ADVentura The Royal Return – King’s Gold Toro

Today we take a look at a cigar from ADVentura Cigars known as The Royal Return – King’s Gold. ADVentura Cigars was founded by Henderson Ventura and Marcel Knobel. It’s a brand of cigars that comes out of Tabacalera William Ventura in the Dominican Republic. This is a factory that has earned a reputation for making cigars for companies such as Caldwell Cigar Company, La Barba Cigars, and Room101 Cigars. The Royal Return is actually a two-cigar line consisting of Queen’s Pearl, a Connecticut Shade; and King’s Gold, a Connecticut Broadleaf. In both cases, these are cigars that feature wrappers that had not been seen in the ADVentura portfolio to date. In this assessment we will look closer at the King’s Gold offering in the Toro size.

The lines in the ADVentura Cigars portfolio have had a theme of exploration. This has been seen in offerings such as ADVentura – The Explorer, ADVentura – The Navigator, and ADVentura – The Conquerer. With ADVentura – The Royal Return, the theme focuses around explorers bringing back gifts for the Queen and King from a sea voyage. As the name indicates, this includes pearls for the Queen and gold for the King. Both the Queen’s Pearl and King’s Gold are positioned as more ultra-premium offerings in the ADVentura portfolio.

Without further ado, let’s “explore” The Royal Return King’s Gold Toro and see what his cigar brings to the table.

SPECIFICATIONS

Blend and Origin

The Royal Return King’s Gold is a multi-national blend highlighted by a Connecticut Broadleaf wrapper. In addition, the blend features a Mexican San Andres binder and Dominican, U.S., and Nicaraguan fillers. As mentioned above, production for ADVentura Cigars comes out of Tabacalera William Ventura in the Dominican Republic.

Wrapper: Connecticut Broadleaf
Binder: Mexican San Andres
Filler: Dominican, American (USA), Nicaragua
Country of Origin: Dominican Republic
Factory: Tabacalera William Ventura

Vitolas Offered

The Royal Return King’s Gold comes in two sizes. Each is presented in 20-count boxes.

Robusto: 52 x 5
Toro: 54 x 6

Appearance

The Connecticut Broadleaf wrapper of the Royal Return King’s Gold Toro wasn’t an overly dark one. It had the appearance of a cocoa powder brown. There was some mottling on the surface of the wrapper, but not much in the way of oil on it. There were some visible veins and some visible wrapper seams.

The band of the Royal Return King’s Gold really stands out. This is a thick metallic foil band that has a brass/gold color to it. All of the designs are embossed on the band. The center of the band has a shield shape with the ADVentura “ADV” navigator logo in the center. The left side of the band has the text “ADVENTURA BY Henderson Ventura” embossed on it while the right side has the text “The Royal Return” embossed on it.

PERFORMANCE

Pre-Light Draw

A straight cut was used to remove the cap of The Royal Return King’s Gold Toro. Once the cap was removed it was on to the pre-light draw experience. The cold draw delivered notes of bittersweet cocoa and earth. This was a simple, straight-forward flavor profile on the pre-light draw, but it still was one that was satisfactory. At this point, it was time to light up The Royal Return King’s Gold Toro and await what the smoking phase would have in store.

Tasting Notes

The Royal Return King’s Gold Toro started out with more bittersweet cocoa, tea, dried fruit, earth, and cedar. The bittersweet cocoa was the dominant note in the early stages of this smoke. This gave way to the tea notes which displaced the cocoa as the primary note. The cocoa settled in the background with the fruit, earth, and cedar notes. Meanwhile, there was a subtle black pepper note and some slight sweetness from the cocoa note on the retro-hale.

During the second third of The Royal Return King’s Gold Toro, the tea notes remained the primary note. During the early part of this stage, a black pepper note emerged on the tongue. Slowly throughout the second third, the black pepper note built up in intensity. There still were notes of dried fruit, earth, and cedar in the background. At the same time, the black pepper was now more prominent on the retro-hale.

The last third of The Royal Return King’s Gold Toro saw the tea notes still grounded as the primary note. The pepper notes were a close secondary note, and the cocoa notes had a slight resurgence. Meanwhile, there still were some notes of dried fruit, earth, and cedar rounding out the flavor profile. This is the way the King’s Gold Toro came to a close. The resulting nub was soft to the touch but cool in temperature.

Burn

The burn of The Royal Return King’s Gold Toro had some jaggedness on it throughout the smoking experience. There were a couple of occasions where the burn line started to meander. As a result, the King’s Gold Toro required multiple touch-ups along the way and these were slightly more frequent than I prefer. The resulting ash was light gray This wasn’t not a firm ash, but it wasn’t a loose nor flaky ash either. As for the burn rate and burn temperature, both were ideal.

One side note, the band to this cigar did have a lot of glue on where it is fastened together. The glue does not touch the wrapper, but this band still required some TLC when removing it from the cigar.

Burn of ADVentura The Royal Return – King’s Gold Toro

Draw

The draw to The Royal Return King’s Gold Toro had a touch of resistance to it. This is something that I like on the draw of a cigar. At the same time, this was a cigar was low maintenance in terms of deriving flavor from it.

Strength and Body

If you are looking for a bold and powerful maduro, The Royal Return King’s Gold Toro is not going to be the cigar for you. This cigar is quite the opposite. It’s a cigar that is on the milder side delivering a mild to medium experience in terms of strength and body from start to finish. While there was a slight increase in intensity of both attributes, the King’s Gold Toro remained in the mild to medium when the cigar experience came to a close.

OVERALL ASSESSMENT

Final Thoughts

The best way I can sum up The Royal Return King’s Gold Toro is that is a cigar geared for the connoisseur. It’s not going to be an “in your face/bold” smoke. Its flavors are subtle, refined, and balanced. I made the mistake of smoking my first sample of this cigar too quickly, but on the subsequent smokes, a relaxed and slower approach really made this cigar shine. On top of that, it’s also a very different Broadleaf cigar that one might be used to. It’s not an inexpensive cigar, but it is one I felt delivered. It’s a cigar that I would recommend to any cigar enthusiast. As for myself, this is a cigar I would buy and smoke again. At 90 points, it reaches the Cigar Coop Standard of Excellence threshold.

Summary

Key Flavors: Tea, Cocoa, Cedar, Dried Fruit, Earth, Black Pepper
Burn: Very Good
Draw: Excellent
Complexity: Medium
Strength: Mild to Medium
Body: Mild to Medium
Finish: Very Good