2008 Montecristo Sublime Edicion Limitada in NEW ORLEANS

Let the smoking begin.  I have been lucky enough to take advantage of my sister's gracious offering af a place in her condo in New Orleans for nearly the entire week.  I worked a few days in Memphis and am sitting in New Orleans on not such a good night, but for New Orleans, any cool night is not bad.  It's low overcast and windy with a chill in the air, and I picked a heck of a time to smoke a MONSTER of a cigar in this Monteccristo Sublime.  What was perhapes the most popular Limitada ever, the Cohiba Sublime, lent it's size to this giant cigar.  Not a cigar you want to smoke on a windy evening.  The cigar is wrapped in a dark wrapper reminiscent of the old fireproof wrappers, and wind and fire makes it tough for a leaf lover.  It burned a bit unevenly, and the sheer girth makes it tough to make a go of it.

The cigar was steeped in leather notes, all on a medium/strong body.  Various chocolatey flavors wove their way in and out of the smoke, but the feature of the cigar that made it a challenge to write about was this one flavor I found nearly impossible to finger.  I am taking a stab at it with a "musty, old oak board taste" with a hint of mint.  I loved the flavor of the cigar and it made for a good hour on the stoop, but I hate it when I can't place a flavor.  I have an amateur's palate to be sure, and this flavor just made it that much more difficult to feel like I have progressed very much.  I liked the cigar an awful lot, but when something bothers me like that, it takes all the fun out of it.  Add to that the fact that the smoke is easily a two hour smoke, and it made me as uncomfortable as I get watching a movie like Bill Murray's "Quick Change" or Anna Faris' "Smiley Face", just a series of uncomfortable moments strung together leading me to a feeling of rushing through it to get over that FEELING of discomfort.  I should have smoked something short, thin and simple.  Instead I took the most complex and time-consuming of the cigars I have with me.

Top it off wth the fact that the current price of one of these cigars is about 22-25 dollars and it makes for a colossal mistake.  But it's also just another glorious day in the city that care forgot, and who really cares in the end?  I can't put a score on this cigar because in smoking terms, I just butchered it, and it will take a two-person smoking con-fab to sort out the flavors at work here.  I paired it with a Acai daiquiri cranked out by the Frozen Concoction Maker, and it was a good, tart, sweet mate.  Under proper smoking conditions, I could see this as a 95 point smoke.

2005 Partagas Serie P No.2 - Spring BBQ smokes

Pulled out a few cigars for a weekend of smoking delicious back ribs and perfecting my smoked-grilled chicken wing.  Started the day with a 1998 Punch Corona.  Delicious first third, then I quickly ruined it with an over-smoke job.  I was so busy messing with my fire that I just puffed and puffed and puffed, over-heated it and had a harsh second half.  But of course, I am not compelled to smoke a harsh cigar, so I threw it at a squirrel, hitting it right in the head, which I would call a satisfying smoke.  Before PETA calls me, I have a mob of squirrels that knocks all the pecans out of my tree while they are still green.  If they drop one they simply pull off another one until there are half-eaten pecans all over the patio, floating in the pond and a tree that never has any pecans on it.  You want to protect them from flying cigar butts, then you come over here and protect the pecans on my tree 16 hours a day for two months straight.

After the ribs were smoked and slathered in Sweet Baby Ray's, it was time to clip a 2005 Partagas Serie P No. 2.  This has become my favortie Partagas, which is really saying something.  There are nearly a dozen great Partagas cigars.  A paragon of smooth, lightly spicy perfection, this cigar drew quite tightly at first, showing a very dense pack at the clipped head.  But it burned slowly and steadily, delivering less smoke than I like, but making it very tasty and easy to discern the flavors that did come through.  I turned up the Margaritaville machine and cranked out a pitcher of Raspberry daiquiris which was a very good pairing considering the unseasonably warm first day of spring. 

