Category Archives: cigars

Davidoff Aniversario No. 3

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There are a small handful of cigar brands that occupy the “premium” category at cigars shops, and Davidoff is certainly one. On the higher end of the spectrum in cost, Davidoff cigars are definitely a treat. For me, it’s their construction that help exhibit that “premium” quality, and I love their soft, smooth wrappers.

As you can see, the Aniversario No. 3 displays its own beautiful, soft wrapper. On lighting the cigar, there’s a taste of woody spice, with a creamy note on the exhale. Wrapped in an Ecuador wrapper and filled and bound with Dominican tobacco, the Aniversario has a mild profile initially, but builds quite a bit into a medium-to-full-bodied smoke over time.

At about the halfway point, the woodiness is replaced by chocolate, which is the primary profile until the end, with continues spice notes on occasion, too. As expected, the Aniversario smoked well, and remained flavorful and enjoyable until I was finished — definitely a treat for a special occasion, though if your budget allows, a great Dominican cigar for regular smoking.

I smoked a Aniversario No. 3 size, a 6″x50 Toro that will run you about $24. The Aniversario is available by the box from Davidoff Geneva.

S.T. Dupont Minijet

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S.T. Dupont of Paris has been making iconic luxury items for over a century. James Bond can be seen using a Dupont lighter from time to time. Since cigar smoking is considered a luxury hobby, Dupont has a wide range of options for cigar smokers, and all of their accessories are gift-quality.

The S.T. Dupont Minijet has been on the market for several years, and those made previous to 2017 use a horizontal line as an air vent. Picture above, the new lighters use a flame cutout for ventilation. Current models are a part of the  James Bond 007 Minijet family and retail for $150.

The Minijet a lightweight, single-torch butane lighter that is compact enough to carry in your pocket easily. It uses standard butane to refill and lights easily with a side-squeeze ignitor. These is a flame-height adjustment screw on the base. Because these lighters are minimalist and small, the ignition trigger will only light when the lighter is upright, preventing you from burning your hand or functioning as a sort of child lock as well.

The flame is clean, straight and ignited well on every squeeze. Of course, a quality-built product like a Dupont should be both visually elegant and functionally flawless, and these lighters are certainly both.

The S.T. Dupont Minijet is available in a range of colors and designs directly from the Davidoff of Geneva online store. Pictured above are the Matte Black and Red Lacquered Minijets.

Davidoff Churchill The Late Hour

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Davidoff Cigars are famously well-constructed and are most certainly some of the most premium sticks on the market today. The Davidoff Churchill Late Hour is a relatively new blend from them, using an Ecuadorian wrapper, Mexican San Mexican San Andres Binder, plus Dominican and Nicaraguan Filler.

The wrapper is silky-smooth, and it’s these soft, smooth wrappers that are one of my favorite things about Davidoff, in general. Once lit, the cigar has flavors of pepper and bitter dark chocolate with really great smoke output. As you smoke, the pepper mellows in favor of roasted peanuts and the cigar remains well-built and full flavored throughout.

I smoked a Late Hour Robusto size, a 5″x52 stick that will run you about $20. The Late Hour is available by the box from Davidoff Geneva.

La Aroma de Cuba

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One of the most classic blends you’ll commonly see represented in the cigar world is La Aroma de Cuba, available from Holt’s in 9 unique sizes, as well as a variety of cigar samplers. LADC is an amazingly tasty cigar and very affordable – ranging from just $5-8 for a single smoke.

Being comprised of Nicaraguan tobacco, LADC cigars are rich and woody, with notes of black pepper that give way to a wonderful palate of peanuts, almonds and sugar cookies. This is a cigar that is perfectly balanced between sweet, spicy and creamy, and in this price range, these would be the perfect cigar to fill your humidor with as their flavors are approachable and satisfy many cigar-smoking preferences.

I paired the La Aroma de Cuba with a drink that I invented just for this pairing: a Double Rum Old Fashioned. This is a sweet and citrusy drink that adds an acidic and smooth element to the pairing, and this is a drink that’s so familiar and tasty that it would easily be enjoyed by most drinkers.

