Vitola: HR54 (Robusto Grande)- 5” x 54 ring gauge
- ~$10
- Cigars gifted by a friend
Background
Last time in my “Aged” series, I looked at the second release from Crowned Heads—Headley Grange. It was a blend I liked, but never really “loved” until I got the chance to try one with a bit of age on it. While I maintain that aging does no favors for most Nicaraguan blends, it had the effect of mellowing and smoothing out the qualities I didn’t care for in the blend’s Sumatran wrapper leaf, completely altering the flavor profile for the better. Today I’m looking at the third release from Crowned Heads: J.D. Howard Reserve.
In 2013, the company released the J.D. Howard Reserve as a tribute to Jesse James, who lived in Nashville (the company’s home) under the Howard name. The blend was made in the E.P. Carrillo factory (La Alianza) in the Dominican Republic, but uses Nicaraguan fillers, a Sumatra binder, and a Brazilian Arapiraca wrapper leaf. It was CH’s first Maduro blend and at the time I originally reviewed it, I quite enjoyed it.
Time did its thing, though, and I moved on to other blends…always chasing “what’s new” and “what’s hot.” Sadly, in doing so, it’s easy to lose track of blends you did really like at one time. As with the Headley Grange, a friend gave me several of these when he was cleaning out his coolidor…he bought stuff he ended up just wasn’t interested in later and he wanted the room back. If you want to buy some, Small Batch Cigar (a Leaf Enthusiast sponsor) has them in stock as of this writing.
Notes
In doing some research on this blend, I found that for many online retailers, it is backordered or “not available to order.” I couldn’t find any official word that the blend was discontinued, but it seems like a lot of retailers are having a hard time getting their hands on it. Is it just the COVID-production-blues that every company suffered through in the last year? I guess we’ll know before too long.
For a cigar without cellophane, this held up remarkably well. The wrapper leaf still seems oily and undamaged. It had a nice mild earthy aroma to it, along with notes of coffee and cocoa powder. The foot had a slightly stronger earthiness, along with cedar and vegetal notes. Once clipped the cigar had a good draw with flavors of generic wood and light earth.
Fired up, the J.D. Howard had more pronounced cedar and earth, along with more subtle cocoa powder and copper notes.
Since Crowned Heads is based in Nashville and the blend is named after an alias of a famous outlaw while he stayed in the same city, I thought it appropriate to pair it with a whiskey from the same city: Davidson Reserve Bourbon, named after the county where Nashville is located. I got a Single Barrel “store pick” expression from a local store recently, but because of an accident, I lost the majority of the whiskey…so there may not be a full review coming…unless I can afford to get another bottle before they are sold out.
The Bourbon was 114.45 proof and even with the addition of a good amount of water, it was still more spicy than sweet. It really amped up the spiciness of the cigar, though, which had lost a lot of its edge in the years since it was made.
In the end, the J.D. Howard Reserve did not “improve” with age. I found that the spiciness that I had liked in the early days was greatly diminished. That said, however, I did enjoy the cigar quite a bit as a more mellow version. It showed pretty much exactly what I’ve come to expect from a Nicaraguan blend with 5 or more years of age…softened around the edges but still displaying some of the flavor profile of the younger version. I hope we can all age so gracefully.
