This morning I tried out the new Charter Oak Especiales Pasquale from Foundation Cigar Co. This cigar is a new release, and new to the site. It has a Connecticut Broadleaf wrapper over Nicaraguan Binder and Filler tobaccos and comes out of Tabacalera AJ Fernandez. This was a pretty solid cigar, very AJ-esque, and a pretty stout cigar for first thing in the morning… It was not overly peppery, but had plenty of earth, leather, cocoa, and subtle sweetness. I think it is something worth trying out, but maybe try it a little later in the day, as it was a pretty strong bugger.
I may have talked about this before, but this smoke got me thinking: I typically lean towards bolder, darker cigars for my first smoke of the day - if my first smoke is in the morning. If my first smoke is later in the day, then it’s crap shoot.
Typically a lot of smokers start their day with more mild cigars and end their day with more full cigars. There is no correct order. As with anything involving cigars - it's subjective. I go the other way with it. For some reason, in the mornings, my palate just seems a bit “off” or incapable of picking up subtleties and complexity in more mild to medium cigars. So a fuller flavored and bodied cigar is more appealing to me in the mornings, and I don’t feel I’ve done an injustice to the cigar by knowingly smoking a milder blend at an inopportune time.
This holds true even when smoking multiple cigars a day. Some people smoke the bolder cigars last because they don’t want to “wear out” their palate. For me, if I smoke two or three cigars in a day, I often end the day with some on the milder side. I feel like my palate doesn’t get worn out as the day goes, but instead is “warmed up”.
I don’t know - different strokes for different folks.
What about you? Do you start light or strong?