New Addition to Arandoza’s Battle of the Bands
Arandoza Cigars is a family owned company that apparently started early 2011, launching its first line of cigars called Blue Label in 2012, with light blue bands. This cigar was reviewed by my compatriot in October 2012 and he gave it a 3.5 out of 5. At the 2013 IPCPR, Arandoza announced the “rebirth” of the medium bodied Blue Label line with a deeper, bolder blue in the cigar bands. This...
JC Newman’s Pearl of the Sea
Aside from a pretty woman’s neck, the best place to find pearls of the sea is in a bed of oysters. In 2012 JC Newman introduced their Perla del Mar and had them available for the 2013 IPCPR where they gave me one to sample and review. I recently inspected the bottom of my humidor and found the JC Neman Perla biding its time until I selected it. The Perla I had was the “G” , a 6 ¼ X 54...
1875 Romeo Y Julieta – Good, But With a Complicated Pedigree
Romeo and Juliet – would be lovers kept apart by differences between their families. The Romeo Y Julieta brand name/global market is no different. The non-US version is Cuban produced and sold outside the US by Habanos SA. Altadis produces the US version in the Honduras. Another complication is that Altadis also sells different Romeo Y Julieta cigars where the 1875 is after the name of...
Kuuts Has a Winner With the Placeres Reserva
Kuuts has their cigar factory in the Danli region of the Honduras where they make their Kuuts Nicaraguan, Placeres, Miro and Zapata brands. Although Kuuts has been selling in Europe for a long time, they entered the US market in 2013. At the 2014 IPCPR Kuuts gave me a Placeres Reserva 6 X 54 Colosos to review. The Placeres brand comes in 5 sizes and has a Habano Jalapa wrapper around a Costa...
Humidores Dominicanos reincarnates Faraon Tutankamon
Humidores Dominicanos registered to do business in Florida in the middle of 2013. Sometime later Humidores launched a brand called Cigar Factory where each of the blends was named after a Pharaoh and offered in various sizes. I first noticed them at the 2014 IPCPR where they gave me three blends to review – Tutankamon, Ramses and Esfinge. The Faraon Tutankamon was a 6 X 50 toro that had a...
Cuban Stock Has a New Chubby VP
Cuban Stock Cigar Company launched an addition to its Chubby line of large ring gauge cigars at the 2014 IPCPR in Las Vegas. The new line is called “Boss” and comes in 3 lofty title sizes – the Chairman (7 X 60), the CEO (6 X 56) and the VP (5.5 X 56). Yanev Levy, the founder of Cuban Stock Cigar Company and probably both its Chairman and CEO, gave me a VP to test. The Boss series uses a...
