Vitola: Robusto
Size: 4.875″ x 46 ring gauge
Price $9.99
Review Sample from Maxamar’s
Background
This is one of the cigars that Caldwell released at the most recent IPCPR show in Las Vegas. This is a collaboration between William Ventura and Robert Caldwell. Both of their signatures adorn the box and the second band of these cigars. The blend is supposed to be one that the Ventura factory has had for many years but hasn’t released until now. There isn’t much info on the blend other than the wrapper is an Ecuadorian Connecticut varietal but no info on the binder and filler. There are four sizes released; a 4.875 x 46 corona gorda, a 4.75 x 52 robusto, a 5.125 x 50 petite belicoso and a 6 x 30 culebra. They range in price from $9.60 – $15 each. There hasn’t been info released if this is a regular production, limited production, or a limited edition. This was my first experience with the cigar.
Prelight
I’ll be honest that the choice of color for the band made the wrapper have sort of a greyish, unappealing tint to it. I think they should have chosen a color that wasn’t as similar to the band color. The top band was familiar if you’ve had one of the Eastern Standards with the second band carried both William and Robert’s signatures. It had the familiar pigtail cap of other Caldwell releases. The wrapper did have a good amount of oils but without a lot of texture. When I gave it a squeeze there was a slight amount of give without any soft spots. When I put my nose to the wrapper I got the aroma of hay with wood and leather from the foot. After clipping it and taking a cold draw on it I got a sweet woodiness with a good draw.
Flavor
It started off with a good amount of cinnamon and sugar flavors with some wood and leather flavors thrown in. There was a good amount of spice and I did get a decent wasabi like burn on the retrohale. It starts off pretty strong at medium-full strength. Moving into the second third the spice did mellow a bit but never go completely away. The sweetness also pretty much disappeared leaving flavors of wood, leather, earth and green herbs. During the second third the strength built to the bottom end of full. The final third saw the spice start to come back on the tongue and retrohale. The flavors didn’t change a whole lot but I wasn’t bored by it. I did get a slight nicotine hit from it as well.
Construction
The draw was great throughout and it produced a large volume of smoke. The burn started off slightly wavy but that pretty much resolved itself without any intervention. The ash was a bit flaky at the beginning but firmed up at the end of the first third.
Value
I’m glad to see them coming out with a pretty reasonably priced “special” cigar. We’ll see how those the FDA crap affects it.
Conclusions
To be honest I was not looking forward to this cigar when I saw it on the shelf. I’m not a huge fan of CT shade cigars and the slightly unappealing look due to the band color didn’t help either. However I really did enjoy this cigar. Don’t let the CT shade wrapper fool you, this cigar had some power. Even though I didn’t get a wide range of flavors from it I did enjoy it and wasn’t bored by it. I’d like to see what some age does to these cigars so I’ll probably pick a few more up. If you want to try one for yourself our site sponsor SmallBatchCigar.com has them in stock.
By-The-Numbers
Prelight: 1.5/2
Construction: 2/2
Flavor: 4/5
Value: 1/1
Total: 8.5/10
