Caldwell Cigar Co. Murcias Corona Review
Cigar: Caldwell Cigar Co. Murcias
Size: Corona 5.75" x 43
Wrapper: San Andres
Binder: unknown
Filler: unknown
Price: MSRP ~$6.00
Initial Impression/Prelight
The Murcias had a very dark brown, toothy San Andres wrapper. It had a tiny bit of oil, one soft spot, and overall appeared to be well-rolled.
I got a sweet raisin and tobacco aroma from the wrapper and foot. The draw was a hair on the tight side, but not too bad. The flavor was pretty mild prelight, just a bit of generic sweetness.
Caldwell Cigar Co. has their top shelf lines (Eastern Standard, The King is Dead, and Long Live the King), as well as what they call their Junior Varsity lines, which include the Murcias. From my reading, the idea comes from an understanding that not everyone can knock down $9-10 smokes every day, so Caldwell made the JV line from more accessible tobaccos and at a lower price point. The Murcias, Gibralter, and Sevillana come in around $5-6 MSRP.
The Caldwell website seems to be down. They had a bunch of blend info up a week or so back when I was writing notes on the Long Live the King, and now I can't find any good info on what's in the Murcias and I don't see any other reviews or writeups on it. From talking to the owner at the B&M a couple weeks back their cigars seem to be moving well so hopefully it's nothing serious.
Seems like I've smoked a lot of San Andres cigars lately, and I'm looking forward to this one both for the wrapper and to see how it stacks up against it's more expensive brothers. I bought this from a B&M and it was in my humidor for about 2 weeks at 65%.
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1st Third
The dominant flavor in this section was coffee, and it came on big and distinct from the very first puff. There was also a touch of heat, with some light red pepper on the edges, along with a so-faint-it's-almost-not-there citrus tang, maybe lemon peel. The retro gave some wood, and more pepper and citrus. The Murcias gave off plentiful white smoke and a good burnline, and the ash dropped liked clockwork around 3/4" throughout the smoke.
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2nd Third
There was little change in the second section - more coffee, but some unsweet cocoa and flitting creaminess as well. The smoke stayed more on the rich rather than dry side, certainly. Burnline stayed great, and this part ended around medium flavor and strength.
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Final Third
The soft spot I noticed earlier never came into play, as the burn stayed perfect and never did need a retouch. The flavors really came on strong in the final section too, with a big uptick in spiciness. I got stronger and sweeter cocoa to go with the red pepper, plus dark earth and some of the raisin sweetness I expected from the prelight. Towards the end I also got a lot of the warm baking spices that I enjoy so much from my beloved Preferidos - thick, rich smoke and nutmeg/cinnamon types spices that just warm your whole mouth. The finish improved and lengthened as well.
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Overall Impression
This was a solid smoke from the start, and the ending really picked it up. There was a clear difference in the wow-factor between this one andCaldwell's top lines - from the appearance of the wrapper through the complexity of flavors - but the price reflects that adequately I think.
I enjoyed the coffee at the start, and the spicy red pepper definitely kept my attention throughout the session. I really liked the cocoa sweetness playing with spicy red pepper towards the end, and that was clearly the best part for me. While the flavors weren't as shifting and complex as some cigars, they were solid. Sometimes I don't need (or want to concentrate on picking out) a dozen little nuances, and in those cases the price seems right on the Murcias.
There is such huge competition in the $5-6 cigar market that I probably would not buy a box unless I could get them in the $4 range. GivenCaldwell's newness and popularity, plus the demand for boutiques of any kind, I bet we won't see a lot of discounts on these for a while. That said, I'd easily grab a few here and there, and I'd never be disappointed to pull a Murcias out of the humidor.
There's a Caldwell event at Blue Smoke in Dallas scheduled for October if any DFW B/SOTLs are interested. Right now I'm 3 for 3 on Caldwells - this one, the Long Live the King, and The King is Dead. I rarely go to events, but I am going to try to make it over and see if they offer any deals there.
I'd recommend giving this a shot as a 5-er.
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