Vitola: Toro
Size: 6 x 50 ring gauge
Price $8.99
Purchased at Burns Tobacconist
Background
Today I’ll be looking at another one of the cigars I picked up at Burns that I can’t easily find locally. I did notice that Fred does have a shop about 30 minutes (without traffic) away that I’ll have to hit up sometime. I got one of these while I was at Doc’s herf and was planning on reviewing that sample, but when I pulled it out of the cello the wrapper had a big crack in it. So while I was at Burns I picked up a couple more so I could do a review. This cigar is comprised of a Nicaraguan filler and binder with an Ecuadorian habano wrapper. They come in 5 sizes all with a MSRP less than $9.00, and come 21 to a box. I think this review cigar was the third one I smoked.
Prelight
It is pretty easy to tell which cigar in the line it is by the foot band. This is different then he has done on other regular production cigars of putting the blend name on the side of the main band. The wrapper was a nice ruddy brown in color with a good amount of oils and a slight amount of tooth. I also noticed that the roll on this cigar was just about perfect, the wrapper was smooth, there were no gathers or bumps, and this line of the wrapper was perfectly straight. Putting my nose to the wrapper I noticed a slight aroma of leather with wood and hay coming from the foot. After clipping it and taking a cold draw I got a hint of sweetness with some wood from a good draw.
Flavor
The cigar started off with a good amount of spice on the tongue and a wasabi like burn on the retrohale. After a few puffs I started to get tastes of leather and wood with a sweet finish. Towards the end of the first third the spice did tone down a lot but didn’t go completely away. The cigar started off at medium strength. When I got into the second third the flavors were very similar to the first third but the spice did start to come back. I also got some sort of savory herbal flavor, that I really couldn’t pin down. The cigar maybe moved into the medium-full range at the end of this third. As I moved into the final third the flavors pretty much stayed the same with the exception of the sweetness got a bit stronger. I did start to get a slight nicotine hit from it, but it never moved beyond medium-full strength.
Construction
The draw throughout was perfect. The burn was a little wavy but nothing too bad.
Value
To me this cigar is a great value at just $9.
Conclusions
While this isn’t the most complex cigar I’ve had, I definitely enjoyed it. I wasn’t ready to put it down when I had to. I will be picking more of these up when I have the opportunity. I would recommend this to almost any smoker except those most sensitive to nicotine. I checked and Burns doesn’t have these listed on their website, but if you gave them a call they’d be happy to sell and mail some to you.
By-The-Numbers
Prelight: 2/2
Construction: 2/2
Flavor: 4/5
Value: 1/1
Total: 9/10
Very nice review. I didn’t find this to be a very comlex cigar either, but I absolutely loved the flavor and strength balance! Great construction, but the burn was a bit wavy…
I bought a box at the Hacking the Blend seminar I went to with Fred. Great smoke I will be buying more
Another one on my “list.” Thanks for the review Keith!
Smoked one and really enjoyed it, great review.