I’d like to think that one of the biggest names in the cigar trade today does their research, but I guess my standards are too high.

Courtesy of Stogie Review’s Brian Hewitt who posted a pic this morning on Twitter, we all know that the Fuente Family has debuted a new cigar called the ‘Julius Caesar’, but look closely at the picture below:

At the advent that your vision is poor the image is of Julius Caesar but the Fuentes have decidedly spelled the last name of one of history’s most famous men INCORRECTLY.  Sorry Carlito, but it’s ‘Caesar’ and not ‘Caeser’.

You’d think there’s spell-check or a marketing associate in charge of preventing such embarrassing mistakes down  at Chateau Fuente, but I guess that got tossed with a budget cut or something.
#CIGAR_FAIL

I generally think that I’m easy to please (my parents might disagree here!) and that’s a very generic statement, but I think it’s true: I’m not super-picky when it comes to a plethora of things, but like any human being I have my preferences and tobacco is no exception. I’m often asked by cigar smokers around the world what I enjoy and why and it’s difficult to narrow it down to a few brands or lines since what I want to smoke at any given moment is dependent on the situation and my surroundings.  Occasionally a customer or a random smoker in a lounge will ask me a rather interesting take on the trite, afforementioned question, which is “With all of the cigars out there to try, how would you know if you might like to try something or not?” The answer to that is simple: tell me a cigar’s composition and I’ll know if it’s worth me giving it a shot or not.

I don’t think you have to be a tobacco professional these days to be picky in the leaves you like because there are well-versed consumers that take their cigar smoking very seriously.  Out of the hundreds of different cigars I’ve tried over the years as usual with me I’ve narrowed things down to specific details all stemming from what leaves are used to make said cigar–it’s actually served me well when trying a label that’s unfamilar to me. Yes folks, I’m leaf-biased.

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MATA FINA

It’s taken me years to come to this conclusion, but I hands-down stick by my statement that Brazilian Mata Fina is the best wrapper leaf for a cigar I would want to smoke.  For me it’s like a best friend that I can depend on and I seriously love it with every tastebud on my palate.  I used to think it was under-utilized in the cigar industry because people misunderstood it, and while I think that’s partially still true, the real reason might lie in the fact that it is very expensive to buy. The Brazilians call it “Green Gold” and rightfully so: it’s a money maker for them and it’s a beautiful crop with an exquisite flavour profile.  So much emphasis is on Dominican, Honduran and Nicaraguan tobacco in the US Market and I don’t need to explain the reasons why, but this dark and rich tobacco has been documented as growing naturally in Bahia since the country’s discovery in the 16th century.

Do you know that you can actually roll a puro with Mata Fina tobacco?  This region actually produces a great crop that can be used as filler, binder AND wrapper and if you’ve not yet had a Mata Fina puro, do yourself a favour and get your hands on one.  Superb flavour, beautiful ash, attractive appearance, nice strength and great development from foot to cap. Since Bahia is home to Brazil’s sugar cane production, Mata Fina’s standout characteristic is it’s unique ability to give you a hint of spice at the front of the draw and just enough cane sugar essence in the back to bring everything to an equilibrium.

ARAPIRACA                                                                                                                                        

The name is fun to say and the tobacco makes a Hell of a wrapper: what more could you want?

Arapiraca is actually a municipality in the Brazilian State of Alagoas and since it’s mostly known for its tobacco production, it has been dubbed “The Tobacco Capital of Brazil.” Funny enough, but I’m sure most cigar smokers–even serious ones–have maybe only had a cigar with this leaf very few times in their smoking lives. (And before you yell at me for that statement, I am NOT counting CAO’s Brazilia cigar because of my personal issues with how that cigar came to be and why the Ozgener family couldn’t have come up with that blend if they tried.) Arapiraca is a little less sweet and lighter than a standard maduro leaf, but it’s something that when paired with the right binder and filler(s), allows for a magical smoking experience.

Charlie Toraño uses Arapiraca for his family’s “1959 Exdous 50 Years” (one of my personal weekly favourites), Alan Rubin used it for the Alec Bradley “Trilogy Exotic Maduro” and the latest cigar to hit the market is one near and dear to my heart, the Quesada 35th Anniversary. (Slight disclaimer for purists: the Quesada 35th actually uses an Arapiraca wrapper, but it was grown in Ecuador and not Brazil.)

CAMEROON

Any of you that know me personally know how cookoo I am for Cameroon: out of the leaves commonly used as wrappers many smokers will argue that it is the best wrapper leaf outside of Cuba.  Grown in Central Africa with an insanely temperate climate, Cameroon tobacco is completely sun-grown with a semi-permanent cloud cover allowing for the leaves to look more uniform in appearance. The one drawback to this tasty, tasty tobacco is that the leaves are general on the small side, so if you’re someone who enjoys a larger gauge, chances are you won’t be able to find a Cameroon in your preferred size.

