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Cigar News: Draig Cayuquero Lancero

June 24, 2014 By Kip Fisher

Draig Cayuquero Lancero to ship tomorrow

June 24, 2014 – Earlier today, Gary Griffith of Emilio Cigars announced that the limited edition Emilio Cigars Draig Cayuquero lanceros will begin shipping on June 25, in honor of his 60th birthday.

The Cayuquero line is produced for Emilio by Noel Rojas’ Guayacan Cigars in Nicaragua, and features a Brazilian Arapiraca wrapper, and Nicaraguan filler comprised of leaf from both Jalapa and Esteli. The original lineup was limited to four vitolas (Robusto (5×50), Toro (6×50), Torpedo (6×50), and Corona (5.5×42)), and only 1600 boxes, and the new lancero will be limited to 100 boxes of 10 (total production 1,000 cigars). According to Griffith this will be the only time the Cayuquero is produced in the lancero size.

The Draig series of cigars honors Griffith’s Welsh heritage, and each Draig blend is entirely different.

The previous Draig release, the Draig “K” was featured in a Cigar Spotlight here on The Cigarmy back in October, 2012.

[Editor’s Note: I have had the pleasure of enjoying a couple of the initial Draig Cayuquero toros, and very much look forward to trying to get my hands on a few of these. Of course, I’m an absolute sucker for lanceros these days, and a big fan of Guayacan in general….]

Leesburg Cigars receives exclusive Tatuaje Celebrando

June 4, 2014 By Kip Fisher

Leesburg Cigar and Pipe is in exclusive receipt of the Celebrando 25 Años

About an hour ago, Pete Johnson (Tatuaje Cigars) re-posted an Instagram photo and caption from Leesburg Cigar and Pipe. They are in receipt of a little-known shop exclusive produced for them by My Father Cigars via Tatuaje. According to the post, the blend is known as the Celebrando 25 Años, in celebration of Leesburg Cigar and Pipe’s 25th Anniversary. The Celebrando is a spinoff of the Cabaiguan blend, and is available in a singular Lonsdale vitola. Only a single run has been produced, and the cigars are currently available at a price of $8.75 per single or $175 per box of 20.

“To celebrate the 25 year anniversary of Leesburg Cigar & Pipe we present you the Celebrando 25 Años. Blended by the often imitated cigar man Pete Johnson at the factory responsible for the most sought after blends, including the 2012 No. 1 cigar of the year, My Father Cigars….The thinner shape concentrates the body and flavor while the shade grown wrapper perfectly balances out the blend. We liken it to an iron fist in a velvet glove.”

Press Release: Drew Estate to release Undercrown Dogma

March 24, 2014 By Kip Fisher

Drew Estate Announces Undercrown “Dogma” Commemorative Cigar & “5 Days of ‘Dogma’” Giveaway

Miami, FL, March 24, 2014: Drew Estate announced today their plans to release a new size within their Undercrown cigar line. The size will be called Undercrown “Dogma”, and has been created to celebrate the one-year anniversary of the online community Cigar Dojo. The blend of “Dogma” is based on the Undercrown Corona ¡Viva! and is comprised of Mexican San Andres wrapper, Connecticut Stalk-Cut Habano binder, and Nicaraguan & Brazilian Mata Fina fillers. The “Dogma” will come in a 6 x 56 box-pressed vitola.

When asked about the “Dogma” project, Jonathan Drew said, “we have been major supporters of Cigar Dojo from the beginning. A handful of Drew Estate employees, myself included, are Dojo members, and we have always been floored by the support Drew Estate has received on the app and website. When Eric (owner of Cigar Dojo) approached us about coming up with this special commemorative cigar, it was a no-brainer. My dad, “Baitfish” Gary, came up with the name ‘Dogma’.”

The “Dogma” will be a limited run of 10-count bundles, and will be sold exclusively through Smoke Inn, a South Florida cigar retail chain, owned by Abe Debabneh. For those based outside of Florida, the cigars will be available through Smoke Inn’s web store. The “Dogma” will be priced at $9.95 MSRP per single and $99.50 MSRP per 10-count bundle.

The flavor profile of the “Dogma” aligns with that of the Corona ¡Viva!, featuring notes of cocoa, earth, and a rich spicy character. If you enjoy the Corona ¡Viva! but would like a longer, 56 ring gauge smoke, the “Dogma” will be a new favorite.

