Arturo Fuente:Hemingway:Between The Lines

After going through some of my past reviews I was surprised to see that I didn't review anything remotely rare. Well today I bring you the Hemingway Between The Lines. I originally planned to age this cigar, but with me moving to a new house and a bottle of Baileys on a sunny day I couldn't think of a better time to smoke one of my rarities. This cigar was first conceived by Cynthia Fuente who wanted a cigar that was flavorful but yet not harsh. The BTL is only released on Christmas season on very limited quantities and to only a very lucky few. This limited window to get a BTL only adds tinder to the hype machine that is Arturo Fuente and like many Fuente's, getting one of these for the MSRP is very hard. But tobacco is tobacco,it comes goes, and today here's my attempt to review one.


SPECS-

Size-4.5x54
Wrapper-Connecticut Shade and Maduro
Binder-Dominican
Filler-Dominican
Price-$13.95
Cut-Straight
Smoke Time-45 mins
Drink-Bailey's Over Ice


FIRST IMPRESSIONS- This cigar in short words is just neat. The wrapper is very clean and almost veinless. The double wrapper seam very close together, one could think that the Fuentes grew a Wrapper leaf that is multicolored when analyzing the overall neatness of the cigar. The nearly smooth wrapper presented a succulent aroma of cedar and slight hay. The cold taste produced a very good draw that showed a bit of earth and slight chocolate truffle, the natural sweetness of the wrapper leave left a good taste on the lips. The craftsmanship of this cigar is pretty much perfect.


FIRST HALF-The nipple end of cigar was very easy to light and even with the slight breeze I was having the cigar took a flame really well. At the first puffs the cigar produces a unique taste of creamy cedar that I never experienced. The cedar produces a undertone of hay which itself has an undertone of black pepper. The profile is very mild and smooth producing subtle tastes of ripe peanuts and a nutmeg finish. There's not much going on on this first half. The main flavors of hay and cedar play on each other and sometimes highlight and outshine each other leaving the smoker with a very interesting experience. The burn is good and with a room note of sweet honey this delicacy can definitely be attributed to the touch of a woman.


LAST HALF-This cigar isn't very big on flavor spectrum. The main flavors of this cigar never really change. But what does change is the texture of the smoke. The cigar goes from a creamy wonderland to a Oreo cookie splendor. Towards the end of the cigar the smoke leaves and feels like a hearthy chocolate cake in your mouth, very soft yet moist. The finish changes from an earthy chocolate to a dry cocoa powder, what this cigar lacks in flavors it makes up for it in the smoke profile. The creaminess of Baileys just adds to the overall flavor of the cigar.


FINAL IMPRESSIONS-This to me is easily one of my favorite AF cigars. The cigar is mild and flavorful. But here's one major flaw about this cigar, the flavors and the profile sometimes is too mild. This cigar reminds of me chicken, mild but with a good taste, chicken can be prepared in many different ways but in the end it will taste like chicken and we all know chicken can get rather boring and bland. While I was smoking this cigar I wished for just a bigger bloom of smoke for my palate or maybe more array of flavors to sample, and this is the only bad thing about this cigar, everything else is just perfect. This cigar is worth every penny of its MSRP but paying anything over the MSRP is just crazy. After all chicken is just chicken even if it lays golden eggs.

Rating:92
Buy It Again? Yes
Recommend It? Yes

A.Fuente Anejo:No. 49:Maduro

Time to shake off the dust on my cigar notebook today, after a solid 3 months without posting I feel bad about not updating you, my fellow readers on my cigar adventure. This brief hiatus was due to me not having a digital camera and I sorta felt bored with the blog in general. I hope this blog would of spread like wildfire once I released it, but to my avail it didn't. I did capture the attention of a few and for that I'm thankful for y'all not giving up on me. But enough chit chat and circle jerking, its review time. Today I bring you a rather infamous cigar. The Arturo Fuente Anejo. After 1998's hurricane swept through the Caribbean it left a huge aftermath. The Fuente farm found itself without its Rosado Wrapper leafs. After some digging the Fuentes found a Aged Maduro leaf, (hence the word "Anejo") and with the new found leaf and previous filler tobacco they created the Anejo. So if this cigar is about fresh starts and here's mine.

SPECS-
Size-8x49
Wrapper- Conne. Broadleaf Maduro
Binder-Dominican
Filler-Dominican
Price-~$14
Cut-Straight
Smoke Time-1 hour and a Half
Drink-Coke

FIRST IMPRESSIONS-The wrapper leaf on this cigar looks weather worn. The dark brown leaf presents thick veins and small discolored spots. But in between the lines is a smooth fragrant cedar leaf. This cigar had very good overall construction with just a small soft band near the band. The leaf was slightly salty on the lips and the near perfect draw had woodsy sweetness almost contradicting the rum and raisin scented foot.


