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| Perdomo 20th Anniversary Maduro |
The Perdomo 20th Anniversary Maduro is one of two cigars released by Tabacalera Perdomo to commemorate the company’s 20th anniversary. The line made its debut at the 2012 IPCPR Trade Show in Orlando, Florida. The cigars released are Nicaraguan puros utilizing the best tobacco from Perdomo’s farms in Nicaragua. I recently have had an opportunity to sample the 20th Anniversary Maduro. Overall, I found this to be a good cigar and one that provided more of a kick than I had originally expected.
Perdomo Cigars has done a good job of “verticalizing” their cigar brands. In other words, they provide a common blend of binder and filler and then offer different wrapper options. The Perdomo 20th Anniversary Series follows this pattern. In addition to a maduro wrapper option, there is also a sun grown option. A second part of this “verticalization” is that the same vitolas are provided with both wrapper options. We will get into the particulars in our usual sections below.
For this assessment we will focus on the 20th Anniversary Maduro. Without further adieu, let’s break down the cigar and see what this cigar brings to the table.
Blend Profile
As mentioned above, both editions of the Perdomo 20th Anniversary are Nicaraguan puros.
20th Anniversary Maduro
Wrapper: Cuban Seed Maduro
Binder: Nicaraguan
Filler: Nicaraguan
20th Anniversary Sun Grown
Wrapper: Cuban Seed Sun Grown
Binder: Nicaraguan
Filler: Nicaraguan
Vitolas Available
Both blends of the Perdomo 20th Anniversary series will be available in five vitolas. The cigars will be packaged 24 per box. The vitolas are geared toward larger ring gauges and are offered in a box-press shape.
Robusto: 5 x 56
Epicure: 6 x 56
Torpedo: 6 1/2 x 54
Gordo: 6 x 60
Churchill: 7 x 56
Appearance
For this cigar experience, I smoked the Robusto vitola of the Perdomo 20th Anniversary Maduro. The 20th Anniversary Maduro is a well-packed box-press. The wrapper has a coffee bean color with a slight amount of oil to it. There are some dark spots on the wrapper. There are also some visible veins and visible wrapper seams.
The band to the Perdomo 20th Anniversary Maduro has the black, white, and gold Tabacalera Perdomo sunburst logo on the upper portion of the band. The lower half of the band has a large red stripe with gold and black stripes on the top and bottom. On that stripe it says “20th ANNIVERSARY” in gold font.
Preparation for the Cigar Experience
Before lighting my Perdomo 20th Anniversary Maduro, I commenced with the pre-light draw actions. My first step was to place a straight cut into the cap of the cigar. When I started the actual pre-light draw, I was treated to notes of leather. Overall, it wasn’t the most exciting pre-light draw. Since we do not factor the pre-light experience into the assessment rating and score, there was no loss of points here. At this point, it was time to light my 20th Anniversary Maduro and see what this cigar would deliver.
Flavor Profile
The Perdomo 20th Anniversary Maduro continues with its leathery profile that started on the pre-light draw. These leather notes were soon joined by some spice notes. The spice notes were not of a traditional black pepper profile, but more of an exotic spice. The spice moved into the forefront and the leather notes diminished. By about the five percent mark, some unsweetened cocoa notes joined the exotic notes in the forefront. These notes balanced the spice perfectly and prevented the cigar from becoming overly spicy. The profile of unsweetned cocoa and exotic spice with some background leather notes set the stage for a good chunk of the cigar experience.
As the 20th Anniversary Maduro moved into the last third of the cigar experience, I detected some nut flavors. These flavors complemented the cocoa and exotic spice nicely. Toward the end of the smoking experience, the spice notes definitely took control. The close to the cigar never got overly harsh. The resulting nub was ideal firm to the touch, and cool in temperature.
Burn and Draw
From a burn perspective, the burn performed reasonably well. There were a couple of points early on where the burn got a bit jagged, but that seemed to resolve itself early on. The resulting ash had a salt and pepper color. I would categorize the ash as firm ash, but not overly tight ash. The burn rate was ideal. While the burn temperature was ideal, this did seem like a cigar that could burn hot if overdrawn. By keeping an easy draw, there were no issues with a hot burn. I just kept an easy draw for the majority of the smoke. The draw itself had no other issues.
Strength and Body
I was a little surprised that the Perdomo 20th Anniversary Maduro had some pop to it. There was definitely more buzz from this cigar than I originally expected. I assessed this cigar to have just enough strength to qualify as a full strength smoke. As for the depth of the flavors, they were there. I assessed the body of the 20th Anniversary Maduro to be medium to full-bodied. Toward the end, the flavors do move into the full-bodied range. For most of the cigar experience, the strength to the 20th Anniversary Maduro had a slight edge over the body – but I would not categorize this as a major imbalance.
Final Thoughts
Overall, I thought the Perdomo 20th Anniversary Maduro was a good smoke. While I didn’t find this cigar to deliver a lot in flavor transitions, it still produced some interesting flavors. The one distinguishing characteristic I liked about this cigar is that it delivered a good combination of strength and smoothness – something that we don’t often see in cigars. I’m curious to see what the Sun Grown wrapper will do to this particular blend (and will be smoking it in a subsequent assessment). I probably would not steer this cigar to the novice because it is a little stronger than a newbie might be used to. I still would recommend this to a more experienced cigar enthusiast. As for myself, I would definitely reach for this again – and look forward to trying some of the other sizes.
Summary
Burn: Good
Draw: Excellent
Complexity: Low
Strength: Full
Body: Medium to Full (Full toward last 25%)
Finish: Good
Assessment: Nice to Have
Score: 88
Source: The cigars for this assessment were purchased from The Pipe and Pint in Greensboro, North Carolina.
