Cigar Review: The Pope of Greenwich Village by Drew Estate

Vitola: Panatela
Size: 6″ x 40 ring gauge
Price $8.50, MSRP
Review Sample from Drew Estate

Background

I didn’t really know anything about this cigar until I saw it in the bloggers sampler box that Drew Estate sent me.  You can check out Dave’s review here, which gives the background (and better pictures) on the Smoke Inn exclusive.  This was the first one of these I smoked.

Prelight

The wrapper on my sample was a slightly reddish brown with some golden highlights to it.  The wrapper was very smooth to the touch.  Almost like the tooth I could see was pressed out of it.  The wrapper showed a good amount of oils to as well.  The simple band made it pretty clear what the cigar was and who made it but didn’t say anything about Smoke Inn.  When I gave it a squeeze there was a slight amount of give but no soft spots.  When I put my nose to the wrapper I detected some hay and leather with barnyard emanating from the foot.  After clipping it and taking a cold draw on it I got a good draw with a bit of sweetness and salt.

Flavor

The cigar starts off with a good amount of spice, especially on the retrohale.  After a few puffs I started to get flavors of leather, earth and cream coming though.  Towards the end of the first third I noted some woody and sweet notes as well.  The cigar starts medium full strength.  As I moved into the second third the spice mellowed out a lot and the flavors were pretty similar to the first third; wood, cream, leather, and a saltiness.  The strength stayed the same as the first third.  Once I got into the final third the flavors changed slightly again to wood, leather, and coffee.  The strength built slightly to the bottom end of full.

Construction

It started off with a slight bit of tunneling, ash flakiness, and irregular burn line.  I was a little concerned about the tunneling, but by the end of the first third it pretty much worked itself out.  After that I didn’t have any problems.

Value

A solid cigar at a reasonable price.

Conclusions

Even thought it was blended by Willy Herrera I thought it was quite a bit different than other releases from DE.  Even though it wasn’t the most complex cigar it was quite enjoyable and will try and pick up some more when I can.

By-The-Numbers

Prelight: 2/2
Construction: 1.5/2
Flavor: 4/5
Value: 1/1
Total: 8.5/10