Many well-known labels have a Cameroon in their arsenal, such as Fuente (Don Carlos & the Hemingway Series), Toraño (1916), H. Upmann (Vintage Cameroon), Partagas (Almirantes), and La Aurora (Aurora Cameroon) to name a few. Cameroon is out there, it’s tasty, dependable and produces a nice medium-bodied cigar that is pleasant without being boring.

Now I’m sure prefacing this review with what I’m about to say will create some backlash, but let’s just say those who won’t agree with me on this have fallen prey to a great Fuente plot: I don’t normally smoke anything from the Opus X collections because they are often overrated.  Anytime someone immediately makes something in limited supply and creates hype around it, it’s generally just a really good PR campaign and that lets me know not to waste my time.  I would’ve never smoked this cigar had my friend Barry not bought two sticks and like a typical man, told me we would have to have a “love affair”  together. <insert corny laughter here> I’m sorry to have to say it was better for Barry than it was for me and I finished first…. ;o)

Familia Fuente Opus X “Love Affair” (a cigar tribute to  Andy Garcia’s film, “The Lost City”): 50 x 4 9/16″

Appearance and Construction: The above pic was actually of Barry’s cigar and I have to say overall they are attractive perfectos.  Nice Dominican tobacco, slightly oily wrapper and it had very little veins, so it looked promising.  Unfortunately I did have two major appearance issues with the stick, and the paramount of the two was there were shiny, light-coloured spots on my cigar not too far underneath the label on the body.  I mentioned to Barry it looked like the watery glue that’s used to seal the label on cigars and he disagreed, but guess who was right? ; ) Also on the aesthetic side of things, if Fuente is going to make such a short cigar, I really feel they need to amend their labels because from the very beginning the giant Opus label was basically getting in the way.

I don’t have much to say in regards to construction, but for me the roll was a bit on the sloppy side.  (25/30 overall for category)

Delivery (Notes, etc): To the cigar’s credit the draw was incredibly easy throughout and upon lighting there were immediate — albeit slight — hints of coffee and wood.  Once off the “bulb” of the perfecto and into the main body of the smoke there were some lovely hints of sugar that for me didn’t last long enough, since I honestly hoped upon their initial tasting they would return later in the cigar but did not.  I know that in the Opus line there tends to be more spice than in your average Fuente, but here the spice notes were rather mellow and only made their entrance once I was halfway through the stick.

I really don’t like being negative, but one thing occured for both Barry and myself and that was almost three-quarters of the way through the “Love Affair.” Have you ever put a cigar down long enough to have it go out and then truly re-light it?  If so, then you are familar with that old ash/old smoke, semi-bitter Earthy taste that you get when that situation arises and this actually happened naturally for the both of us at the same point in our respective cigars.  (29/35 overall for the category)

Burn/Ash/Draw: Like I said before, the draw was just easy and that’s personally a good thing.  The ash was solid and although a bit flaky, wasn’t flying away from me, but I think that can be attributed to it’s size.  The burn itself was alright, but remember how I mentioned those supposed glue spots?  Well, let’s just say they came back to haunt me.

It didn’t take long for me to remove the imposing Opus X band and upon doing so, my glue theory was proven fact: after slowly beginning to remove the band, low and behold there was so much glue holding it together it took off a nice chunk of the wrapper.  Once this happened I have to say it started to crack and burn unevenly; honestly had this not been such a short cigar, I probably wouldn’t have been able to finish it based on this issue alone.  In the picture below you can see where the wrapper was ripped off by an overzealous, glue-loving employee of Tabacaleria Fuente:

Out of a possible 35 points, this rather unfortunate issue for me left the cigar’s score at a 25.

Overall Assessment: I hate to say “I told you so,” but I have to in this situation. I really want to give the Fuente family the benefit of the doubt, but here we have an example of a cigar manufacturer overextending itself with a specialty line that at the beginning was a good thing. Carlito Fuente Jr. seems a bit too bent on making a profit from the allure of the Opus X Collection because he knows consumers will not just pay the price, but they will often go on hunts for these limited edition cigars.  Just like the patching issue many of you have had with Rocky Patel cigars lately, I think my glue predicament is just as bad because I want to smoke tobacco, not tobacco with dried glue fingerprints on it.

*Final Score: 79

If you would like another opinion, go check out Barry’s site (www.acigarsmoker.com) because his experience was a bit different than mine; but then again, isn’t is always better for the man than the woman?