The Stogie Guys

In our ongoing effort to make StogieGuys.com as entertaining and informative as possible, each Friday we’ll post a mixed bag of quick cigar news and other items of interest. We call ‘em Friday Samplers. Enjoy.

1) Virginia finally lost its protracted battle against the anti-tobacco movement. The last legislative hurdle was cleared yesterday for a smoking ban over most restaurants and bars across the state that was built on tobacco. The law, which goes into effect December 1, omits a previously included exemption for businesses that are off-limits to minors.

2) Hawaii, meanwhile, joins the list of states that are having difficulties enforcing their own bans. As reported by MSNBC, the American Cancer Society is peeved because “more bars are ignoring state smoking prohibitions.” Many bar owners are apparently posting “No Smoking” signs and then turning a blind eye when their patrons light up.

3) Inside the Industry: In celebration of their 35th anniversary, MATASA will be introducing a new Fonseca at the IPCPR trade show in August. Altadis is launching its newest H. Upmann, the Reserve Maduro, with a series of in-store promotions. Oliva is releasing a new Connecticut-wrapped cigar.

4) Around the Blogs: Keepers of the Flame smokes a Camacho Havana. Stogie Review tries a Casillas Cigars Zebra. The Cohiba Club fires up an Ashton ESG 20 Year Salute. Cigar Command reviews an Adrian’s Havanna 2000.

5) Deal of the Week: This “Eight Horsemen Sampler” features eight torpedoes for the bargain price of $19.99. Included are pricey smokes such as the Graycliff 1666, Padilla Obsidian, Rocky Patel Connecticut, and CAO Black—any three of which could easily cost more than the entire sampler. Pick up yours today here.

–The Stogie Guys

photo credit: Flickr

Pairing cigars with beer is more challenging than pairing them with more traditional cigar spirits. While nearly any good bourbon, scotch, or rum will go well with nearly any good cigar, beer’s flavor profile is more difficult to match up with stogies.

With that in mind, I popped open a few bottles of Geary’s Pale Ale to see if it had the type of flavor that would pair well with beer. Geary’s is brewed in Portland, Maine, and is widely available in New England. Elsewhere Geary’s is tougher to find, so when I found it at a Total Wine here in Northern Virginia I grabbed a six-pack.

The Pale Ale is the beer that Geary’s is best known for and, according to Geary’s website, it is “a classic British pale ale with a nod to the legendary beers of Burton-on-Trent. Copper-colored, dry, clean, and crisp with lots of late hope taste in an appetizing complex with ale fruitiness from imported Hampshire yeast.”

A half inch of light, frothy head settled on top of the reddish brown ale after I poured a 12 oz. bottle into a pint glass. Geary’s doesn’t have as much intense hoppiness on the nose as many pale ales, but it seemed to have a pleasant floral aroma.

When I got down to tasting, I found a crisp, heavily carbonated beer with an almost champagne-like quality. I also detected citrus to go along with a classic, if understated, pale ale hoppiness, as well as a hint of fruity sweetness as if a bit of hard cider had been mixed in.

This is an excellent summer beer that will refresh on its own, or accompany a meal of lobster (such as the one that adorns the label). Pairing it with a cigar proved a little more challenging.

The lightness means that it would be overpowered by a full-bodied cigar and almost any maduro. A mild Connecticut-wrapped cigar, however, seemed to pair quite well. I’d recommend the Perdomo 10th Anniversary Champagne, the Arganese Connecticut Ambassador, or the Romeo y Julieta Vintage line.

So, the next time you have the chance, I suggest you twist open a Geary’s (this rare micro brew that uses twist-off caps) and light up your favorite mild smoke that features a Connecticut wrapper. You’d be hard-pressed to find a better way to spend a warm summer afternoon.

–Patrick S

photo credit: Stogie Guys

While some stories are more exciting than others, it’s always interesting to learn how and when people became cigar smokers. We all share a common bond—a love of the leaf, if you will—and discovering the various paths we’ve taken to arrive at the same conclusion can help put our own experiences in perspective.

Well, maybe that’s a reach. But, at the very least, we’re bound to come across a few worthy tales from occasional smokers and full-blown cigar enthusiasts alike. In that spirit, and even though the tot in this dated photo surely has a more interesting story than any of ours, here’s how (and approximately when) each StogieGuys.com team member got their start.

Co-Founder & Editor in Chief Patrick A

I can’t remember my first cigar, but I’m fairly certain I smoked it during my high school days. Probably on the golf course or the back deck of my parent’s home in Chicago. I’m pretty positive, however, that I smoked it with my dad. He has casually enjoyed cigars for as long as I can recall and—way before I ever got to smoke one myself—wasn’t averse to taking me into tobacco shops or letting me hang around and enjoy the aroma of whatever he was smoking (back then, usually anything from Punch). Save for the summers back home, I mostly took a cigar hiatus as an undergrad, spending whatever disposable income I had at bars. It wasn’t until I moved to the nation’s capital to pursue a career and a master’s degree that I really increased my intake and, ultimately, started reading and writing about cigars whenever I could.

Co-Founder & Publisher Patrick S

I too don’t exactly remember my first cigar, but I’m reasonably certain I had it on a golf course when I was 16 or 17. I would go with a friend to a local magazine/card shop/smoke shop to peruse the cabinet humidor. Thankfully, we went for some decent handmade brands—Romeo y Julieta and Punch, at first—and they accepted my shoddy fake ID.  Before I knew it, I purchased a Cigar Aficionado and was buying cigars from a local shop based on their CA ratings, always to be smoked while golfing, sailing, or at the beach. CAO Cameroon and Maria Mancini were two of my favorites back then. A few years later, during college, I was smoking a cigar every month or two, and even smuggled my first box of Cuban cigars into the country. Once I graduated, entered the “real world,” and had a back deck, I caught the cigar bug full blast.

