Cigar Review: Viaje Christmas Tree

Vitola: Short Torpedo
Size: 4” x 60 ring gauge
Price: $9.20
Sample from SmallBatchCigar.com

Background

A couple weeks ago Drew over at SmallBatchCigar.com handed me this cigar and asked me to review it.  Never one to turn down a cigar I was glad to do it.  Now I know it is after Christmas but I know the cigar is still available, especially here.  From what I can find this is a line extension to the regular holiday line.  Like most Viaje’s it is a Nicaraguan puro.  I couldn’t really find what varietals of tobacco were in it other than the criollo wrapper.  They are packed in 20 count white boxes.

Pre-Light

There isn’t much to see of this stubby little cigar since it is almost completely covered with wrapping paper.  What I can see is a nice reddish brown wrapper with some oils and medium sized veins to it.  After removing the paper I’m able to get a much better look at the cigar.  There is quite a bit more oils to the wrapper that was covered.  There is the traditional Holiday Blend band with a slim second band with a Christmas tree on it letting you know which blend it is.  The cigar is fairly firm to the touch and I couldn’t detect any soft spots.  I didn’t get much aroma from the wrapper of the cigar but there was a lot of barnyard coming from the foot.  After clipping it and taking a cold draw on it I got some sweet leather with a good draw.

Flavor

Like with most of the Viajes I’ve had this cigar starts of with lots of spice that does seem to be one of the main flavors throughout.  The other flavors I tasted throughout the cigar were leather, earth, coffee, wood and cinnamon.  I also did get a slightly sweet finish at times.  There was some bitterness that I started to get when the tunnel developed about half way through.

Construction

This is one area that the Viaje cigars I’ve had seem to be lacking.  A fairly significant tunnel developed about half way though.  This made the draw very difficult, the flavors a little bitter, and the cigar to get hot to the touch.

Value

At almost $10 this cigar was too expensive IMO.  I think that if the construction issues weren’t there it would be more worth the price, but not all the way.

Conclusions

As soon as I lit up this cigar I was really enjoying it and was very hopeful that this would be an enjoyable cigar.  Unfortunately the construction issues changed that.  I’m a little hesitant to purchase a few because of that and their high price, but I just might because I could taste the potential.  I’ll see how age affects them.

By-The-Numbers

Prelight: 2/2
Construction: 1/2
Flavor: 3.5/5
Value: .5/1
Total: 7/10