Up for review today is the Camacho Coyolar, a re-release of the original Coyolar which was discontinued in 2013 when Davidoff revamped the Camacho brand. I can’t say that I ever smoked the original Coyolar, and I’m generally a fan of the products Camacho puts out, so I’m excited to review this cigar.
Product Specifics
Cigar Reviewed: Camacho Coyolar Rothschild
Wrapper: Honduran
Binder: Honduran
Filler: Honduran
Size: 4 1/2 x 50 (Rothschild)
Appearance and Construction
The cigar comes presented in a strong, if blunt, black band. Camacho has run this visual branding play a few times now, with the Camacho Triple Maduro, Camacho Blackout, and Camacho Powerband all using black primary bands. Is it an attractive band? Sure, but it was damn near impossible to photograph and even to the human eye the name is only apparent when the light hits it just right. Not what I’d consider a good tactical play on the brand side.
In any case, the outer Honduran wrapper is mostly smooth with a few visible veins. When squeezed, the cigar has a moderate amount of give and is packed mostly consistently, though there are some minor soft spots about two thirds down the cigar.
The draw is perfect, and the cold draw is surprisingly flavorful, with a blast of fruit (something akin to mango/peach, which I’ve never encountered in a cigar before), and some mild spiciness. The foot is a bit more standard, with some minor chocolate and dried wood notes.
Flavor and Smoke Characteristics
The Camacho Coyolar opens with thick, medium to full bodied smoke. Lots of flavor and great smoke production. The profile is dominated by spice, black and red pepper, heavy leather, and some semisweet chocolate. The pepper is felt mainly on the tip of the tongue, the back of the throat, and on the retrohale. It’s very enjoyable, but I can already tell it’ll be overpowering at times as well. The retrohale is full leather and pepper, which reminds me a bit of the Camacho Triple Maduro.
Half an inch in, the body is above medium but the flavor is up to full. And I’m conflicted. Though I’m enjoying the flavors, I’m also aware that my palate is on track to get exhausted well before the cigar ends. For this reason, this would be a cigar I’d recommend pairing with a sherry cask finished single malt like Glenmorangie Signet, Glenlivet 18, or the Glenrothes Vintage 2004.
As the cigar heads into the second third, the flavors morph a bit along with the texture. The pepperiness settles down a bit and is replaced by peanuts. On the palate, pepper and spice are dominant, along with leather and a twinge of orange rind. The flavors aren’t often in perfect balance, but when they are, they work together well.
Construction wise, the ash is mostly solid but with a bit of flakiness. The burn is a bit wavy.
Burning into the final third, leather and spice are dominant. Otherwise, little changes and the cigar is ready to be retired right on time.
Conclusion
Camacho continues to produce high quality, enjoyable cigars. The Camacho Coyolar has all the hallmarks of a full bodied Camacho smoke. Extremely rich, quite strong, with good complexity and enjoyable flavor.
On the negative side, the smoke is often out of balance, which costs it a few points. As much as I’m a fan of full bodied flavors, the Coyolar gets a bit out of hand at times producing a smoking experience that’s at best overwhelming and at worst downright uncomfortable. Needless to say, I was glad I was smoking a rothschild size and not a toro.
Bloody Butcher Bourbon from New Liberty Distillery caught my eye, or more accurately, my ears, a few weeks ago on a visit to Park Ave spirits in Midtown. I heard one of the salesman giving a heartfelt recommendation to try Bloody Butcher Bourbon, so after the other customer stepped aside I snatched one of these beautiful bottles up.
The claim to fame for this particular whiskey is its use of the bloody butcher varietal of dent corn which has been grown since the 1800s but almost never used for bourbon (Widow Jane distillery is one exception). The corn itself is known for having one of the reddest complexions of any heirloom corn varietal.
New Liberty is also unique among many distilleries in that it is located not outside of town next to a solitary river but just a few minutes from downtown Philadelphia. The building that houses the distillery’s still and rick house was once a stable, presumably for the pre-automobile transportation industry.
