Preferred shade of Montecristo No.2?

[DeeBeezy]

Both cracking boxes, which do you prefer? What are the differences in profile

[JohnS]

My heart says the lighter wrapper, but my head says to smoke one of each first and work out which one is closer to my flavor preference for a Monte 2! 😁

[FatPete]

Both of those boxes would be darker than my preferred colour. I usually like them Colorado to Colorado Claro as I find them sweeter & able to be smoked earlier than the darker ones. The darker ones do have more of the cocoa/bitter chocolate thing going, so they are great too. 

[Kaptain Karl]

Even though I love chocolate, I just dont pick up a ton of chocolate in cigars. So I'll take as light as wrappers as I can on monte's. I have 2 boxes of colorado claro wrappers from last year that I'm gonna tear into next spring!

[rascalmonkey]

I concur with FatPete: dark wrappers on the Monte 2 require more aging 

[Skeng Don]

Love both, The darker the better, with age of course 

[cigaraholic]

I haven’t had a great dark wrapper Monte 2 this century 😰

[sw15825]

The best Monte 2's, 4's and the twin Edmundos I've ever smoked were wrapped in lighter wrappers. About Colorado Claro. At least to me. Yes, if I'm going to put a cigar down to age, somewhat darker, oily wrappers have done very well. They actually lighten up, slightly in color after some significant time. It's just a matter of preference imo. 

[karp]

One more vote for the lighter wrap… milk chocolate vs dark mocha. Both can be nice though.

[Meklown]

3 hours ago, Kaptain Karl said:

Even though I love chocolate, I just dont pick up a ton of chocolate in cigars. 

you need thin, dark, oily wrappers on monte for that. I love chocs too and what really turned me on to cigars was the 2010 Grand Edmundo (when a year or two old - they seemed to have mellowed out a lot now). Almost literally munching on a bar of dark chocolate. 

Although, they don't seem to make it like that any more. Or maybe that's my dragon that I keep chasing but never catch

[NSXCIGAR]

I like Monte wrappers to be a true Colorado or a touch darker. Both above would be too dark for me. 

[dshot]

Here's my opinion. Monte #2 I like light wrappers the performance for me has been better. Petit Edmundo's  I like dark as night wrappers I dunno why. I like that huge blast of Cocco/Coffee they give. Monte #4's light wrappers have been the best.

[williamthewolf]

The last several Monte 2's I've had were a shade or two lighter than the lighter one you have up there. Yesterday though I received a box of Petit Edmundos with wrapper somewhere in between the two you posted. I'm sure you'll enjoy both boxes when they're ready to smoke.

[Bigpink]

So is it pretty much just generally accepted across the board that ohh lighter wrappers need less downtime than their darker brethren? 

[Tstew75]

Colorado is about perfect. Some of the RAT-coded 21s even have some Rosato hue. Not a fan of really dark wrappers.

[DeeBeezy]

There will never be a straight answer for This because it’s Down to preference but: how much aging time do you essentially save with lighter wrappers?  

[BrightonCorgi]

Those boxes look like what I would pick.

[freelunch0402]

Just had two boxes of Monte 5s from the same factory with the same date code. One box had way darker tone of wrappers. The darker box showed more cocoa with sweeter finish, the bright box had brighter tone of flavors(freshly cut grass) and slight sharp and bitter finish. Both were pleasant but preferred the darker box(cocoa and sweet finish) box. I might be in the minority, but from the Monte 4s i've compared similarly(but with different factory/date code. mostly 2019/2020 though), I get more earthy taste and bitter finish from brighter wrappers and cocoa and sweetness from darker wrappers for some reason. I built a preference for darker shaded montes for the time being, but might change after more experience.  

[DeeBeezy]

On 9/24/2021 at 3:53 PM, Tstew75 said:

Colorado is about perfect. Some of the RAT-coded 21s even have some Rosato hue. Not a fan of really dark wrappers.

This looks much much lighter than I would go for 

[Tstew75]

Just now, dan benhamou said:

This looks much much lighter than I would go for 

Different strokes for different folks, that's what makes the cigar game so wonderful.

I'd also take one shade darker than these, but that's about it.  I tend to find dark-wrappered Montes one-dimensional by reason of them staying in that singular chocolate lane. 

 

[RDB]

Time is definitely a key variable here. I have a dark box of oily M2s that I’m really looking forward to smoking when they are 5+ years old. But a lighter box from 2018 is smoking just great now. I’d say the same across the whole marca: both work for me, but give a different experience. 

[drinaldi84]

This topic motivated my cigar choice last night, and so I grabbed a fairly dark shaded Monte 2 LTU ABR 19.  Maybe a touch lighter than the second box pictured above (my box seemed to look much darker indoors). 
 

I can certainly understand what you mean when you say darker wrappers stay in the singular chocolate lane experience @Tstew75, but it went from hazelnut/nutella chocolate notes in the first third, to milk chocolate, and then to dark chocolate covered almonds in the finish. Definitely chocolate all the way through, but in a way where it still transitioned beautifully and kept things interesting.  Bitterness at the last inch or so, but maybe we can chalk that up to youth and lack of rest (4 months down on these).  Oh, and I couldn’t agree more, this is truly what makes the cigar game so wonderful!

[Tstew75]

57 minutes ago, drinaldi84 said:

This topic motivated my cigar choice last night, and so I grabbed a fairly dark shaded Monte 2 LTU ABR 19.  Maybe a touch lighter than the second box pictured above (my box seemed to look much darker indoors). 
 

I can certainly understand what you mean when you say darker wrappers stay in the singular chocolate lane experience @Tstew75, but it went from hazelnut/nutella chocolate notes in the first third, to milk chocolate, and then to dark chocolate covered almonds in the finish. Definitely chocolate all the way through, but in a way where it still transitioned beautifully and kept things interesting.  Bitterness at the last inch or so, but maybe we can chalk that up to youth and lack of rest (4 months down on these).  Oh, and I couldn’t agree more, this is truly what makes the cigar game so wonderful!

Pretty perfect shade here. Glad you enjoyed!

[Kaptain Karl]

23 hours ago, dan benhamou said:

This looks much much lighter than I would go for 

They’d be perfect for me!

[SCgarman]

On 9/24/2021 at 10:53 AM, Tstew75 said:

Colorado is about perfect. Some of the RAT-coded 21s even have some Rosato hue. Not a fan of really dark wrappers.

Those are perfection in my preferred wrapper shade.