Memoirs of a Cigar

FREE CIGAR INFO:
General Cigar is giving away the La Aurora 107 Free on 4/30/10, much like they did with the Nestor Miranda Special Selection. You can find a list of the participating cigar stores across the U.S. at the following link: http://rediscoverlaaurora.com/stores.html

CIGAR REVIEW:
I was just putting My La Aurora 107 Belicoso away in my humidor this evening, and decided to take a quick sniff of the wrapper and foot. It had a sweet hay scent over the sweet spot, and a rich flavorful aroma at the foot. I also noticed it was spongy to the touch, meaning it was perfectly humidified already. The La Aurora 107 forced me into abandoning my plan of skipping cigars for a day, with all it’s amazing pre-light qualities.

Upon cutting the La Aurora 107 Belicoso the cigar had one of the absolute best pre-light flavors I have ever experienced. It took me back to my childhood with something…but what was it. After a few moments, and some help from my girlfriend, we realized it was Raisin Brand! Bold flavors of sweet raisins and sugar, and I could almost swear I tasted the flakes in there too.

Upon lighting the new La Aurora 107, the Raisin Brand flavor was mixed with a cream note. I swear one of the blenders most love their Raisin Brand, because it was just like a bowl of the cereal with milk. Gradually the Raisin Brand taste faded into the background, and a light white pepper note emerged. Toward the middle of the cigar a citrus flavor took over, mixed in with the sweet raisin flavors which lingered on the palate. I’m being serious here when I tell you this phenomenal cigar tricked my mouth into believing I had just eaten some raisens, as I could taste the fruit under my tongue! The final third increased in strength with the white pepper note as the leading flavor, with the cream still present and some leather notes. A great smoke, which I would rate at 92-93 points.

As the sun sets on my “Weekend of Romeo”, I took my last smoke on a sunset stroll along the water. My final Romeo of the weekend was also my newest Romeo. The Romeo Y Julieta Duke Edición Limitada 2009 is a 54 inch ring gauge Gran Corona, and as the name suggests, was just released in 2009. This Romeo obviously differs from the rest in that it is a dark maduro cigar, with a very large ring gauge. It’s very well dressed in it’s dark wrapper and double cigar bands, and screams “smoke me at night”.

Upon cutting and lighting ‘The Duke’, you are greeted with a dark rich chocolate tobacco taste with a subtle spiceness. Leather flavors are soon added, and become the primary flavor for the entire cigar. Although the Romeo Y Julieta Duke is a much fuller and richer smoke then most other Romeo’s, it does not overwhelm you, but maintains the same soft balance and grace as it’s brethren. Perhaps the large ring gauge added to this effect, as a way to balance out the strength of these darker tobacco leaves.

The Romeo Y Julieta Duke Edición Limitada 2009 is a good 90 point smoke. If you think of your typical Romeo Y Julieta as a croisant, then think of ‘The Duke’ as a chocolate croisant. All the typical soft buttery flakiness of the croisant is still very much present, just with a creamy chocolate center.

I hope you enjoyed reading my “Weekend of Romeo” as much as enjoyed reviewing and writing about these wonderful Cuban Cigars. Until next time, this is Bernie from Memoirs of a Cigar signing off. Be sure to check back next week as I bring you excellent cigar reviews from sunny Florida and from Paradise Island in the Bahamas!!!

On Sunday, my “Weekend of Romeo” took a decidedly English turn. I made my way over to Menlo Park for an amazing English Breakfast at “Lisa’s Tea Treasures”. A pot of Louis the XIV Tea, which was made with Oolong Tea, lavender and fresh blackberries, was served with a full English spread of finger sandwich’s, croissant’s, scone’s, English Biscuit’s and Devonshire Cream. Boy-o-Boy that Devonshire Cream is good. It’s a lemon honey flavored jam to spread on the biscuits and dip in your tea. Good stuff!

After breakfast I took a walk with my dog Maggie, and met up with my friend Andrew for a drink at the British Bankers Club, aka the BBC. We sat out on the patio which has a live 3 piece jazz band from 12-3 on Sundays. Andrew ordered some Foie Gras (pictured below), and I had a blue crab omelet for my 2nd Breakfast. It was 85 degrees outside and felt like summer had arrived, so we finally got down to business.