Double Rum Old Fashioned

in an old fashioned glass, add:

  • 1/4 oz simple syrup
  • 2 dashes of orange bitters
  • 1/2 oz spiced rum
  • stir well, and fill glass with ice
  • add 1 1/2 oz aged rum and stir again until cold
  • garnish with a lemon twist
Thanks to Holt’s Cigar Company for sponsoring Simple Guy Stuff. 
Enter the promo code SIMPLE at check out and receive a complimentary 10% discount on your purchase! Discount is available online only. Certain exclusions apply. Offer expires January 31, 2018 – cannot be combined with other coupon codes.  Limit one discount per customer.​

Ashton Cabinet

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The Ashton Cabinet is a luxury cigar, both in its build and flavor profile. Its tobaccos are aged 4-5 years and it results in a flavorful, mild profile with touches of citrus, honey, cashews and cedar. The Ashton Cabinet is one of hundreds that are available to order from Holt’s Cigar Company.

I smoked the Ashton Cabinet in the #7 size, which measures 6 ¼ inches (length) by a 52 ring gauge (thickness). It’s solidly built with a smooth, creamy wrapper with tasting notes of black pepper and nuts. While the overall strength level and flavor profile of this cigar is quite mild, there is a nice, balance selection of flavors to enjoy as you smoke it through.

I paired the Ashton Cabinet with a cocktail that’s easy to make: the Black Manhattan. Consisting of 2 oz whiskey (rye or bourbon preferred), 1 oz Averna, 2 dashes of bitters and a cherry garnish, the Black Manhattan turned out to be an excellent companion to the Ashton, as both share a prominent and complementary flavor profile. Averna, an Italian amaro (Italian for “bitter”), is a rich and flavorful collection of herbs and citrus that complemented the Ashton so well, I was pretty shocked.

Together, the Aston Cabinet from Holt’s and a Black Manhattan are excellent companions. The intermingling of the nutty and citrus notes and the excellent quality of the cigar ensured a long and pleasant pairing experience.

Thanks to Holt’s Cigar Company for sponsoring Simple Guy Stuff. Enter the promo code SIMPLE at check out and receive a complimentary 10% discount on your purchase! Discount is available online only. Certain exclusions apply. Offer expires January 31, 2018 – cannot be combined with other coupon codes.  Limit one discount per customer.​

Ashton Virgin Sun Grown (VSG)

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Ashton Virgin Sun Grown (or VSG) is a central blend in the acclaimed Ashton portfolio. For more than 30 years, the Ashton brand has been a favorite among lovers of premium, handcrafted cigars. VSG debuted in 1999 and is renowned for a smooth, but potent profile of aged Dominican tobaccos beneath a succulent Ecuador Sumatra wrapper leaf. Holt’s Cigar Company hosts a phenomenal selection of cigars online, perfect for any cigar lover looking to purchase and taste every available variety of Ashton VSG.

As I fired up the blend, an enticing profile of cedar, espresso and dark chocolate showered my palate with creamy Dominican spices and a luscious complexity. Ashton cigars are blended and handcrafted by the legendary Fuente family in the Dominican Republic. The family’s patient aging of select tobaccos truly distinguishes VSG with iconic flavor.

I was particularly drawn to the cigar’s format, a VSG Illusion, which is 6 ½ (inches) by a 44-ring-gauge (thickness). The long, somewhat slender shape provides ample room for savoring a wealth of tasteful transitions, from the beginning puffs down to the nub.

I paired my cigar with a “new” rum from Bacardi: Havana Club Añejo. Although Havana Club has been around for quite some time when you consider its historic Cuban origins, Bacardi has introduced the blend to the U.S. by distilling it in Puerto Rico to work around the ongoing Cuban trade embargo.

The rum’s natural sweetness merged elegantly with VSG’s creamy spices and bold, woody aromas. I highly recommend that fans of rum and cigars indulge in the luxurious combination presented by Bacardi and Ashton, a pair of classic, world-renowned brands. A supremely satisfying experience awaits!

Thanks to Holt’s Cigar Company for sponsoring Simple Guy Stuff. Enter the promo code SIMPLE at check out and receive a complimentary 10% discount on your purchase! Discount is available online only. Certain exclusions apply. Offer expires January 31, 2018 – cannot be combined with other coupon codes.  Limit one discount per customer.​

Sensor Push

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Cigar lovers everywhere seem to be locked in a battle of always trying to keep their sticks at just the right temperature and humidity. From humidors to coola-dors to tupper-dors, smokers know that too little or too much humidity will lead to unpleasant smoking or worse, critters like tobacco beetles.