This smoke does not offer a lot of changes across it's length, but is mildly-spicy, slightly creamy and features a hint of pepper and leather all the way through.  This is one of the few habanos that I can recommend to any level of smoker and know that they will be pleased.  The strength is not overpowering, the spice is accented well with the taste of rich havana tobacco, and the blend is what is often termed 'magical' by aficionados. Year after year the blend seems to remain very much the same, which is something I find rarely well-accomplished by Habanos.  It surges past the Montecristo No.2 over and over again in box to box, cigar to cigar quality comparisons.  There were problems for sure, the tighter than optimum draw, a slightly over-aged flavor profile....but I would score it reasonably high;  I give it an 87. 

Up next, perhaps tonight, the return of the Montecristo Grand Edmundo EL 2010.  I am drying it on a countertop as I type this.

The most popular habano - Montecristo No.4 2007

A year after this blog began, there has as yet been no review on the Montecristo No.4.  The most popular habano in the world, yes.  On this blog?  It would not seem so.  Still, I always liked them, and tonight's smoke was no exception.  This was clad in the same wrapper that one often finds the Monte No.4, a medium colorado wrapper that is light in color and red tones, very clean and smooth, but not anything exceptional.  You can find these cigars wrapped in all kinds of wrappers, but this is the shade that is generally accepted as the "Montecristo-style" wrapper, in my experience.  It cut very neatly with the perfect smoke portal.  The draw was on the tight side of medium and this would play a major role in the perfect burn this cigar would offer.  The photos do not do a good job of conveying the true color of the cigar as I perceived it.

The first puffs were very sharp and tannic.  It played out like this for about a quarter-inch.  After the initial harsh behavior, it calmed down into a creamy and lightly-spicy taste.  The burn was extremely even and well behaved with each puff offering the perfect smoke.  This is how every cigar should perform, allowing for the lightest possible draw and offering the maximum flavor.  With most cigars, I believe that you should puff as lightly as you possibly can while still properly feeding the burn.  This gives you the best chance to detect light flavors and fully understand the "language the cigar is speaking".  Gulping anything, food, beverage or smoke, does not allow your taste buds to operate with the proper amount of air.  I am not a scientist, and I may be characterizing this improperly, but taste is much more about the sinuses than the taste buds.  The olfactory system of the human head operates on several fronts.  When you smell something good, you are quite simply "tasting the air".  This is the same with eating food.  Your taste buds work in concert with your sinuses much more than one would think.  This is why you can hardly taste food when you are sick and stopped-up.  In order to taste food under those conditions, you must sniff air in or out sharply to capture the tiniest hint of flavor.  Try it next time you are sick, but desparate to taste that cheesecake or savory meal.  My mother used to say something when her piglets were eating at the table.  "SAVOR your food."  This was code for, "I just slaved over a hot stove to make this meal, so please at least TASTE it...make it last...enjoy it." 

Blablabla.  How does this support  my statements?  The less food or smoke or drink you have in your mouth, the more air you have to interact with the system.  So it would stand to reason that the lighter puff you take, the more flavor you get.  But again, you must feed the burn.  This is easy when the cigar is at the perfect moisture content, but very difficult with a overly-moist cigar, as in my recent Trinidad Fundadore.

And now to return to where I left the roadway.  This Montecristo burned absolutely perfectly.  I was able to lightly smoke it with almost no hard puffs to encourage the burn.  I tasted coffee, cream, cane sugar and whipped cream.  There were bold notes of chocolate and vanilla with a wonderful tangy strength that was pleasing, but indicitave of not just youth, but tremendous aging potential.  I pushed the band up three times on this smoke, which is my way of saying, this cigar is done, but I am going to give it another few puffs to see if this is the last thing she has to say.  In each case, the cigar was not finished with me yet.  I still left more than an inch unburned of this five and a half inch cigar.  I smoked a good bit more than the last photo shows, however.