Product Specifics
Producer: New liberty Distillery
Mashbill: corn, barley, rye
ABV: 47.5% (93 proof)
Age: 9 months
Aged in: new charred American oak barrels
Here’s what the New Deal Distillery website has to say about Bloody Butcher Bourbon:
In the early 1800s, European settlers in the southern United States blended their corn with a native variety. The result was Bloody Butcher corn: instantly recognizable for its striking deep red kernels and legendary fruity, buttery flavor. Unsuitable for industrial scale farming, this heirloom variety is grown by only a few farmers.
New Liberty Bloody Butcher Bourbon celebrates our nation’s early agricultural heritage. We sourced Bloody Butcher corn from Castle Valley Mill in Doylestown, PA, just 25 miles from our distillery, and combined it with malted rye and barley from Deer Creek Malthouse. This blend of corn, barley, and rye gives the bourbon a balanced flavor, with notes of milk chocolate, butter, leather, and stone fruit on the palate, and a dry spice on the finish.
Appearance
As you can see, in the glass the whiskey has a bright, full gold appearance with just a touch of reddish amber. In the bottle, it is a deep red, similar to stained cherry wood. The shape of the bottle is fairly straightforward, but it sports a really beautiful paper label decorated with a dark red corn motif.
Nose
A really nice nose, quite unique for a bourbon. Stone fruits up front, with additional chocolate chunks, oak, and maraschino cherry aromas. Unlike most bourbons which are very caramel/vanilla forward on the nose, this is a more fruit-forward whiskey which I like a lot.
Palate
Very similar to the nose. Bloody Butcher bourbon starts off on the palate with some oak and light vanilla notes. As the liquid coats the palate, the heavier fruit notes come into play, alongside some leather and a generic corn flavor. Above any others I get a nice dark cherry note which complements the more traditional bourbon notes immensely.
Overall, the flavor profile is unlike any other bourbon I’ve ever had.
Finish
The finish is where this whiskey shows its youth. There’s quite a bit of ethanol burn, along with vanilla, rye and some nice spiciness.
Conclusion
Bloody Butcher bourbon is a solid “buy” recommendation from me, particularly if you’re into bourbon and even more particularly if you are a follower of the American boutique whiskey scene. The flavor profile is truly unique among bourbons. I loved the cherry influence on the nose and palate.
The uniqueness of this whiskey reminds me a bit of the Copper Fox Peachwood American Single Malt. Though the two share nothing in terms of flavor or character, they both set out to produce something really unique on the whiskey scene, and both succeed (Bloody Bourbon more than CF Peachwood).
All that said, I think that a much older, carefully crafted whiskey using a similar set of ingredients could make for a truly mind-blowing American whiskey, so I’ll be looking forward to further releases from New Liberty.
After reviewing the Gran Habano Corojo #5, I must admit I was not all that enthusiastic about reviewing the Connecticut. There’s usually a less-than-fun period of trial and error that every new cigar company and quite a few brand new cigars have to go through before they get their unique quirks resolved. Based (albeit solely) on my first G.R. cigar review, Guillermo Rico’s company seems to be in the thick of that period right now. On the other hand, I know and firmly believe that first impressions are never everything, so I’m accordingly happy to be going toe-to-toe with Mr. Rico’s Connecticut #1!
Product Specifics
Cigar Reviewed: Gran Habano Connecticut #1
Vitola: Gran Robusto
Wrapper: Nicaraguan Connecticut
Binder: Nicaraguan Habano
Filler: Nicaraguan Habano
Size: 6 x 54
Aesthetics Construction, & Feel
The Connecticut presents itself as a kind of sibling to the Habano Corojo #5. It’s body is quite tightly packed with no soft spots and very little flexibility. The wrapper is rugged and veiny, but very well-crafted and free of any breaches. This is especially the case with the cap, which is just as perfect as the Habano Corojo’s; evenly wrapped, with no seam breaches. The Connecticut has a hidden bonus, though; the cold odor is unlike anything I’d experienced up to now; a lovely and subtle sweetness that reminds me of, wait for it, a croissant.
