Cigar Review: New Casa Fuente 800 Series
18 Sep 2012
Last week I interviewed Michael Frey who owns Casa Fuente in Las Vegas, a cigar destination worth visiting if you are ever in Sin City. Today, I’m reviewing the new Casa Fuente exclusive cigar, which Frey mentioned he was smoking while answering my questions.
The new smoke is the second Casa Fuente exclusive smoke, made (no surprise) by Arturo Fuente. The first, we were told by Casa Fuente manager Michael Fayerverger, was a variation of the Opus X blend made with a Cameroon wrapper.
This second, new Casa Fuente blend is quite different. According to Frey, the cigar features a Havana-seed Ecuadorian sun-grown rosado wrapper around binder and filler comprised of “secret tobaccos” from the Fuentes’ Dominican farm. The cigar, he says, was blended by Carlito and introduced earlier this year. (The rosado wrapper is likely the same as the Rosado Sungrown Magnum R blend.)
The cigar is available in three sizes: 806, 807, and 808, which I’d estimate to be a robsuto (5.25 x 52), double robusto (5.75 x 52), and toro (6 x 54). I smoked one of each and found them to be sufficiently similar to be summarized together in one review. The cigars cost $21, $22, and $24, respectively and, depending on what report you read, are strictly limited to one or two cigars per person on a given day.
The new 800 series Casa Fuente features a complex combination of clove, nutmeg, molasses, wood, leather, and earth. It’s medium- to full-bodied with excellent balance and tons of complexity. The molasses and clove build towards the second half, creating an extraordinarily savory blend.
While it contains Dominican binder and filler tobaccos, I seriously doubt it uses the same binder-filler combination as the Opus X and original Casa Fuente, as both are the same cigar except for the wrapper. This cigar has far less peppery spice than either of those cigars. Instead, it is full of clove and cinnamon spice.
Tasty, unique, complex, and, yes, expensive. The original Casa Fuente is a tremendous cigar and this new rosado-wrapped version is a worthy successor. For that, the new Casa Fuente 800 series earns a formidable four and a half stogies out of five.
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Taste like clove? Man I don't know if I could smoke that. I'm not a huge fan of clove taste. I guess to each their own. Does the Rosado wrapper bring out more of the clove taste?
It's not an overwhelming clove taste, but more like a subtle combination of winter spices (clove, nutmeg, cinnamon, etc…). Not sure why, but in certain cigars I very much enjoy the taste even though I don't want the clove to be overwhelming. This cigar walks that line well.