Humidor – Non Cuban Humidor 1

And here is my other small humidor with a selection of my non cuban cigars in it.

Review: PDR Liga Especial – Reserva Superior – Salomon

My friend in the USA sent me this cigar quite a long time ago, over 2 years ago in fact. Its always looked amazing in its coffin, but for some reason I have always left it alone until the correct occasion arrises. Well in the end I just decided to give it a go, and see if smokes as good as it looks, cant wait…

Appearance 9.5/10

Come on just look at the picture, whats not to like, it looks amazing. It comes in a really nice coffin, the cigar looks perfectly rolled, the bands are very crisp and well printed, and just look at the cap and the foot, they are works of art. If it wasn’t for the slightly darker colour at the tip of the cigar I would have given this a 10.

Construction & Draw 9.0/10

Construction on this cigar is as good as it looks, the wrapper is a lovely dark chocolate colour, with a nice amount of tooth, the end caps are great, and its clearly been well rolled. Two things dropped the score, again the darker part of the wrapper near the foot of the cigar looks a little less “special” than the rest of the stick, and the initial draw, until you get past the light coloured tip and into the body of the cigar is tight, and you do have to put a bit of work in!

Flavour 6.0/10

Well this is where things start to go wrong, there is nothing bad, or unpleasant about the flavour of this cigar, I could detect an earthy note and some pepper at the beginning, about an inch in I got a little cocoa and some sweetness, and then that was it. The flavour profile did not really change from there on, the strength moved from medium to strong as I got towards the end of the cigar, but the flavours were static.

In hind sight I was bored whilst smoking this cigar, and I should have stopped around halfway through, but as this cigar looked so good I was expecting that any minute it would take off and impress. In the end this was a meeh cigar, it might work in a smaller size, but it was just dull, and I would not have another one.

Value 7.0/10

I think these were around 15 USD when they came out, from a construction and presentation point of view I would say $15 would be okay, as long as the flavour profile was up to the same standard, and unfortunately this was not the case, so not great value for money.

Summary 6.0/10

Okay the truth is that for me this cigar is all style over substance , or to put it another way its “All fur coat and no knickers”. I was so looking forward to this, as I do like other PDR cigars, but for me this was just not interesting enough, so in the end quite a disappointment…

Humidor: New Arrivals – Flores Y Rodriguez – Exclusivo The Coney

Somehow PDR cigars dont seem to be very popular, but I really liked the PDR 1878 Reserva Dominicana Capa Habana Robusto, so I have been looking to try other PDR cigars, especially as they are often reduced heavily !

So whilst reading around on the net I read a couple of reviews of these cigars, and when my friend in the USA told me the price I just had to get some, lets just say they were heavily discounted.

 

 

 

Humidor: New Arrivals

I really like PDR cigars, so I cant wait to try these, got a whole box on their way at a crazy price. Expect a review in the next week or so

Review: PDR 1878 Reserva Dominicana Capa Habana Robusto

My friend in the USA sent me this cigar quite a while ago, but for some reason I never picked it out of my humidor, so this weekend I decided it was about time to give this stick a try. It turned out to be a very good stick, and when I found out how much it cost I was very surprised, read on….

Appearance 9.0/10

This is a really good looking stick, the wrapper is a nice medium dark brown, with some darker spots, and it has a nice oily sheen to it. The little pig tail on the cap is nice, and the bands are pretty good looking in their silver and blue, so all in all a good start. This is the first cigar I have had with a closed foot, so I was a little nervous about lighting it.

Construction & Draw 9.0/10

Construction is very good, the cigar has only a few small veins, the wrapper as mentioned has a lovely oily sheen. Cap construction is excellent with no visible seems, and the pig tail is very tight and neat. Squeezing the cigar revealed a tightly packed stick with no hard or soft spots. The closed foot is nice, and despite my concerns lighting the stick was easy.

After cutting the pre-light draw had a tobacco taste, but no other flavours came through, the draw throughout this cigar was easy with just the correct amount of resistance.

Flavour 8.0/10

The first third of this cigar had quite strong pepper flavours along with a strong tobacco taste, I am not a big fan of really strong pepper, but this was kept under control and seemed to work well with the tobacco. In the second third of the cigar the pepper backed off and the tobacco became really creamy, and there was a slight hint of earthiness or nut at times, for me this really hit the spot, with the pepper just accentuating and bringing out these lovely flavours on the tongue.

The final third of the stick was pretty similar to the second third, but the pepper did pick up a little and I think the strength moved to medium-strong, from the mild-medium strength of the rest of the cigar. The cigar managed to stay cool pretty much to then end, and only stated to get a bit bitter when I was about 1 inch from the cap.

Value 9.5/10

I was pretty surprised when I looked up the price for this cigar and discovered it was only 5.50 USD. From the construction, draw, and flavour I really expected it to cost quite a bit more than this, so this cigar offers exceptional value for money, which is why it gets such a high value rating.

Summary 9.0/10

This is a great stick for the money, whilst I dont smoke a cigar everyday, if you did this cigar would give you a really satisfying smoke without breaking the bank. If only we could get cigars of this quality at this price in the UK, even if we did not get the dollar to pound conversion and we had to pay 5.50 GBP this would still be an amazing cigar for the money.

So whilst we in the UK cant get these, if your in the USA I would say that this is a great, cheap, addition to your humidor…