FIRST HALF-The cedar in this cigar seems like a big flavor in this cigar. As the cigar develops the initial puffs are of a dry cedar with an undertone of red pepper. The initial dry finish is soon replaced by chocolate and a rum sweetness, this is what I describe as a Anejo signature taste. I've smoked lots of Anejo's and they all seem to have this main flavor. Exploring the flavor it presents a vanilla wafer after taste and is slightly musky.


LAST HALF-In the last half the volume in the last half picks up tons of smoke. The main Anejo flavor now gets slightly tart but still maintaining its original flavor. The cedar turns sweeter and the pepper is at its most pleasant at this point hiting the nose smoothly. Through out the smoke the flavor never really changes up, that main flavor usually is completed by slight woodsy flavors. sometimes cedar and oak with slight Cinnamon backdrops is ussually hinted but never remain.


FINAL IMPRESSIONS- A. Fuente does tend to make some epic cigars from time to time. But what Fuente is really more famous for is being a hype machine. I believe they can get their regular Gran Reserva line, slap a new band on it and say only 200 cigars were made people would swear by them. The Anejo is not one of those cigars. Overall the Anejo line is good, the flavors are deep,pleasant and overall a great experience. But if you're not one of those lucky few that can get these in season this experience might cost you $30.


Rating-88
Buy It Again? Sure.
Suggest It? Sometimes, while its season is a great smoke.

Arturo Fuente:King B:Rosado

Arturo Fuente is a bit tricky with me. They have some alright blends. I feel like they specialize more in rare cigars than everyday smokes. Every cheap cigar I tried by AF has been somewhat lacking. The 8-5-8 is a good example of this, to me they don't make good everyday smokes. Well today I bring you a King B, a somewhat rare smoke that when priced right is just about in the everyday smoke price range but since these are kinda rare they also tend to be overpriced, so how does this semi-rare cigar smoke? Like its rare brother the Opus? Or is this like its other sibling the 8-5-8? Lets find out.

SPECS-
Size-6x55
Wrapper-Ecuador Sun Grown
Binder-Dominican
Filler-Dominican
Cut-Guilatine at a angle
Price-$9.60
Smoke Time-45 mins

FIRST IMPRESSIONS-This is a very pretty cigar. The torpedo is very solid, no mushiness. The wrapper was very veiny but the brown smooth wrapper made them blend in very well. The wrapper had a nice cedar smell to it probably due to the cedar sleeve its packaged in. Foot was slightly coconuty with a bit of earth on the background. The cold taste produced a easy draw with no particular flavor, so far nothing too overwhelming.

FIRST HALF-Yup, another review in halves. It's easy to write a review on a cigar that you like, but when a cigar disappoints its very hard to describe it. So excuse me if you find this review slightly lacking. The cigar opens up very spicy on the back of the throat, after the first initial spice you are left with a very dry finish. If you venture to smoke this cigar make sure you have plenty of water. Once you get used to the harsh smoke hints of vanilla add to the dryness. After the finish small touches of nuts with a hay undertone are introduced adding more to the already sharp flavor profile. The burn was also iffy, the burn line would sometimes stray off and the cigar would put itself out. I think I got a fluke but this cigar tasted too much like the candella.

LAST HALF-The smoke is still disappointing, the cigar turns for the worst. Little by little the smoke gets darker and stingier. The spice is still there and very much dry.Almost all the familiar flavors on the first half are lost except the mocha that is introduced does have a small hint of nuts. After the longest ash fell the cigar just completely got bitter. The smoke tasted stale,very dry,and a nasty bit of tobacco is there. I quickly put the cigar out the flavor gave me a nasty headache and a terrible nicotine buzz. I can handle strong cigars but for some reason this cigar just gave me a huge dollop of nicotine. I was happy I didn't pay for this cigar since this was a gift from my Cousin. (Thanks Paul).

LAST IMPRESSIONS- The King B seems to be either hit or miss. I talked to many people that liked it and other people that hated it. I wanted to like this cigar but I feel that Fuente doesn't make anything good that's available everyday. So far I feel that Fuente should just make their rare stogies and not focus their attention anywhere else. At $9 bucks a pop its a rip-off really and even if it never got harsh and just the same dry flavor profile is not worth $9.

RATING-60
Buy It again?No
Recommend It? Only if you got it as a gift and who ever gave you it assured you that the cigar you just got is one of the better blends.