Strength, flavor, body. What is the difference?

[Billb1960]

Nice post. Like many if not most here I'm guilty of interchanging strength and flavor in my description of cigars. I think when I smoke a cigar that a lot would consider "strong" it's really the heavy, deep earth flavors that give that impression. I smoked a MF LE Bijou 1922 the other day and while it was definitely strong in the nicotine dept it also has a very heavy body to the smoke as well as deep earth and espresso flavors with no sweetness or floral notes that lighten it. The overall impression is that the cigar is very 'strong'.

[RenoH414]

Very well written and great info for a noob like me. It cleared up some of the misconceptions I had about the reviews and descriptions. Thanks for taking the time to put this together.

Reno

[herman]

I never really got this.

I've always used it kind of like FireRunner says. I always mentally substitute intensity for body.
I have had some cigars with heavy smoke. You know that thick heavy smoke you feel you can practically chew the flavor out of as it rolls around in your mouth? But it wasn't all that strong in nicotine and didn't have a lot of flavor shifting so without too much surprise the website had them listed as medium bodied, so I'm still lost!