Cigar Review: Cohiba Nicaragua

Vitola: N50 (Robusto)
Size: 5” x 50 ring gauge
MSRP ~$13
Samples provided by General Cigar

Background

It seems natural if you think about it…just a part of the ascendency of Nicaraguan leaf to the top of the heap. A decade ago there were plenty of Nicaraguan cigars on the market, but they were often separate by brand lines from Dominican blends, which dominated the scene. Now brands commonly associated with the DR are producing “Nicaragua” blends left and right…Davidoff probably is the most visible with their “Davidoff Nicaragua,” but they were followed shortly by “RyJ” by Romeo y Julieta and now the non-Cuban Cohiba (owned by General Cigar) has released the “Cohiba Nicaragua.”

I have comrades who say the Cohiba Red Dot is a bad cigar that coasts by on the name it shares with the most famous Cuban brand in the world. I maintain that the General-owned version isn’t a bad cigar, but it does cost more than it should for what it delivers. For me that extends from the regular Red Dot, to the XV, to the Puro Dominicano…and I haven’t even been tempted to try the Diamante or Comador versions. I was curious to see how this stick stacked up to others under the brand.

The Cohiba Nicaragua is the first of the brand’s sticks to be blended and made in Nicaragua. According to the lifestyle magazine’s website, the fillers are from Estelí, the binder is from Jalapa, and the wrapper hails from Honduras…I guess that’s close enough to Nicaragua, though (and honestly, there just aren’t many Nicaraguan puros on the market compared to those with Nica filler and binder and a wrapper from some other country, so this isn’t so strange). General sent me a few samples for this review; I smoked at least one (and maybe two) before I settled down to write about it.

Prelight

From a standpoint of appearance, General treats the Cohiba brand very well. The Red Dot logo has been tweaked for different releases, but never really altered, and that is the case here. You won’t mistake this for anything else with the middle of the “O” filled in with red ink. The rest of the band is fairly basic: black background with some copper foil for lettering. It’s basic but elegant…attractive without being showy. The wrapper, which has been described as “Colorado Oscuro” in color, was a light brown color with a bit of mottling and a couple larger veins. When I looked closely I could see a fine toothiness and a slightly oily sheen on the leaf. The aroma I got from it was sweet hay and a bit of natural tobacco. The foot had a ripe earth note to it, reminiscent of what I’ve smelled in the blends of some LFDs…which is odd because those are generally all Dominican fillers and this is all Nicaraguan.

I tested the cold draw and found it to be excellent. Prelight flavors were earthy with a bit of cedar and semi-sweet chocolate mixed in.

Flavor

The Cohiba Nicaragua started out with body in the lower medium range, and a mix of flavors that leaned heavily on cedar and grassy notes, while the traditional Nicaraguan earthiness served as more of an undercurrent. I got a little red pepper on the tongue and a strong blast of it on the retrohale. As I burned through the first third, I didn’t notice the body getting any fuller, but the flavor did mellow out to cedar and hay, with just a touch of the earth and almost none of the pepper from the beginning.

I got more hay in the second third, as well as an emerging citrus flavor that was just mildly sweet. The retrohale burn had given way to a nuttier note.

At the end, I got a strong wood influence, though still with strong grassy and citrusy notes.

Construction

The draw was good. The burn line was fairly straight. The ash tended to be a bit flaky. And the cigar acted as if it wanted to go out if I didn’t puff on it every 20 seconds or so. This behavior was seen in both samples that I can remember. This is not necessarily a construction problem, but is something to be aware of.

Value

As with pretty much every other non-Cuban Cohiba, I found the price to be beyond the experience here. Not a bad cigar at all, I just have a hard time justifying the price/experience ratio.

Conclusions

The Cohiba Nicaragua was a good cigar that shows another way to blend Nicaraguan leaf without it being full-bodied and strong. This was medium in body the whole way and fairly complex, but in the end it did let me down a little bit in flavor profile. That’s just a personal thing, though, as you may like the profile that’s in this one. The price is another issue, in my opinion. If this cigar started at the $10 mark instead of $13, it would be much easier to recommend. Starting a $13 puts it into more or less direct competition with the Davidoff Nicaragua, which is just a better cigar.

By-The-Numbers

Prelight: 2/2
Construction: 2/2
Flavor: 3.5/5
Value: .5/1
Total: 8/10