Flavor & Smoke Characteristics
First Third
It quickly becomes apparent that the croissant-esque cold odor wasn’t just a pleasant fluke. The Connecticut #1 makes a smooth entry with a beautiful buttery bread foreground flavor that more than makes up for the predictably tight draw (which thankfully stays out of the flavor’s way). The aroma exuded by the velvety smoke clouds is just as sultry and buttery. The foundation is completed by a deliciously salty retrohale that perfectly complements the bread & butter of the foreground. There’s not much of a background flavor profile, but the foreground’s flavor once again more than makes up for it.
Second Third
The ash begins to split right down the middle at the start of the second third, but the burn holds its ground and stays even throughout. The retrohale also begins to strengthen with the addition of a sweet spice essence, which also provides an enriching contrast to the salt. The foreground’s bread begins to morph about halfway through into a flavor that almost tastes like sourdough, with the butter moving out of the foreground and into the background to provide a contrast similar to the one occurring simultaneously in the retrohale. The morphing of the foreground continues throughout the rest of the second third to the point that the bread tastes slightly immature, but not to the point of spoiling it.
Point of Convergence
The point of convergence is slightly anticlimactic as the foreground flavor’s maturity doesn’t recover to its original glory, instead merely bringing its decent to a halt. As the sweet spice and the salt begin to fight each other for control of the retrohale, the butter in the background begins to slightly reassert itself into the soured foreground, though not quite enough to save it. The pull begins to singe the tongue surprisingly early on, but this discomfort is alleviated somewhat by something every smoker longs to hear; that delicious soft crackling sound as the smoke draws ever nearer towards its inevitable end.
The Final Verdict
Much like its sibling the Habano Corojo #5, the Connecticut #1 displays great potential that has yet to be fully realized. The buttery bread foreground and the salty retrohale in the beginning of the experience made for a flavor profile that was downright heavenly. It also displayed a nice complexity when the buttery bread morphed into sourdough in the middle. Sadly, the middle was the pinnacle of the experience; the final third was a bit of a letdown as the maturity of the tobacco faded and the tongue singe began way too early. Again, however, this stogy has potential. I look forward to reviewing it again sometime in the future.
Today, I’m interviewing Craig Vanderslice of www.cigarcraig.com. Cigar Craig is one of the first blogs that I started reading when I started smoking cigars in the late 2000’s, and it’s a website that takes a down-to-earth approach to cigars.
In my interview with Craig, we discussed how he first fell in love with cigars, how he keeps up with the work of running a cigar blog, some of his favorite posts ever, his favorite cigar bloggers, and more.
MC: Let’s kick it off with some standard background. When did you start smoking cigars, and why did you start your blog?
CV: I started smoking premium cigars around 1995. I had been enjoying cheap cigars every Friday at lunch with a coworker and it was the cigar boom of the 90s so we decided to see what the big deal was with a premium cigar. We bought some Macanudo Hyde Parks and smoked them and got the bug. I don’t think I went back to the Garcia Vegas and Backwoods after that. Around the same time I was getting into the whole internet fad, and did some cigar research and found a cigar newsgroup on usenet, which was the ancestor of forums and Facebook basically. I ended up participating in that for ten years, travelling all over the country to attend herfs (the term “herf” was coined by that group, it’s taken on a life of it’s own) and met a lot of great people. Steve Saka and Christian Eiroa were contributors at the time. I got tired of the demeanor of the usenet group around 2006 and stopped contributing.
In 2009 my wife bought me the cigarcraig.com domain and I decided to start a blog as my creative outlet. It started very rough, but after taking my first trip to cigar country in 2011 it started getting visits and I settled into a regular schedule. I’m proud to say that if you search for “cigar blog”, “cigar bloggers” or just about any permutation of that in any major search engine, CigarCraig.com places very high in the results, in many cases the first result. I believe this was just a result of consistency and using appropriate keywords.
MC: Writing a blog takes a lot of work on a weekly and sometimes even daily basis. What’s kept you motivated to keep your blog up to date all these years?
