The Stogie Guys

For the first time, Tesa cigars can now be purchased at a location other than Tesa’s shop in Chicago. Starting on Friday, Riverside Cigar Shop in Jeffersonville, Indiana, began carrying Tesa’s “ultra-boutique” cigars, and the tobacconist kicked off its new relationship with an event featuring Chris Kelly, owner of Tesa Cigars.

“I have had the pleasure of knowing Jeff Mouttet [owner of Riverside Cigar Shop] for several years now, and since he has heard about my cigars and factory, Jeff has been vocal and proactive about spreading the word, “ said Kelly in a press release. “Jeff has created a great environment for cigar smokers with a top-shelf selection of cigars, and I am proud to be able to have Riverside as our first authorized dealer.”

I recently exchanged text messages with Kelly about this development, inquiring if an even larger distribution of Tesa is in the works. He did not rule out the possibility of more tobacconists carrying Tesa in the future.

Since I discovered them several years ago, Tesa’s various blends have been among my favorite cigars on the market, and also some of the highest-rated cigars at StogieGuys.com. Riverside will be carrying several of (what I consider to be) Tesa’s best smokes, including Vintage Especial, 312, and Picadura King. All are made at Tesa’s small factory in Estelí. Until now, these smokes could only be procured via a personal visit to Tesa’s shop, or by placing an online order at Tesa’s website.

Self-described as “an Irish kid from the South Side of Chicago,” Chris Kelly is a young, atypical cigar maker who may be one of the most talented blenders in the industry. For a while now I’ve been saying Tesa is a company to watch given its tremendous quality of complex blends, consistency, and growth potential. Riverside Cigar Shop carrying Tesa is one small step towards realizing that potential.

–Patrick A

photo credit: Tesa

Each Saturday and Sunday we’ll post a Quick Smoke: not quite a full review, just our brief verdict on a single cigar of “buy,” “hold,” or “sell.”

I got a shot at this limited release sooner than I expected, as a local shop scored several boxes at the IPCPR Trade Show. It’s a remarkable concoction of sweetness and strength, satisfying from beginning to end. My only complaint is a somewhat erratic burn, caused, no doubt, by the thick Mexican maduro wrapper. That’s the only flaw in this box-pressed torpedo that weighs in at 6.5 inches long with a ring gauge of 52. If forced to choose, I’d opt for the original Melanio, but this is a great cigar to put in the mix. It runs about $13 per stick and comes in 10-count boxes.

Verdict = Buy.

–George E

photo credit: N/A

Each Saturday and Sunday we’ll post a Quick Smoke: not quite a full review, just our brief verdict on a single cigar of “buy,” “hold,” or “sell.”

Black Label Trading is a new company with a skull-and-bone pirate theme and six debut blends. Redemption, the blend I smoked, is a Nicaraguan puro with a Habano wrapper that comes in two sizes: Robusto (5 x 54) and Gordo (6 x 60). A first in my experience, the large band on the sample I smoked seemed to be a final production band, but it also had the phrase “pre-release sample” across the top. The cigar sported lots of deep, dark flavors, yet it keeps a medium-bodied profile with woody notes. I expected an ass-kicker, but got a balanced cigar. Without knowing the MSRP, I think this is a cigar with some real potential. I’m looking forward to trying more from Black Label Trading.

Verdict = Buy.

–Patrick S

photo credit: Stogie Guys

As we have since July 2006, each Friday we’ll post a mixed bag of quick cigar news and other items of interest. Below is our latest Friday Sampler.

1) September is a great month for cigar events. The fifth annual Crush & Roll West starts today at the Paso Robles Fairgrounds in California. The gathering is expected to attract hundreds with cigars, wine, craft beer, poker, and entertainment. Twenty cigar makers will be on hand representing Nicaragua, Honduras, Costa Rica, and the Dominican Republic. Meanwhile, in Kansas City, the KC Cigar Festival kicks off tomorrow. And W. Curtis Draper’s Little Puff is slated for September 27 in Washington, with proceeds benefiting DC-area academic scholarships.

2) The Cigar Family Charitable Foundation, created by the J.C. Newman and Fuente cigar companies, is again hosting an event in the Dominican Republic where the Fuente factory and farms are located. The event will be held February 5-8 and costs $295 a person. Attendees will get the chance to help the foundation, tour Chateau de la Fuente, and enjoy a cigar dinner celebration. Details can be found here.

