halfwheel

Review: Pinar del Río Small Batch Reserve Maduro Robusto (Prerelease)

Rumblings of two new cigar lines from Pinar del Río started circulating around the internet in late January, and on February 2, we broke the details of the new additions: the Small Batch Reserve and Flores y Rodriguez. The Small Batch Reserve will be the first to come out, with a due date of late this month or [...]

Redux: Arturo Fuente Don Carlos Lancero

The Don Carlos Lancero is a cigar that I should like. Up until December 2011, the Don Carlos Lancero was a rather rare specimen reserved for Casa Fuente, Prometheus releases and other limited fashions that meant walking into a B&M and purchasing a box was out of the question. Truth be told, for the most [...]

Review: La Flor Dominicana Double Claro No. 42

In late 2010, Litto Gomez added his name to the growing, yet still small, hat of manufacturers to produce a Candela cigar. Unlike recent initial launches from both Dion Giolito of Illusione (~hl~ Candela) and Andre Farkas of Viaje (WLP Candela), Gomez announced that his release would be regular production from the get go. (Giolito’s [...]

Review: Quesada q d’etat Molotov

In December of 2011, SAG Imports/Quesada announced a new project that would be the company’s first cigar solely created at Quesada’s new factory and an effort to raise awareness for cigar rights. Manuel “Manolo” Quesada’s company would create the q d’etat line as a way to protest increased restrictions on cigar smoking and higher taxes [...]

Review: E.P. Carrillo NWC Short Run 2012 Invictos (Prerelease)

For those of you that don’t know… In June of 2010, the relatively new E.P. Carrillo released the first in what has become an annual tradition for the company, the Short Run. Each year, E.P. Carrillo produces the same 3 sizes in close to the same numbers, but with different blends. The 2010 version used [...]

Review: Opus X Forbidden X 13 God’s Whisper 1924

Today is a review of yet another one of the Forbidden X 13 releases, or Forbidden 13. The God’s Whisper 1924 is perhaps the most intriguing of the six releases because it is by all accounts erroneously listed in the Fuente price list. As Brooks noted in his review of the Opus X Forbidden X 13 [...]

Review: Romeo y Julieta Exclusivo Para TAA by José Seijas

Over the past two years, a series of limited edition cigars produced exclusively for Tobacconist Association of America members has garnered a fair share of buzz among cigar smokers in the know. Interestingly, most of the buzz comes via members of the online media or a few retailers who are active on Twitter, as the TAA keeps a fairly [...]

Redux: Pinar Del Río BOTL.org Small Batch 2010

Today is another one of our Monday morning traditions at halfwheel, redux reviews. For more info about redux reviews and all of other review types, click here. Today’s redux review is of a cigar I reviewed way back in 2010, the Pinar Del Río “Brother of the Leaf” (BOTL) Small Batch 2010. While I had [...]

Review: Paul Garmirian PG Corona Grande (1995)

For those of you that don’t know… Today is the first non-Cuban cigar that will qualify as “vintage” as per our standards and it comes from Dr. Paul Garmirian. Paul Garmirian has been around the cigar business for a while and may well be one of the most interesting cigar brands you have never heard [...]

Review: Casa Fuente Double Robusto

This will be sixth cigar we’ve reviewed that is exclusive to the legendary Casa Fuente, yet it’s only the third Casa Fuente release. Despite being the first cigar ever reviewed on SmokingStogie and being reviewed on TheCigarFeed, we seem to be missing a definitive history on the Casa Fuente line. Casa Fuente is a cigar [...]