CV: I spend much more time on research than actual writing! I like to think my site is a blog in the purest sense, it’s a web log of my cigar journey. This can be a recap of the cigars I’ve smoked, store visits, events either at stores or festivals, interviews with industry people and celebrity cigar smokers (it’s been a while since I’ve done a celebrity interview, working on that), and accessory reviews. Lately I’ve been sharing more press releases verbatim, while I have the time on my hands to do it. I should actually write an article based on the press release, but I’ve been taking the lazy route. I think it’s the variety that keeps it from getting boring, both in the industry and with my personal style. Also knowing I have a faithful readership that, for some reason I can’t fathom, looks forward to reading my nonsense! I deeply appreciate all those who choose to waste their valuable time reading, so I often have contests to reward the loyalty, or just send random stuff to people, it’s fun to share.
So what keeps me going is the interactions with the readers, having the opportunity to smoke new cigars and play with new accessories, and having sponsors who believe enough in what my site does to support me.
MC: What’s your favorite post on CigarCraig. Either one you feel the most proud of or that you’ve gotten the best response from readers on?
CV: Oddly, a post I wrote on my travel to Reykjavik, Iceland (linked here) about cigars there has been getting daily visits for the last year and a half. It comes up first in Google searches for cigars in Iceland, I guess the fact that there’s one shop in Reykjavik and no discernible cigar culture so there haven’t been a lot of articles written on the subject.
Probably the post I’m most proud of for the writing and the comments and discussion it produced goes back to 2012. I was frustrated (and remain so, not too much has changed!) with the IPCPR and wrote what I think was a well reasoned rant on the subject of “new media” being members and attending the trade show. The comments were from a who’s who of media, manufacturers and retailers. It was some of my best work, I think and it did lead to some changes for the better with the trade organization, although, six years later there are still IPCPR members who would rather not see bloggers at the show. It’s mystifying, and I’ve chosen no to be a member any longer as a result.
MC: Are there any other cigar blogs that you read or find worthwhile?
CV: I have had the good fortune of meeting many fellow bloggers and cigar media types, and consider them friends, so this is a loaded question! Certainly Halfwheel and Cigar-Coop are outstanding resources and come up in a lot of searches when researching specific cigars. While I don’t regularly visit a lot of other blogs, I check in to a bunch from time to time. Most of them offer a unique perspective. Some do a great job of reviewing cigars, others excel at presenting news items and everyone has their place. There are some that go off the rails a little I think, but overall there’s something for everyone out there.
MC: “Off the rails a little.” I love it. I’ve certainly seen some of that firsthand and far from being frustrating it’s mostly just entertaining to watch.
Let’s talk about the brands. In your time writing about cigars and meeting industry reps, you’ve likely had a chance to see a lot of companies fail and succeed. What in your mind is the ingredient that makes a successful brand in the cigar world?
CV: Great question! Today I think the brand owner or ambassador or manufacturer has to be personally involved at the retail level. Rocky Patel set the standard and has had pretty good success. Omar de Frias followed Rocky’s model and his Fratello brand enjoys a lot of success. Perhaps just being engaged with the consumer via social media is enough as long as the product is spectacular, in the case of RoMaCraft. Cromagnon started out being available largely through Skip Martin’s Twitter engagement. When Ernesto Carrillo launched EPC cigars his website was basically a map with tweets mentioning the brand popping up from wherever in the world they originated.
We have an unprecedented level of interaction with the principles in the cigar industry, and I think that reinforces a lot of brand recognition. I know, whether it makes sense or not, I enjoy cigars more when I have a personal relationship with the people who make the cigar, or are responsible for the blend.
MC: Man, that’s so true. I had a similar experience recently with Sans Pareil / La Instructora cigars. For a while I had been pretty skeptical, even after reviewing the La Instructora Box Pressed No 2 and enjoying it. But after meeting Aaron Saide at one of my private tastings and enjoying two hours of conversation with him, I experience his cigars in a completely different way (I’m still sitting on four or five unreleased La Instructora blends).
