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Released every Tuesday, the LOUNGE LIZARDS podcast helps listeners navigate the experience of finding and enjoying premium cigars (both Cuban and non-Cuban) and quality spirits. Episodes are normally around 90 minutes long and feature a variety of different topics including food, travel, life, sports and work.
The podcast features eight members: Rooster, Poobah, Gizmo, Senator, Pagoda, Chef Ricky, Grinder and Bam Bam.
This is not your typical cigar podcast. We’re a group of friends who love sharing cigars, whiskey and a good laugh.
Join us and become a card-carrying lounge lizard yourself! Email us at hello@loungelizardspod.com to join the conversation and be featured on an upcoming episode!
Ep. #214: Aganorsa Leaf Aniversario 25 Edición Limitada (w/ The Macallan A Night On Earth: The First Light, UK vs. Cigar Lounges, The Year of the Horse Continues, J.C. Newman's Ybor City Restoration, Aganorsa History & More Distracting Packaging)
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Gizmo: [00:00:00] Welcome to the Lounge Lizards podcast, presented by Fabrica five. It's so good to have you here. It's a leisure and lifestyle podcast found out on our love of premium cigars, as well as whiskey, travel, food, work, and whatever else we feel like getting into. My name is Gizmo. Tonight I'm joined by Rooster Senator Pagoda, chef Ricky, and bam bam.
And I plan to smoke a cigar, drink some scotch, talk about life, and of course, have some laughs. So take this as your 214th official invitation to join us and become a card carrying lounge, lizard plan. It is here once a week. We are gonna smoke a new world cigar tonight. Share our thoughts on it and keep you our formal lizard rating.
We share Agin horse's history. We discuss more year of the horse releases, and we find ourselves once again distracted by packaging all among a variety of other things for the next two hours. So sit back, get your favorite drink, light up a cigar, and enjoy as we pair the Macallan a Night on earth. The first light single malt scotch whiskey with the AOR leaf anniversary 25 ion.
A Nicaraguan [00:01:00] Toro tonight on the Pod Boys. And it's a debut.
Rooster: Mm,
Gizmo: a technical debut. We'll talk about that in a second. It's the aor Saif Ann 25th, Addision Liata celebrating their 25th anniversary. Of course. And boys, I'm surprised. First off, you can't even see the rapper from the halfway point down here. So I was, I was about
Bam Bam: to say how handsome this cigar is, but I can't see it.
Yeah. And if you do, it's all banned.
Gizmo: If, if you do take off the bottom half band that covers the cigar. I'm surprised for the cost of this cigar and celebrating the 25th, 25th anniversary. It, it kind of looks dull to me.
Bam Bam: Yeah, it looks like a delicate rapper. Um, bit bumpy, lumpy, no veins though. I
Chef Ricky: have a couple on mine ear
Bam Bam: and, but the seams are pretty visible for me.
Gizmo: Just looks a little dull, but hopefully it doesn't, uh, taste dull.
Bam Bam: You may be getting that monochromatic effect because the rapper almost matched the color of the band,
Gizmo: kind of camouflaged. So you're saying it's an optical illusion? [00:02:00] Correct.
Bam Bam: Yeah. It could have a little, the lighting and illusion, which you're susceptible to, I believe.
Senator: Well, I have four eyes for all the challenges and how it looks. The cigar smells great. It does, yes. The wrapper, the foot.
Gizmo: While we're at, at boys, let's cut this thing.
Chef Ricky: Hold. I smell this pork fat.
Gizmo: See where we got from? My shirt.
Chef Ricky: The
Gizmo: cold draw and the wrapper. Your Hawaiian shirt, by the way, she rolls in here. How, what? What's the temperature? Outside? 30. 20 degrees. 30 degrees. She rolls in here. Like he's going to To the pool. The pool.
To the pool. In the Dominican Republic.
Chef Ricky: I literally just came from Playa, the restaurant. It, you know, you, you put, you drive, you park your car right in front, you know, like, fuck. A couple seconds in, couple seconds out.
Bam Bam: Forgot to vacuum. It's already started. Started. The cold draw is nice. Yeah, it's very nice.
It's mild. It's wide open. Yeah. Mine's a little tight, which I don't mind. No. Mine is wide
Chef Ricky: open. Take a little bit more off. Hmm.[00:03:00]
Gizmo: Tastes great on the cold draw. Coleco some dried fruit. Little dried fruit. Mm-hmm. All right, boys, let's like this thing. The aor Saif Ann 25th at Liata. It's a Toro 52 ring gauge cigar by six and one quarter inches long. It's a Nicaraguan pirro. We'll talk about their story in a minute and why that's important for them.
This cigar was released in the middle of 2025 right after PCA of this year. And they're only making 10,000 total cigars. So they're making 1000 boxes of 10 of this.
Bam Bam: This is so good. Off the light. It's almost unnatural. Oh, I get a burst of sweetness across my palette. It's very pronounced.
Gizmo: That's a very balanced, nice
Senator: [00:04:00] open.
It's good. And and a very natural one. I'm sorry babe. It doesn't taste very, it doesn't to me, to me it's, it's very sweet.
