Memoirs of a Cigar

I found myself in San Francisco early one afternoon, so I decided to stop by Grants Tobaconist on Market Street. Grants has a great walk in humidor, a great selection of cigars, and some wonderful store made sampler packs. The samplers come with 4 cigars, a double-guiletune cutter, and Davidoff matches for $35.00. They even come in a ziplock bag that has a built in humidifier pack good for 90 days. I have been keeping this bag in my car for some time now, and trust me, it really works.

The Fuente Fuente Opus X Torpedo was the #2 Rated Cigar of the Year in 2007, so when I saw they had released a Lancero size, I jumped at the opportunity to smoke one. I cut and lit this baby while my Visa was still authorizing the charge.

As with many good Lanceros, the Fuente Fuente Opus X Lancero started of with a bit of spice. The smooth cinnamon spice was just right, and blended into a balanced caramel and earth treat. A great cigar, with a great draw, and of course that killer Opus X look.

Yesterday after work I felt like relaxing outside and enjoying the great weather, so I grabbed an amazing looking cigar to keep me company. I also grabbed a bottle of PowderKeg Petite Sirah that I picked up recently at the BevMo “Buy 1 Get 1 for 5 cents” Sale.

The Gran Habano Corojo #5 is an awesome looking Lancero. It’s dark Nicaraguan Corojo Wrapper is smooth and oily, and it’s cigar bands just look fantastic. It hails from Honduras, but is made of Nicaraguan and Costa Rican Tobacco. It’s a bargain priced cigar, but I had high hopes for the quality.

I was right. This Lancero was excellent, and to dismiss it as a bargain smoke would be ludicrous. It smoked beautifully and presented perfectly balanced flavors of pepper, spice, cedar and earth.

I plan on trying the other Gran Habano Cigars now that this full flavored Corojo Lancero has made me a believer. Do you believe in Corojo?

Chloe, Maggie and I went for a walk on the beach in Princeton Harbor today. What a great way to relax and de-stress. You know what else helps to relax and de-stress? A good cigar!

Don Pepin Garcia is probably the best cigar roller and blender in Miami, if not the world. He has been rolling cigars for over 40 years (since he was 11 years old), and it shows. He is the man behind recent cigar sensations Padilla Miami, Tatuaje, Cabaiguan, and of course Don Pepin Cigars. I would definately say he is the premier Lancero roller on the planet, many of them complete with Cuban Triple Caps and Pigtails.

He grew up in Cuba, where he helped with the creation of the Montecristo and Cohiba Brands. He achieved the highest rank of Cuban Cigar Roller, and is even rumored to have been the personal cigar roller of Fidel Castro!

The Don Pepin Garcia Blue Label Cigar starts with a blast of black pepper and spice. It then blends in strong notes of leather and wood, while the wrapper adds chocolate and coffee notes. A full flavored cigar that knocks the socks off most Cuban’s I’ve smoked, this is a primo cigar to be enjoyed after a big steak dinner.

The CAO LX2 Lancero…now that’s a ringer!

My last of six CAO LX2 Lancero’s is a sweet aged treat. I have reviewed these a few times before, but they are consistantly amazing. I highly recomend trying it if you are able to find one.

My friend Dave ordered a bunch of Cubans recently, to see which ones he likes best. He ordered 2 of each, and was gracious enough to smoke his Romeo y Julieta’s with me. We had some Stella Artois beers with our little Romeo’s, and talked about the home market, the job market, and life in general. Afterwards we got a shoe shine, and I’m happy to report that my 8 year old Prada’s, that I bought on my first visit to Milan, look like new again. Thanks Dave!

I enjoy cigars with scotch, champagne or mojitos, however my beverage of choice is coffee. It’s funny because I don’t really drink coffee otherwise, I prefer tea, and not that crappy bleached bagged shit, but real loose whole leaf tea, like Yame Kykuro or Formosa Nut Oolong. In fact whenever I do go to Starbucks, I order a Green Tea Latte, which uses Japanese Cerimonial Green Tea.

Nothing spells vacation to me like waking up in the morning with a cup of coffee and a maduro cigar. Coffee really brings out the coffee and cocoa flavors, for obvious reasons.

This morning I lit up a La Gloria Cubana Reserva Figurados Maduro, an elegent shape that showcases the full spectrum of taste in the cigar. The pointed end quickly opens up to a full ring gauge, while the torpedo tip funnels the flavors to your lips.