It's 42 ring gauge is my favorite size cigar, to me there are no better cigars from havana than the 3 or 4 or more vitolas with near 42 ring gauges.  The perlas, the minutos, the cervantes, the marevas...I'll stretch it to the dalias.  Maybe there are more, who knows or cares.   While this cigar performed as well as any I have had lately, the flavor was not quite up to par with a really great cigar, so the score was lower than I might ordinarily give such a fantastic experience.  Still, I give her a 91.

The package - Trinidad Fundadore 2007

A new friend sent me a generous package of cigars the other day.  They are totally unrelated to the blog, I don't accept cigars for review out of the membership or from stores or vendors.  But a philosophical discussion with me playing the part of the beligerent as usual led to him saying that he might send me some cigars.  I am guessing as some sort of method of showing that he was not a jerk, which I already knew.  But I think also that not everything has to be about something, and many of the people in the asylum where I live in my smoking hours tend to be very generous to one another, almost militantly so in some cases.  So as it will come to pass, there will be an opportunity to review cigars that I didn't have and would never buy.  Tonight's Trinidad is on the right.  In future entries I will smoke two cigars at once, the two "Holy Lance" cigars from Illusione shown here, one in the dark natural wrapper that looks Nicaraguan, and the other in the green "Candela" wrapper, once the most popular wrapper style in the US.  WHAT??  You're kidding me, right?  Well, we are always a fad country.  I am not a fan of candela.  But this is an opportunity I just can't pass up.  I love the Lancero shape.  It will be a long entry that will likely end with me hunched over a bathroom appliance of some kind.   That's an AWFUL lot of slow-smoking cigar there.  Under 15 inches, but BARELY.  It should be fun, don't miss it.

Tonight's cigar is a Trinidad Fundadore.  It was once the only cigar in the Trinidad lineup, and there was a time when this cigar was unavailable to the general public.  If you were a head of state, there was a shot you might smoke one one day.  In early 1998, perhaps even late 1997, a commercialized version of this cigar was released to the public for the first time.  I had a trip to Michigan planned and I went across the bridge into Canada and managed to get one, outrageously expensive Fundadore.  I saved it for years and smoked it I think in 2001.  I was not altogether sure what I thought, it was very delicate and I had no idea of how to smoke a long and thin cigar.  But there were delicious flavors of honey and spice and herbs and it was delicious. 

And now ten years later, I have a chance to smoke another.  This is what is termed the "new blend".  The cigar lineup was expanded with the addition of three new sizes and the Fundadore received both a new band and a new blend.  This smoke lit up extremely slowly and continues to burn awfully.  Not SO bad, but it does not want to burn straight and it's one of those smokes where the burn line hardly moves, and then when it goes out, you see that it has burned inside, tunnelled a bit, and when you re-light it, you are half an inch down the line.  Again, it is a cigar that needs to be sipped three times and puffed hard once to keep the burn going right.  In the hard puff it is nothing special, a bit leathery and strong.  On the three light puffs, there is honey, vanilla, cream, orange, mint, cafe au lait, just myriad wild tastes.  I couldn't smoke these all the time, they are far too expensive.  But they are just strong enough to be up my alley and it's a great smoke.  About two inches are gone now and things are rolling right along unchanged, which in this case is pretty OK. 

A bad thing about the wrapper on this cigar is memories of the 98 I smoked.  It had  a sandy, light brown wrapper with little hairy tooth all over it.  But the wrapper was very much like the Cohiba wrappers of the day.  This wrapper is a variant of the Habana 2000 strains that produced what is known as the Fireproof Wrapper.  That's why the burn is just so terrible.  And yet again, the cigar is good.  The kind of cigar that demands full attentiveness.  And yet I just type more drivel and watch Magnolia.  One of those movies that has to be seen a few times before you can even LIKE it.  I still have no idea why or what I am watching.

