Monday, February 27, 2012

Drew Estate Tabak Especial Red Eye Review

Wrapper: Connecticut Broadleaf
Filler: Nicaraguan
Price: $7.00

As many of you have probably noticed, I have not reviewed many flavored or infused cigars. Well after talking to a friend of mine, he offered to send me a few different infused cigars for me to review. He is, what I consider, a very knowledgeable person when it comes to this genre of cigars. There was part of me that was hesitant to try these, but I knew it was something that I could do to change the pace of my reviews every once and awhile.

I chose to review the Red Eye first because I was told that it was probably one of the better ones to start with to ease into this type of cigar. Well the dark brown wrapper on this cigar was very smooth with only a couple very thin veins in it. The cap lays perfectly flush and has a small twisted end on it. There is also a shaggy foot on this cigar that makes it very easy to light. As i was finishing up inspecting this cigar, I noticed how solid it was and just how strong the chocolate smell was coming from this cigar. 



As soon as I touched this cigar to my lips I could taste the strong sugar and coffee notes that were infused into this cigar. Once I lit it up, the flavors were even stronger. Behind all of the sweetness is a strong earthiness with a nice mild spice. As this cigar progressed, there was a nice woodiness that picked up. Once the woodiness came out, it was a little easier to focus on the traditional flavors while keeping the infused flavors as nice accents.

Once I got about an inch into this cigar my palate was completely covered in the sugary sweetness. The flavor became very creamy, even though the spice picked up a little bit. The combination of spiciness and sweetness worked perfectly with the earthy and woody background.

As I got into the second third of this cigar the coffee flavors became much stronger. Just when I started to get used to all of the sweet infused flavors, the profile switched. The sweetness actually mellowed out quite a bit and left me with an even stronger wood and earth profile. The spice was still there and added some great accents o the traditional flavors.

As I entered the last couple inches of this cigar, the flavors really mellowed out quite a bit. The spiciness was very light, as well as the chocolate-like sweetness that was present throughout the whole cigar. As I finished up this cigar, the wood and earth notes stayed strong and combined to with the supple notes to lead to a great finish.

The ash on this cigar was a medium shade of gray and actually held on until the halfway point of this stick. The burn was completely even throughout, which was very nice. The draw was very easy, which helped to produce a very thick white smoke. Because of how thick the smoke was, it was easy to pick out the very sweet notes in the aroma.

I have to admit, I did enjoy the change of pace that this cigar gave me. I usually don’t smoke flavored or infused cigars unless I am asked to review them, and now, I have a ton more to review. I have to give this cigar a 8 out of 10 because I enjoyed it. The construction was flawless and the traditional flavor notes were just as prominent as the infused flavor notes.

Thanks for reading,

Zack the Stogie Man

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