Cifuentes y Compania Partagas 1845 - Black Label

Cigars, unlike wine or beer,  take a certain amount of practice - much more than simply drinking a beverage - to even smoke properly, let alone enjoying or analyzing the flavors. Add the wide, wide variety of tobaccos, countries of  origin, blends, sizes, wrapping techniques, and flavors and it may seem daunting. And it can be daunting. But have no fear - you have a reliable guide here at Sip and Puff! Today I'm going review a rather strong, full-bodied cigar that I consider to be one of the deepest, richest cigars I've ever enjoyed. It's the "Black Label" offering from Partagas. 

So just look at that cigar. What do you notice? It's pretty much one of the darkest cigars I've come across.  The dark brown / black tobaccos are generally sweeter, richer, and stronger. These are called maduro or oscuro. The darker leaves usually mean that the leaf itself had more exposure to the sun - maduro stems from the Latin word "maturus," meaning aged or matured. So keep that in mind - as a leaf sits on the plant longer, it gains certain flavors and strengths that are not present in other types (like claro, for example, which is a still-green young tobacco leaf that's picked and quickly dried and stoved, thereby retaining the green color of the leaf.)

Sometimes these dark leaves are added to a cigar to give it strength and flavor. Certain leaves - those with direct exposure to the sun - are called ligero. Ligero tobaccos are dark, oily, and often have extra nicotine in them. Those tobaccos are often blended with other tobaccos to create a darker, stronger cigar. There are three parts to a cigar - filler, binder, and wrapper. The filler is the tobacco that forms the body of the cigar. The binder is a layer of leaves that wrap the filler tightly and help it to keep its shape. The wrapper is a thin layer that goes on the outside. Each element has its own unique characteristics and properties. Generally, the wrapper is the most prized part of the cigar, and some of the best cigar wrappers come from right near where I grew up in Connecticut.

The Partagas Black Label is, in my opinion, one of the nicest maduro/ligero blends. Master cigar maker Daniel Nunez, who learned the trade from Ramon Cifuentes himself, spent ten years perfecting the Partagas Black Label. He took a Cuban-seed Dominican wrapper and blended both Dominican Pilota Cubano ligero fillers and Nicaraguan ligero binders. 

The cigar itself wasn't too tight and lit up fine. It drew nicely, and soon I was pulling nice clouds of languid white smoke. As for the taste, I found it tasted a little like espresso - it had that same sense of singed coffee beans...although it wasn't coffee-flavored (more on that in a few weeks!) I also encountered a slight mineral taste with a finish of oiled leather. I had to put it out around pinky-length because it had gone out one too many times.

In conclusion, this was a cigar I really enjoyed. It's strong, and perhaps best suited to summer evenings (according to my brother Dan.) This isn't an "everyday smoke", either - save a Partagas for a nice summer evening.