For those of you that don’t know…

In 1997, a new brand of Cuban cigars was born… Vegas Robaina. Named after the legendary Alejandro Robaina, who you may recall passed away in April, it uses tobacco from the premium Vuelta Abajo region of Cuba. In fact, Robaina is the only Cuban grower to have a brand of cigars named after him. The Vegas comes from vega, the Cuban word for a tobacco field. It is quite a small line of cigars, and it currently consists of only five standard production cigars.

The Famosos is a 5 inch x 48 RG box pressed cigar with an EXTREMELY light brown wrapper (almost yellow, really) that has no oil at all, and feels quite dry to the touch…It is very firm when squeezed, and the wrapper smells faintly of tobacco and aged wood (cedar)…

• Cigar Reviewed: Vegas Robaina Famoso
• Country of Origin: Cuba
• Factory: José Martí
• Wrapper: Cuba
• Binder: Cuba
• Filler: Cuba
• Size: 5 Inches
• Ring Gauge: 48
• Vitola: Rothschild
• Est. Price: $6.50 (Normal Price of Current Production)
• Date Released: 1997

In fact, the wrapper was so light in color, I wanted to show a photo next to a few other cigars (just what I had laying around to photograph for other reviews). Here it is next to a Don Pepin Firecracker, a Camacho Liberty 2005, and a Viaje TNT:

This cigar surprised me quite a bit with an amazing amount of spice and pepper in the first third, more so at the end of the first third, especially considering the color of the wrapper and the reputation that the Robaina cigars have for being a milder blend. Dominant flavors were a fairly spicy wood (cedar), leather, and aged tobacco.

The flavors turned very mild in the second third, (even boring really), but picked back up in the last third with a more creamy, sweetish profile that was quite pleasant…I even thought I tasted some caramel at one point…The spice from the first third never returned (sadly)…

The burn was just so-so (I had to touch it up multiple times, but nothing too bad) but the draw was great for the whole smoke…The ash was fairly ugly as well, but stayed on for over an inch every time…It had a very dry finish, but nothing over the top in that regard either. The Final Smoking time was 1 Hour and 30 Minutes.

One other note: it has been said by many people that the Vegas Robaina line of cigars does NOT use the same tobacco as the farm rolled cigars by the actual Vegas Robaina (and his family) on their farm in Cuba. I don’t know which is true for sure, but I will say that there is a HUGE difference in flavor and profile between this cigar and the Robaina Family “El Padrino” which came from his farm.

The Bottom Line: Overall, this was just a very pleasant cigar, one that you would smoke first thing in the morning, if you are into that kind of thing. I admit I was quite surprised at the amount of spice in the first third, but that did not stick around long enough to really make much of a difference in the whole cigar. It really did not stand out from the (very large) crowd of other milder Cubans on the market, and while I enjoyed smoking an (almost) 15 year old cigar, I doubt I could have told you that it was that old if reviewing this blind. A good cigar with good flavors, but really not enough complexity to be more then a standard smoke.

Final Score: 80