Now what everyone has been waiting for… the results of the Blind Review Challenge that my buddy Matt of Matt’s Cigar Journal and I participated in. Basically we gave each other three cigars, one inexpensive, one medium priced and one super premium and we had to try to guess as much as we could about the cigars.
The idea of this little experiment was to see if we could properly identify a cigar without the bias associated with the band (price, manufacturer, etc.).
Results:
What was so interesting about this whole thing was that we still found a way to bias our reviews and tastings. I know Matt is a huge Pepin smoker, he loves everything the guy makes. So as I was smoking his cigars, I often found myself thinking, “which Pepin cigar could this be?”. Matt also incorporated bias into his reviews but in a different way. He kept trying to pick out Pepin-like characteristics in the cigars that I gave him.
How is this? Well, let’s share the results.
Cigar #1 – Matt was given a Carlos Torano 1916 Cameroon Robusto. Unfortunately he received a bad stick. It was not a great smoking experience for him, and because of that he thought this was the cheap smoke. But he did think that the wrapper was a Sumatran wrapper. Well it actually is. Cameroon wrappers are from Sumatran plants grown in the Cameroon. So even with a bad stick, Matt was still able to guess the eight wrapper! Bravo!
Cigar #2 – I was given an El Rey del Mundo Robusto Larga Oscuro. I had thought this looked like a maduro wrapper, but it was missing that characteristic sweetness you get in a maduro, most often a Connecticut Broadleaf. Often times, Oscuro wrappers are not from the Broadleaf plant or in general are a little less sweet. TO me it had a characteristic taste of Honduran tobacco, and in fact the wrapper is a Honduran Oscuro so I did a pretty good job with this one. Whew!
Cigar #3 – I gave Matt a 5-year old Fuente Fuente Opus X Super Belicoso. Matt thought it was some sort of Pepin cigar, and he thinks he was pretty off on this one. I would like to point out that I really think Pepin was going for a traditional rutic tasting cigar and the Opus has all of that earthy, musky, leathery-ness that is also present in a lot of DPGs. Plus it was aged, so that had to throw Matt for a loop on this one. I thought he did a great job nailing the flavors and just let his bias and love of all things Pepin to steer him away from the Opus. Plus, an Opus doesn’t really taste like other Dominicans does it. Good job, Matt!
Cigar #4 – This one was the toughest one out of the bunch for me. Matt gave me a Perdomo Edicion de Silvio Maduro. The cigar was very mild and did not have a lot of depth in flavor. One might think it was the value smoke, but the cigar really was aged and was not harsh. Also, the wrapper was exquisite, so I knew for a Maduro wrapper, this had to be the premium smoke, becasue normal these leaves are less than pretty. I was right in that it was a maduro, but that’s about it. I ws biased with Matt’s predilictions so I was trying to fit a Pepin cigar into what I was tasting. Woops.
Cigar #5 – I tried to fool Matt on this one. I gave him a La Vieja Habana Corojo by Drew Estates. This particular cigar is not bad at all, but does not taste like a Corojo. There is hardly any spice to the blend, but Matt nailed the other flavors present. I find these to be very decent value smokes plus you always get good construction. This was the star of the show for this challenge because it was probably the best reviewed of the six smokes and cost the least. So there you go folks! I am quite sure smoking this with the band on, Matt would have probably had some bias going in to it. This one smoke made this Challenge really cool!
Cigar #6 – I got this one! Sorta. Matt gave me an Excalibur Legend by Hoyo de Monterrey. I had just smoked this cigar recently and Matt wanted to see if I recognized it. Luckily I did recognize that I had smoked this recently but I guessed against my intuition because I figured again Matt was going to give me a Pepin stick. At the last moment before the reveal I told him what I thought it really was and I was right. So I guess I could give my self partial credit on this one…
So, the moral of the story is that there just about always is some bias even when trying to puposefully eliminate it. I liked the fact that the best reviewd cigar was the cheapest and that the most expensive cigar , the Perdomo, was also one of the least complex. That shows that just becasue you shell out the dough doesn’t mean you are getting a world-class stick. And there are always “diamonds in the rough”. So keep searching!
Here’s the link to Matt’s wrap-up. I’d like to again thank Matt of Matt’s Cigar Journal for steering this project, it was a blast and I hope we do it again!
