RealFreakinCigarReviews

So... I had to purchase on of these, because I was actually at the corner drugstore.  More importantly, its important to know what's out there if you're stuck somewhere without a tobacconist in sight.

Initial Thoughts

After actually purchasing this cigar, and reading the blurb about it on the Cigars International website, I thought "hey, this can't be all that bad."  I took the stick out of the tube, and... welll.... I think I'll stick by the adage of not judging a book by its cover, because this is one pretty ugly cigar... plenty of veins, and obvious folds.  I know... MACHINE MADE.  Sniffing the stick was somewhat surprising, in that it didn't smell completely like crap.  It does however smell slightly sweet, and somewhat like a dank basement.

The Smoke

Given that this is a machine made smoke, there is no clipping to be done.  I light the cigar, and my initial thoughts are "if I can ACTUALLY finish this smoke, I'll be in shock."  In terms of taste, a slight sweetness on the palate, along with plenty of bland but smoky flavor.  It seems to burn well so far, and produces a fair amount of white smoke.  At the 1/3 point, the flavor starts to get a little peppery.  I think seriously that I'm going to have to have one of those petite coronas after this to get the taste out of my mouth.   At the 1/2 way point, the burn is noticeably uneven.  The taste is slightly sweet, with peppery and bland but smoky flavor.  At the 2/3 point, my taste buds are screaming in protest, as I'm taking in a full frontal assault of bad smelling smoke, and peppery non-descript bland smoky flavor.  Thank all that is tobacco related that there is less than half an inch of smoking horror remaining.  The peppery flavor has been replaced with bitterness, and there is a lovely and truly wretched aftertaste to make things even more unenjoyable.

Ok... I'm done.  The moral of the story: DO NOT get caught in the middle of nowhere without an emergency cigar or two in a hermetically sealed container.  I'm going inside to wash my mouth out with soap.

Cigars International had the following to say about this brand:
Garcia Vega is considered by most machine-made smokers to be the best domestic cigar available. The natural leaf wrapper is a combination of Cameroon, Connecticut, and Mexican tobaccos with a short-filler blend and binder leaf.
If thats the case, I weep for the prospect of reviewing more machine made/domestic brands.

The Rating