Vegueros Especial No 2 Review

[El Presidente]

I have given a 1998 Vegueros Especial No 2 to Ken to review which means we will see a review sometime before June 2006.

In the interim I was wondering the thoughts of others on this forum in relation to this never spoken about cigar.

I will review one also this afternoon during the Czar House "Happy Hour"

[Ken Gargett]

may i first take this opportunity to offer my most humble, grovelling apology to rob for taking more than 15 hours between receiving said stick and getting back from brizzy and smoking the thing and posting. unforgivable. i prostate myself before you (don't even think it).

and sorry to hear of the disability preventing you from posting.

anyhow, was quite excited by this. never tried anything from this producer. and not often one gets to review a stick from 1998. as this house only kicked off in 1997, this then is obviously one of their earliest efforts so it might be interesting to also look at a few of their more recent releases to see if they are sticking with the style.

they look good, nice little pigtail and a hint of an oily sheen. construction looked pretty good all round. liked the flavours. quite mild and there is some complexity built up from the time. there were some grilled nuts, creamy flavours. about mid way thru, it went quite chocolatey for a bit but then that faded. developed some shoe leather and burnt earth notes. did finish a touch dirty with a hint of bitterness but overall, more than worth a look. not sure of pricing but suspect that these would be well priced making them decent value.

now for the 'but'.

having only tried this one, can't tell you if it is endemic to this cigar or just a one-off but this was far and away the tightest, toughest draw i have ever encountered. most of the time, it felt like sucking on a rock. linda lovelace would have struggled. we are talking laguito no2 size so not a huge smoke but over two hours of hard slog. those who like a strong draw are going to love this. i felt like i'd done a marathon by the end and i also felt that i was probably missing much that the cigar might otherwise offer if it were not packed like concrete. i do like a draw that requires some effort (one of the things i like about the slr dc's is that they don't give up their glories without making you work for it) but this was too severe even for me. (you'd have got your review earlier, rob, but i have been catching my breath ever since). i'd be interested in seeing more to see if this is a widespread problem and interested on thoughts from others. if you were interested in these, i'd check with rob to see if he has some that are more approachable. for some reason, i had this thought in the back of my mind that the age would have loosened things a little but if so, these would've scratched diamonds when young. 86.

now, if rob doesn't mind, i might go and get on with something that earns me a living, not him.

[habanohal]

Well Ken, it is known here that Rob giuves you al the plugged "reject" cigars. So why would that 1 be differant??? LOL:-D

[El Presidente]

Ken

Feel free to post the October Cigar review any time soon :-)

Let me give you a non plugged one and a big hug next time I see you.

Will smoke mine this afternoon.

[Ken Gargett]

what, you haven't got some poor innocent newbie to berate today so i am it?

i have posted october. granted it might not have been spot on time but it is there!

i'll need far more than a hug after the shabby treatment i've copped today.

[Ken Gargett]

just to clarify, it wasn't plugged as such. it was just incredibly tight right thru.

is your experience different?

[Tampa1257]

I have not smoked this marca before, and have read several different accounts about it, unfortunately, none have been stellar. It was also my understanding that quite a few of the laguito no2 & no 1's during this time period were prone to being very tight. Was this a result from newer rollers trying their hand on this Vitola? Of course, there were numerous issues during this period with construction coming out of Habanos and it might not surprise me if it may have been a tad overfilled resulting with the tight draw. Now granted, I enjoy a firmer draw over a loose draw, but as Ken stated, if Linda Lovelace would have had difficulties, then no one could have gotten a good draw from it.

[Phailure]

» as Ken stated, if Linda Lovelace would have had difficulties, then no one

» could have gotten a good draw from it.

Thanks for the review ken. It was interesting to find out more about this lesser known brand.

[El Presidente]

Enjoyed this mild to medium bodied stick Friday afternoon during our staff bonding session also known as happy hour.

Mild and creamy. Built up to medium bodied with a raisiny nutty flavour which whisped in and out of focus.

Very Juan Lopez like in parts.

The ugliest band I have seen. Obviously came from the same Cuban graphics department as Sancho Panzo and Raphael Gonzalez.

Mine drew like a champion :-D

[Ken Gargett]

i am staggered beyond belief that if there were two sticks you were doling out that i would end up with the tough one. not in a million years would such a thing have ever occurred to me.