I am going to ignore the burn here.  Even though this cigar came all the way across the country to get to me, it is still not dry enough to smoke.  But not only is it giving me a great flavor experience, It is a very transformative TYPE of cigar.  It is a day changer.  A mood enhancer.  A pleasant surprise.  A long, thin, thing of beauty.  This one, at this age, maybe Megan Fox?  She is not really my type, but I am at a loss for the perfect woman to showcase as long, thin, a thing of beauty.  The 98, I have no problem identifying as Wendy Malick.  I love that woman.  Vanilla, cinnamon, sugar, spice, herbs, meat, bread, pastry, milk, cocoa.....how you gonna just let that pass by.  And while I didn't mention it yet, the aroma is and has been spectacular.  As sad as it is, VERY few havana cigars do it all anymore, or rather, the ones I can afford just don't do it anymore.  I hear the Conde 109 does it.  I even had a Bolivar Belicoso Fino that did it once.  It would be a great, great thing if Havana got back into the business of doing it all the time.

94 points, ignoring the erratic, infuriating burn.  That would be the highest score I ever gave a smoke on this blog....I think.  Hell, I don't pay any attention.  If the burn were taken into account, it would likely have a tough time breaking 86.  But sometimes, you just have to blame the operator.

Guest Review - Punch Royal Selection No.12

OLScigars thanks a reader for helping with an idea from a few weeks ago, that regulars around here might want to contribute guest reviews from time to time, and Anthony M. of Washington up in the beautiful Pacific Northwest came through with an interesting review of one of my favorite cigars, the Punch Royal Selection No.12.  I have only had the 99-00 versions of this cigar, which are great, but he had recently gotten ahold of some 2009 stock and I was curious.  What are these cigars like FRESH?  So without further blablabla from me, here is Anthony's double take on this legend.

Punch Royal Selection No.12 - 99 versus 09

After talking with OLS I decided to write a review on this 2009 Punch Royal Selection No.12.  It started out for me as just another cigar I would smoke a few times and give my uneducated palate and grammar skills a try with.  The first one was fresh out of a new box, it only had about a week in the humidor, but I couldn't wait any longer. ( I should have)  It was of good construction and color, light brown with no obvious flaws.  It still had the cedar box smell with some faint tobacco.  I cut and lit it; it was harsh for the first half-inch or so, just as you might expect from a young cigar.  The burn was even but it had trouble staying lit.  The rest of the cigar was pretty much one dimensional with notes of cedar and pepper spice.  Not bad, just not what I was hoping for. 

So I waited a few weeks and made my next trip to the cigar bar with the RS12 ready to smoke.  I met up with a good friend and we sat down and ordered ourselves a beer and started to BS.  He already knows I'm having this Punch for the second time, but he has a twist to throw into my plans.  He hands over the same cigar, but from 1999.  I couldn't say no, we swap over, a 1999 for a 2009.  The color is the same on both sticks, but the taste could not be farther apart.  The pre-light draw brings a flowery, fruity flavor I've never had.  The cigar lights perfectly and we are on our way.  The taste of fruit doesn't stay long, with a light leather and faint spice in the background.  I would say this is a medium to strong cigar with flavor changing about every third puff.  I wish I had a better palate so I could explain all the things I am tasting, but I don't, so just take my word for it, it's GOOD.  I took this cigar all the way to my fingertips and it burned well the whole time. 

So it's Friday, and I am ready to try the 2009 RS12 again.  It lights just fine with a strong, earthy leather taste and a strong pepper spice that lingers on the palate for a good amount of time.  I'm by nature a faster smoker and tend to get my cigars too hot.  With this one, I really need to slow down to get any kind of different flavors and even with that they are hard to pick up on.  When I reach the middle of it, the flavor really starts to mellow out and I can almost get hints of the 1999 profile.  It only lasts for an inch or so and it's back to strong spice and leather.  I like a stronger cigar, so it's fine with me.

I'm not going to rate either cigar with a number, I just don't find it to be fair.  If you like the Punch's profile it's definitely worth trying...if you have the patience to wait ten years, DO IT!  As for me, I don't have that kind of patience.  I'll revisit these in a few months and see how much closer they are to that 1999 flavor.  It's kind of like watching a good movie backwards.  Oh well, it's definitely worth finding out what a cigar could do with time.