It’s sad that La Gloria Cubana has probably passed it’s prime now with it’s 30 year owner and cigar master Ernesto Perez-Carrillo leaving the company. He sold La Gloria back in the 90′s, but stayed on as the creative force and manager of operations. Now he has decided to strike out and build a new brand with his two children who want to get into the cigar business with their dad. I’m excited to see what new cigars they will produce, but it will probably be a few years before they are available. I’m sure La Gloria Cubana will continue their cigars with the same quality as they are today, but innovation will probably be non-existant. Ernesto did produce one final gem before leaving La Gloria Cubana with the new Artesanos de Miami collection, his swan song, which are great cigars and have placed in the top 10 cigars for 2008.

Pretty strange pairing…yes… but then again, I’m not your typical aficionado.

For example, next weekend I’m contemplating driving down to L.A. for Tea. But not any tea, the best tea in the U.S., courtesy of La Palais De Tea, which is the The Tea Palace in French. They have the absolute best tea’s on earth, and are a tea conisuer’s Mecca.

But back to the cigar, I have never had a bad Punch. I have had 5 types of Punch cigars from a 25 pack, and all of them have been great. Maybe Punch only releases 90+ rated cigars, but whatever they are doing, it works.

While roasting marshmallows over the campfire, I endulged in a champagne colored Punch Gran Cru, an excellent, smooth, creamy, semi-sweet cigar. I paired it with a bottle of Proseco Champagne, which was an excellent choice. You can always tell if you made a good choice by asking “would you order it again”? The answer is invairably “Yes”.

BTW, the “would you order it again” system works great with Foie Gras too!

For lunch today, my friend Doug and I went to our local Cigar Shop “Cigars and More” in San Carlos.  I had picked up a CAO LX2 Lancero there yesterday, and needed to get a few more.  While inspecting each box in the walk in humidor, I discovered a box half-full of Casa Magna Colorado Robusto’s, the #1 rated cigar of 2008 by Cigar Aficionado  We quickly alleviated them of that problem – all gone!

The Casa Magna Colorado Robusto is rated 93 points, and its priced at only $5.25 wholesale, which helped elevate it to the #1 rated cigar in the world.  We paid $7.00 for ours, which is quite a resonable markup.  Their was quite a bit of confusion this year over the fact that price was one of the combining factors affecting the Top 10 Cigar Ratings, as most people wrongly assumed it was based purely from taste.  Anyways, you can read more about that here if your interested: http://www.cigaraficionado.com/Cigar/CA_Blogs/Blog_Detail/0,4695,346,00.html

My full purchase today consisted of quite an assortment of sizes ranging from Robusto > Torpedo > Belicoso > Lancero.

• Casa Magna Colorado Robusto — #1 “Top 10 Cigars of 2008″ by Cigar Aficionado, Rated 93 points
• CAO LX2 Lancero — Brand New Cigar Rated #91 points by Cigar Insider
• Dunhill Signed Range Torpedo — #10 “Top 10 Cigars of 2007″ by Cigar Aficionado, Rated 92 points
• Joyo De Nicaragua Belicoso — Rated #91 points by Cigar Insider

We both smoked a Casa Magna right there on the spot.  I mean come on, seriously, how far did you think we were going to get with the #1 rated cigar in the world.  And at that price, I can have one for lunch every day.

I wasn’t really hungry at lunch time today, so I decided on something low fat, low carb, but full in taste. I chose the #9 rated cigar of 2007, the CAO Vision.

This is the first of CAO’s non-flavored cigars to be rolled in the Dominican Republic, and my first ever lunch time smoke.

It was a really well balanced cigar with a roasted nuts aftertaste. It was wonderfull. I might have to consider continuing the Cigar-Diet for a few more days.

I guess you could say I’m a ‘new-wave’ cigar smoker. I sit on the beach listening to the weekly DJ Tiesto Podcast with my Girlfriend and our dog. I watch the sunset while I sip on a “Tinto De Verano”(a refreshing mix of Red Wine and Sprite) which literally translates to “Drink of the Summer”.

As for the cigar, it’s called El Rico Habano, and it’s a beautiful Maduro made by, and produced in, the same place as La Gloria Cubana. I picked up several El Rico’s when I visited their factory store “El Credito” in Miami’s Calle Ocho District this past Christmas.

This El Rico Habano has a 54 inch ring gauge and is about 7 inches long. It’s amazingly smooth, and I’m loving every bit of it. It’s everything I had hoped for, and exactly what I had expected from the folks who make La Gloria Cubana.

There are tons of cuban tasting, cuban knock-offs in the market today. Most don’t taste anything like a cuban.

Cuban Delights are different.

