Casino Real | CigarCraig's Blog

I’m running low on new stuff to smoke, in a few years I’ll be scraping the bottom of the barrel! Seems like there’s always something new, it’s just a matter of getting my hands on stuff. A few weeks after my aborted attempt to be among the first to smoke the new Fratello Vice Versa with Omar when he released it in Virginia, I picked a couple up at a local shop. I would have gotten more, but these are no cheap date. I get it, they are expensive to make, they are bunched in a very specific way, and capped on both ends. Not begrudging Omar the price, just saying I’m a cheap prick and don’t buy more than a couple $15 cigars at a whack. I smoked prototypes last May, they were good. I smoked a Vice Versa this week and started with the strong end. This is an interesting cigar that smokes mild from one end and strong from the other. Seems like I should have gotten a third one, because the one I smoked, unfortunately, had a void in the first half and tunneled. After struggling with it for a while, it eventually corrected itself. I kinda missed the strong part, but it was a tasty cigar. This isn’t a small cigar at 7″ x 52, and it has a six country blend: Ecuador, Indonesia, Pennsylvania (USA) , the Dominican Republic, Peru and Nicaragua. Peruvian tobacco is a in almost all of Omar’s blends. I wonder if I would feel better about cutting this cigar in half, although if I think a $15 7″ cigar is expensive, two $7.50 3½” cigars actually seems pricier. I have one left, I’ll need to get a couple more eventually, I enjoyed the flavor.

Friday was Saint Patrick’s Day, so I smoked the new Firecracker cigar from United Cigars, the All Saints St. Patrick. This is a 3½” x 50 based on the St. Francis blend, which I really like. They accented the oscuro wrapper with a Candela, making a barber pole. It seemed to me to be stronger than the St. Francis, which is kinda the point. I didn’t taste much of the candela, to be honest. A lot of the candela barber pole cigars have that grassy candela flavor present, this wasn’t apparent except it might have contributed to some of the bite. It was good, I liked it. I typically only buy from 3 to 5 Firecrackers, maybe I should have gotten 5. It’s been a few years since I’ve gotten any, the last few didn’t capture my interest. If you find these, buy some, I bet they go fast. I wonder if All Saints will do a St. Bernard one day? It would have to be a large format.

Yesterday I did a little test of a platform that will let me do interviews remotely. Hopefully that is something that interests my readers. It’s something I’ve been wanting to do but finally got around to it. So I tested it yesterday with a couple of friends and smoked a Casino Real Double Toro (6″ x 60) which I think I got at the 2022 TPE show. This is a brand which is, from what I can tell, is distributed by Zander Greg/Nat Cicco. This is a Ecuador Habano wrapped cigar with Nicaraguan binder and fillers. It was a tasty cigar with some woody and coffee type flavors. The burn and draw were perfect. I have no idea what these cost but it was a solid smoke.

I got home from going out to dinner a bit late and decided it was a great time to smoke a short cigar. I said before that my go to is a 6″ cigar, I don’t mind bigger cigars, although I don’t often go over a 60 ring. So shorter cigars end up spending some time in the humidor often. I had a Yaya Short Robusto, which is a 2022 PCA exclusive, which I got from the United Cigars booth at the 2022 PCA show. I like the fact that this had the date on the band, it makes it harder for me to forget where it came from and when. Not impossible, just harder. I’ve heard good things about this cigar, so I was anxious to try it. It’s 4″ x 54, with an Ecuador Habano wrapper over Dominican fillers. These are made in Jose Dominguez’ Magia Cubana factory in the DR. I’ll be honest, there’s not a lot of cigar from this factory that have thrilled me. This one was the exception. It started out with a little bite, which I liked, and had some nice spice notes. It’s a tasty smoke!