I'd like to thank Ant'ny for his effort here, I have smoked a bunch of old cigars, but never really had a chance to compare two in this way.  I think I will check into doing a few like this soon.

Bolivar Coronas Gigantes revisited

The first swing with this bat was a few months back, wow, maybe 5-6 months back.  Time really flies when you are pushing drivel.  I am always trying to avoid smoking fresh cigars, I feel like no havana cigar is ready to smoke for two years at least.  I like 3-5 even better.  But the times they are a changing, and I read daily about someone's fantastic experience with fresh cigars.  People's opinions that I trust.  So I took a shot at a Boli Coronas Gigantes within a week of it's arrival.  Bleh.  Not good.  Once again my philosophy is upheld.  But being right doesn't always make sense.  Fresh Bolivars are among the greatest of all havanas.  And this one will help explain why.

The BCG is a Julieta 2 vitola, what's better known as a churchill.  It's a full 7 inches long with a decent ring gauge of 47.  I prefer Bolivars of much smaller size, like Petit Coronas and Coronas Junior.  But this cigar offers up everything I expect in a fresh Bolivar.  A palette of sweet and tangy delights, a little sour, in a good way.   There is leather and a little sweet spice.  The smoke, like the draw, is stingy. 

The cigar was heavy for it's size, and very firm.  The burn was very straight.  Well...angled, but straight, if that's possible.  What I mean is that it did not have a ragged edge as it burned along.  The flavor stayed pretty linear throughout the smoke, but this is pretty common with fresh cigars.  If anything, it improved from medium bodied to full and added some coffee and cream notes in the heavy smoke. 

The end of the smoke was pretty stout with the return of the nicotine blearies of the Cohiba robusto from last night.  But it redeemed the cabinet of Bolivar Coronas Gigantes which were previously not worth smoking more than a few inches of.  This smoke ws taken to within 3/4 of an inch from the band and laid down for good.  This cigar, 86 points.

Cohiba Robusto 2009

Most people who know habanos say that it is a waste of a good cigar to smoke a Cohiba before it's passed it's 5th birthday, and I am with them for the most part.  But real curiousity wells up now and again, as well as a recognition that reading the impressions of others often compels one to try a cigar a bit early.  And so it was with this Cohiba Robusto.  That and a ragged foot.  When I see a cigar damaged like that, I think about how little is lost in turning it to ash.  And how much is to be gained. 

It lit up with some effort, because while breaking one rule, I see no harm in breaking another.  I could dry this one out overnight and let it come up to a more combustible state.  But I often wonder when I smoke a dried cigar, dried on purpose, and it is less than spectacular, if I wasted it by believing so devoutly in my maxim, 'a dry havana is the best-tasting havana.'  So I smoked it up right out of the cabinet, moist and generating all manner of funky barnyard aromas.  It was a dark, deep, rich brown, perfectly rolled, but slightly split at the foot.  It is firm and without any soft spots. 

The first impressions are of brute strength and sweet, honeyed nuance.  It is a dense and rich smoke with a short finish, with hints of toffee and cream.  It burns with a ragged, scalloped edge, and requires a difficult smoking technique.  I have to sip the smoke, barely breathing in to harvest all of the beautiful subtlety, but occcasionally giving it a good hard puff to keep it burning.  This requires a good bit of purging to keep the smoke delicate and cool, but it is worth it.  How such a strong cigar can give up such light and delicious flavor is a wonderful thing to behold.  It is a real powerhouse and makes a hot bath a true Friday night treat.  And for once, I did not let the stick roll off the edge of the tub and into the water. A flat edge on the tub would be better for the dodgy chances one must take.  But a round edge keeps both the lit end and the portion I must put into my mouth away from the porcelain.  I think that's best.

As the cigar burns down past halfway, the power really picks up.  A daunting prospect considering the strength it displayed from the outset. Yikes.  But in a good way.  The finish turns a bit to wine and tobacco, with a first appearance of the grassy flavors that the brand is known for.   There is little of the honey sweetness and the sweet element is more of molasses. 

