder how much attention the Royal Gold division is going to get now that Swisher owns a premium cigar company, factory and all.

 

That’s all I got tonight. I’m watching the Flyers play their arch enemies the Penguins, and they are winning for a change.  I have some great friends that are Penguins fans, but I like them anyway. Until the next time,

 

CigarCraig

 

 

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Aging Room, Black Abyss, and Señorial Cigars, and a Contest Winner!

AgingRoom_M356_ForteAfter staring the week smoking the newest offerings from Villiger Cigars, I figured I’d continue a trend and smoke some other cigars originating from the same factory in the Dominican Republic, Tabacaleras Palma. This seems to be the hot factory these days, and they are, no doubt, making some tasty smokes.  I started on Thursday with the Aging Room M356 Forte. This is a really cool shaped perfecto, measuring 5 7/8″ x 40-56-40, tapering on both ends.  This is a classic, old-school shape, I like it.  The M356 has a Habano wrapper over Dominican Binder and fillers and is NOT a mild cigar. As a matter of fact, every example in the M356 line I’ve smoked has given me a little bit of a butt-whooping, and that doesn’t happen to me often.  That being said, it’s a terrific smoke, it burned perfectly and was loaded with rich flavor.  I wouldn’t smoke these on an empty stomach!  One thing that confuses me about lines which use number in their naming is that I just can’t remember them!  It’s a darned good thing they put it on the bands.

 

Senoreal_Corona GordaFriday I finally got around to smoking José Blanco‘s new cigar, Señoreal, in the Corona Gorda No. 5 size.   My daughter doesn’t buy me a lot of cigars, but she lives a stone’s throw from The Wooden Indian in Havertown, PA, I asked her to grab me a few last week.  This is another cigar made at José’s cousin Jochi’s Tabacaleras Palma.  When José suggests that this may be his strongest blend to date, you can take that to the bank. This is a full flavored cigar with a mix of Nicaraguan and Dominican tobaccos wrapped in the Ecuador Habano wrapper.  This is, perhaps, the perfect size for a cigar, 5½” x 46, and was recommended to my daughter by the tobacconist (I gave her very specific direction…and that was on my list).  There must be a leaf in common with the M356, becuase this cigar also threatened to put a hurtin on me, I needed some sugar after I was done. José has a winner here, his first true solo effort is awesome.

 

BlackAbbys_Hydra BlackAbbys_BansheeI’ve smoked a couple of the sizes of JR Cigars new brand, Black Abyss.  This is a San Andrés wrapped cigar made for them by Boutique Blends/Tabacaleras Palma.  This week I smoked the Hydra (toro) and the Banshee (robusto).  I had a feeling I was going to enjoy this cigar from the start, and I was right. These have a down and dirty, bold sweet and earthy flavor that I really like. It’s a no-nonsense smoke, and is priced very well staring in the $3 range. Both burned perfectly, the toro I smoked on a walk with the dog mid-week, and the robusto was smoked while waiting out a thunder storm in the garage. I got a lot of pleasure form these cigars, and would probably keep some around if I had room for more cigars. I think there’s a torpedo and a 6×60 left in my humidor, I’ll be interested in smoking those to see if one size stands out over the other. I think the toro and robusto were a tie.

 

AgingRoom_Havao_SharpLast night I sat down with an Aging Room Haváo Sharp (Torpedo). I had my reservations, but I wasn’t going anyplace, so if I found another Aging Room cigar that was going to do a number on me I was ready. This line has an Ecuador Connecticut wrapper, although it’s by no means mild. It’s full of flavor.  Actually the website lists it as “Mild Plus”, but I think it’s a pretty big “Plus”.  I loved the silky, creamy smoke that poured off this cigar, and the dead even burn. One reason I despise this time of year is that it’s getting darker earlier, which makes it hard to see my cigars!  In this case, I stared to get a papery flavor then realized I was burning through the band. I hardly ever do that!  I thought this was a great smoke, and can’t help comparing it to the Villiger Cuelllar Connecticut Krēmē made at the same factory.  Both are bolder than usual Connecticuts and both are loaded with flavor. This is a “must try”.

 

Here’s a video from the Rocky Mountain Cigar Festival with Rafael Nodal of Boutique Blends. If you ever get the chance to meet Rafael, you will come away with the impression that you’ve just caught up with an old friend. He’s a tremendously nice gentleman.

 

 

Contest

CAO_Signs Contest_3Monday I promised that I’d select a winner today for the CAO Flathead tin sign and Flathead 554 Camshaft and Sparkplug cigars. there were some great pairings, and some of you threw my count off with replies to replies!  No big deal, I can manage!  So Random.org’s random number generator selected 21 out of 44 entries. By my count, Ray Holthaus is the winner!  Ray, send me your address so I can pack these goodies up and send them along!  I hope you watched and enjoyed the video, I thought jum and Bruce did a fine job of describing their experiences. Thanks to everyone for entering and stay tuned for more contests!

 

I have some yardwork to do today, and we had a PODS container dropped off so we can start getting ready to move sometime in the future!  Plenty of stuff to move, plenty of weeds to pull! I’ll provide cigars to anyone who wants to help! 🙂

 

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

 

CigarCraig

 

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