3) Inside the Industry: Palm Beach-area retailer Smoke Inn is introducing the latest addition to its MicroBlend Series. The Quesada Octoberfest Dunkel uses the same binders and fillers as Quesada’s regular Oktoberfest release. However, the wrapper is a broadleaf maduro with an underlying Ecuadorian Connecticut wrapper only at the foot. Production is limited to 750 boxes with 15 cigars (6 x 54) that retail for $8.95 per stick or $134.25 for the box.

4) Around the Blogs: Cigar Inspector inspects the Camacho Havana. Stogie Review reviews the Joya de Nicaragua Rosalones. Nice Tight Ash checks out the King of Kings Cuadrado. Tiki Bar kicks back with a Kilo. Stogie Fresh smokes the Joya de Nicaragua CyB.

5) Deal of the Week: Maduro fans should take a good look at this five-cigar sampler. Just $27 lands you one each of the Ortega Serie D No. 6, Perdomo Noir Epicure, Pinar del Rio Small Batch Maduro Robusto, Kristoff Ligero Maduro Matador, and the AVO Maduro No. 9.

–The Stogie Guys

photo credit: Crush & Roll West

Take two of the most popular cigars on the market (Padrón Anniversary 1964 and Liga Privada No. 9), switch a couple numbers, squish them together, and what do you get? The Nat Cicco “Aniversario 1965 Liga No. 4.” At least that’s what the name seems to imply.

It wouldn’t be the first time Nat Cicco has created a brand—without violating any trademarks—that alludes to another brand. A while back, I reviewed the Nat Cicco HHB which, in name and packaging, quite clearly is designed to invoke the Cohiba Behike.

According to Zander-Greg, who now owns the Nat Cicco line, the Aniversario 1965 Liga No. 4 is a celebration of the first time (1965) the “Factory Rejects” concept was produced. Back then it was the National Cigar Company, which has since been shortened to Nat Cicco, whose “Rejects” is still the company’s best-known line.

Aniversario 1965, the company’s first big move into the higher end of the market, is available in Robusto, Toro, and Churchill shapes, and has Nicaragua-grown Habano-seed  filler, binder, and wrapper tobaccos. I smoked four Toros (provided by Nat Cicco) for this review. The press release put out last year says the cigars retail for around $8, but it also says the cigars are band-less, and clearly they aren’t.

It’s a well-made, box-pressed cigar with an even burn, easy draw, and sturdy ash. The cigar features a pigtail cap and a dark, oily wrapper. The profile tastes of molasses, powdered chocolate, earth, and a little leather. It’s pretty simplistic, though pleasant, with not much variation from start to finish.

The Aniversario 1965 Liga No. 4 doesn’t exactly stand out, but it’s still a well-made, tasty cigar. A classic example of the new higher baseline for cigar quality that I mentioned in my recent commentary.

Well-made, well-constructed, and featuring a pleasant, if not particularly balanced, profile, it’s an interesting new addition that I wish was easier to find. (A quick Google search suggests it’s tough to find.) While it’s no Liga No. 9 or Padrón 1964, the Nat Cicco Aniversario 1965 Liga No. 4 does earn a rating of three and a half stogies out of five.

[To read more StogieGuys.com cigar reviews, please click here.]

–Patrick S

photo credit: Stogie Guys

Over the years my colleagues and I have written many articles about various bourbons, rums, ryes, whiskies, mixed cocktails, beer, and coffee—and which cigars they pair best with. (You can peruse all of those articles here, or you can simply use our search bar at the upper right to locate the libation you’re looking for.) During this time I’ve found a few rules of thumb for pairing drinks with cigars. Keep in mind these conclusions are mine and mine alone. They may fly in the face of my colleagues’ opinions, your own experiences, or even conventional wisdom. But they’ve served me well. I list them here with hopes they help with your own experimentation and/or prompt a constructive dialog.

Coffee

I’ve admittedly turned into a bit of a coffee snob and lately have been favoring Chicago-based producers like Metropolis and Inteligensia. Both have myriad blends that accentuate notes of fruit or nuts over the standard bitter flavor that’s dominant in less superior black coffee. These blends pair outstandingly with milder, Connecticut- or Ecuadorian-wrapped smokes. No, you can’t judge a cigar by the color of its wrapper, but, as a general rule of thumb, lighter, golden wrappers make for excellent coffee companions.

Wine

I’m not a fan of pairing cigars with white wine (or even champagne, for that matter). Big, bold reds, however, tend to be a treat with dark, maduro cigars, particularly those that yield chocolate notes. I’ve especially found that cigars with significant Mata Fina tobacco are good candidates for red wine pairings. I’ll leave any musings on specific varietals—pinot noir, zinfandel, merlot, malbec, etc.—to myself for now since that’s a little too specific for this article’s purpose.

