Tom's Cigar Reviews

Illusione 88

I really don’t have a lot of information about tonight’s cigar. I managed to pick a couple up in Orlando recently, and figured it was time to review it. I’m pairing with my usual beverage of choice, PUR filtered Florida tap water. Let’s get to the review and stop this rambling…

Wrapper: Nicaraguan Corojo

Binder & Filler: Nicaragua

Size: 5 x 52

Price: Around $7.00

Pre-smoke & Construction:

Visually, the cigar looked great. The wrapper looked a little oily with a few mid sized veins. Squeezing the cigar revealed a soft spot or two, but nothing that I’d consider bad. Sniffing the wrapper and foot, I could only detect some natural tobacco and a hay-ish smell. The pre light draw had a slight resistance, and virtually no taste. I’ll have to say it was mild tobacco and slight earthy notes. The burn only required a few corrections. I probably could have let it go, but my OCD forced me to correct it. The ash was firm and held for an inch. Construction was great.

Flavor:

As I got in to the first third, I could only detect earthy notes with nutty flavors. A very slight spice was noticed when passing the smoke through the sinus. The flavors seemed subtle and relaxing.

The second third started off where the first left off. That subtle earthy flavor remained, and mild nutty notes continued. As I progressed towards the end of this third, the nutty flavor increased and combined with the added flavor of coffee. I enjoyed this more then the first third for sure.

On to the last third… The earthy flavors fell WAY back, to the point where I had trouble detecting it at times. The smoke became thick feeling – Lip smacking type of texture. The nutty flavors faded a little, and the coffee picked up and demanded to be noticed. A pleasant sweet taste lingered and would vary in intensity. When passing through the sinus, that sweet spice was present. This was by far my favorite third of the cigar.

Conclusion:

I’ll admit… At first I thought this was going to be a boring cigar. I was prepared to give it a bad review. But each third gradually developed and became anything but boring. I wasn’t “Wowed” by this stick, but I definitely wasn’t disappointed. I’d have to recommend you at least try it and be the judge.

Posted in: Cigar Reviews

Tags: 88, illusione

This entry was posted on Wednesday, April 29th, 2009 at 12:00 am and is filed under Cigar Reviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.