Tampa Bureau Chief George E

I wish I had a better story—or at least a clearer memory—of how I got interested in cigars. I suppose it goes back to cigarettes, which I smoked for 25 years or so. I quit sometime in the 1980s when it began to get more and more difficult to light up. I had my last Marlboros when it was still possible to smoke at your desk and just about everywhere else. I used to joke that I was going to start smoking again when I retired. Before that, though, we bought a small condo in Florida and on vacations there I was exposed to cigars. Like Miami, the cigar culture is pretty strong around the Tampa area. Somehow, I just fell into it. And fell for it.

So, now that we’ve shared our tales, how and when did you start smoking cigars?

–The Stogie Guys

photo credit: Flickr

It seems like every week another study comes out on the subject of tobacco. Nearly all are done by advocates of increased “tobacco control” (a euphemism for higher tobacco taxes and expanded smoking bans) and they all seem to come to the same conclusion: more “tobacco control” is needed.

Now if the tobacco industry was presenting study after study that concluded that we need fewer smoking bans and lower tobacco taxes, you can bet that reporters and politicians wouldn’t blindly believe their claims. When the anti-tobacco industry has a study that agrees with their anti-tobacco agenda, however, the results are dutifully reported as scientific fact without so much as a second look.

But if the media and politicians aren’t doing their jobs, who can you turn to to get a straight scoop? One of the best sources is Michael Siegel, who runs a blog called The Rest of the Story.

Siegel, himself a doctor and professor of public health, is an unlikely foe of anti-tobacco activists, especially since he is an advocate of workplace smoking bans. According to a bio on Siegel’s organization, The Center for Public Accountability in Tobacco Control, Siegel is “a physician with 21 years of experience in tobacco control who recently became disillusioned by the direction in which the anti-smoking movement is going.”

According to Siegel, more and more “[t]he tactics being used by many anti-smoking organizations have become questionable, including misleading and deceiving the public, improperly attacking individuals, and improperly using kids to promote a political agenda.” When anti-tobacco activists deemed those who question the link between second hand smoke and lung cancer the equivalent of “holocaust deniers,” Siegel called them out for their fanaticism.

As a doctor and researcher, Siegel has the technical background to examine the methodology of studies to see if the conclusions claimed are actually supported. He finds that they regularly aren’t, such as the often-repeated claim that just a few minutes of exposure to second hand smoke has negative lasting health effects.

Siegel’s writings are invaluable in exposing the “ends justify the means” nature of much of the anti-tobacco movement, whose once possibly well-intentioned aims seem to have turned into an all-out propaganda campaign against an individual’s right to smoke.

–Patrick S

photo credit: Actonel

With a winkled texture, a soft feel, and a few green splotches, I had every reason to be leery of this relatively unknown cigar when I removed it from a Bravo five-pack that was labeled “100% pure gold.” But this Colombian puro—that’s right, Colombian puro—made a real believer out of me.

Blended by Roberto Juarez and Antonio de Jesus, this series is one of five puro blends made by Bravo in the Andean mountain range of Colombia, “the same location as some of the world’s finest coffee beans.” It features an Ecuadoran-seed wrapper, a Connecticut-inspired binder, and a filler with Cuban ancestry.

Handmade by artisans at the Duran Factory in Santander, Colombia, the six inch by 50 ring gauge Toro has a flat, hastily applied cap and a shade-grown look. It sells for about $5 apiece when bought by the box from select retailers. I’ve wanted to try this particular vitola ever since our friends at Keepers of the Flame named it one of the best mild cigars of 2008.

Based on appearance, I was preparing myself for disappointment. This cigar, however, serves as a fine example of why you can’t judge a stogie by looks alone.

After touching flame to the tobacco, the prelight notes of delicate hay give way to a mild taste of cream, toast, and traces of spice. The flavor builds after the first inch to take on oak, vanilla, and honey characteristics.

Where many cigars are bold and boisterous, this Bravo is subtle and patiently delectable. The profile is particularly intriguing, allowing the smoker to discover the complexity on his own instead of hitting him over the head with it.

With an all-around fantastic burn, a well-behaved ash, and a good draw, the experience stays enjoyable to the nub. I noticed little increase in spice and no harshness in the two Toros I sampled.

It’s safe to say I am pleasantly surprised by this mild treat and its uncompromisingly gentle yet intricate aroma. Maybe there’s something about Colombian tobacco. Or maybe the folks over at Bravo really know how to develop excellent cigars. Either way, the Colombian Gold Toro is worthy of four and a half stogies out of five.

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

–Patrick A

photo credit: Stogie Guys

Each Saturday and Sunday we’ll post a Quick Smoke: not quite a full review, just our brief take on a single cigar.

This 4.75 inch by 54 ring gauge robusto features an attractive Connecticut wrapper and prelight grassy notes with a touch of graham cracker. The flavor is mild and pleasant with honey and grass.  Construction is flawless, just like when I last wrote about this cigar for a Quick Smoke. Also impressive is the price, considering at times I’ve seen this cigar available for well under $40 per box.

Verdict = Buy.

–Patrick S

Each Saturday and Sunday we’ll post a Quick Smoke: not quite a full review, just our brief take on a single cigar.

At a bargain price of $3-4 per stick, this Cameroon-wrapped classic is much more accessible than Fuente’s high-priced Hemmingway, Anejo, Don Carlos, and Opus X lines. It features a straight burn and charismatic flavors of nut, pine, herbs, and toast. If you ask me, the Flor Fina 8-5-8 (6 x 47) is the tobacco equivalent of homemade chicken soup—inviting, reliable, and downright comforting.

Verdict = Buy.

–Patrick A

photo credit: Stogie Guys