Vitola: Corona Gorda
Size: 6″ x 46 ring gauge
Price $7.75
Review Sample from SmallBatchCigar.com
Background
I hadn’t heard of this cigar prior to smoking this cigar. They look to have a couple blends already released before this one. This cigar was inspired by a backpacking trip VP Carson Serino took to Iceland. Most of the cigars he could find there were of Cuban origin and when he got back to the factory he decided to come up with what would be his take on the “Cuban tasting cigar”. This is the result of that project. The blend consists of a binder a filler from Nicaragua with a Ecuadorian Corojo 99 wrapper. This cigar comes in three different sized, a robusto, a toro and a corona gorda. The cigar differ in addition to size in that they all use a different Cuban style cap. The corona gorda sports a triple cap, the robusto a Perilla cap, and the toro uses a 109 cap. They come in 20 count boxes and range in price from $7.75-$9. This was the second one of these I smoked.
Prelight
I don’t get a Cuban inspiration from the band, it’s more of a steampunk style. It does contain the brand and blend on it pretty clear so it is easy to tell what the cigar is. The wrapper is a medium brown in color with a bit of golden tint with some darker mottling especially towards the foot. It also had a good amount of tooth and oils to it. When I gave it a squeeze there was a slight amount of give without any soft spots. Putting my nose to the wrapper I got the aroma of leather with a barnyard aroma coming from the foot. After clipping and taking a cold draw I got a good draw with a woody flavor.
Flavor
The cigar starts off with flavors of leather and wood with a sweet finish and some spice on the tongue and retrohale. Towards the end of this third I got some graham and cinnamon flavors from it as well. It stars off at the upper end of medium strength. Once I got into the second third the spice definitely mellowed out. The flavors were pretty similar to the first third, but with a sweeter finish. The strength stayed the same through the second third. As I got into the final third the spice did start to come back some and the strength built slightly. The flaros were pretty much the same as the second third.
Construction
The draw was great throughout. The burn was a little wavy but not too bad.
Value
To me this is a great price point for a relatively small cigar company to be releasing a cigar at.
Conclusions
Even though there weren’t tons of flavor changes I definitely enjoyed both of these cigars I smoked. I do plan on picking up some after I try the other sizes. If you want to give them a try yourself head on over to SmallBatchCigar.com and they’ll take care of you.
By-The-Numbers
Prelight: 2/2
Construction: 2/2
Flavor: 4/5
Value: 1/1
Total: 9/10