The Romeo Y Julieta Churchill Tubo comes in a beautiful red & white tube. The cigar is also very attractive looking, and very well made, with it’s perfect cuban triple cap. It started off with a sweet wood taste mixed with some soft spice. It had a creamy texture, some wheat flavors for balance, and a cedary finish. It tasted much like my previous Romeo Y Julieta Belicoso, and essentially maintained that toasty woody flavor throughout the entire smoke. A perfect Cuban Cigar for a hot and sunny Sunday afternoon, live jazz, world class cuisine, and enjoying friendly conversation.

The third installment of my “Weekend of Romeo” led me to a Cuban staple, the Romeo Y Julieta Belicoso. This cigar is very easy to mistake for a #2 or a Torpedo, as it is so beautiful and elegant, and is rather on the slim side for a Belicoso, which are traditionally fatter torpedo’s.

The Romeo y Julieta Belicoso started of with a sweet wood taste and some soft spice. I soon determined the wood taste to be Balsa Wood, which is unmistakable. It gives a soft but spicy woody flavor that is very toasty and very pleasing at the same time. I would say that Balsa Wood is the prominent flavor through this cigar. Toward the middle of the cigar you could clearly discern the creamy and buttery texture, and the addition of some bread like flavors, which combined nicely with the toasty Balsa Wood. The finish was very long and spicy and seemed to leave some almond notes on the palate. Overall the Romeo Y Julieta Belicoso was a medium bodied, smooth and gentle Cuban Cigar, with a creamy and buttery texture, that provided flavors of Balsa Wood, bread and almonds.

I imagine this cigar would be an excellent choice for breakfast, served along side some buttered toast or a butter croissant, as the cigars texture is very similar to that of butter and toast. Bon Appetit.

My “Weekend of Romeo” continued on Friday evening with a 20 year old Romeo Y Julieta! The exact name and age of this cigar are unknown, as are so many things from so long ago. I know it came from a box from the early 1990′s, and I believe the name might be the Romeo Y Julieta 125 Aniversario Exhibition.

My 20 year aged Romeo Y Julieta had a woody mineral taste with a hint of mintiness present in the taste and aroma. It had a very soft and elegant woody aroma, that I inhaled several times while smoking. The middle of the cigar added some soft spice flavors, maybe white pepper, and had a very long dry wood finish. Starting the final third, I could taste a new leaf kick in, with a touch of woody sweetness and light cream added to the flavor profile. The very end exhibited a very strong herbal mineral taste, and left a strong herbal tingle on the tounge.

Overall it was a very elegant, herbal and woody cigar, with a long and balanced finish. It was still full of flavor at nearly two decades of age, and I would rate it a 96-97 point smoke. A soft and elegant smoke, as you would expect from a 20 year aged Romeo Y Julieta.

This weekend I decided to indulge myself in the several different variations of Romeo y Julieta that I currently own. I will call this my “Weekend of Romeo”, and will smoke nothing but Romeo Y Julieta Cigars, from Havana of course.

My “Weekend of Romeo” started on Friday afternoon, when a few friends and I went to the Sofitel for lunch. We took our normal table by the pool overlooking the water, and lit up our cigars. When they bring out your food and drinks, it feels as though your being served in a Cuban Countryside Estate.  The Sofitel also has an excellent selection of Rum’s, including 10 Cane Rum from Trinidad, but of course drinks are for after work, not at lunch.

A treat you can enjoy on your lunch break is a Short Churchill, as they only take around 45 minutes to smoke. These Romeo Y Julieta Short Churchills were named the #6 Cigar of 2008 by Cigar Aficionado, and scored a stellar 94 points!

Upon lighting our Romeo Y Julieta Short Churchill’s, all three of us were momentarily speechless. The silence was broken with a “That’s a good cigar” comment, followed by each of us muttering back “Yeah, that’s a good cigar”.  We were in awe of this Romeo and all of its brilliance. It had a soft and balanced flavor that consisted of leather and wood, and we soon detected a powdered cocoa flavor on the back of the throat as well. Toward the middle of the cigar the tobacco taste increased the strength of this short churchill, and was balanced out by an increasing orange peel zestiness.

