Montecristo Especial #1 NOSC-SS-2 (10/97)

[greenpimp]

Montecristo Especial #1 NOSC-SS-2 (10/97)

This is one of my favorite cigars. It always satiates. A good 2 hours of pleasure, starting out mild to strong as hell at the end. And to me it represents the Montecristo core flavors better than any other vitola when it’s a good one. Roasted nuts and dark chocolate and coffee with cream and leather and bean and smooth earth. Montecristo’s got it all and when it’s good it’s probably my favorite marca. It’s what made me fall in love with cigars. Montecristos in Paris. They can be perfect.

Beautiful medium Colorado hued cigar, firm to the touch and well rolled. Draw tight but effective. Prelight smell and taste like…an aged Montecristo. It smells only like that. I guess I could say light cocoa and leathery tobacco, but that’s crap. It smells like an old Montecristo. Started mild, smooth. Light and creamy to open, good smoke volume. An inch in bittersweet chocolate opens up, with light earth on the finish. Medium body now. Still very smooth and the smoke is aromatic. Turns savory and adds some scorched vanilla to the profile. Elegant and medium and satisfying.

Second third I get to the really good stuff. I exhale through the nostrils and there is the Montecristo profile so well executed, which really is indescribable. Yet I blather on. Roasted coffee bean and nuts more on the forefront at the halfway mark. The cigar moves to medium full but still completely smooth, in step with itself. I am having this after a large dinner of grilled sage-rubbed porterhouse, and it is holding up well, but would go equally well as a slap around with some coffee. If I could find the time to sit for an hour and a half in the morning. Maybe in another 17 years.

Final third continues to intensify, as if I were boiling it down and making a syrup. Full bodied, with strong dark coffee elements, some black cherry notes. But really just the Montecristo thang intensified. Reduced. Fantastic. And then I’ll have a light, creamy puff that is almost sweet, with the finish turning brooding and dark. Satisfying and complex. I am very happy I took my time smoking it, as the latter portions are my favorite. If I hurry, it is ruined and bitter towards the end. But it finishes well, with an intense nuttiness that I am always accused of.

A wonderful smoke and I worry that I have not purchased any more recent vintages to begin aging. I only have a few of these left and it will be a sad day when they are gone. I would score it a healthy 93, and these do not seem to be in danger of expiring soon.

[shrink]

You know how to turn a phrase, Matt. And how to enjoy a cigar, as well.

I'm completely in agreement with you on this one. The Especial No. 1 is reliably good, and is often superb. All the ones I've had from the mid to late 90's have been very good to excellent.

Recent ones are very good, too. I recently sampled another from an early 2006 box, and was pleased to find that they are coming along nicely. Good and strong, and smoothing out to reveal those succulent Montecristo bittersweet flavors.

[El Presidente]

That is cigar poetry Matt

I tend to agree with Shrink. They come in Good and Great. When you have a great one you remember it for the rest of your life. You nailed the flavour profile