Vitola: Robusto- 5” x 52 ring gauge
- MSRP $7.49
- Samples provided by General Cigar
Background
Last year, General surprised a lot of brick-and-mortar stores by offering the Diesel Grind to them. Diesel is a very popular, long-standing line made by A.J. Fernandez, but sold almost exclusively at a few of the big catalog/online retailers (some of which are also owned by General’s parent company). I enjoyed the Grind, especially for the price, and from what I can see it enjoyed a moderate amount of success in brick-and-mortars. So what to do for a follow up?
Diesel Whiskey Row is the answer. Barrel-aging tobacco isn’t a new or different thing anymore, but the trend does seem to be picking up steam. For this project, Rabbit Hole Bourbon sent several barrels down to Nicaragua in 2016 and A.J. Fernandez used them to add some extra age and flavor to the binder leaves that were destined for this blend. The press release for the blend indicates that A.J. used a “proprietary process” for the extra barrel aging. The blend consists of filler leaves from 3 of Nicaragua’s regions—Ometepe, Condega, and Jalapa, each aged 5 to 8 years—along with the barrel-aged Mexican binder and an Ecuadorian Habano wrapper that was aged for 5 years.
Whiskey Row is being made in 4 sizes, each of which comes in a 25-count box. You should be able to get them nationwide by now. CigarAndPipes, a Leaf Enthusiast sponsor, has them available online.
Prelight
The band of the Diesel Whiskey Row is a unique die-cut band that interested me from a design standpoint right away. It uses gray, brown and an almost-red-clay color as primary backgrounds, along with some metallic gold and darker gray. The “d” logo is at the top with “diesel” below that, and “Whiskey Row” just below that…and a rabbit jumping into a hole at the bottom. The diagonal cut provides room for everything, although the colors maybe don’t stand out as well as they could from each other. The foot is enclosed in a separate band that adds “Bourbon Barrel Aged” and “Rabbit Hole” in case you were still wondering what was different about this cigar and what company they collaborated with.
The wrapper leaf was a milk chocolate brown color and smooth, at least in the parts that could be seen because no bands were in the way. To the touch, the leaf was smooth and slightly oily. It smelled of earth and cedar, mostly. Sniffing the foot of the cigar, I started to pick up on what was special and different here. There was a rich earthiness and some coffee aroma that you might expect from Nicaraguan leaf, but there was also a pronounced sweetness and a touch of vanilla in the mix.
The sweetness is even stronger on the prelight draw where it was vanilla and caramel overlaying cedar and pepper.
Flavor
The Whiskey Row opened up with huge woody notes of cedar and oak, with sweet notes of ripe apple, caramel and vanilla coming on right behind. There was a good amount of pepper in the mix, which took on more of cinnamon burn toward the finish. The retrohale was unapologetically peppery with some woody and nutty notes floating around. One note: I elected to grasp the foot band and pull it off. Unfortunately, there was a little too much glue on it and it ripped a chunk of wrapper off with it. I didn’t think it would affect the burn much, if at all.
Another note: the band dips down further on the back of the cigar than you would think…remove it before it starts to burn. The paper of the band started to brown just as I got into the second third and I got it peeled off just in time before I started getting “papery” notes in the blend. What I did get as the second third got underway were increasing notes of caramel and vanilla, mostly due to the barrel-aged leaf since those are traditional Bourbon flavor notes. There was still a good amount of wood in the mix but the pepper died down quite a bit. Late in the second third I picked up a bit of resurgent cinnamon spice.
The cinnamon grew until it was really just a red pepper spice during the last third, and that became the dominant flavor component, with the sweeter notes from the barrel-aged leaf taking a secondary role.
Construction
So despite my ripping a whole in the wrapper, the burn was nearly perfect. I also had a great draw and very solid ash up to an inch.
Value
Very good cigar and an excellent price point. That continues to be one of General Cigar’s biggest advantages…their economies of scale allow them to continue to offer cigars at prices that seem like those from two or three years ago.
Conclusions
The Diesel Whiskey Row is a great addition to General’s catalog and I’ve seen it already do better in sales than the Grind did when it showed up at my shop last year. This is among the lowest priced barrel-aged cigars and it definitely shows off the Bourbon flavoring. It isn’t the most complex of these offerings, with Camacho’s American Barrel Aged still taking that honor, but it is significantly less expensive than the Camacho, so it stands apart from that cigar. I’ve enjoyed several of these already and can see adding it to my regular rotation very easily, whether I’m enjoying it with a glass of Bourbon or not.
By-The-Numbers
Prelight: 2/2
Construction: 2/2
Flavor: 4/5
Value: 1/1
Total: 9/10
