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What is your favorite brand/manufacturer? WHY?
oldsoulrevival
Posts: 632 ✭✭
Subject says it all.. will post on this topic later.
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oldsoulrevival
Posts: 632 ✭✭
oldsoulrevival
Posts: 632 ✭✭
oldsoulrevival
Posts: 632 ✭✭
Comments
2. DPG/AJ this tie cannot be broken, it changes daily
3. Liga
Padron is what got me into smoking. I always tend to have a decent amount of natural's in the humi and always will. The anny maduro's are unbelievable IMO and one of few cigars I look at the price tag and say...yup it's worth it. I cannot think of any other cigar I wuod be willing to pay $20+ for and nto have a problem with it, although I have several in the humi waiting for that and I'd imainge those who've had Behike's might chime in. The Opus is amazing too, but I can't justify the price tag for some reason when people inflate the retail.
2. Illusione Epernay
3. LADC before and after DPG started blinding for them
4. AF
5. Kristoff
Everytime I smoke a Padron it's as if it was made just for my specific pallet. They are really the only brand of cigar that i enjoy both natural and maduro lines. Also all of their anniversary series are amazing. I totally agree with Catfish when saying that a Padron cigar is well worth the money!
Cuban Cohiba Gran Reserva, Behike, San Cristobal La Habana, Robina's Don Alejandro
Padron 1926 #9, 80th anniversario, 45th Family Reserve
Arturo Fuente's Don Carlos Annivesario, Opus X
Viaje Oro Reserva # 5
Davidoff Crown Series, Millenium Blend
Complex flavor profile and consistency
Illusione- I always have some in the humidor
Tatuaje - Pete makes some fantastic sticks
everything they do is nothing short of amazing.
Davidoff (of course), Avo, The Griffin... heck, even the 3x3 is fantastic.
Dominican Tobacco is anything but weak and flavorless. they just produce SO MUCH tobacco in the dominican. the good stuff gets gobbled up by good blenders and the crap is stuck with people that cant or wont pay for good tobacco. since there is so much of it, it goes CHEAP. hence TONS of mediocre cigars with dominican tobacco and a few that are done right.
that being said, i find that i like Honduran tobacco better than dominican. there is a round nuttiness to it that i find in no other tobacco, especially stuff in the Jamastran Valley. Camacho is a close second (though i know they are part of Davidoff i tend to view them as a different company because the people at Davidoff dont actually blend the Camacho line they just own it) but i feel that Davidoff just has more subtitles, complexities, refinement, and i have been finding myself shying away from the ultra full cigars that camacho tends to produce.
Money can't buy happiness, but it can buy cigars and that's close enough.
If you talk about a single tobacco producing country then Cuba is always ahead. Cuba is the only country which exclusively make Cuban Puro and has no intention to blend with other countries.
Tobacco can be weak(some Dominican) or strong(Honduran or Nicaraguan) but both can be full of flavor and aroma. General cigar, Altadis mostly use average Dominican tobacco, that is why they are weak and can be with less flavor. Dominican Piloto Cubano is medium but very flavorful tobacco. Dominican Yaque valley produces some excellent tobacco. Outside Cuba most of the cigar producing countries blend their cigars either with Nicaraguan, Honduran, Dominican, Ecuadorian, Brazilian, Peruvian, Indoneshian, Mexican, US or Cameroon tobacco for wrapper, binder of filler. Opus X, some La Flor Dominicana cigars are entirely Dominican puros.
Honduras produces some good puros because Camacho is the only company in the world outside Cuba who successfully produces first generation Corojo Seed tobacco with Davidoff quality construction.
I would say each country has unique taste to offer and outside Cuba each country offer unique flavor, aroma and strength to the cigars. I am not sure, I would say Dominican tobacco is weak and flavorless. Overall Dominican Republic still produces some great tobacco in my opinion.
LG by litto Gomes is a Dominican Puro and it is not weak and flavorless.
5 Vegas Relic (though not as good) is not weak and flavorless
Davidoff Puro d'oro is not weak (medium in body) and flavorless,
as i said before, it has more to do with the blender and how the tobacco is used than the country of origin.
all the Ligero gets bought up and used by the blenders willing to pay for it and the rest of it needs to go somewhere. lower quality cigar manufacturers buy it up and use it in very mild cigars.
there is weaker Honduran and Nicaraguan tobacco as well. Baccarat, a Honduran puro is pretty mild.
the JdN Cabinetta is a mild Nicaraguan cigar.
again, thats the blender. not the tobacco.
Here we do not see it as often because who is going to spend the money and effort to get a crappy cuban into the US. People only bring in well known brands recommended by others. Go elsewhere in the world you'll find just as many flavorless, mild or crappy cigars Cubans as you do Non-Cubans in the US. There is even a huge market for machine made cubans.
Also Cubans are only puros because of their government. If private industry was there I guarntee you'd see cuban wrappers on nicarguan fillers, etc. There are plenty of blenders using cuban tobacco, they just have a hard time getting it and aren't able to import a cigar using it into the US.
2. Padron
3. Oliva
With the exception of the Opus line (and thats just my palete) these manufacturers put out top notch cigars no matter what the price tag is, and each and every one of their blends is outstanding.
Also with a single exception (Oliva's Master Blends III), Ive never had a cigar from them that had ANY sort of construction issue (such as plugs, extremely tight or loose draw, needing consistent touch-ups on the burn, etc). That is HUGELY important to me, as I light cigars to smoke them, not fight with them.
EPC, Kelner, AJF
Its hard for me leaving DPG off of here but like I said it's a right this moment thing. And those 3 are not in any particular order.
I could be wrong though.
Also, I'm not saying I don't like Nic, Honduran, and Cuban tobacco. I do. I really like Honduran quite a bit, and Cuban would probably win over it if it wasn't such a pain in the ass (Consistency, difficultly of getting, etc). I know it's "easy" to get, but it's still a pain compared to other countries, to me at least. I guess I'm lazy. I'd rank Nicaraguan as my least favorite, but I still smoke it, and enjoy it when I'm in the mood, but it has a heavy, palate staining quality that I don't always care for.
This kind leads me a bit off topic to a thought I have often...why does one need to be better than the other, especially when the good qualities can be combined to make something better than the individual parts are capable of? I always see talk of "this being better than that", or "this isn't as good as the other one", etc..., and I don't know if it's just an American attitude about clearly defining the best or what. Or maybe I'm just doing that thing again where I overthink the situation.
to me this like asking who is the greatest guitar player ever. once you get to that top level it is so difficult to say what makes one better than another and some people have different styles and qualities that there is really no saying who is the "best" so its all subjective.
tobacco is all subjective. i mean, coke, or pepsi? Abita or stone? Pinot noir or Cabernet?
how do you develop criteria for whats "better?"
maybe thats why the thread is "favorite" not "best"