Cigar Review: Tatuaje Verocu No. 9

I joined Tatuaje’s Saints & Sinners Club in its inaugural year, and I’ve been happy to renew every year since. The club includes access to a private cigar forum and an annual shipment of cigar swag and a box of 15 cigars.

The smokes alone are worth the price, as every year the selection has been an interesting mix of that includes rare Tatuajes, one-offs, and test blends. This year’s shipment included two different exclusive sizes of the Tatuaje Havana VI Verocu blend.

Smoking them reminded me so much of how I enjoy the blend, which over the years has come out in a number of different sizes. The originals were a Verocu No. 1 (Exclusivo Lado Occidental) and No. 2 (Exclusivo Zona del Este), both of which earned perfect 5-stogie ratings. A tubo torpedo came later, and the only regular release still shipping is the No. 5, a petit corona (4 x 40) size that comes in boxes of 50.

The forgotten member of the Verocu line is No. 9, a 4.5-inch, 49-ring gauge robusto sold exclusively by the Philadelphia-based Holt’s retailer. Reminded by the excellence of the line, I recently picked up a 10-pack of the No. 9 size for just $45 (normal price is $130 for a box of 20).

Like the rest of the line, No. 9 uses Nicaraguan filler and binder with a dark, oily Ecuadorian Habano wrapper. It is intended to be a more full-bodied edition of the normal Havana VI line, and it hits that mark dead on. It starts with lots of dark cocoa, oak, and earth. There’s a little pepper spice. Body is medium-full, sometimes bordering on completely full. As it progresses, a little more spice emerges.

The well-made smoke produces tons of thick smoke on the palate. Each of the four cigars I smoked for this review had a perfectly straight burn, easy draw, and a sturdy white ash.

If I had to find a flaw, it’s that there’s not a ton of transition here. But that’s not a big deal as this is an all-around excellent cigar. It’s also the type of smoke that, perhaps counter-intuitively, would be good for relatively new cigar smokers looking to expand their horizons with a smooth yet full-bodied smoke.

I really can’t find much wrong with the Verocu No. 9, except perhaps that it is not more widely available. At $4.50, it’s a steal, and even at regular price it’s a good value. That, combined with excellent, full-bodied flavors, earns the Tatuaje Verocu No. 9 a formidable rating of four and a half stogies out of five.

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

–Patrick S

photo credit: Stogie Guys