Cigar Review: Davidoff Colorado Claro

Originally published at Tiki Bar Online

Special R (Robusto), 4.875” x 50 ring gauge / $17.85, Burns

After hearing the term “Colorado Claro” thrown around by some other bloggers with total abandon, I decided I would spring for the extra money and give one of them a try. Well, to be completely honest, I waited until I started working for Burns so I got the employee discount…then sprung for the money to try one. Truth be told, I’ve never been a fan of Davidoff’s pricing structure, but I’ll also admit that the few of theirs I’ve smoked have been absolutely wonderful. The Colorado Claro is a special, limited edition Davidoff, but apparently not so limited that they don’t still have plenty years after their release. The last release date I could find reference to was 2009 and it seems like my shop and almost every shop online that carries them still has plenty. From what I can surmise from a survey of online shops and other blogs’ reviews, this has Dominican filler, either a Dominican or Ecuadorian binder (probably Dominican), and a Ecuadorian Connecticut wrapper. And that’s where the fun part comes in…apparently this Ecuadorian Connecticut is sungrown because rather than being the golden color these leaves normally are, this is practically as dark as a Maduro. In the interest of full disclosure, I did buy this and I am smoking only one for this review.

The classic Davidoff White Label band is joined here by a secondary band declaring this to be “Colorado Claro.” The wrapper was a smooth milk chocolate shade of brown and, as befits this brand, it was flawless. It was oily with a few veins in evidence. The cigar felt solid and hefty for its size, as well as fairly hard…although I have to admit to not worrying too much at this point about construction…the way I look at it, you pay the big bucks for these sticks to have perfect construction and flawless appearance. You may not like the flavor (that’s all subjective), but you should never have a construction issue at these prices. After clipping the cap, I found an excellent draw with lots of flavor. First and foremost, there was that good ol’ “Davidoff funk.” If you’ve smoked a few Davidoff products you’ll know what I mean…that foresty, musty, mushroomy flavor. It’s there on pretty much everything that exits the factory and it’s there on this one. If that is something you don’t care for…just stop right now and save your money. There was also some earth, wood, and a bit of citrus…yes, all on the cold draw.

From puff one of this cigar, the Colorado Claro dazzled. From the outset I got cedar and citrus, natural tobacco and earth, leather and even a little bit of pepper spice. The musty, foresty flavor was definitely there, but strangely not as strong as it was on the cold draw. I would say it definitely started off in the medium-bodied range; not as light as you might expect a Davidoff, but not full-bodied by any means. About halfway through the first third, I started picking up saltiness that mixed well with the sweeter flavor notes.

Sadly, before the first third was over, the wrapper developed a crack. Trouble with the way I kept it? Not likely. It spent quite some time in the shop’s humidor, then about 10 days in mine at home, so it was not dried out. The flavor kept delivering, though…actually, it was fairly astounding. Salty, sweet, earthy, woody, peppery. A flavor cavalcade…a cornucopia, if you will. Besides the cracked wrapper, the construction was perfect. I had a flawless draw and a solid ash.

I wish I could say that everything continued wonderfully through the end, but…well, the cracked wrapper really screwed things up. The flavor went sideways as I puffed through the final third. It was still very good and showed flashes of the greatness of the first two thirds, but it just wasn’t quite there the rest of the time. The body did push into the lower end of full toward the end but between trying to keep it burning semi-evenly and trying to keep ash out of my lap (and off my iPad), it just ended up being more of a chore than it should have been. I wanted to give this cigar a very high score based, and based on the first third I would have. Based on the first two third, it still would have been quite high, but by the end, I was really frustrated by the destroyed wrapper. Damaged stick before I bought it? Most likely and maybe that’s something difficult to control with Connecticut wrapper even if it’s sungrown. Still, I expect more for such a pricey cigar. And, still…I will buy more of these over time, because I don’t expect this to be the norm. So I ended up only giving it half points for construction and knocked a point from flavor, while still giving it full points for value. Why? Because I still feel like it’s worth the price if it performs correctly and it’s definitely something you should give a try.

P.S. My normal practice is to write a review and let it stand. But sometimes it makes sense to revisit a cigar or to average out the experience over several sticks. So that’s what I’ve done. I bought a second Colorado Claro Special R and smoked it almost a week after this first somewhat disastrous smoke. It was immaculate all the way through…no cracks, no explosions. I found myself wondering if someone may have dropped the original cigar, then replaced it in the box. A small drop can cause a crack to form, then ruin the whole experience. I found the second cigar to be un-be-liev-able in flavor throughout and a true embodiment of what the company wants this stick to be, so I have amended my scores to reflect that. Flavor I have bumped to a full 5/5 (it was previously 4/5…flavor does suffer when a cigar doesn’t burn correctly due to a cracked wrapper and unraveling). And I have bumped construction from 1/2 to 1.5/2 (yes, the typical Davidoff is flawlessly made, but I’ve had other cigars with cracked wrappers that did not become the mess the first one did, so I didn’t feel good about giving it full available points). So…

Body: 8/10
Strength: 6/10
Complexity: 9/10

AFP Scale

Prelight: 2/2
Construction: 1.5/2
Flavor: 5/5
Value: 1/1
Total: 9.5/10