This may have been a life altering cigar, which all 3 of us refused to leave behind. We cut off the ash and took them back with us to finish off separately after work. One of my co-workers even started to contemplate giving up cigarettes all together, in favor of fine cigars, and as I write this he is on his way to Hemingway Cigars in Palo Alto, to pick up some cigars for the weekend.

Here’s to quitting cigarettes, and moving to world class cigars!

Here’s to the Romeo Y Julieta Short Churchill!!!

Another Cigar Store in Florida I am excited to visit next month is El Credito, the makers of La Gloria Cubana. Since their founder Ernesto Perez Carillo left last year to start a new brand with his family, the EPC, La Gloria Cubana has gone through some significant changes.

They just recently let go 8 of their 10 cigar rollers who worked in their El Credito Factory Store in Miami. The majority of their cigars will now be rolled overseas in the Dominican Republic.

They are also said to be transforming their Factory Store into a Cigar Lounge, and presumably the remaining 2 rollers will be a part of that new image, rolling cigars live in the Lounge for smokers to enjoy.

Their first new cigar without their founder also looks quite intriguing. Named the La Gloria Cubana Artesanos de Tabaqueros, it has 2 wrappers and looks amazing. It has a light colored Connecticut Shade wrapper for the first third of the cigar, and then a dark Equadorian Sumatra wrapper for the remainder. It is said to provide a ‘cigar dinner’ like experience, with an appetizer followed by the main course.

I will report back on all that is new with La Gloria Cubana live from the corner of 8th & 11th in Little Havana, Miami next month. Stay Tuned!

Well it took me about 3 hours, but I did it. I finally did it! After going through every drawer, searching every box and bag, and shaking every photo album, I finally found my Passport and it’s good for one more year! Paradise Island Nassau Bahamas Here We Come!!!

I have been sort of peeking around for my passport the last few days, but today I came home determined to hone my FBI searching skills. To celebrate finding my Passport, I ordered a pizza, poured a glass of Kentuckys finest bourbon, and lit up a Habaneros Maduro Robusto!

It’s the very last Habanero’s Cigar that I own, but since I’m going to Florida next month I can stock up again. You would not believe how much cheaper cigars are in Florida compared to California. I think California has a 40% Tobacco Tax, and much higher sales tax. The last time I was cigar shopping in Florida I spent about $700.00. I calculated the same cigars in California would cost over $1100.00. This means that in Florida you can buy a high quality cigar for around $5.00. In California almost any cigar is going to cost you around $10.00.

The Habaneros Maduro Robusto’s flavor well exceeded it’s $5.99 price tag. Upon lighting it revealed a velvety texture soaked in layers of rich dark chocolate. You can buy Habaneros at only 1 store in the United States: Lost City Cigars, in West Palm Beach. They take phone orders too: +1 (561) 832-8342. Check out their website at the following: http://www.habaneroscigars.com/

Their Maduro’s are excellent, but their claim to fame are their original connecticut wrapped cigars in all shapes and sizes. I have tried their churchills, torpedos, cuelebras, gangsters and their lanceros, all of which are excellent. Their Lancero’s only cost $3.00 a cigar, and they are one of my absolute favorites. The Cuelebra pictures below is only $12.00, and that’s for 3 cigars and the amazing presentation. Habaneros are made by a former master roller from the Romeo y Julieta Factory in Cuba, their connecticut wrapped cigars are phenomenal! I swear on my Cigar Blog, you won’t regret ordering a box of your favorite size.

I keep a collection of Lancero’s pressed between 2 cedar sheets in an H. Upmann Sir Winston Humidor. My current selection of Lancero’s includes the following:

-2 Lancero’s rolled by Rene Sanchez of Just Easy Cigars
-Rocky Patel Decade Lancero
-Rocky Patel Sun Grown Lancero
-Alec Bradley Tempus Lancero
-Flor De A.Allones 98 Lancero
-La Gloria Cubana Maduro Lancero
-My Father No. 4 Lancero

The My Father No. 4 Lancero, rolled by Don Pepin Garcia, is a solid smoke. It has a touch of spice upon lighting, and then settles into a earthy, nutty and woody smoke. It has a great draw and even burn, but it does have a dry aftertaste. If a touch of cream were added to this blend it would be phenomenal, although it is still a damn good smoke.

