My account of Cuban Cigars since 1995

[mcgoospot]

For newbies and veterans aloke, below is my take on the quality of Cuban cigars since 1995:


Quick history of Cuban cigars from someone who has been through it for the past 17 years.

Cigars from 1995 and before: these are pre cigar-boom when Cuba had tons of raw materials, criollo wrapper (extremely fine wrapper leaf which was tremendous!!!).  Have never had a bad cigar from this era and they have aged tremendously.  Very costly to buy these today.

1996-1998: Cigar-boom has started to catch up with production.  Cuba no longer using criolo leaf for wrappers due to blue mold epidemic.  Cuba experiments with many wrapper leafs.  Cuba doubles export of cigars EACH year to meet demand brough about by increased popularity of cigars.  Good quality cigars but not near the quality of 1995 and before.

1999-mid 2001: Cuba cannot meet the demand for cigars yet continues to mass produce to meet demand.  Cuba's export of cigars goes from 50,000,000 in 1995 to 250,000,000 in 1999/2000 years.  As a result uncured tobacco and inexperienced rollers cause a tremendous drop in the quality of cigars.  Many thin guaged cigars are plugged.  Cigars are very harsh when young.  Known as the "bad years".

mid 2001-mid 2003: Cuba catches up.  Demand falls (boom ended), inexperienced rollers now have more experience.  Able to again use aged tobacco.  Experiment with wrapper leaf has ended with a nice wrapper leaf being used.  IMHO these are the best cigars rolled since 1995.

Mid 2003- present: starting in mid 2003 Cuba started doing something to their tobacco to make the cigars more enjoyable when fresh.  Prior to this EVERY box of Cuban cigars went through a "sick period" where the cigars reeked of ammonia.  This was the natural curing process resulting from the moisture used to roll the cigars resulting in an accelerated fermentation and an ammonia smell. This sick period generally arose sometime within the first year of production and lasted anywhere from 6 months to a year.
    Starting in mid 2003, cigars have no longer gone through this sick period (they sometimes go flat for a short period but I have not had a single box of Cuban cigars have this ammonia smell since August of 2003 and I have bought thousands of boxes since then). Some people believe that Cuba now "cooks" their tobacco to make it more enjoyable when young or Right of the Truck (ROTT).  Whatever they did the cigars have become much better when young.  There is concern, however, that what is being done has effected the ability of these cigars to improve with age. Many collectors from the Far east believe that the post July2003 cigars will not age as well as their predecessors.
My experience confirms this belief.  Many cigars I have smoked from 2004-2005 have become flat.

Recent prduction cigars are rolled better and smoke great young.  We will see how they age.



 

[UpInSmoke]

Great write up bro!

Agree with everything, and they definitely are smoking great at young age

Thanks for posting

[jabuan]

Nice write up. Thanks!


"Let no man pull you low enough to hate him." - Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

[Gee-Man]

Thanks Mike !!

[KING]

Great stuff brother. Appreciate the write up...

[Duc21]

Thanks for sharing your knowledge and experience Mike.

[Hutch]

Pretty much the same experience here. Additionally, through smoking as well dissection, I've found less ligero in quite a few vitola, as well as none in cigars that used to have some. This seemed to start in '03 sometime and maybe even increase some in '06-'08. Great job, Mike !

[shlomo]

Good post M. I hope you and many others are wrong about the aging potential of post 2003 boxes as 99% of my stuff is from this past decade. Have a handful of things pree 2003 that have aged magnificently and 2008 is still my favorite year of the past 6 or 7, but luckily nothing from 2006 and later has been flat for me. I have not had enough experience with 2004-05 to really comment however as 2006 was the year I started buying boxes to age instead of singles to smoke.

[txcigarmadcap]

Thank you for the great post.  :bigup:

[TheGiver]

Good stuff. Thank you.