As always, when I smoke a pre-release cigar, I feel it is premature to give it a firm assessment rating – therefore, I do a pre-review to provide some initial feedback. With some follow-on smokes completed, it’s time to assess some more cigars.   With this installment of “Assessment Updates”, I look at Joya de Nicaragua’s My Uzi Weighs a Ton, La Gloria Cubana’s Artesanos Retro Especiale, and A.Turrent’s Puro Corojo.


Joya de Nicaragua My Uzi Weighs a Ton

Joya de Nicaragua My Uzi Weighs a Ton

 My Uzi Weighs a Ton represents the first joint blending collaboration with Jonathan Drew himself and the folks at Joya de Nicaragua.  The initial vitolas are geared at the 60 ring gauge smoker.   With many blends, the 60 ring gauge does not work, however when it does work – it showcases the robustness and power of the cigar.  The Joya De Nicaragua Uzi is one of those 60 ring gauge cigars that fits the bill.   The cigar has outstanding construction and delivers a nice mix of cocoa sweetness and pepper spice.

Here is a link to a pre-review of my initial impressions of this cigar.

Assessment: Memorable

La Gloria Cubana Artesanos Retro Especiale

La Gloria Cubana Artesanos Retro Especiale


La Gloria Cubana’s Artesanos Retro Especiale is somewhat of an experimental concept. For the Team La Gloria Cubana was looking to engineer a cigar where it was not the wrapper providing all of the flavors of the cigar.  Instead the team looked to leverage significant flavors from the binder and filler.   The good news is that the experiment is definitely successful . The bad news is that I don’t feel it delivered a very good cigar in terms of flavor.  Yes there are notes of cedar, pepper, nut, and citrus, but I still wondered how much better this cigar would have been if the wrapper would have been allowed to do its job.  It is worth noting while the flavors were not there for me, this cigar consistently burned and drew well.

Here is a link to a pre-review of my initial impressions of this cigar.

Assessment: See What You Think

A.Turrent Puro Corojo by Altadis

A.Turrent Puro Corojo

The debut cigar under Alejandro Turrent’s line in Altadis last year was A. Turrent’s Triple Play Maduro.  This secured a spot in my Top 20 for Cigar of the Year in 2010.   This had me very excited to look forward to Turrent’s follow-up a triple corojo.  Originally dubbed the A.Turrent Triple Corojo, it underwent a name change to the A.Turrent Puro Corojo.   This cigar was launched at Cigar Dave’s Charlotte North Carolina broadcast in May.   At that time, the Puro Corojo (still called the Triple Corojo) needed some age.  While age did rectify some of the burn problems I had, it still didn’t do much to improve the flavor profile.  Ultimately, I still found this to be a low complexity cigar that just did not wow me.

Here is a link to a pre-review of my initial impressions of this cigar.

Assessment: See What You Think