Vitola: Toro- 6.125” x 50 ring gauge
- MSRP $10.99
- Samples provided by General Cigar Company
Background
Early this year, Scandinavian Tobacco Company started a fairly aggressive new release campaign in both their General Cigar and new Forged Cigar distribution lines. In today’s installment of “Is it General or is it Forged?” we have CAO Cigars with one of two new releases since the first of the year, one of which is the limited edition I’m looking at today. Mortal Coil is the first release in the “Arcana” series, which is designed to “highlight the secrets and traditions of old-world tobacco processing methods, passed down from generation to generation to bring out the best in native tobaccos from across the globe.”
Mortal Coil’s main purpose is to highlight Andullo tobacco, a process of fermenting tobacco by wrapping it “tightly in handcrafted palm tree pods known as ‘yaguas” that are compressed with rope coiled around the pod.” After two years, the end result is a tobacco with a thick texture earthy sweetness. The official party line is that they are “resurrecting” or “shining a light” on this method, but they aren’t the first ones to do so, with La Aurora bringing a cigar using Andullo to market 2 or 3 years ago.
The blending uses Dominican Andullo, Honduran Jamastran, Nicaraguan Esteli, and Dominican Piloto Cubano in the filler, a Connecticut Shade binder, and a Connecticut Broadleaf wrapper. This is a limited production cigar, with 100,000 sticks being made and sold in boxes of 20. There is a single Toro size. General Cigar (yes, it’s General, not Forged) sent me samples for review; this review is based on the 4th or 5th time I have smoked this release. If your local B&M doesn’t carry CAO Cigars, you can find them on Small Batch Cigar, a Leaf Enthusiast sponsor.
Prelight
The box for this release is unlike anything I can remember from the CAO brand, but they try fairly frequently to produce original-looking packaging, so it’s not really a big surprise. It’s good-looking, although nothing award-winning, in my opinion. I almost feel like they were purposely trying to win some kind of award with the band, though. It wraps around the cigar a couple times on a diagonal and taking up an inordinate amount of the body of the stick. It’s not obvious without looking closely where you are supposed to pull to remove the band and the type read right (or wrong) from several different orientations. It’s original, but I almost feel like they were trying too hard on this one…hey, the band’s the coil! Get it? Mortal Coil!
The wrapper leaf was a dark chocolate brown with some veins and lumps as you would expect from Broadleaf tobacco. It had rich notes of earth, anise, and espresso beans. Anise notes were stronger on the foot, almost overpowering the notes of earth and cocoa powder.
I clipped the head and got a good cold draw that had flavors of milk chocolate, dark roast coffee, and earth.
Flavor
I fired up the CAO Arcana Series Mortal Coil and immediately got earth, rich chocolate and espresso notes…a very nice balance of bitter and sweet throughout. There were notes of black and red pepper and a touch of wood. The retrohale was leathery with a bit of roasted nuts and a fiery red pepper heat. The sweetness morphed from chocolate to more of a dark fruit as the first third burned along. Notes of dark roast coffee and earth and anise flitted in and out of the mix. By the time I was done with the first third, it was time to take off the band.
It seems like the second third was time to address a couple of “controversies” about this blend. Some people threw around the idea that this was the most full-bodied CAO blend ever. Friends I trust said very differently after they tried it. I find it very full-bodied, but not terribly strong in terms of nicotine strength. Some people get those confused, so I’m going to say, “Yes”…this is quite a full-bodied blend. Whether it’s the fullest CAO ever, I can’t remember for sure. Secondly, another review site had trouble with “tar” coming out the cut end. One or more General reps have taken to refuting that by saying “andullo NOT tar,” but I’ll point out that the two aren’t mutually exclusive. I have had the issue of seepage on a couple samples, including this one. It tastes nasty…like tar…so I really don’t care what it actually is. It made the draw tight and I had to recut, which opened it up dramatically and restored the flavor profile to a very good one. I had more milk chocolate on top of espresso beans, along with the dark cherry in the background and pepper hanging on at the finish.
The “tar or Andullo” issue did not resurface during the final third and the flavor profile remained full of earth, dark fruit, and espresso, followed by a low pepper burn.
Construction
The draw plugged up and I had to recut. I wish this was the only sample I had to do that with, but it’s not. The burn line was very good and the ash held on for up to an inch at a time.
Value
Good cigar with a slightly-high-than-average price tag equals good value.
Conclusions
One friend of mine called this “one of the worst cigars I’ve ever had.” Obviously that assessment is completely subjective and it turns out…I like it! The CAO Arcana Series Mortal Coil is a full-bodied blend with tons of sweetness, mixed with earth and coffee bean flavors for a very pleasant amount of complexity. Because it’s fairly full-bodied, I wouldn’t recommend it on an empty stomach, but if you like fuller cigars with a pronounced sweetness, this might just be in your wheelhouse. The only problem I had was with the “either tar or Andullo” that threatens to plug up the draw on some samples. If you can safely recut (without it unraveling on you) you should be fine on a second cut about halfway through.
By-The-Numbers
Prelight: 2/2
Construction: 1.5/2
Flavor: 4/5
Value: 1/1
Total: 8.5/10
