Drew Estate Cigar Safari: Bourbon Barrel-Aged Tobacco

As a fan of bourbon, one of the things that most intrigued me about my recent trip to Nicaragua on Drew Estate’s Cigar Safari tour was something so experimental, there aren’t even pictures of white-banded cigars with code names floating around the gossipnet yet. In recesses of the Drew Estate compound there are a couple Buffalo Trace bourbon barrels full of aging tobacco. There’s no telling if Drew Estate cigars with bourbon barrel-aged tobacco will show up in retail shops …

Asylum Cigars interview with Tom Lazuka

Welcome to another interview post that I was fortunate to get with Tom Lazuka, co-founder of Asylum Cigars, when he stopped by Genuine Tobacco. I appreciate Tom taking the time to sit down and have some fun on camera.

Asylum Cigars has three labels right now, Asylum, Asylum 13 (I reviewed the 7×70) and the Schizo. I am including The Ogre in with the Asylum 13 line. We had a chance to run through the …

Gun and Cigars – Lets Strike a Match Up

Ben: This article, which I co-wrote wrote with Student of the Gun host and author, Park Markel, took on an interesting concept of pairing cigars with certain firearms.  Many of us shoot for recreation, hunting, sport, etc and we also smoke our cigars on the range while doing it.  Paul had the idea of what would be a good cigar to match with a certain firearm.  I thought it was an interesting idea myself.  We got together and …

Drink. Smoke. Eat.

Drink. Smoke. Eat. Not only three things that all go perfectly together but it is also the tagline for the soon to be opened, Civil Cigar Lounge. Civil Cigar Lounge is the brainchild of Matt Krimm and John Anderson (co-owners of the W.Curtis Draper empire) and is set to open to the public on January 14th. I was recently invited to a media event to get a glimpse of Civil Cigar Lounge. Needless to say, the event was pretty …

Consumer Day? Why Not?

Earlier this year I wrote a post about IPCPR and the changes that had been put into place for Media Members called “If We Don’t Go…They Win”. And our complete coverage of the 2012 IPCPR show is something I’m very proud of and is one of the things that I think we did an awesome job on especially our Blogger Question video. News from IPCPR hit my inbox this morning pertaining to the 2013 Trade Show taking place in …

Top 10 Cigars – TGT Editon (2012)

2012 was an interesting year for cigars for me. To be totally honest, most of the new releases that I smoked this year, didn’t really wow me. Most of the newer stuff I smoked this year falls into that category that I call “okay to pretty good”. Cigars that were decent but not memorable. That category, for me, seemed to grow by leaps and bounds. Some will disagree no doubt and thats cool with me. My opinions are usually in …

Cigars International Superstore Coming to Hamburg, PA

A few months ago I began to hear local rumors of a new Cigars International location coming to town. The initial buzz was that the new location would be a Cigar Bar, much like their Wooden Match location in Bethlehem. I didn’t care to much for this news (Cigars and Over-Priced drinks don’t go hand in hand with my current cigar budget).

The second tid-bit of news was the part I found very interesting. The rumor was that this …

2012 Delaware Cigar Festival

Last Saturday, I had the distinct pleasure of attending the 2012 Delaware Cigar Festival at Delaware Park in Wilmington, DE. This is a terrific event put on each year by the Delaware Cigars chain of brick & mortar retail shops, managed by Gary Griffith from Emilio Cigars. The $125 admission fee included a large assortment of premium cigars, a great buffet lunch, an open beer & wine bar, tons of raffle prizes, and the opportunity to purchase additional cigars …

El Cruzado (Coming Soon)

Coming soon to a retailer near you the El Cruzado featuring a pre-embargo Cuban wrapper found in perfect condition in the back of a abandoned warehouse in Ohio. Each box comes complete with your own stache just like El Cruzado. Available in 37 sizes including the 4×90 War Pony.

Thanks to Jose Flores Jr. for the box work.…

Interview with Gary Griffith of Emilio Cigars

This past weekend, I headed back up to my old stomping grounds to visit Gary Griffith of Emilio Cigars at Cigar-ette City in Newark, Delaware. I bumped into Gary at the recent IPCPR trade show in Orlando, but he didn’t have a booth set up for Emilio this year and was busy running around placing orders for the chain of cigar shops he manages. I really wanted to catch up with him and hear about all of the new …