At this point it begins to go out after every 15 or twenty puffs, and with barely 1/4 inch to go before the band, I let it go to it's end with no hard feelings or sadness.  But there is a great deal of cold sweat and a touch of queasiness.  This cigar has real power.  Delicious, scary power.  A fine cigar that I have no trouble awarding a 92.  Well done.  The rest will have to wait at least a year before I revisit them.  It will be worth the wait, it's clear.

Montecristo Edmundo 2005

I love being right, hate being wrong.  Today I had a quick chat with a friend I've never met but have long respected.  We were talking about some cigars I was considering, chief among them the Montecristo Edmundo.  Just a terrible cigar when it first came out, it was not long before I realized a few years down in the dark produced a cigar that was FANTASTIC.  So after he said he did not like the cigar, I told him that obviously he'd never had one with some good downtime on it.  So tonight, I was thinking that I had never reviewed one here, and was rather looking forward to smoking one. 

So off we went.  I found one laying in a cedar box, cut it and lit it.  I was greeted by the usual dusty cocoa I like in any cigar, but find mostly in the Montecristos.  But it was light, as was the body on the smoke throughout.  So I mostly began to reflect on how this is just a curse with the Montecristo.   I hate to prolong the use of any cliche' but it just became necessary again.  Montecristo's fat cigars are great when they are ON, but are FAR too variable in performance to ever expect to regain their place among the finest cigars in the world.  SO close, and yet so far.  Give me the thin ones, many of which I will review in months to come.

Now I can't say it's a bad cigar, I've had some outrageous Edmundos over time.  But a good one is FULL of cocoa and light spice and cream.  A little mild for what COULD be coming out of such a formidable cigar.  This one is OK.  A little heavy on the hay and light on the cream.  From time to time there are HINTS of great  taste.  And I am hoping that the next one will be better.  Aren't we always?  A bit sweet here and there, but no real body to speak of.  I am going to give this one a pass tonight and smoke another tomorrow, a fair review can't be made on this smoke, but the point can be well made that once again, there's a long way to go for Habanos.  2005 was maybe the last full year of hit and miss blends in cuban cigars, and things definitely began to improve rapidly.  And there were some fantatsic smokes made in '05, too. 

Ah, the sweet, sweet Short Story

A Ernest Hemingway once said, Give me liberty or give me a ME Short Story.  The Arturo Fuente is the last in my brief foray into the world of non-cuban cigars, and of course, I saved the best for last.  Most smokers who have been into cigars for more than a few years have run into the Arturo Fuente Hemingway Short Story.  A fantastic little fireplug of a smoke that almost single-handedly led the way of cigar makers back into the world of figurados, and even moreso, the short, stout smoke.  These are wrapped in a dark, beautiful Cameroon wrapper, covered in tooth and oil.  A little plume is on the head.

A quick snip to both ends and it lights right up, pouring dark espresso and white pepper notes with a sweet edge into my mouth, and coating the tongue with a luscious finish.  I used to smoke about a box of these a year, along with my favorite H. Upmann Churchills. (a toro actually)Then I got into the H. Upmann 2000 pretty heavy.  Then they changed from Cameroon to another wrapper and I just lost the taste for them, the Churchills, I mean.  Then I discovered habanos and they all got left behind.  I was running far behind on troop support and picked up these various cigars to send out, and as usual, I pinch a few.  Well this smoke is just amazing.  In a Non-cuban sort of way.  Leave it to the Fuentes and the Padrons to consistently make great smokes that draw everytime.  The taste of well-aged tobacco is pretty great, and was missing from habanos for a long time.  Like the Don Carlos line, these Hemingways are just made to impress.  Of course, Habanos SA has been using more aged tobaccos in their smokes in the past 5-6 years, and it shows in my experience so far. 