Cuban Delights taste like a Cuban Cigar tastes.  While they burn a little quick, and are not blessed with excellent construction, they are great cigars to smoke.  I first purchased a 5 pack, and went back for a 20 pack.  Now I’m planning on splitting a box of these with some guys in the office.

Once when I was camping, I handed out about 5 of these to some guys at a bonfire.  I told them they were real cubans, and they believed me. One guy came back up to me later saying “Thanks man! That was the best cigar I ever had!”  Its amazing what a little marketing can do. 

These are the new Maduro Cuban Delights, so Im not entirely sure how they will taste, as I have only had the Natural one’s.  Hopefully they still have that great cuban taste, but with a spicy maduro wrapper on top!

Thompson Cigar has a sale going on now, where you can order 30 Cuban Delight Maduro Robusto’s for $19.95 (regularly priced at $47.00).  At this price we would be crazy not to try them!

http://www.thompsoncigar.com/default.aspx?uid=2785&page=product&sender=email&cm_mmc=Email-_-20090121-CubanDelights-31511-_-body-_-delightspage#

Tonight I smoked one of my 10 value buys from Island Smoke Shop down in Key Largo, along with my new Key West Ashtray. I just couldn’t resist the dark oily wrapper on this tiny little Box Pressed Maduro. The Sancho Panza is a bold little cigar, that packs a punch. Wrapped in a shiny reddish Honduran-grown Cuban-seed leaf, this Honduran handmade cigar definitely did not disappoint. It was strong, it had depth, it had flavor, and it lasted about an hour.

The Sancho Panza – Pamplona only cost $2.75, so I was really impressed by the quality and value this cigar offered.

I come to find out that these cigars are crafted under the direction of Estelo Padron of Honduras. Apparently Estelo Padron and his brother Jorge Padron had a bit of a falling out, which resulted in Estelo leaving the Padron line in Nicaragua and going to work in Honduras. He is now the man behind the blends in Punch, Hoyo Excalibur , El Rey del Mundo and Sancho Panza.

The sizes are named Barcelona, Madrid, Cadiz, Cordoba, and the Pamplona.

…or, if you prefer in satellite view…

Being a survivor of San Fermin Festival myself, I had no other choice but to opt for the Pamplona. Now that I think about it, the words “no other choice” when referring to Pamplona, are quite ironic.

From Ibiza to Pamplona, the party continues…

A friend and I had just returned to the mainland from spending about 2 weeks in Ibiza – an island off the coast of Spain. Several people had suggested we go to Pamplona for the world famous San Fermin Festival, so we decided to do it.

We made our way to Zaragoza, and booked the early morning train to Pamplona. The train was packed, I mean standing room only packed, I mean packed so full you couldn’t even fit a potato on the train packed. Practically every square inch on the train was taken by guys wearing all white shirts & pants, with red bandannas and belts. We were able to negotiate about 4 feet of floor space for the both of us, and tried to get some rest, laying over people, with people crawling over us.

July 11th, 2001 – We arrived in Pamplona at 5:30AM. The “Run” starts at 8:00AM when they release the Bulls. We walked the street and tried to familiarize ourselves with the route where the bulls would be running. About 20 minutes to 8:00, they take hoses and start watering down the streets. I guess being drunk (from gallons of Sangria), and sleep deprived is not challenging enough when running from 1000 lbs Bulls, so they needed to add ‘ice skating’ to the list.

I never felt the need to prove my manhood and run with the bulls. I thought watching the event would be more fun, so I had planned to do just that. Next thing I know, the police closed down the streets with huge wooden gates. I started climbing out, but a police officer with a rifle started screaming out me to get down, so I had “no other choice”… I was gonna run. A few minutes later we heard a gunshot, signaling that the first bull has been released.

About 45 seconds later, a second gunshot, signaling that the last bull was out.

I didn’t stick around to chit chat.

I ran like a little girl.

The most dangerous part of Running of the Bulls is the last stretch of the course when it goes through the tunnel into the arena. The tunnel is dark and small, and with so many thousands of people running through, it’s easy to get hit by the bulls there. I made it through the tunnel, heart pumping, running onto the Plaza de Toros, hooked a right, hopped the wall, and watched as the bulls charged into the arena.

The after-party was so big, the energy so high, the drinks so strong, that the rest is pretty much a blur. Everyone was celebrating being alive! I do recall we went to a bar in the main square and had a pitcher of Sangria which was served by dipping the pitcher into one of several garbage cans full of Sangria, and it was the best Sangria I ever had.

Click Here to watch the July 11th, 2001 Running of the Bulls Video”
http://www.sanfermin2.com/2001/videos/streaming2001/110701_100.wmv

LONG LIVE SAN FERMIN!!!