PeanutPete and I met up at 10MS yesterday and fired a couple of sticks over a great afternoon tea.
RA Allones Superiores - this is a very nice, good value CC. Not game changing but a very good addition to the range. Draw was a little loose but burn was perfect for a young stick.
Hard to describe but a really good 'Cuban' if you know what I mean? 3-5 years and these will be a staple, go-to smoke (a bit like the Boli GM). Great vitola and price, put some down now while they are still on the original release. I put this in the same quality as the new H.Upmann Noellas, a very welcome addition of a decent standard.
COH Custom Rolled - (if you need to ask what this is, you can't) - For those of you who have not seen these they are a big Belecosos vitola, 52-54 ring gauge and about 6.5 inches long.
Construction - Excellent. Dark, silky maduro wrapper, very heavy and densely packed. Was worried there would be draw problems with so much leaf in there but first pre-draw pull revealed a perfect draw (clearly a lot of effort has gone into the build standard of these sticks).
Fire it up - Wow, this is a big smoke. Huge mouth-fulls of thick creamy smoke. Pete an I were almost silent for the first third apart from comments like 'now this is a stick' and 'this is a big stick'. Huge body (perhaps too much), deep tobacco and coco flavour, huge creamy mouth-feel and loads of nicotine.
I would describe this smoke as something between a Cohiba Maduro/aged Siglo VI/old school Juan Lopez meeting a RA Phonecios with a dash of Trinidad. The levels of rich, creamy smoke surpassed anything I have smoked before (and is often what I hope for in high-end sticks, but rarely is realised).
By half way down we were both shocked and a little scared as the strength picked up, there really is a lot of tobacco in these sticks. I purged mine as it was getting a touch tarry and continued down.
There was little in the way of development, a little spice came in towards the end but fairly linear overall.
If this was a smaller stick (perhaps 42-44 gauge) with a couple of years on it to develop it could be one of the greats.
Not for the faint hearted or uninitiated but if you like a big smoke this will blow your mind.
RA Allones Superiores - this is a very nice, good value CC. Not game changing but a very good addition to the range. Draw was a little loose but burn was perfect for a young stick.
Hard to describe but a really good 'Cuban' if you know what I mean? 3-5 years and these will be a staple, go-to smoke (a bit like the Boli GM). Great vitola and price, put some down now while they are still on the original release. I put this in the same quality as the new H.Upmann Noellas, a very welcome addition of a decent standard.
COH Custom Rolled - (if you need to ask what this is, you can't) - For those of you who have not seen these they are a big Belecosos vitola, 52-54 ring gauge and about 6.5 inches long.
Construction - Excellent. Dark, silky maduro wrapper, very heavy and densely packed. Was worried there would be draw problems with so much leaf in there but first pre-draw pull revealed a perfect draw (clearly a lot of effort has gone into the build standard of these sticks).
Fire it up - Wow, this is a big smoke. Huge mouth-fulls of thick creamy smoke. Pete an I were almost silent for the first third apart from comments like 'now this is a stick' and 'this is a big stick'. Huge body (perhaps too much), deep tobacco and coco flavour, huge creamy mouth-feel and loads of nicotine.
I would describe this smoke as something between a Cohiba Maduro/aged Siglo VI/old school Juan Lopez meeting a RA Phonecios with a dash of Trinidad. The levels of rich, creamy smoke surpassed anything I have smoked before (and is often what I hope for in high-end sticks, but rarely is realised).
By half way down we were both shocked and a little scared as the strength picked up, there really is a lot of tobacco in these sticks. I purged mine as it was getting a touch tarry and continued down.
There was little in the way of development, a little spice came in towards the end but fairly linear overall.
If this was a smaller stick (perhaps 42-44 gauge) with a couple of years on it to develop it could be one of the greats.
Not for the faint hearted or uninitiated but if you like a big smoke this will blow your mind.
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