In any case, we’re at that point in the interview where I’ll go ahead and ask that most important and most hated question: what are your top two or three cigars? You know, the cigars that continue to blow your mind year after year, even after smoking dozens or more?
CV: There are a handful of cigars that I never tire of and pick up when I need a “sure thing”. Padron 1964 Anniversary Exclusivo, Fuente Hemingway Classic come to mind as cigars which are as tasty and satisfying today as they were 20 years ago. Drew Estate’s Nica Rustica is a go-to also, I love the no nonsense, straightforward flavor of this, and similarly the CAO Flathead. Over the last years or so I’ve defaulted to the Cornelius and Anthony Cornelius Toro for a special occasion smoke. It’s a refined and complex medium bodied cigar.
MC: Ah man. I’m so with you on Cornelius and Anthony. They make phenomenal cigars. The Daddy Mac is in my top 25 of all time for sure. Let’s send our readers off with something fun. What’s a fun fact about cigars or the industry you have in your back pocket that you think my readers would be surprised to learn?
CV: Fun fact? Sheesh. That’s a tough one. One thing that I find interesting that many may not know is that is costs about the same to make a Corona as it does to make a Churchill. Because the consumer equates size with value, most manufacturers can’t sell the small sizes at the same margins as larger sizes. So, if you think about it, when you buy a Corona, technically you are getting a better value. Maybe that’s not real interesting…
MC: that’s definitely a fun fact! For all of my readers here – you’ll get many more fun, quirky insights on www.cigarcraig.com so don’t forget to visit the site and subscribe via email.
Craig, thanks for taking the time to share about yourself and your work on www.cigarcraig.com.
Up for review today is the Plasencia Reserva Original Nestico, a cigar released in the summer of 2017. It’s a unique cigar primarily because of its size. At 4 1/2″ x 36, it functions just like a lancero but at half the length.
The Plasencia operation is also unique. The Plasencias have been growing and farming tobacco for decades providing quality leaf to many companies. They also feature their own cigar lines and this one in particular has the privilege of being a cigar grown with 100% certified organic tobacco. Whether organically farmed tobacco tastes better or worse than chemically controlled farming is debatable, but consumers can rest assured this tobacco was treated using natural methods. Whatever the process, one needs to smoke it in order to assess its true quality.
Product Specifics
Cigar Reviewed: Plasencia Reserva Original Nestico
Wrapper: Nicaraguan
Binder: Nicaraguan
Filler: Nicaraguan
Size: 4 1/2 x 36
Appearance and Construction
This diminutive cigar has a white and muted gold band with the Plasencia name and the “Reserva Original” across it. The design is subdued for me with the attraction being its color scheme. On the foot is another band with “Reserva Original” across it. The milk chocolate wrapper has some veins without being excessive. Well rolled and a bit soft to the touch.
Flavor and Smoke Characteristics
The Plasencia starts off with some sweetness and spice upfront. The retrohale gives up a bit of black pepper and secondary flavors of wood and pronounced sweetness. The next few puffs coat the palate with a creamy texture and a bit of coffee on the finish. The draw and burn are excellent
The second half yields oak, allspice and cream. A bit of cocoa grabs you midway along with another hit of spice. Almond paste is coming through while the cigar burns. Lots of flavor emoting from this smoke and a slight nicotine buzz which catches you by surprise. Rounding out the finish is the all spice and clotted cream on the palate.
The last third sweet cream interplay’s with chocolate and spice. A taste of nougat and cocoa coats the mouth and lingers. The Plasencia finishes with a creamy pleasant nuttiness.
Conclusion
For a short smoke the Plasencia Reserva Original Nestico offers rounded flavors of sweet spice, cream and nuts. Its starts off medium bodied and mid way you get a nice hit of nicotine strength. This is not a morning smoke unless you’ve had a hearty breakfast then this would be a wonderful cigar with an espresso afterward. I recommend picking one up for a pleasant afternoon cigar or an after dinner smoke as it will hold up well.