Up until now, I’ve used a digital hygrometer to read the humidity in my humidor, and it’s been very unreliable. Lately, it’s stopped giving me a readout at all for some reason. Hygrometers, both digital and analog, require regular calibration, and ultimately, I’m too lazy to do all that….but I love my cigars to be well cared-for.

Now, I’ve discovered a device that does what I need, and allows me to be as paranoid at monitoring my moisture levels as I want: Sensor Push. A small self-enclosed device that is just set-it-and-forget-it, Sensor Push gives you temperature and humidity readings on an app in your smartphone. Each sensor retails for $50 at Amazon and you can use as many as you’d like.

Setting up a Sensor Push device is easy: open their free app, then tap “add device.” Hold your sensor up to the screen, and it conpairs. It connects with bluetooth from the device to your phone, so as long as you’re within 30-50 feet of your sensor, it’ll constantly send data to your phone. If you’re not close enough to the sensor, though, it stores data up to 20 days while it waits for your phone to be back in range.

Sensor Push has also introduced a wifi gateway for $100 that allows you to monitor temperature and humidity from anywhere you have internet. It’s not required, but if you’re away from your sensor a lot, you may want to consider it.

(Click to zoom).

I’ve been using 2 Sensor Push devices for the last 2 weeks, one in my humidor and one in my living room. I’ve been really happy with the data the app provides, especially compared to my old junky hygrometer (which consistently reported the wrong humidity). Above are some screen shots of the Sensor Push app at work, just click to view the image in high-res. Note that on my humidor sensor, I’ve set a range of temperature and humidity I want it to remain at. If my humidor drops below 58% humidity, it warns me with a notification.

As a cigar smoker who lives in a desert climate, Sensor Push is proving to be invaluable in the both accuracy of its data and the long-term outlook of using the device. The company says battery life is 1-2 years and calibration is basically never required.

Rocky Mountain Cigar Fest 2016

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My coverage of Rocky Mountain Cigar Festival in Denver is now live at Cigar and Spirits Magazine. Check out the summary of the event here, and here are some individual brand profiles:

As a bonus for Simple Guy Stuff readers, here’s an interview I did with Willy Herrera of Drew Estate about his upcoming cigar blend releases:

Old Henry Cigars

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Holt’s Cigar Company, which is mostly a mailorder outfit unless you’re in the Pennsylvania area, has their own line of cigars: Old Henry, which are available exclusively from them. If Old Henry isn’t a familiar name to you, it wasn’t to me either. If, however, you pop the hood on these stogies (or simply look on the bottom of the box), you’ll notice a very familiar manufacturer behind them: the Garcia family.

If that’s not ringing a bell, the Garcia family blends cigars of their own brands, including My Father (Cigar Aficianado’s cigar of the year last year ) and Flor de Las Antillas (cigar of the year in 2012), then they also blend the Tatuaje family of cigars, and occasionally some others, too (like this one). Based out of Esteli, Nicaragua, the Garcia family has a good reputation for blending great cigars, and these Old Henry blends are no exception to the rule.

I got to try the “Best in Show Assortment” of Old Henrys, which includes 2 each of Pure Breed, Old Henry, Maduro, and Gold Label blends, all in Toro size (6×52), packed in a cedar box. These retail at $5.50 each for the last 3, and under $6.50 for the Pure Breed. The Best in Show Assortment will run you $29.99 from Holt’s.

Each of these blends are spicy (as Nicaraguan tobacco tends to be), a bit oily, and very well-built. Here are some distinguishing characteristic of each one:

Pure Breed. Medium-full bodied; medium strength. Nicaraguan tobacco in a Ecuador Sumatra wrapper. Smokes sweet and spicy with quite a bit of earthy flavor in the wrapper. Flavor profile is the most complex of the bunch and varies between spice, earth and pepper throughout.

Old Henry. Full bodied; medium strength. Nicaraguan tobacco in a Nicaraguan Corojo wrapper. A spicier experience, plus cream and leather. Highly flavorful, yet the strength is very manageable.

Maduro. Full bodied; medium-full strength. Nicaraguan tobacco and Connecticut Broadleaf maduro wrapper. Similar to the standard Old Henry in spice, but more chocolately and wet overall.

Gold Label. Medium bodied, medium strength. Nicaraguan tobacco and Ecuador Connecticut wrapper. The lightest blend of the bunch, but just barely lighter in its profile. Still plenty spicy though also creme brulee, vanilla and cinnamon notes.