I went to see a roller, Christian Galvan, who works for General cigars at one of my favorite B&M’s in Amsterdam, Hartman cigars at the Beethovenstraat. Christian Galvan was there to roll cigars as part of the release of the Macanudo 1968 in The Netherlands. I smoked one right on the spot, and I brought one home to review and here it is.
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Macanudo came with this new blend and named it “1968” as that was the year that Cifuentes blended the original Macanudo café, so this is a cigar in his memory. The cigar is blended with tobacco from the Dominican Republic and Nicaragua, part of the filler comes from the remote island of Ometepe, which is located in the lake of a volcano. The binder is a Connecticut Habano and the wrapper is Honduran San Agustin Havana seed.
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The size of this fresh rolled cigar is 5.5 x 52 which is not a regular production size, it’s in between the 6 x 54 toro and the 5 x 50 robusto. The cigar smells like hay. The construction feels good though the draw is a bit on the loose side and gives me a mild peppery raisin flavor. The wrapper is smooth, oily and dark.
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I can taste toast, coffee and some pepper at the back of my throat. After a few puffs I also taste some bean but that flavor disappears soon, just like the toast. A chocolate flavor shows itself through the peppery coffee. After an inch the pepper joins the flavors that disappeared before and all I can taste is coffee with chocolate, of which the chocolate is slowly becoming the dominant flavor, but the flavors are well balanced.
After reaching the 1/2nd point of the cigar I get some toast again and at 2/3rd the chocolate disappears for just a few puffs. The grand finale brings me some cedar with chocolate and later some nuts and chocolate.
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I get a lot of smoke, the smoke is a bit thin though. The ash is silver-gray and firm. The draw is fine and the burn is great, straight and it won’t die easily. I didn’t need to purge this cigar and could still nub it. This is a full flavored full bodied cigar, but the full bodyness is sneaky, because of the overwhelming flavors you don’t notice and realize that this is a powerful stick.
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Would I buy this cigar again? Yes, I liked it, but this was a 2 day old fresh rolled cigar, I don’t know if the cigars that are commercially available have the same flavor palate.
Appearance: 8 / 10
Construction: 7 / 10
Draw: 7 / 10
Smoke & ash: 7 / 10
Burn: 8 / 10
Aroma (first part) 7 / 10
Aroma (middle part) 7 / 10
Aroma (last part) 8 / 10
[Reply]
Originally Posted by Don Fernando:
Would I buy this cigar again? Yes, I liked it, but this was a 2 day old fresh rolled cigar, I don’t know if the cigars that are commercially available have the same flavor palate.
Great review.
I like the Macanudo 1968s and to answer your question, to my palate, the commercial version has a similar, if not identical profile to what you described in the fresh rolled.
[Reply]
So much about this seems unfair...
- A fresh rolled stick
- A trip to Amsterdam
- A place inside to smoke
Too lucky, just too lucky! Great review, looks mighty nice...
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