Cigar Review: Soap Box

Cigar: Dissident Soap Box
Size: Rave (4 3/4 x 46)
Wrapper: Nicaraguan (Jalapa)
Binder: Nicaraguan (Double Esteli)
Filler: Nicaraguan (Jalapa, Esteli, and Condega)
Price: Purchased for $7.99 at Burns Tobacco

Last week on Wednesday, I had the pleasure of driving down to Chattanooga to assist in the setup for this year’s Tweet Up. While my trip was cut short one day, I was able to meet a bunch of great people and get some education into some cigars to check out. One of those cigars is the one being reviewed today. A couple of the gentlemen from Dissident Cigars were in attendence and gave me a couple minute intro to their offerings. If I could sum up the pitch on their cigars, it was that they wanted to attempt to take the flavor profile in a different direction than the majority of the industry goes. As I’m always interested in trying unfamiliar cigars, I picked up two for when I got home to smoke with my wife later in the week.

I found zero construction issues with my cigar with prelight notes of subtle hay and straw. After a punch and a light, I was met with an open draw and moderate amount of spice right away. That spice hovered all around the middle to the back of the palette, front middle to back of the tongue all the way up the roof of the mouth. None of it was overpowering but it was the predominant flavor. I did also detect a background flavor that reminded me of leather but it was only present while the spice flavors existed. Those spice flavors, over the course of about 40 minutes, gradually died down to nothing, like someone slowly turning down the volume on a radio until it was off. In the last third of the cigar, the Soap Box left me with woody notes to finish out the cigar with a total smoking time of 1:23.

The only issue I encountered with this cigar was around the halfway point in the cigar where I noticed that it started burning a bit uneven. After a relight to get the burn moving correctly, the burn problem ceased. While I would consider this cigar medium bodied, my wife’s take on the Soap Box characterized it as between mild and medium. The spice in her cigar didn’t last as long but also found those woody, leather flavors as well. This cigar was a big hit for her as it was well in her strength range.

By-The-Numbers
Prelight: 1.5/2
Construction: 1.5/2
Flavor: 5/5
Value: 1/1
Total: 9/10

To recap the Dissident Soap Box:

• I really enjoyed this cigar. The strength and flavor profile is in a nice middle range that would appeal to everyone without scaring off new smokers or those who prefer milder flavors.
• The $8 area of where this cigar is priced at works for my wallet. I think for the flavor profile you get here, that is a fair price to pay.
• Thanks to the Tweet Up, I’m not exactly in need of buying cigars right now. But when the humidor does start to run low in a couple months, I will be purchasing a bunch of these for my wife and I’s enjoyment.

I would also encourage those who are interested in learning more about Dissident Cigars to read up on David’s company overview on them and his review of their other cigar, the Bloc.

As always, thank you very much for reading and I look forward to the next time I can share my thoughts with you.