Photography by Rikesh Chauhan
Expanding their horizons across the Caribbean is something more and more Cuban cigar lovers are doing these days. A great many factors – some well-documented, some not – have led to smokers everywhere exploring the New World of luxury tobacco to find something great to enjoy. Luckily, great things are easy to find in the cigar world, and many of them are the fruits of the Eiroa family’s labour.
Famous for revamping the reputation of Camacho cigars before embarking on several new brand journeys, the Eiroas are the clan behind Aladino cigars. This collection is designed to honour the Corojo leaf and bring the modern market a taste of how cigars were in the “Golden Era” before the Cuban Revolution. The Aladino Corojo Reserva No.4 is a classic corona cigar, 5 inch by 44 ring gauge and about 35 minutes of smoke. Supplies each year are limited because only the finest leaves of the crop are used for the Reserva series, but are well worth looking out for.
Construction: 10/10
- There was a grain to the wrapper, but no blemishes or tears. Build quality was flawless, with a completely even fill from cap to foot.
Draw: 10/10
- As to be expected from construction that good, draw was also flawless. Smoke flowed not too fast, not too slow.
Combustion: 9/10
- There were one or 2 surprising issues with very slightly lopsided burning, but nothing major. One touch up with the lighter was all that was required.
Ash: 5/5
- Bright white, tightly packed and bound to the cigar until I knocked it off.
Smoke: 5/5
- Generous body and aromatic plumes of smoke filled the air for the whole half-hour.
Flavour: 19/25
- The flavour from this cigar was pleasant and pungent, but perhaps a little lacking in variety. Often the downfall of cigars from outwith Cuba, this is far from a deal-breaker but is worth noting.
Overall: 31/35
- What this cigar lacked in development and extra dimension was made up for by the utterly magnificent quality of the construction. New World cigars will perhaps never be as expressive as Cuban cigars, thanks to the legendary terroir of that particular island, but that does not mean they are to be ignored. This is a very fine example of why.
Final Score: 89/100
- The maduro colour of this cigar’s wrapper gave promise of rich, earthy flavours, and when lit it kept that promise. Initial notes of pure tobacco mixed with that rich earth, and a decent amount of strength and body was there from the outset. As the cigar developed into the middle third that earth was still the dominant flavour, and this continued for the full duration of the smoke. Notes of black coffee, leather, and cinnamon toast flitted in and out as best they could, but the prevailing taste was of that rich earth from the beginning. It may not have been the complex ride some Cubans can take us on, but it was delicious, and paired perfectly with a strong black coffee.