CRC: Partagas Serie E No.2 AND AF Don Carlos Personal Reserve Robusto

[Hoosh]

Happy Merry Christmas Eve! I decided to make my day off today a two-fer; one NC and one CC. It’s is the holiday season and it’s all about giving, right? 🙂

The NC - An AF Don Carlos Personal Reserve Robusto

I’ve wanted to smoke this coat for quite awhile; my precious experiences with the DC line have all been really good and I’ve been sitting on this cigar for a minute. Out of the cello, a milky raisin nose met with grapes, cashews, and pound cake on the unlit draw-really nice for a NC. 

Once we’ll lit, I had an almost immediate creamy mouthfeel with some cedar, caramel, and a bit of spice on the throat. The aroma was outstanding, especially in the early morning freshness.

The second third carried the caramel and cedar, but added an unexpected, but welcomed, mintiness to change things up a bit.

Halfway in and through the rest of the smoke, flavors of nutty yeast rolls took center stage. Honestly, really nice and for sure not like any AF cigar I’ve had, probably ever. I’m curious as to how close this blend really is to the “real” personal cigars smoked by Carlos…

While I never touched up the cigar, it did have a slightly wonky burn sometimes that affected absolutely nothing. Lots of great smelling smoke throughout. I need to find more of these.

The CC - A Partagas Serie E No.2

I don’t smoke many CC, but the ones I do, I generally enjoy. Unfortunately, I don’t have the box code for this cigar, but it has been in my humidor since I purchased them in July.

Light hay and grapefruit(?!) on the unlit, slightly resistant draw met with both honey and a cashew nuttiness once well lit. I was surprised at the Drew Estate amount of smoke coming from this cigar (IYKYK), and as much as I enjoyed the aroma from the morning’s Don Carlos, this was (unbelievably) even better! Leathery and woody is the best way to describe the flavors I was picking up. Not a “dry smoke” however, as many Nicaraguans that exhibit these flavors are.

Unfortunately, halfway into this really great tasting smoke is where the wheels started to slightly come off. A pretty major crack in both the wrapper and binder developed, as did a few smaller wrapper cracks closer to the head. As I don’t get the chance to smoke many CCs though, I was determined to ride it out, and, as it turned out, found this to be, as the others in the small box I had, a delightful smoke! 

I’m not certain of the correlation (or if there even is one), but the major split seemed to “open” the cigar; it became more creamy and more flavorful from that point on till the end. And while it ended up splitting even more, I thoroughly enjoyed the woody spiciness the last third of the cigar provided.

Ultimately, while being disappointed with the construction issues (was this really all just my fault?!), I enjoyed this cigar immensely, and wish I did have the box code to know what year it was from because the flavors were outstanding.

All said and done, what a great cigar day for me! I hope yours was just as wonderful!

[Matai]

That’s interesting. I’ve smoke the personal reserve and to me it was a leather bomb.  

[Li Bai]

13 hours ago, Hoosh said:

Unfortunately, I don’t have the box code for this cigar, but it has been in my humidor since I purchased them in July.

The box code can be found under the 5-count SBN box, probably under a sticker if you still have it 👍

[Hoosh]

6 hours ago, Li Bai said:

The box code can be found under the 5-count SBN box, probably under a sticker if you still have it 👍

It’s gone. I took a photo of the box and cigars and then put them in my humidor. The box was tossed pretty quickly afterward . It was last July so I wanted to get them put away pretty quickly out of the heat. Sorry guys…