Life Goes On

I picked up a four pack tin of the Papas Fritas during my weekly trip to my favorite cigar store here in Spokane,  Cigar Train . I have been reading about these for a few weeks now and have wanted to give a Drew Estate product a try, (there are Undercrowns and Feral Pig in my humidor but I haven't had the time to smoke them yet), since I have been hearing good things about them. These short filler cigars are rolled using the clippings from the Liga Privada No. 9, a maduro wrapper and a Brazilian binder. These had only been in the humidor for a week but I couldn't wait any longer. I peeled back the cellophane and was pleasantly surprised to see the thickness of the maduro wrapper. The wrapper did contain a couple of smaller veins but it looked good with a fair amount of tooth to it. Putting the cigar to my nose I could smell notes of tobacco and anise. When I clipped the little pig tail off I was a bit surprised for a minute by the loose tobacco that fell out but then

Written by: Pipe Tobacco Place If not cleaned regularly, tobacco pipes can develop a sour taste. After you have smoked your pipe and knocked out all of the ash, use a  pipe cleaner  and run it gently through the stem, pushing it back-and-forth several times. Use as many pipe cleaners as you need until the last one comes out almost completely clean. Then take a pipe cleaner, bend it in half and swab the inside of the bowl with it, making one complete revolution in order to avoid building up too much cake, the carbonized tobacco that's stuck to the inside of the bowl. Cake insulates the bowl and allows good air flow around the tobacco, promoting a clean, even burn. Cake also prevents bowl burn outs and keeps your pipe burning cool and dry. Cake should be kept to a maximum of 1/16 of an inch thick, about the thickness of a dime. If the cake is thicker than that, it could expand while you are smoking the pipe and crack the bowl. When the cake gets thicker than 1/16 o

Written by: Pipe Tobacco Place Remember to take  slow, gentle and steady puffs  - sip at the pipe rather than gulp at it. Do not inhale the smoke; draw it in, savor the tobacco’s flavor and then gently blow it out of your mouth. If you puff too hard, you will burn the tobacco hotter and faster, which can ruin the tobacco’s taste. Puffing too hard on the pipe may also cause condensation to occur inside the tobacco chamber, which will make the tobacco taste even worse and make it harder to keep your tobacco lit. If you have properly packed and lit your pipe, your smoke should be cool and smooth. If you get “ tongue bite,”  that dreaded burning sensation on your tongue, you have not packed the tobacco firmly enough. If your pipe keeps going out, you most likely have loaded it too tightly. Do not worry if you have to light your pipe several times throughout the smoking process. Even the most seasoned pipe smokers often light their pipes several times while enjoying a bowl of

This is an introduction to an eight parts series of articles that will be posted over the next few days. I purchased my first pipe almost 40 years ago and have had a great many hours of enjoyment and misery along the way. If I had access to this information way back then--way before the internet--my hours of misery would have been drastically reduced. I hope you enjoy reading these as much as I did! ********* Written by: Pipe Tobacco Place So you've decided to smoke a pipe? Wise decision!  Pipe smoking is one of the most relaxing and pleasurable experiences that a person can enjoy. Smoking a pipe is a distinguished pleasure and you have chosen to join the elite few who call themselves  pipe smokers. As such, always smoke your pipe with respect for others and observe proper smoking etiquette. There's an almost infinite variety of  pipe tobacco  available, some of which may offend people around you, so consider the people around you when choosing your tobaccos,

Time was running out on an auction site. I had already picked up two, five packs and wanted a third to save on the shipping cost when I stumbled upon these at $5.00 with two minutes to go. Since they were Rocky Patel's I figured I couldn't go wrong so I pulled the trigger without even reading the description and two minutes later they were mine. The next day I went back to the auction site to browse around again and saw another five pack. This time I did read the description and to my surprise they were of Cuban-sandwich construction. I was a bit disappointed to read this but figured that since I started this site to review cigars that deliver the best bang-for-your-buck, they would fit right in. Once they arrived I could see that the construction on these sticks were top notch so I tucked them away in my daily smoke humidor so they could rest for a couple weeks. After two weeks I figured it was time to pull one out and give it a spin, to my surprise this is what I found

I have seen these General Grant cigars at rock-bottom prices online several times but have been unwilling to pull the trigger on a box so far. The other day while making my weekly run to Cigar Train I saw them in stock so I picked up a couple. I wanted to test-drive one of these on the drive home to decide if they were box-worthy. This is what I found... Quick Details Cigar Size: 5 x 42 Corona Origin: Dominican Republic Wrapper:  Sumatra Filler: Central America Price: $2.99 ea. or $29.99 in boxes of 30 online These General Grant cigars are free-hand rolled and a bit rough looking. However, I didn't let the looks of this cigar scare me off. The cold aromas were earthy and feeling down the cigars body, I found it was loosely packed the entire length. Once burning the cigar did burn well and the ash held tight for the first third. I found the cigar to be about medium in body with a simple and straight forward flavor profile. In the first half, flavors were a mix of

By Waxing Moon Humidors How to determine cigar count in a humidor! Typically, a rule of thumb for figuring out count.... is 100 cigars for every (overall) 700 cubic inches.... (or there 'bouts)  However.... if you take it a step further..... and look at the available space inside the humidor.... take away trays, tray supports, crumb catcher & dividers and let's say you have a space of 15.5" x 8.5" x 4" available to lay your cigars.... which comes out to be 527 cubic inches.... Now.... finally, I get to use the high school formula of Pi R Squared..... in order to determine the volume of a cigar. Cigar ring gauge is measured in 64ths of an inch... so, the radius of a RG 50 would be 25/64ths.... which converts to .390625  So, with the formula to determine the volume would be (Pi * .390625 squared * the length of the cigar) and using a 6/50 toro as an example, you wind up with a cigar volume of 2.876214 for each cigar. So... take the 527 cubic inches and

The San Cristobal Seleccion Del Sol is another cigar that proves that a cigar band can be an effective marketing tool. If you visit my personal Pinterest site you will see that I have a fondness for parrots and my desire to own and smoke this cigar won over my thriftiness forcing me to pay full retail to obtain one. This cigar was released by Ashton cigars in 2009 and is created from tobaccos all grown by Don Pepin Garcia on the family “Estrella” farm in Esteli, Nicaragua. This cigar is described on the Ashton web site as being medium to full-bodied with a rich and complex flavor profile. Let’s see how it turned out. Quick Details • Cigar Size: 5 x 52 • Origin: Nicaragua • Wrapper: Nicaraguan • Binder: Nicaraguan • Filler: Nicaraguan • Price: $8.00 Online Construction: Holding this cigar in my hand, the first thing I notice, besides the cool band with the parrot and the second band around the foot, is the overall quality of construction. The wrapper, which is held in plac

If you are a constant reader you know that I have mentioned in previous reviews how a cigar band can be a very effective marketing tool.  There are several cigars that I have purchased just because I liked the artwork on the band. Ave Maria cigars are another brand that because of their great band design, I became interested in trying their products and eventually had to buy a few. Let me explain this motivation a bit. After reading “The Da Vinci Code,” and several other novels, by Dan Brown, the mystery surrounding the Knights Templar organization really intrigued me. It intrigued me enough that over the years I have done great deal of research on the history concerning the rise and fall of the Knights Templar and this in turn spun off to more research on King Richard’s third crusade.  In a nutshell, how these events are portrayed on television and in movies (other than Dan Brown renditions), are not even close to what really happened Now that you know where my desire to smoke th