Cohiba 1966 EL 2011 (COHRW)

[CaptainQuintero]

  The weather is being crazy at the moment, I've been getting the garden sorted for winter and the long cigar draught until spring, but in-between the torrential downpours this week a glorious morning appeared! Supposedly only lasting until after lunch so I'm taking this weather bonus as a sign and lighting up my last 1966.

  I picked up a handful of singles when these came out and if in honest, I never really enjoyed them! They might have been too fresh but do me, my batch had too much of that famous 'EL wrapper' overpowering them. They also suffered from more than a touch of the fireproof wrapper..

  If I remember right I thought the Hoyo EL of that year was the best!

  Anyway the sun is shining and hopefully I can see if age has changed these up.

  Draw is good, this size is a little uncomfortable for me, it doesn't sit naturally in either the hand or mouth. Bit of spice of the cold draw.

  Lighting up and there's a big blast of peaches and cream. I remember this with the originals and loved it, back then it seemed to fade very quickly though. There's that old EL flavor still there, it's a difficult one to pin down; almost a burnt leather but there's a dark cocoa playing around in the mix. It can be good as long as that burnt profile doesn't go overboard.

  Motoring towards the second third and there isn't much in the way of complexity so far. There's still that peach and cream that tempered with a burnt background. It's crème brulé and melba. Enjoyable.

  Into the second third and the old EL wrapper issue is rearing it's head. The burn just begins to curl in on itself and smoulders. As soon as it starts the sweet peach and cream drops out and the burnt profile decides to take over and begin to trash the place. It's the same experience that I had back when these first came out which disappointed me so much.

  Final third and it's been a real battle to get here, the burn is spluttering and dying out. Some say that burnt mud and old tyres aren't a brilliant flavor combo, I can't disagree with them and it's a shame that it's all I'm getting from this. Taking a flying dive into the bin.

  An inglorious end to and underwhelming bunch of cigars for me. I know some people have had incredible experiences with these but mine have been just terrible. The blend is there, I can see it hidden deep down but those old EL wrappers and some of the materials used just killed this and so many ELs for me. Just bad luck getting a bunch with such a prominent flaw. I haven't had any of the recent ELreleases but it sounds like Cuba have dialed it back and tweaked the wrappers, certainly the fireproof stuff seems to have gone. 

  I'm not even sure how to rate these, gut says 70/100 but If I look back I only enjoyed the first third. Construction was good. Price even back then wasn't great (For the time) so I'm going to revise it to 50/100 with a mildly peeved sad face sticker to go along with it ?

...and it's just started to rain

[SigmundChurchill]

Unfortunately, I have had the same experience with these.  Too much EL, not enough Cohiba, even coming from my super special H&F box.. ?  A lot of people swear by them though.  I have 7 or 8 left.  Maybe they just need some more time.???

[Fugu]

Sorry to hear about your consistently poor experience with these! Actually, judging from your pic, that wrapper doesn't look overly dark and robust, typical EL-type, so the issues seem quite a bit surprising. Those are the kind I would usually seek out in ELs.

[CaptainQuintero]

Just now, Fugu said:

Sorry to hear about your consistently poor experience with these! Actually, judging from your pic, that wrapper doesn't look overly dark and robust, typical EL-type, so the issues seem quite a bit surprising. Those are the kind I would usually seek out in ELs.

Yeah I thought I had lucked out with the wrapper when they came, I think these were the beginning of the end of my ventures into the EL program. I had so many amazing experiences prior; Monte Sublimes, Cuaba Piramides, Monte D, Mag 48 etc that I think the hype train didn't help