Barry Stein | Half Ashed

Half Ashed Episode 082: Guest Barry Stein

September 10, 2014 By Kip Fisher

Welcome to Episode 082 of Half Ashed, featuring special guest Barry Stein of Two Guys Smoke Shop and The Cigar Authority. Craig was traveling this week, Barry graciously agreed to sit in and host with me. So, a huge thanks to Barry. I chose the Insidious by Asylum for the show, and unfortunately Barry was unable to join me due to his lease agreement restrictions.

In addition to an excellent update Barry about his personal recent history, we covered stories from EP Carrillo, Crowned Heads, La Aurora, and My Father. In other topics, we discussed lots of legislative goings-on, and the validity of a couple new packaging concepts. So tune in and enjoy!

Next week, we will be featuring an Unbanded (#018, from Zedman) as our Cigar of the Week. I will be rejoined by my esteemed co-host, so be sure to check back in Friday night at 9:30pm EST on halfashed.com where you can catch us recording and participate in the chatroom. If you would like to contact us in the meantime, you can reach us through the contact page or at the following emails: [email protected] or [email protected]. Please feel free to drop us a line if you have any questions you’d like answered, comments to make…or even compliments and complaints. We love to get your emails! Also, remember you can always go back and listen to previous episodes, which can be found in the Half Ashed Archive. You can download this week’s audio directly below (right-click “Download” and save), find us on iTunes, or subscribe with any podcast app at our RSS Feed. Video, as always, will be available at the CigFed Half Ashed Video Archive.

P.S. – If you have unbanded suggestions or contributions, you can get those to us by sending an email to [email protected]. This email address goes directly to my wife, so you can simply suggest an unbanded cigar for her to source, or send me an email to [email protected] if you have something you’d like to send in. I will provide an address to send them. Thanks!

Half Ashed Episode 063: Unbanded 014

April 26, 2014 By Kip Fisher

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Hello, everyone. Welcome to Episode 063 of Half Ashed, featuring Unbanded #014 as our Cigar of The Week. This particular cigar was supplied by long time friend of the show Maria Elena González. Here is just a sampling of a few items covered in Episode 063:

News

Barry Stein commented on his future plans in returning to cigar media, and hinted at some future potential for the Kilo (hoowahh!).

Oliva has begun shipping the extensions to their Melanio Maduro line.

Kevin Paige of acigarsmoker.com is reporting that La Sirena is moving production from My Father & La Aurora to Erik Espinosa’s La Zona factory.

The focus of our news conversation tonight was the FDA’s “Deeming document” concerning their intentions toward regulating premium cigars. At the heart of the matter is: 1. whether or not premium cigars will fall under the same classification as other tobacco products, and 2. the definition of a “premium” cigar. Tune in to get the full scoop. To summarize, for those who have any desire to continue smoking cigars, I’d strongly advise you to pay attention here. This is the “other shoe” we’ve been waiting to drop for several years. The time is now. You can find an excellent summation of the document at halfwheel, and submit your comment to the powers that be HERE for the next 75 days (through July 9th, 2014.

Other

In “What We’ve Been Smoking” this week, Craig gushed about what he considers one popular manufacturer’s Magnum Opus (and no, it’s not a Fuente). We covered a few more pedestrian smokes as well

There were a couple of embarrassing stories about myself thrown in for good measure this week….

We wrapped up with a fantastic listener email from Louis Alvarez. He made some excellent points we were happy to discuss on the show. Following that, we gave the final wrap on this week’s Unbanded….and I have to admit I was floored when I saw what it actually was. Thanks again to Maria Elena González for supplying it.

Next Episode

Next week, our Cigar of the Week will be a very special Fuente stick given out at CFC2014. We know little about it, except it’s roughly the same vitola as a Hemingway Classic, and carries their “prototype” X band and a secondary “Destino al Siglo” band. Be sure to check back in next Friday night at 9:30pm EST at ~~Cigar Federation~~ ****We will temporarily only have chat access on our Show Page on halfashed.com. We have outgrown our previous chat, and it has been overloading the server and causing various and sundry issues with our hosting provider. In fact, they shut down our site this week during the show. I have installed a stopgap chat for the time being, but it will not frame into the Cigar Federation page. We will remedy this as soon as possible.****, where you can catch us recording and participate in the chatroom. If you would like to contact us in the meantime, you can reach us through the contact page or at the following emails: [email protected] or [email protected]. Please feel free to drop us a line if you have any questions you’d like answered, comments to make…or even compliments and complaints. We love to get your emails! Also, remember you can always go back and listen to previous episodes, which can be found in the Half Ashed Archive. You can download this week’s audio directly below (right-click “Download” and save), or find us on iTunes to subscribe. Video, as always, will be available at the CigFed Half Ashed Video Archive.

