Ocean State Cigars Floats a New Maduro.
Rhode Island is home to Ocean State Cigars, a relative newcomer to the cigar making industry. Paul Joyal, founder and President of the company and active in the cigar industry itself for many years, launched his J Grotto line which, for 2014, included a new “Anniversary Maduro” series. This series uses a maduro fermented Connecticut broadleaf wrapper, Dominican Habano binder and fillers from...
SWAG Black Lavishes Big Flavor on a Robusto
Boutique Blends has 3 well-known brands – Aging Room, SWAG and Oliveros. I have enjoyed a number of Aging Room offerings and, at the 2014 IPCPR, Boutique Blends president Rafael Nodal provided me with one of their new creations, a SWAG Black. The Black comes in 4 sizes and the 5 X 54 robusto is called “Lavish”. The Lavish is promoted as a full bodied Dominican puro using tobacco aged for 8...
Double Nickel Cigar by Rodriguez
Lou Rodriguez Cigars sells exclusively through “brick and mortar” stores and targets the mature smoker looking for limited production cigars. At the 2014 IPCPR Rodriguez introduced its new cigar called the “double nickel”. The band is orange and black with a large “55” on it. In keeping with the name, the cigar is 5.5 X 55 – two double nickels. Old smokers like me remember the...
No Kudos for Kuuts Miro
Kuuts has their cigar factory in the Danli region of the Honduras where they make their Kuuts Nicaraguan, Placeres, Miro and Zapata brands. At the 2014 IPCPR Kuuts gave me a Miro 6 X 52 toro to review. The Miro brand has a Sumatran wrapper around a Nicaraguan binder and Nicaraguan/Honduran filler. It comes in 5 sizes ranging from a 4 X 48 Momento to a 6 X 60 Gordo. The 6 X 52 toro was an average...
Curivari’s Seleccion Privada
Curivari began in Europe in 2003 and expanded into the USA in 2010, just in time to join our “still ongoing” recovery from the Great Recession. While the company maintains a low profile in the US, I found their cigars on the websites of most major internet sellers. Every year Curivari launches a new cigar and at the 2014 show they provided me with their Seleccion Privada Maduro, a Nicaraguan...
The SAGA Continues With Blend No. 7
Corporation Cigar Export (CCE) is operated by the Reyes family where the current fifth and sixth generations maintain their tradition of making high quality cigars. CCE makes one of my favorite cigars, the Gigante of the Don Julio Punta Espada series. CCE launched a new series called Saga at the 2014 IPCPR and I previously reviewed (and liked) the new Saga Golden Age. The remaining 2014 Saga...