In tandem with the release of the new “Dogma” size, Drew Estate will be running a social campaign and giveaway through their website which will allow consumers to try the cigar before it hits the market. To enter, visit http://drewestate.com/dojodogma. Unfortunately, the giveaway is not available in MA, MI, and VA due to anti-tobacco promotion laws within those states

The Undercrown “Dogma” will be available for pre-order Friday, March 28th, 2014, through SmokeInn.com. In the meantime, make sure to enter Drew Estate’s “5 Days of ‘Dogma’” giveaway for your chance to try the cigar before anyone else in the country. If you have any questions, please contact Drew Estate’s Public & Media Relations representative, Johnny Brooke.

About Drew Estate:

Founded in New York City in 1996 by two former college fraternity brothers who shared a dream to become world-class cigar makers. Jonathan Drew and Marvin Samel led Drew Estate to become one of the largest and fastest growing cigar companies in the world. Under their mantra “The Rebirth of Cigars”™ Drew Estate has defied the odds by innovating new elements to the cigar industry with their unique tobaccos and blending styles that have attracted new and old cigar enthusiasts. In their Gran Fabrica Drew Estate, their Nicaraguan headquarters, Drew Estate produces successful brands such as ACID, Herrera Estelí, Java by Drew Estate, Kentucky Fired Cured, Liga Privada, My Uzi Weighs a Ton, Natural, Nica Rustica, Tabak Especial and UnderCrown.

Blessed Leaf to release a new cigar: Kairos

March 24, 2014 By Kip Fisher

[NOTE: I’m a little late with this, and we talked about it at length on last week’s Half Ashed, but here’s a new cigar headed down the pike that I think you ought to check out….

March 13, 2014 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Kyle Hoover and Chris Kelly, the leaders of BlessedLeaf.com, a Christian cigar-based ministry, announce the release of the long anticipated Blessed Leaf Kairos.

“This is a project that has been in our hearts for over a year. Our vision was to produce a great cigar with vintage tobaccos and have the proceeds go to ministry and missions efforts.” noted Kyle Hoover.

“For this project, we went back to our roots: Nicaraguan tobacco This is a Nicaraguan puro in the Ezra Zion genre of blending. Since we are doing this for The Lord, it had to be the best work we could possibly do ” added Chris Kelly.

The Blessed Leaf Kairos is a 52 x 6.25 box press. The wrapper is Corojo 99 Rosado. The ﬁller includes ligeros from Esteli and Jalapa. Total production is 4000 cigars of 100 boxes and 5 packs.

The Blessed Leaf Kairos is produced at the Casa Fernandez factory in Miami, Florida.

“We chose the name Kairos because of it’s unique meaning to this project. Kairos is deﬁned as a speciﬁc moment in time when the Divine intervenes directly into your life. To us, there is a duel application. Obviously, as a person smokes the cigar they will have a “heavenly” smoking experience. Secondly, that the support raised for Christian missions will impact people’s lives with the gospel of Christ.” added Hoover.

The Blessed Leaf Kairos will be available for pre-order on BlessedLeaf.com and CigarFederation.com. The ofﬁcial launch herf will be on April 2 on BlessedLeaf.com.

La Flor Dominicana TAA Exclusive 2014

March 19, 2014 By Kip Fisher

2014 La Flor Dominicana TAA Exclusive- The 707

La Flor Dominicana is proud to announce the release of the 2014 La Flor Dominicana TAA Exclusive Cigar, available only to those TAA (Tobacco Association of America) members attending the annual TAA conference in beautiful Los Cabos, Mexico.

This year’s TAA Exclusive cigar is a Ligero blend, the 707 is a 7 x 70 packed in a custom 24 count box and secondary band signifying the blend as the TAA Exclusive. The wrapper leaves are Ecuadorian Sumatra seed, the binder and fillers are all Dominican leaves from our farm in La Canela, Dominican Republic. These cigars are full bodied. The first few boxes will begin shipping in April 2014 and will only be found at participating TAA tobacconists.

For more information, contact:

La Flor Dominicana
123 San Lorenzo Avenue
Coral Gables, FL 33146-1513

www.laflordominicana.com
[email protected]

Press Release: Cuatro Cinco by Joya de Nicaragua

October 15, 2013 By Kip Fisher

45 years of the Nicaraguan cigar industry celebrated with a Limited Edition by Joya de Nicaragua

Esteli,Nicaragua—‐1968 was the year when it all started: the first Premium Nicaraguan cigar was hand-rolled in Estelí under the Joya de Nicaragua seal. With it, the Nicaraguan cigar industry was born and a new era for Premium hand‐rolled cigars began. JOYA DE NICARAGUA S.A is proud to honor this achievement with Cuatro Cinco, a Limited Edition cigar.

