HDA (Hermanos de Armas) Cigars Veiled Mutiny Toro in Review

BRAND: HDA
BLEND: Veiled Mutiny

WRAPPER: Ecuadorian Maduro
BINDER: Nicaraguan
FILLER: Nicaraguan

FORMAT: Toro (654)
ORIGIN: Nicaragua
INTENSITY: Medium
SPICE: 2/5

NOTES:
Brioche | Cocoa | Nuts & Raisin mix

Fairly straight-ahead, quite approachable blend. Brioche, where bread and pastry meet. A sugar-free hot cocoa packet with marshmallows. Not trail mix; just GORP (good ol' nuts and raisins). Soft leather, sweet earth. Black pepper through the nose, softly-so. Ginger on the tongue.

But enough about Gilligan's Island.

Burn needs a few retouches. Ash drops dryly. Smokes a bit like comfort food eats. Food doesn't eat. We eat food. I used to write better than Mike. That's an inside joke. This is an inside cigar, late night, feet up. Hooch on the side. Would pair well with a book, I wanna say Dickens.

TASTE: B+
DRAW: A-
BURN: B
BUILD: B+

FINAL GRADE: B+
A 90-100 B 80-89 C 70-79

::: very ::: 

Bariay 1492 Cigars Red Label Toro in Review

BRAND: Bariay 1492
BLEND: Red Label

WRAPPER: Ecuadorian Habano
BINDER: Nicaraguan
FILLER: Nicaraguan

FORMAT: Toro (654)
ORIGIN: Nicaragua
INTENSITY: Medium
SPICE: 3.5/5

NOTES:
Honey | Sweet Spice | Cream Soda

Duck sauce, too, via progression. Sweet spices are hard to tease apart and label beyond orange/red. They also operate in a separate sweet grain, and again in a yeasty bit. Roasted orange turns into that duck sauce at mid-point. Crisp, complex, transitional; but also not super delineated.

Draw is snug, although it scans as by design in a super-stuffed barrel. Exceptionally tight near invisible seams. Nice Ash growth. Hints of praline. Maybe a rumor of pale floral notes. Ultimately a quite pleasant almost ingratiating profile. I'm getting images of mocktails and lemon twists.

TASTE: A-
DRAW: B+
BURN: B+
BUILD: A-

FINAL GRADE: A-
A 90-100 B 80-89 C 70-79

::: very ::: 

HDA (Hermanos de Armas) Cigars Descending Shadows Toro in Review

BRAND: HDA
BLEND: Descending Shadows

WRAPPER: Ecuadorian Sun Grown
BINDER: Nicaraguan
FILLER: Nicaraguan

FORMAT: Toro (654)
ORIGIN: Nicaragua
INTENSITY: Medium/Medium-full
SPICE: 2.5/5

NOTES:
Grapefruit | Spice Rack | Cocoa

Knock knock. Who's there? Interrupting grapefruit. Interrupting gr--YoU gEt ThE iDeA. For a predominantly dark blend, the constant grapefruit note, while interesting, is distracting and somewhat out-of-place. Hard to pull apart the spice array but anise and ginger(snaps) are present. Unsweetened chocolate.

Dries the palate a bit, making it seem thinner than it wants to be, neither egregiously-so. Imbalanced but consistent at least in the first-half, gives a sort of IPA feel. Olfactory is a notable patisserie treat throughout. A blonde java tries in at the second-half, is enough to steer towards but short of the smoke's goal.

Mexican Latte | Spice Rack | Grapefruit

TASTE: B
DRAW: A-
BURN: B
BUILD: B+

FINAL GRADE: B
A 90-100 B 80-89 C 70-79

::: very ::: 

Villiger Cigars La Capitana 2025 Toro in Review

BRAND: Villiger
BLEND: La Capitana 2025

WRAPPER: Ecuadorian Connecticut
BINDER: Nicaraguan
FILLER: Nicaraguan, Dominican

FORMAT: Toro (650)
ORIGIN: Nicaraguan
INTENSITY: Mild-medium/Medium
SPICE: 3/5

NOTES:
Citrus | White chocolate | Golden hay

Tastes like staring into the sun. Citrus is a medicinal orange, chewable aspirin thing which I get to varying degrees across almost the entire Villiger line; here muchly-so. Way underneath comes white chocolate and golden hay is on the back-end of that, sinking into to terracotta nethers. Stiff suede. Coffee & cream.

White pepper, an apropos sea salt. Perhaps some metallic meandering on account of Peruvian silver. Some of that silver is still down there if anyone has a snorkel and metal detector handy. However, 1654 was a long time ago. Many have already gone looking and some have found; pack a heavy lunch and light hopes.

TASTE: B
DRAW: B+
BURN: B
BUILD: B+

FINAL GRADE: B
A 90-100 B 80-89 C 70-79

::: very :::