Well, it hasn't been months, but I have a few months cigar reviews to post. More to come.
I love having a friend who takes the time to reveiw our times of trying different cigars. I find myself doing a lot of writing, but not taking time to record our reviews. Shame. Enjoy these and I'll try to do a better job in the future.

The Pastor and the Shrink - Cigar reviews for your Mind and Spirit - The Rocky Patel 1961

Date: 6-14-2010
The Man Shed
Dave and Randy
Rocky Patel - 1961
Robusto - $8.00 from Churchill’s in Topeka

Randy and I decided to try this cigar from Rocky Patel . We have rarely been let down by a smoke from Rocky Patel (except the Indian Tabac Super Fuerte) and we are always excited to try a new product. Rocky Patel produces two of our all time favorites the Connecticut and the Decade. The 1961 has a fairly dark brown wrapper and has a bit of an oily sheen to it. It is well packed but not overly firm. It has some prominent veins that leads to it looking a little on the rough side particularly when compared to the exquisite appearance of the Decade or Old World Reserves.

The draw was relatively effortless and produced an abundant amount of thick smoke. Initially the cigar seemed to have a fairly strong taste profile with a significant amount of spice on the finish. However, very quickly (within about half an inch) this cigar turned into having a more medium body and mellowing out on the finish. It maintained some nice rich flavors but lost the spiciness and bite on the finish.

The burn started pretty well with this cigar, but it began to produce a wavy burn line and then Randy noticed that he was having trouble keeping his lit. There was significant flaking in the ash consistent with a cigar that is not tightly packed as are intermittent burn problems.

We paired this cigar with some Hoppin’ Frog Silk Porter (who knew they made good beer in Ohio?) and a bump of Glenmorangie Single Malt scotch. Both of these were very good and complemented the smoke.

In the end we liked this cigar but we did not love it. We gave it a score of 3. Randy indicated that he might give it a 4 if he smoked it again and enjoyed the flavor as much as he did this time and did not have the burn issues we experienced. I was not as enthusiastic about this cigar. To me it is clearly a 3, a good smoke but I could think of a number that I would prefer to have and most would cost less. Both of us would definitely smoke it again.
Monday, July 5, 2010
The Pastor and the Shrink - Cigar reviews for your mind and spirit - John Bull
2-22-2010John BullThe Man ShedDave and RandyRobusto - $4.00This is a relatively inexpensive cigar and you can tell. It has a light brown and very veiny wrapper. It is fairly spongy to the touch and I found a significant soft spot in the cigar about a third of the way down, this usually means that there will be burn problems in that area. I also found a split in the wrapper of my cigar. The interesting thing is that Randy’s cigar showed none of the construction issues that mine did – sometimes it is literally the luck of the draw.We clipped the cigars and tested the draw Randy found his to be just right, whereas mine was very tight. This was somewhat surprising as it was not at all tightly packed – this generally means that it is plugged and that is a significant problem. In looking at the cigar I do not see any clearly visible stems protruding that might be causing the blockage. As it is, I am really having to work at drawing air through the cigar.There is not much going on with this cigar it is very mild almost bland. There is a slight little spice or pepper on the finish but very little. The cigar burns pretty well although it has a thick and wavy burn line. It produces a relatively compact and tight ash without much coning. We paired this cigar with Fuller’s London Porter which is one of my favorite beers – my brother Rob introduced me to it and it has only recently become available in Kansas. It is a wonderful, rich, dark, and flavorful beer. I’m enjoying it much more than the cigar.This cigar was what we thought it was, to paraphrase ex-Arizona Cardinal’s football coach Denny Green. It was very mild and lacked in any interesting tasting notes. It started mild and stayed that way. As I said before it was pretty bland. I also had problems with mine in terms of its construction and draw. Randy did not experience any of those issues but still found the cigar fairly mediocre. We gave it a 2 – we would not go out of our way to smoke one and in fact would choose almost anything over it, but if you wanted to have a smoke while you were fishing or playing golf and did not want to feel bad if you had to abandon it this cigar would fit the bill.
Posted by Plains Sailor at 7:48 AM 0 comments
Sunday, July 4, 2010
Posted by Plains Sailor at 9:53 AM 0 comments