Cuatro Cinco has been especially crafted to commemorate four and a half decades of history of Joya de Nicaragua, its people and the city of Estelí, where it all started. Cuatro Cinco is an authentic Nicaraguan puro, hand rolled in Estelí with tobaccos grown in the region and in Jalapa, with a special 5 year old ligero that the factory had been saving in its bodegas for this special occasion. As if time wasn’t enough, the filler tobaccos have been specially aged in oak barrels for more than a year to give them distinctive and sophisticated notes, and the silky smooth wrapper and binder are Nicaraguan grown in the Jalapa valley.

“We are very excited about Cuatro Cinco, for this is one of the few Limited Editions we have produced. With this cigar we are capturing the true Nicaraguan Spirit, rich in the tradition that embodies our cigars and that defines us as the archetypal Nicaraguan cigar maker, because before Joya, there was no Nicaraguan cigar. While this cigar promotes our heritage, it is also a celebration of the future and the many years we still have ahead of us. It’s been 45 years already, and we are just getting started!” stated Dr. Alejandro Martínez Cuenca, Chairman of JOYA DE NICARAGUA S.A.

Leonel Raudez, General Manager and Head of Production of Joya remarks: “this is also a tribute to the people of Joya, the ones that went and the ones that are still with us, even after 45 years. We Estelianos are proud of contributing to make Nicaraguan tobacco among the best in the world, and to celebrate that, we have made one of the most exceptional cigars we have rolled, using our finest local tobaccos and rolled by a selected few of our talented tabaqueros. The profile of this cigar is nothing like what we’ve produced, although the richness and complexity of the Nicaraguan grown tobaccos still predominates.“

Cuatro Cinco will be available in a single vitola: a 6 x 54 semi–‐box pressed in 10–‐count boxes. As a Limited Edition, only 4,500 boxes of Cuatro Cinco are being produced each one numbered to guarantee exclusivity. The initial batch will start shipping in the first week of November 2013 to special Joya customers in the United States and around the world.

About JOYA DE NICARAGUA S.A.

JOYA DE NICARAGUA S.A. is a family owned, Nicaragua–‐based cigar factory that handcrafts traditional cigars for the premium luxury cigar market. First opened in 1968, it is Nicaragua’s oldest cigar factory in operation and home to the legendary JOYA DE NICARAGUA® brand of cigars. Joya is regarded by many as the patriarch crafter of robust, unique puro blends of locally grown black tobaccos, and its cigars are sold in nearly 40 countries around the world. For more information, please visit www.joyacigars.com

Press Release: La Sirena Dubloon

June 10, 2013 By Kip Fisher

New La Sirena Sizes Discovered

Miami, FL June 7th, 2013 – In a recent expedition to Lake Nicaragua, which archeologists feel was once a large bay alongside the Pacific Ocean, a discovery was made. The dangerous mission to find treasures of the mermaid was met by sharks and other seemingly out of place aquatic animals. On the last day, in one of the deepest parts of the lake a cave was located with treasures of the mermaid.

Among these treasures was the Dubloon, a 7.25″X56 Salomon. The name comes from the Spanish coins that surrounded this new rare size. The rarest of all Dubloons, was one that featured a distinctive 8 stamped into it.

These pieces of 8; the La Sirena Dubloon comes packaged in an 8 count box, of which only 500 are available. They will make their debut at the IPCPR in Las Vegas. Like the La Sirena “A” they feature a dark, toothy Habano Oscuro wrapper, two Cuban-seed Nicaraguan binders, a Nicaraguan Criollo ’98 and Corojo ’96 over fillers from Nicaragua.

The La Sirena Dubloon will have a $12.00 MSRP.

About Miami Cigar & Company

Miami Cigar & Company, founded in 1989, is the exclusive US distributor of La Aurora brands. They are also the worldwide owner/distributor of Tatiana, Don Lino, La Sirena and Nestor Miranda line of cigars. They can found on the web at:

Press Release: Espinosa Cigars to release Warhead

June 6, 2013 By Kip Fisher

Earlier today, Erik Espinosa (Espinosa Premium Cigars) published this on Facebook:

On this day, in honor of D-Day, we at Espinosa Premium Cigars are proud to announce that we will be introducing a limited edition cigar for our full bodied 601 La Bomba line called “Warhead” at IPCPR this year. This is the first time the 601 La Bomba line is offered with a Connecticut Broadleaf maduro wrapper. The Warhead measures 6 1/2 inches by 54 ring and is semi-box pressed with the familiar fuse-like pig tail that is found on the 601 La Bomba line. “Although the wrapper is different, we are using the same powerful blend as the rest of the line.” said Erik Espinosa.