This cigar presents exotic hints of various woods and a sweet cedar with delicate complexity.  There is a light creaminess and an even lighter peppery quality.  The burn is wickedly straight and the draw continues to be the perfect compromise of medium and med- tight.  The pulls and smoke production are utterly remarkable.  As I try to photograph the smoke progress, I ash the thing accidentally, so I can't show the ash line as starkly as I want to.  There is a bit of chocolate in there that is so confusing, I am not sure if it is coffee or choco.  I guess in that case, who cares, right. 

So good, so sweet, so aged, so fine, so short.  Nubbed this one and enjoyed it to the end.  Could have gone a lot further but hate smoke in the eye.

WHAT?? More Non-habanos?

SHOCKING!!  Yes, I smoked some non-habanos cigars last weekend and it went as expected, not so hot.  I was marginally satisfied with an Arturo Fuente Chateau Fuente robusto.  It had a harsh taste overlaying a smooth buttery base.  Schizoid to say the least, but in defense of the cigar, I was smoking ribs and beef neckbones in the dark while smoking the cigar.  This was also a bundled cigar which is not the usual packaging for this vitola and had something to do with the way the cigar performed.  Nevertheless, I smoked it down to a nub. 

There were a few high points where the smoke provided good flavor of the kind associated with a Fuente product.  But in general it was not anything I would ever buy at a store again.  It's wrapper burned with a constant flakiness which is never good in a cigar, although even after 20+ years of smoking cigars, I am still not sure why that happens.  It aggravates me though, as the pieces tend to fly down and hit my keyboard and disappear underneath it, or do other annoying things. 

I also smoked an Omar Ortez Original.  They were bought to send to the troops, so the taste was not important to me per se', but I did want to at least be able to tolerate them before handing 50 or more of them over to guys in the military.  I spent some time in the service and never had to fight in a war.  In an odd way I am intensely jealous of that experience, and in a more rational way, I am glad that I never had to face that test.  I am not scared of being shot at, I am much more worried about how I would perform under the conditions they face daily.  Put it this way, when they ask for maxipads and baby wipes and cotton socks, it doesn't take me a second to know I would be miserable there.  I get whiney when  have the slightest tinge of diaper-rash or as men call it, chafing (and worse)  But I sweat like a PIGG!  I used to get laughed at as a young worker in New Orleans, stacking french fries and fried mushrooms in the freezer at the restaurant I worked in, and the girls would LAUGH at me, "That boy be up in a freezer, and STILL sweatin his ass off." So as they say, bless you boys, have a cigar. 

Where the hell was I??

Oh yeah, Omar Ortiz Originals.  This is a cigar that reminds me of why I love havana cigars.  I smoke a fair amount of habanos, but am rarely overcome by strong tobacco.  The best tobacco in the world is not strong, it is complex and sweet and mild......ish.  The OOO cigars are stout!  I have heard many smokers tell of weak knees and cold sweats and nausea.  While I had none of those in the strictest sense, it left a mark on me to be sure.  This is a Nicaraguan puro, which to me should be great.  Outside of cuban tobacco, my favorite is Nicaraguan.  It's wonderful peppery and sweet smoky quality has hypnotized me for years.  I guess i am just spoiled by Padrons, that are masterworks of Nicaraguan blends.  Sometimes, it's just strong and crazy.  And some people LOVE the strong stuff.  The problem with smokes like this though, it seems to me as if there is a symphony tuning up at the top of its's power and I am listening for the music, but it's just too LOUD and disorganized.  Granted this was smoked right off the truck as the expression goes.  I DID dry-box it for a day or two, but it was really something.  I am sure there was nuance there for someone with a tougher palate, or more expert at distinguishing anything above the din of power.  I will say it looks great, smells great, smokes great, burns and draws great.  Outside of that, I hope I have not offended the troops with these.  I am not going to try and rate either one.  The Chateau Fuente is a legend in it's own right, and the OOO is rarely if ever panned in online reviews or forums.  Thankfully, I love me some habanos.