Cigar Weekly

I made myself a promise I would write one cigar review a week. I started right before Christmas, but the holiday bustle got me behind. Today is the first chance I've had to smoke a cigar and really pay attention to it.

A while back on Cbid (Cigar Bid, cigar auction site, ed.) I decided to look for something different. I'd gotten in a rut where I like what I smoke, smoke what I like. The problem with that is over time, I can turn myself off to a favorite. The answer is to find some new spice for the rotation. I stumbled on the 601 quite by accident. When I read the description and saw it was a Pepin Garcia product, I decided to give it a whirl. The MSRP was quoted at $8.50 for this Robusto, and I figured picking up a five pack for 15 bucks would be worth it, strictly in the name of cigar science. Somehow, I didn't pay attention to the "box pressed" part. I intensely dislike box pressed cigars. I like cigars that come in cabs of 50 and are perfectly round. Most of the draw problems I've had over the years have been box pressed cigars. I don't like the feel of a square cigar in my round pie hole. I'm also not a big maduro fan, so this stick had the odds stacked against it. Because of all this, I had buried these in the coolerdor and put off smoking them for almost a year. Today I pulled one out and gave it a whirl.

For a maduro, the wrapper was light, nowhere near oscuro, and more like the EMS wrapper. It reminded me of the "dark oily" Habanos that weren't maduro but people seemed to go crazy over. It clipped easily and had that almost damp feel on cutting it. I've had several cigars lately that even though they were stored at 65%, when I cut them they were a little too dry. Little pieces of tobacco flew everywhere. On cutting this bad boy, the end of the leaves and the cap all stayed together in one, nice, little piece. Prelight it had a nice aroma, almost like a RASS.

It lit easily with a torch lighter and gave off quite a bit of bluish smoke. The pleasant aroma continued even before the first puff. The draw was perfect, not too loose nor too tight. There wasn't a kick-you-in-the-nuts strength, but the first draw had a leathery feel with hints of toasted almonds. I usually don't taste exotic crap in cigars, no hints of chapped ostrich leather or smoldering bolivian wormwood, but I swear I tasted almonds. I thought for a minute I'd been poisoned, then I remembered cyanide tastes like bitter almonds not toasted almonds. How did they figure that out anyway?

The first third held the smooth leathery flavor while the almond notes disappeared. The burn stayed even and did not require any relights. The middle third slid into the smooth, earthy flavor I've come to know from Nicaraugan puros. The draw stayed spot on and the burn was even. The final third picked up a little more spice and the earthy flavors remained. I smoked it down to about an inch left before letting it go. It burned and drew perfect throughout.

Flavorwise, if I didn't know it was a DPG product I wouldn't have picked up on it. This was a different animal than Don Pepin Garcia white, blue or black label lines. It held no resemblance to Padilla Miami either. Five or six years ago, it seemed everything coming out of Nicarauga tasted the same to me. It's fascinating to me how many different flavor profiles are coming out of that tiny country. Has Nicarauga become the new Cuba?

All in all, this was a nice smoke. It didn't wow me, but it was smooth and consistent. For someone who loves box pressed maduros, it would score higher. For me:

88/100

__________________
In memory of Doug Odom. The best friend a guy could ask for.

Cigar Weekly member Jason Bolt (jb) hails fromKansas and has been a member of the CW Community Forums and Discussion Groups since October of 2003.