For my tastes, I don’t know if it gets any better then the Hoyo De Monterrey Epicure Especial. It’s one of the new Cubans that burst onto the cigar scene in the late 2000′s, and has since become a staple of my Cuban Cigar rotation. It’s a bit lighter then the Epicure #2, but with a fresh floral herbaceous flavor that makes it very hard to beat. Its also relatively inexpensive for such a great smoke.

This Friday Chloe felt like doing a bit of shopping at Stanford Mall, so while she shopped Maggie (our dog) and I walked around the beautiful mall while enjoying our Epicure Especial. We snapped some photos too.

The Hoyo De Monterrey Epicure Especial is a phenomenal smoke. It’s a Top Cuban Cigar at an affordable price. Another key selling point for this cigar is that while the average Cuban Cigar has a sick period (the time a cigar needs to settle after production) of about a 1 year, the Hoyo De Monterrey Epicure Especial is ready in only a few short months. If that wasn’t enough, consider the fact that Cuban Cigars typically require 3-5 years of aging to reveal their full potential, but the Epicure Especial is beaming with its full flavor in only about a year and a half! This makes the Epicure Especial a great choice, whether your thinking with your brain, or your taste buds. Aficionado tested, Memoirs approved.

I have already enjoyed a Romeo y Julieta Short Churchill earlier today, which is a stellar 94 point cigar. That is a hard act to follow, so for my 2nd Sunday Cigar I had to pull out my Cabinet Selection Boxes out of my Aging Humidor. I decided I would try one of the handful of Casa Magna Colorado Robusto’s I have been aging for about a year now, and I’m glad I did.

Every Cigar Aficionado has heard of the Casa Magna Colorado Robusto, as it was named the #1 Cigar of the Year by Cigar Aficionado in 2008. A large part of it’s winning formula was it’s $5.00 price point, which moved it past a much pricier Padron, albeit with a 96 point performance.

From a marketing perspective, I have always felt the Casa Magna’s to have been slightly rushed to store shelves, thus not revealing their full potential when purchased and smoked immediately. Combine this with the Casa Magna’s #1 rated debut, and in my mind it only makes sense to rush them to store shelves as fast as possible. Therfore, I have set aside a handful of these babies for a year, to see if it’s full potential is really worthy of a number #1 Cigar of the Year title.

My aged Casa Magna Colorado Robusto was firm to the touch, gave a clean cut, and a perfect draw. The ash held on tight, and the burn stayed nice and cool. Essentially, you could say the construction was top notch.

The Casa Magna starts off with a complex spice that is outstanding! It seems to have softened nicely with a year of aging, and is damn near perfect. There is also a dark chocolate flavor present in the background. Once past the first third, the cigar turned creamy, and a sweet woody taste merged with the complex spice and chocolate flavors. This gave the spice a new hightened profile, which might be as good as any cigar can hope for. Toward the end of the cigar, the chocolate and wood notes became prominent, and the spice slowly faded. It had an amazing aroma, and left a sweet note on my lips.

I should also note that although I usually enjoy the Casa Magna Colorado Robusto with a strong roasted coffee, it also paired flawlessly with my sweet French Congac.

My aged Casa Magna Colorado Robusto was a good as, if not better, then almost any cigar I can remember smoking recently, many of which were more than 4 times the price. I now understand (and dare I say agree?) with Cigar Aficionado’s decision to name this it’s #1 Cigar of the Year.

I still believe the Padron Serie 1926 80 Year Anniversary Maduro to be the best cigar in the world. It holds a special place in my heart from the moment I stumbled upon one by chance at the Breakers in Palm Beach Florida. That was the single defining moment which started me on my quest to enjoy the finest cigars on earth, subsequently leading to www.memoirsofacigar.com, and finaly to this post today. As good as the Padron 1926 80 Year is, I just cannot justify purchasing several to hand out and smoke with friends, although I have done it once. Too many smokers could not truely appreciate it’s magnificence, and my pockets are just not that deep.

