Cigar of the Week - Cupidos Campana from Cuban Crafters
Cupido Criollo Compana are box-pressed with a Criollo wrapper and using Cuban-seed habano long leaf binder and filler,   All the Cuban seed tobacco used in each cigar is from the Cupido Vegas, a small tobacco field in Esteli, Nicaragua that yields extra rich tobacco. Each cedar box is numbered and contains 25 cigars. It is also dated with the packing date and signed by all the cigar artisans that created these works of art. Only 9,000 boxes are made yearly for the worldwide market.
After a few years out of the market, Cupido is back.  Tonight we are smoking the Compana, a box pressed Torpedo 5.5 x 54. Only 900 boxes per year.
On the Dark Side - Partagas serie D 5 Edicion Limitada 2008
Length: 4.3 inches (110mm)
Ring Gauge: 50
Factory Shape: Robustos
Strength: Medium - Full
All the leaves (filler, binder and wrapper) have been aged at least for two years in thi mini-mite from Partagas.  A continuation to the popular Partagas Serie line, this stick has been praised and damned for being more powerful than its predecessors and having a less refined blending of the tobacco's.
Year of Foundation: 1845
Tobacco Country: Cuba
Tobacco Procedence: Vuelta Abajo (Pinar del Rio)
Cigar Factory: Partagas
The Partagas cigar brand is named for it's founder, Don Jaime Partagas, who began manufacturing Cuban cigars in 1827, but put his own name on his line of cigars in 1845. After his death, the Partagas brand passed to Ramon Cifuentes in 1889 and was owned by Cifuentes y Cia. prior to nationalization, earning a mention by name in English novelist Evelyn Waugh's 1945 work, Brideshead Revisited. Partagas cigars also won gold medals in at least three international cigar expositions between 1867 and 1884. There is no doubt about the strong, intense flavour of this Cuban cigar line and it is still produced in the Partagas cigar factory in La Habana, Cuba, renamed Fernando Perez after nationalization.
What else have you been smokin' Dale?-  Rocky Patel Decade Robusto - 5 x 50, nicely box pressed, dark Sumatra wrapper. This batch is outstanding! Well balanced, complex and smooth with lots of rich flavors & full body.  Alec Bradley Prensado Robusto - blended around this new Honduran grown Corojo 2006 wrapper leaf, a Jalapa binder from Nicaragua and Honduran & Nicaragua fillers give this cigar structure & strength with deep, dark flavor. Very elegant looking, rolled in the Raices Cubanas factory and starting to show up on B&M shelves now.   Casa Magna Oscuro Toro 6 x 52 - Take the 2008 Casa Magna Nicaraguan puro, add a silky Honduran grown Oscuro wrapper and you end up with a cigar worthy of Cigar of the Year consideration. Coffee, cocoa & roasted nut flavors. Good spice finishes off the cigar leaving you wanting more!     Diesel Unholy Cocktail 5 x 56 torpedo - by AJ Fernandez - PA Broadleaf wrapper, Nicaragua filler & binder. Earthy, with leather, peat & spice! A very nice sweetness from the wrapper is like light fruit. Lots of strength, yet creamy & smooth with deep mouthfeel.  Don Lino 1989 Robusto 5 x 50 - Made in the D.R. from a filler blend of Brazilian, Camaroon and Domincan tobaccos in an Indonesian binder. Covered in a medium brown Connecticut wrapper.
What else have you been smokin' Bob? - La Aurora Ecuador - I have not seen these around very often,the few I smoked were of a petite robusto or corona size (rg of 48) and the flavor was full of a floral spice with a slightly acidic sour flavor. On balance a wonderful cigar.
Ernesto Perez Carillo Inaugural Edition - I want more, extremely smooth and medium bodied this cigar presents a uniquely subtle flavor profile that is driven by the specially grown Ecuador Habano seed wrapper, musky flavors of oats dominate and spice and pepper come on towards the middle of the cigar:
Cigar: Carrillo Edicion Inaugural 2009
Size: 5.38 x 52
Wrapper: Ecuador (Aged 3 Years)
Binder: (Dual Binder) Dominican Republic & Nicaragua (Aged 5 Years)
Filler: Dominican Republic (Aged 2 Years)
Strength: Medium
La Herencia Oscuro - La Herencia De Cuba is a cigar factory and smoke shop in Ybor City, Florida. Master roller Roberto Ramirez leads the production of truly unique cigars: Dominican, Columbian, Nicaraguan
Binder: Equadorian
Wrapper: Equadorian
If you are the type of person that has to have sugar in your coffee or who eats only milk chocolate, then this green labeled oscuro may not be for you. However, if you like to experience unique cigar flavors and are open to a slightly bitter, robust cigar with hints of pepper, then this may be the cigar for you. Overall this is a full flavored cigar that exudes a spicey and bitter flavor profile that I have not had before. The dominant flavor is bitter chocolate backed up with the slightly floral spice and pepper. At first, I thought this was going to be trouble, but as I smoked in to it I became a fan.
Next week's Cigar Of The Week is the Esencia Robusto, Merry Christmas and we also have the VEGAS ROBAINA DON ALEJANDRO on the Dark Side and Jeff Curtis Unbanded.
Music provided by 25 Smokin' Figurados and The Surfonics.

DWCR 12-18-90 MP3