CAO Escaparate Costa Rica
While browsing the incredible selection at The Corona Cigar Company in Orlando, I ran across the cigar being reviewed today. You can only find this cigar at Corona, either online or at their retail stores. The Escaparate blends are from CAO that will never see regular production. They claim these prototypes contain rare tobaccos that simply can’t be mass produced. Tim Ozgener released some of these blends to Corona Cigar Company exclusively as a result. Now that those details are out of the way, read on and see what I thought of the CAO Escaparate Costa Rica.
Wrapper: Coata Rican Maduro
Binder: Ecuador
Filler: Nicaraguan
Size: 5.5 x 42
Price: $7.00
Pre-smoke & Construction:
Squeezing the cigars revealed one or two small soft spots that were too small to be of concern. The wrapper looked nice overall, and had a simple woody smell. Sniffing the foot revealed the same woody odor with a slight spice. The pre-light draw was good, and had a sweet, woody taste.
The burn required no corrections. The ash was a little flakey and held for a little under an inch.
Flavor:
The first third began with simple earthy flavors. I could pick up woody notes and spice when passing the smoke through the nose. The spice had a peppery feel to it but didn’t have a lot of punch.
The second third had a slight increase sweet peppery spice. The woody flavors were pretty dry and left me craving water. The earthy flavors dipped way back and coffee took its place.
The last third again had a dominant dry woody flavor. Next up was a sweet pepper, and a mild sweet coffee entered the picture. It reminded me of coffee with a little sugar and cream.
Conclusion:
Rarely does an advertisers description of flavors hold true. This time around, I did get all of the flavors Corona claimed I would get. It wasn’t exact, but it was close. The body stayed in the medium range and never got harsh. My complaints were the excessive dryness of the smoke. Although the flavors were not bad, it overall seemed unrefined and flat. For $7.00 I think you can get a cigar with much more bang for the buck. It was an OK cigar.
This entry was posted on Monday, November 30th, 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.
John Brooke - The Weekly Cigar December 3rd, 2009 at 1:55 am
Couldn’t agree with you more on the review.