SAN CRISTOBAL COLOSO REVIEW [year]

The San Cristobal Coloso has a 62-ring gauge and is about seven inches long. It is the 10th vitola in the San Cristobal line.

This Nicaraguan puro comes wrapped in a dark brown, oily and leathery cover, showing off the famous San Cristobal emblem of a red parrot with wings outspread – representing wandering wanderers who quench their thirst for travel.

Cigars take us to different heights, up into the realms of physical ecstasy. Come with us on another smoking expedition as we present our official review of San Cristobal Coloso Cigar.

Jose Pepin Garcia, an award-winning cigar maker blended it at Estelí’s famed My Father Cigar factory in Nicaragua. It was officially released in 2007 by San Cristobal Cigars.

They are one of two brands under Ashton Cigar family that make only Nicaraguan smokes; the other one being La Aroma de Cuba.

Nicaragua’s luxury Nicaraguan puros follow Cuban tradition by delivering rich and fragrant flavors plus engaging complexity while their tobacco has a slight earthy twist from the black fertile soil.

After cutting through the traditional Cuban triple-seam cap, there’s loads of earthiness on cold draw. Rich soil that gives it its sweet earthy character and peppery taste is found in Nicaragua. Though I didn’t notice any pepper on my lips upon first few puffs before lighting up they felt a little bit spicy like Chili.

When I smelled the wrapper though, cedar took me by surprise while foot was kind of earthy and slightly sweetish.

It started out with strong tobacco sweetness mingled with some earthiness, leather and that initial explosion of Nicaraguan black pepper which eluded me prior to lighting it up. As I progressed through these opening stages, softer notes including cocoa and sweet cream came into play for added balance and complexity.

The finish was earthy and chocolate cake. This is the contrast between the heavy, full-flavored Nicaraguan tobacco leaf and a gentle dose of sweetness that would excite even the most sophisticated palate.

Even into the middle act as my Coloso burned slowly, I was still amazed at how much smoke it was producing. This one still had body and flavor to spare but more of an earthy edge took over the blend with leather packing a lot more punch. Pepper became less pronounced especially towards the end when I stopped tasting anything else other than its dryness.

Coffee, molasses and sweet cream mingled to create a hay-like sweetness which ensured that earth did not dominate completely while leaving a pleasant creamy taste along my gums.

The closing stages saw great flavors of rich cedar, earth, strong spice and coffee emanating from this Coloso. The stronger notes were on par with fiery black pepper which entered as I lit San Cristobal only to mellow down when I got near the nub turning earthly.

There still remained time for another impressive flavor transition that had sharp citrus notes cutting through lingering black pepper on the palate and cocoa in nose respectively.

He has done it again: the Don Pepin Blue Label cigars have a top-notch quality. Despite the fact that they have plenty of sweet complexity in them and are rich in earthy smoke, he still maintains his trademark palate-blasting black pepper and Nicaragua’s rich, vibrant blend of aged tobaccos without losing equilibrium.

San Cristobal is still setting the standard for full-bodied cigars so if you like your smokes big and powerful then hurry up and buy yourself a box of 21 San Cristobal Coloso Cigars from cigars.com today at $216.40.