Having just returned from Portsmouth for a little 4 day getaway I had a package waiting for me from a member of cigarlive.com. Over at cigarlive.com it is a membership of people who love cigars. It’s a nice little community where some customs are observed. Two of them are cigar passes, and cigar  bombs. A cigar pass is where you sign up with 10-15 people or more and you pass a box of cigars around with random product or all the same cigars. You take a cigar or two you want, and replace it with a cigar of equal or more value and mail it to the next person. I just signed up for that, and should get my box in a couple of weeks. Another custom is cigar bombs. Well, that is what I had waiting for me when I got home. It was a cigar bomb consisting of 3 tatuaje cigars and 3 illusione cigars. Cigars I have desperately wanted to try…

So Sunday evening not wanting to end my little vacation mindset I headed down to the beach and lit up this baby which arrived a little damaged from the wonderful handling at our postal service. The tear in the wrapper was at the mid way point of the cigar along a vein but thankfully it did not affect this smoke one bit…

The Skinny:

Cigar: Tatuaje Exclusivo Lado Occidental
Origin: Nicaragua
Size: Verocu No. 1 6.25 x 52
Wrapper: Nicaragua (Cafe Rosado Oscuro)
Binder: Nicaragua
Filler: Nicaragua (Ligero)

Pre-Light: This is one gorgeous cigar; the color of the wrapper was an amazing reddish brown. It looked like a Cuban right down to its triple cap. The roll was flawless, and other then some  excessive veinage at the foot of the cigar, I really could find no fault with it. The smell of the  wrapper was an amazing black cherry, while the foot had a nice mix of cedar and spice. The pre-light draw was a little loose, and because of that I began to second guess the type of cut I used. I had used a straight cut when I should of gone with a hole punch. On the pre-light draw the cigar has notes of spice.

Smoke: All I can say is wow. I smoked this baby all the way til burned my fingers with no issues  what so ever. It has a nice straight burn line, never once needing to be touched up even with the  damage occurred in shipping. The initial hit was a little bit harsh, perhaps because in my mind I  was expecting a medium body cigar which it eventually became. However the first third was fuller  bodied with an overload of a leathery spice. As I approached the 2nd third of this cigar I was  teased with a little bit of licorice which became abundant in this section of the cigar. It was so  incredibly defined that it just wowed me. Introduced with the licorice was black cherry which  remained til the final third when some leathery spiced crept back in but remained in the background.

Overall: This was a well aged cigar. It was almost a sin to smoke it. One of the finest smokes I  have ever had. The dominant flavors of black cherry and licorice were so defined I was giddy with  delight right down to the nub. Other notes were cedar, leather and spices all of which mostly  stayed in the background. If I could go back in time this is one cigar I would want to smoke again and again.

My Local Price: A Cigar Bomb (Retail: $11.00)
Tinderbox: Tatuaje Cigars
Rating: 95 (Out of 100)