General Cigar Company - Cohiba "Edicion Diamante 2013" [Dominican Republic]

Today's cigar review is over a year in the making - it's a close look at a fine vintage cigar from the Cohiba imprint of General Cigar Co. - the "Edicion Diamante 2013." I first saw these cigars in a catalog two years ago, priced rather steeply - around $300 per box of ten. Balking at the price, I decided to hold off until they fluctuated in price (occasionally things go on sale / clearance / etc.) About a year later, in February 2016, the cigars dropped down in price, and with my brother Dan and a couple of friends, went in on a box.

A note about the vintage - cigars, like wine or beer, aren't always infinitely available. Blends and labels come and go, and some manufacturers even make special releases with varying rare ingredients. These may be offered seasonally, yearly, or only once. Today's blend is one such release - it's special tobacco, aged since 2013, and the capa - the delicate tobacco around the top which holds the wrapper and binder together - has been aged since 1980. In terms of origin, this cigar is made with Dominican longfillers and a Cameroonian wrapper.

Here they are in a maroon hardwood presentation box, dressed in shiny silver foil wrappers. Thanks to Jaclyn S. for the above (gracious) presentation.

Interestingly, nine of the foil wrappers have labels that say "Limited Release 2013" but one says "Limited Release 2012". Weird. And so under the silver wrapping paper is a wooden coffin-style box with the Cohiba logo printed on the lid.

The coffin opens edge-wise, and has a little wooden back piece that gently lifts the cigar out of the box. Such luxury! The Macanudo Jamaica Reserve that I smoked a couple of years ago also had a similar kind of box.

Upon inspection, these cigars are a little drier than I expected. This may have to do with storage - they're wrapped in cellulose, inside a wooden coffin, wrapped in foil, inside a cedar box, wrapped in shrink wrap. Many of the cigars I get wholesale are just wrapped in plastic (with individual cellulose wrappers) so they lose a lot of moisture sitting in the warehouse. Unfortunately, these cigars are rock-solid. They're rolled extremely tightly, it seems, and aren't very springy - not super dry, necessarily, just tight. This can pose a serious problem, since draw is a big part of the smoking experience. You can't enjoy a cigar if you can't even take the smoke into your mouth! So this was a concern of mine going into the smoke.

Fast forward seven months to August 2016. The cigars have been in their own Ziploc baggie with a hydrophilic gel pouch, yet they are still not as "mushy" as I would like. Dan and I were set to visit our folks on a summer trip to Connecticut, and despite the cigars' suspected condition, we aimed to try them together during the trip.

It's a pleasant color, for sure - no stems or anything but some remarkably even coloring throughout the cigar. The spiral wrapper pattern looks cool as well. There's some interesting marbling, if you look really closely, and the foot of the cigar is clean and sharply-cut.

It didn't light up easily, unfortunately - took a bit to get it going. The draw was pretty tight, so looks like our concerns were valid. As expected, it did warm up eventually and opened up a bit. I wasn't drawing mouthfuls of smoke, just sips, but still enough. As it burns, it has a concrete-grey ash.

Taste wise, it reminded me a bit of some of the Davidoff cigars I have smoked - heavy, but not in an oily maduro way. The flavor itself had a strong, yet smooth, leather and ash flavor - kinda what you think of when you think of stereotypical "old stogie" smells and flavors. Not too bad, and as it warmed up, my wrapper cracked so the draw was tougher. Dan feels it's similar to the standard Cohiba "Red Dot", albeit smoother, and I agree that it's a bit mellower but along similar flavor profiles. We struggled through the rest of it, and while the draw opened up, it didn't produce the clouds of aromatic smoke we'd hoped. We came away disappointed.

However, this was not the end. We had two each, so in April of 2017, we tried them again. At this point, the cigars now had a much longer in humidification, and we also both bought Drawpokers - a device that essentially reams out a plugged or tightly-wrapped cigar. It's basically a plastic frame into which one puts a cigar, then runs a metal skewer through the length. This cuts any plugs and increases draw, and this cigar is actually one of the reasons I bought the Drawpoker - and now I can't imagine NOT drawpoking my smokes.

The second attempt proved better. Instead of punching (cutting a circular hole on the capa through which to draw) I used my fancy new Colibri V-Cutter and also ran a Drawpoker down the length of the smoke. Results were better - I still got some of those same flavors, but this time the draw was easier and I was able to get the fullness of the smoke. There's an herbaceous quality to it that we didn't get before; as it burned, that herbal flavor turned to a dry, papery, nutty quality. Think of the hard shell of a chestnut. This second one burned more evenly and I was able to smoke it almost all the way down without it going out.

In conclusion, this cigar is great if you're into the heavier, ashier cigars. If you like Cohiba Red Dot or some of the Davidoff entries, you'll like this. The flavors are deep and refined, and while this cigar isn't bright or oily or flavorful in that way, it's still worth trying. The cost of course is steep, and the cigar is pretty rare to boot, but it's an interesting entry into the Cohiba line and I'm glad to have tried it.