Beer

While I’m not going to win any friends with this opinion, I must say that beer, for me, just doesn’t jive well with cigars at all. I’ve pretty much decided that I’m either smoking a cigar or drinking beer, not both. One tends to ruin the other. My hypothesis is this mismatch stems from my affinity for hoppy, bitter beers. When it comes to pairing a drink with cigars, bitter is not something to look for in a spirit.

Bourbon/Rum

Bourbons and rums are the opposite of beer. Pick any bourbon or rum. Pick any cigar. Relax and enjoy. Whether straight, on the rocks, or even in most mixed drinks, these spirits tend to go well with just about any cigar. The only suggestion I’ll make is, for example, if you’re drinking a particularly sweet rum, like Zaya, pair it with a spicy smoke. The objective is all about balance. And, unlike wine, don’t be afraid to select a full-bodied smoke. Bourbon or rum can hold its own on the palate.

So there you have it. Some general rules of thumb on pairing drinks with cigars from one humble man’s perspective. I look forward to hearing what you have to say in the comments.

–Patrick A

photo credit: Stogie Guys

It’s been almost two months since the IPCPR Trade Show so, with the dust settling, it’s a good time to look back at some industry trends that were on display at the show.

Quality Increasing

It’s my belief that quality is going up across the board in the cigar industry, and smoking plenty of samples only solidifies this opinoin. Obviously these are generalizations and no doubt there are exceptions, but it seems not only are the cigars being produced now better constructed than they were 5-10 years ago, they are better cigars that lack obvious flavor flaws. The result is good for consumers. Whether you buy discounted samplers online, or just pick up what looks interesting at your local cigar shop, odds are you’re going to end up with decent or good cigars.

Expectations on the Rise

When finding a good cigar is easy, consumers expectations are raised. The result can be challenging for cigar companies. Here’s a thought experiment: Take a recent cigar release and imagine how it would have done if it was released five years earlier. Last year, CAO introduced the Concert series, a cigar with sales (I get the sense) that seem to be a little disappointing to CAO’s parent company, General Cigar. I’d suspect that if that same blend at the same price point had been introduced five years earlier (two years before CAO La Traviata) it would have been a smash hit. It is, in my opinion, a classic example of a cigar that would have stood out in 2007 or earlier, but now is just another good cigar in the crowd.

Small Brands Fill Niches

It’s easy to discount cigar brands that don’t own a factory but instead contract someone else to make their cigars. For one thing, there’s an extra level, and that means an additional mark-up before the cigar reaches consumers. The brand owner has to buy cigars then mark them up before they are sold wholesale. Also, people assume that if the blend was so great why didn’t the factory just release and market it themselves? Those are valid points, but there’s also a niche that these small brands can fill. For large companies like General Cigar, Altadis, Davidoff, and Drew Estate, it doesn’t make a ton of economic sense to create a cigar that will sell only 40,000 cigars. But for a small cigar line owned by a single brand owner, that level of volume can be a nice little business, and they can afford to make a cigar that, while it may never be a huge seller, may find a small but dedicated fan base.

Protecting Brick-and-Mortar Shops from Online Discounters

Increasingly, one shop owner concern about bringing in a new cigar is that it will soon be available online for a significant discount. Traditionally, cigar makers have sought to deal with these concerns by protecting prices with a maximum discount (say 10% below MSRP) under which the cigar can’t be sold. But with the increasing number of consumers showrooming (visiting local stores while simultaneously price shopping online), that’s not always enough. The response from cigar makers is bifurcating their lines with some available and marketed to online retailers and others specifically brick and mortar only. The AVO Serenata is an example of a new line strictly for brick and mortar retailers. This has been going on for a while, but it seems to be more prominent recently.

What’s a Flavored Cigar?

With the advent of fire-cured tobacco, the line between traditional and flavored cigars is beginning to blur. Drew Estate’s Kentucky Fire Cured and Sam Leccia’s Black line are the most prominent, but others (Gran Habano) are introducing cigars that use fire-cured tobacco. It’s an interesting development where the line between traditional and flavored (Drew Estate calls them “infused”) is breaking down, because the difference isn’t unnatural chemicals being introduced to the cigar making process, but the traditional process being tweaked using old technology not normally used for handmade cigars. Look for this trend to continue.

–Patrick S

photo credit: Stogie Guys