Half Ashed Episode 034: Ramon Allones Gigante

September 28, 2013 By Kip Fisher

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On this week’s Half Ashed, we took the opportunity to smoke a cigar from one of Craig’s favorite manufacturers – a 2001 Ramon Allones Gigante. We have covered this marque before, when we smoked the petit corona back on Episode 022 and the 2005 Edicion Regional on Episode 005 (pictured at left, because I failed to snap a picture of this week’s cigar). Craig presented tonight’s cigar thusly:

This cigar has waited to be smoked for 12 years since it left its original place of manufacture in Havana. That amount of time typically suits the Ramon Allones blend nicely by tempering some of the initial nicotine strength to the point that the traditional nutty, sweet coffee flavors can emerge. This is still a strong cigar; perhaps the strongest of all Cuban Double Coronas, but is never out of balance. The punchy youth just morphs into a robust maturity. Of all the larger ring gauge cigars this one tends to be the most complex.

Tune in to the show for updates throughout the smoke to see how that went. We also covered several items of news this week, including the following:

As reported by halfwheel, Iconic Leaf is suing Kurt Kendall (7-20-4) over the trademarked use of a spider on cigar packaging….

A recent ruling in Nebraska opens the door to ban smoking….in cigar lounges.

Guayacan is expanding their lineup, in an extension to the existing line and a new maduro offering.

The GAR Deli is open! Total cost is $250 – per GAR, “This includes all of your samples, the workshop, and your box of cigars. George will sit down with you and give you a fascinating informational seminar to guide you through the process of constructing a well-balanced cigar. He will discuss the tobacco growing process and give the customer useful background information on how this process influences the flavor of a cigar. Once you have made your tobacco selections, it takes the rollers a few hours to put your custom blend together. You can usually take them with you the same day or you can return the following day to pick them up. Your box can also be shipped to you.”

GAR also just announced the addition of the GAR Red to the lineup. Reportedly a medium-full bodied stick that is available in 3 size – 6×60, 6×66, and 7×70. Nicaraguan puro w/Habano wrapper, Jalapa binder, & Habano/corojo filler. Price is a major selling point on these, with the 7×70 coming in at a $5 MSRP.

Barry Stein reports that he’s trying samples of a 6X60 KILO…..and tells me that there will be a corona! Hoowahh!

Gary Griffith is implementing a new idea with retailers – the opportunity to become House of Emilio “Master Retailers.” I posted this press release in an earlier post at The Cigarmy.

Democratic Senator Robert Menendez of NJ has signed on as a co-sponsor of S.772. This is a big deal – Every Senator sponsorship is quite important and carries a lot of weight.

Also in this episode, we review what we’ve been smoking lately and a number of various and sundry ratholes….as well as a listener email from Enzo Temko.

Next week, our Cigar of the Week might be the Fuente Unnamed Reserve from this past December….I say “might” because we changed plans up in the final minutes of the show, and there is an outside chance it may change again. In any event, be sure to check back in for that next Friday at 9:30pm EST at www.halfashed.com. If you would like to contact us in the meantime, you can reach us through the contact page or at the following email addresses: [email protected] or [email protected]. Please feel free to drop us a line if you have any questions you’d like answered, comments to make…or even compliments and complaints. We love to get your emails! Also, remember you can always go back and listen to previous episodes, which can be found in the Half Ashed Archive. You can download this week’s audio directly below (right-click “Download” and save), or find us on iTunes to subscribe. Video, as always, will be available at the CigFed Half Ashed Video Archive.

Half Ashed Episode 031: Casa Miranda Chapter 2

September 8, 2013 By Kip Fisher

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Hello folks, and welcome to Half Ashed Episode 031, featuring the Casa Miranda Chapter Two and with guest Barry Stein of Miami Cigar. Barry was slated to join us for the whole show, but we had a bit of a mixup with a Miami storm that took down the power grid in Barry’s neighborhood. He was able to join us for a short time later in the show, when he went above and beyond the call of duty by driving down to Neighborhood Humidor and calling in on his phone. We very much appreciate his doing that; it was truly a stand-up thing to do and not leave us hanging. Check out the episode to get some great insight into Miami Cigar and their upcoming lines.

We cover the Chapter Two several times throughout the show, as well as a number of other cigars from this week’s selections – notably one other Miami Cigar offering, the Nestor Mirand Special Selection Exclusivo Regional. The NMSS Exclusivo is a geographically limited edition, only to be available in the midwest and only in 2500 of each of two vitolas. We also talked Barry’s upcoming release – the KILO – which you all definitely need to be on the lookout for.

Other topics included this week’s news and happenings, some trips you might want to consider taking in the near future, a minor rant from Kip – and our giveaway! This month’s giveaway of some phenomenal cigars goes to…John C. Craig. We’ll be getting those in the mail this week, so be on watch John.

Next week, we’ll have very special guests Bob McDuffee and Dale Roush, formerly of Dogwatch Cigar Radio. Craig will be out of town, so it will be just Kip, Bob, and Dale. Be sure to check back in then as these guys are the godfathers of cigar podcasting, and much of the credit due for the impetus to begin Half Ashed is owed to them. If you would like to contact us in the meantime, you can reach us through the contact page or at the following email addresses: [email protected] or [email protected]. Please feel free to drop us a line if you have any questions you’d like answered, comments to make…or even compliments and complaints. We love to get your emails! Also, remember you can always go back and listen to previous episodes, which can be found in the Half Ashed Archive. You can download this week’s audio directly below (right-click “Download” and save), or find us on iTunes to subscribe. Video, as always, will be available at the CigFed Half Ashed Video Archive.