The Casa Magna Colorado Robusto however, is priced so affordable, I would gladly hand out several, even to non aficionados. It would probably be the best cigar they have ever smoked, as it is certainly one of mine.

I have finally started my journey through the 10 magnificant Cuban Cigars included in the 2008 Festival Del Habanos X Commemorative Case. I decided to start with the smallest cigar, the Cuaba Generosos, since it had several spots of Ploome on the tip and foot.

The Cuaba Brand was introduced in 1996 and is comprised of only figurados. They were made as an effort to re-popularize these figurado shaped cigars, which were quite popular back in the 1950′s. They are made in the Partagas Factory. If you were to compare them taste wise to other cuban brands, you could say they most closely resemble Romeo y Julieta.

The Cuaba Generosos is a fancy little cigar, with a soft and smooth taste. I encountered a firm draw at first, but then cut off a bit more of the tip, and immediately was in cigar smoking heaven. The cigar starts off with a mellow wood and toasted tobacco taste, with hints of herbs and honey. There is also a slight note of green peppers present. The center of the cigar then adds flavors of cream and leather. I also noticed flavors of vanilla and almonds. This is a slow burning and salty cigar, which is very smooth and satisfying. If you smoke one, make sure to cut off a good portion of the tip for the full draw, otherwise you won’t be able to taste all that this wonderful little cigar has to offer.

One down and nine to go!!! Stay tuned!

I was lucky enough to pick up 1 of the 20,000 cases made by Habanos S.A. for the 2008 Festival Del Habanos X, which was the 10th anniversary of the Cuban Cigar Festival held in Havana, Cuba.

These are undoubtably the highest quality Cuban Cigars available, and represent the most sucessful Cubans in the history of the festival.

These 10 cigars came in a luxury cedar case, and were handed out to atendees during the Gala Dinner on the final night of the festival. Habanos S.A. then made an additional 20,000 collectors cases due to overwhelming demand.

The special edition Cuban Cigars included are listed below.

Cohiba Siglo VI
Cohiba Genios
Montecristo Edmundo
Partagás Serie P-2
Romeo y Julieta Short Churchills
Hoyo de Monterrey Epicure Especial
H. Upmann Magnum 50
Trinidad Robustos Extra
San Cristóbal Mercaderes
Cuaba Generosos

It has been 10 long days since I have smoked a cigar. As much as I would like to pretend that my will power enabled such a feat, the truth is I had alot of help from a severe allergic reaction and a sinus infection. I do occasionally smoke cigars when sick, but this time I had absolutely no sense of smell, so it seemed pointless to light a cigar I couldn’t even smell.

On my first day of smell, I needed a high quality cigar to bring me back, and so I opted for the Benji Menendez Partagas Master Series Majestuoso. It’s a fantastic cigar with notes of red and black pepper. I have already done a full review of the cigar recently, so I will just add some nice pictures of this excellent cigar here.

On a beautiful and sunny Saturday afternoon, I sat out on the grass and smoked my Rocky Patel Vintage 1992 Churchill which came in a Glass Tube. This is a sharp looking cigar to store behind the glass, and the burgandy cigar band seems to match the 10 year aged Equadorian Sun-Grown Wrapper perfectly. I slipped my Churchill out of it’s glass tube, and upon lighting, found a nice light toasty cedar taste. It also had a very fresh ‘zestiness’ to it, which was similar to the orange peel flavor of the Fuente Hemmingway.

The Rocky Patel Vintage 1992 is made with 5 year aged tobacco and a 10 year aged wrapper. I have to report that this cigar absolutely delivers in the vintage cigar respect, as it perfectly delivers the aged finesse of a 10-20 year old aged cigar. I was really impressed with the soft subtle smoke produced, which had absolutely no bite of a young cigar.

Flavors of sweet leather, toasty cedar, spicy earth, fresh zest and even French penuts were present. All delivered in a soft, elegant and balanced smoke, as you would expect from a true vintage cigar.