3. Raji’s Untimely Demise
This had the coolest band so far (an elephant flanked by two images of the Taj Mahal at sunset). This was a 7” churchhill that was rolled pretty tightly, but had a few knots along the length. There were several larger veins that looked as if they were about to crack and the cigar had indeed split a ½” up from the foot through both the wrapper and the binder. When examining the end I found a small unfilled pocket between the tobaccos in the foot. The crack ended up being irrelevant and the cigar burned evenly without touch-ups all the way down.

The Untimely Demise was interesting from the first puff. Early on I got a “tinny” taste like you get from beer or vegetable in a can. The metallic flavor didn’t sit well with me, but fortunately it only hung around for an inch or so. After that the stick took on grassy notes that transformed into something like buttered toast. It tasted like the aroma you get when you toast the foot of your cigar with a torch lighter, but then with oily/milky notes. I wasn’t the greatest thing in the world, nor was it as off-putting as it sounds. The profile of the cigar was mild from start to finish.

Single best part of the cigar: A tie between the bitchin’ band and the fact it actually progressed between three different flavors as I smoked it (regardless of whether they were good)

Single worst part of the cigar: The construction was very shoddy. While pretty firm, I was surprised it didn’t simply crumble in my hand while I smoked it.

An overall rating on a scale of 1-10: 6.2 (The fabrication kept it from being a 6.7)