Warhead is limited to 2,000 boxes of 10 and the packaging is inspired by several themes in the World War II era. When unraveled, the foot band on the cigar is revealed to be in the form of a bomb. This “bomb” features nose art or aircraft graffiti, which was common in this era. Most prominent is the shark-face which is a reference to the Flying Tigers, the 1st American Volunteer Group, who would paint the shark-faces on their military aircrafts.

The 601 La Bomba line was first introduced in 2011 and is considered to be one of the strongest cigars in the market

Episode 016: 2011 EP Carrillo Short Run

May 26, 2013 By Kip Fisher

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Episode 016: 2011 EP Carrillo Short Run

Hello again, folks, and welcome back to Episode 016 of Half Ashed. We appreciate you stopping by. In this episode, we take a look at the 2011 EP Carrillo Short Run. We’re smoking the Bombone (4 7/8 X 50), with its Ecuadoran Habano wrapper, Nicaraguan binder, and Nicaraguan/Dominican filler blend. This is Kip’s favorite of the Short Run series so far, but tune in to get full details about how they’re smoking right now.

Show Summary

Rather than the detailed notes I might normally post, I’ll be brief and only include a short summary this week. A busy holiday weekend coupled with my little Dude’s birthday have left me with little time to publish before our self-imposed deadline. So, here goes: We cover a couple of legislative items, a Camacho rebranding, an AMERICAN puro(!), as well as a few more interesting tidbits of news. Also, we discussed what else we’ve been smoking, and Kip’s “Mad Scientist” idea for comparing some of the intriguing new cigars that are hitting the market. Finally, we cover a couple of listener emails and updates. Catch the full show via any of the means below to get “the rest of the story.”

Wrap Up

Firstly, a huge thank you this Memorial Day weekend to all those who have made such sacrifice to allow me the opportunity to enjoy the life and freedom I have grown so accustomed to. As we did at show closing, I wanted to recognize the countless acts that have made that possible over the history of this nation. Next week, we’ll have the Michael Stewart as our guest, and be taking a look at his process for sourcing whole leaf tobacco and rolling his own cigars at home. So again, thanks for tuning in, and be sure to check back in next week for an exciting Episode 017. In the meantime, if you would like to contact us you can reach us through the contact page or at the following email addresses: [email protected] or [email protected]. Don’t forget to get those emails in this month to be entered in our current giveaway. 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.

Press Release: La Palina Releases 2nd Goldie-The Laguito No.5

April 25, 2013 By Kip Fisher

Goldie Drell Paley, the namesake of La Palina cigars, was the wife of Samuel Paley, who founded the company in 1896. Bill Paley, Sam’s grandson and current owner, created The La Palina Collection Goldie to celebrate the history, contributions and accomplishments of women in the cigar industry. Bill is proud to present the initial release of the new Goldie in late May, with a second release in August of 2013. The La Palina Collection Goldie Laguito No.5 will be limited to 2500 numbered boxes.

Produced at the El Titan de Bronze factory in the Little Havana neighborhood of Miami, the Goldie is made under the supervision of owner Sandra Cobas. The La Palina Goldie Laguito No.5 will be a 5 5/8 x 54 cigar and presented in boxes of 10.

Master roller Maria Sierra, who will have signed each numbered box, rolled the entire La Palina Collection Goldie Laguito No.5 release. Maria was one of the first women trained to roll cigars in Cuba. Her historic 32 year career at Villa El Laguito began July 22, 1967. Maria is a 95 rated, category 9 roller trained by Fidel Castro’s personal roller Eduardo Rivera Irizarri, as well as Avelino Lara, the creator of the legendary Cohiba blend.

Each cigar is finished in the traditional Laguito style with a fan cap, exclusively taught to rollers at Villa El Laguito. The Goldie is blended with the prized Medio Tiempo leaf, found on only 10% of tobacco plants.

The La Palina Collection Goldie Laguito No.5 embodies the tradition, expertise and passion of women in the cigar industry.

Bill Paley and La Palina will debut the La Palina Collection Goldie Laguito No.5 at Nat Sherman International in NYC on May 9, 2013. Maria Sierra will be rolling the Goldie Laguito No.5 at the event. Please contact Nat Sherman 1-800-MY-CIGAR regarding attendance. The May release will be limited to 1000 boxes, and distributed to select accounts across the country. The rest of the release will become available sometime in August.