Bam Bam: What did you eat before you got here? I had no pie.
Chef Ricky: It feels balanced. Natural. I'm not getting any, uh, sweetness. Soca esque sweetness. You're not getting any sweetness at all. What you I get some, but not an aggressive outside of the dried fruit note that I called earlier.
I'm not getting anything else. That seems Wow. Yeah. Unnaturally sweet. I'm
Bam Bam: getting like a, um, apricot, jam type thing happening.
Senator: Any carbohydrate?
Bam Bam: Not yet, but I hope so. Nice littles scone thing happening. Maybe. I
Pagoda: think I should wait for a bit because I, I felt a little, it was a bit peppery for me, so I might have, it's,
Rooster: you know, it's, it's the smoke that's coming off.
Yeah, that's peppery. They're almost strong.
Chef Ricky: Well, I think this thing need quite, needed. Quite the bit of flame to toast and light. So big cigar. Yeah. Might need a purge and some time to cool down a little bit. I
Gizmo: kind of like it right now. I do too. This is off to a great start. [00:05:00] How much is this cigar? $30.
Senator: Oh my Lord.
So it's hot. It's hot. So sorry, I just, I just felt the end of pagoda cigar and it's very hot. That's why he's getting the pepper blast. Yeah. Yeah. Mine is not. So if you're getting pepper, just check. Just chill.
Chef Ricky: Can you reach over here and touch the end of my cigar? Just a tip. Not after you say it like that.
Pagoda: How do you want, how do you want him to touch it? Just a tip. Chef. Just a tip. Just the tip.
Gizmo: Great. Smoke output. Mm. I love, there's a, um, there's a little, I, I don't know if I wanna use the word salty or briny thing on the front of the palette. That's very, very nice. It's very satisfying.
Bam Bam: Have you retroed yet?
I
Gizmo: have
Bam Bam: any pepper in there for you. A little bit, yeah. A little
Gizmo: bit of pepper in there. But I'm hoping that that goes away now. It will, you know,
Chef Ricky: I think it will
Gizmo: after it cools down a minute. Mm-hmm.
Chef Ricky: The retro hair was surprisingly dry with a good amount of pepper on it for me. Same.
Senator: But I'm liking the traditional [00:06:00] draw.
It's a nice cigar. I think for everybody. It's like the jury's out and if it gets a lot more peppery, we're probably not gonna be happy. If it gets a little sweeter, develops more. I think we're gonna like
Bam Bam: this. I happen to like the balance. I'm getting a good amount of sweetness and earthy minerality. Just a touch of it.
A little bit of that jammy thing happening for me. Kind of good, unique,
Gizmo: everything I've seen online points to aor Saif being a more mild entrant.
Rooster: Mm.
Gizmo: From a Nicaraguan Piro. So comparing to, you know, Tawa stuff or Padron stuff. Everybody's saying that strength-wise, this is kind of mm-hmm. A little bit tamer.
Well, I agree with Nicaragua Piro. I
Bam Bam: agree with what Rooster said. The smoke does have, um,
Rooster: smoke has the pepper.
Bam Bam: Yeah. There's a, you know, it's a little
Rooster: pungent.
Bam Bam: There's a punch to the smoke. Yeah.
Rooster: I don't mind that though. No, no. But I wouldn't say this is a mild Nicaragua. Neither would I. Neither would I. No,
Gizmo: I think this is what I think what I saw online is this just is a little bit, little bit [00:07:00] less intense than a lot of Nicaraguan Piros.
Rooster: Like we did the Kaba I gu Nicaraguan. Mm. That was on the milder side of Nicaraguan tobacco. This is, but that wasn't
Gizmo: a Piro that had a Connecticut wrapper on it. True. This is firmly medium, I think
Bam Bam: off to a nice start here. I do like the band, the design of it's pretty cool. Unique. Is that green And it's almost like a gray, kind of gray, like with a pale gold.
They're like a steel kind of, yeah. A metallic. How would you
Gizmo: describe this if, for the listener who doesn't have one in their hand right now, bam.
Bam Bam: Well, it's, it's very ornate. If you zoom in it, it's got a lot of intricate detail and it's very organic, so there's no orthogonal or square edges. I, I, to me, it's like a gray green, and the metallic is like a, like you said, a steel color.
And the band itself below, there's a secondary band that's a bit of more, more of a yellow metallic, almost like a gold, but very pale, handsome. I like the design. I, I, I honestly don't
Senator: [00:08:00] like the band really. For me, it, it looks cheap. Um, I don't know. What about it's cheap. It's like very dull. Like the gold doesn't pop.
Mm-hmm. It's like so muted against the background that it kind of all just blends together. I don't, I don't
Bam Bam: know. I don't really, it's like a camouflage and that massive foot band. I mean, I couldn't tell what the hell it was.
Gizmo: Yeah. It's just a continuation of the pattern, I
Bam Bam: guess. But yeah,
Gizmo: it's quite literally like, it actually three inches looks like wrapping paper.
Yeah.
Bam Bam: I wonder if there's a reason for this. I'm sure there is.
Gizmo: So boys, let's talk about aor sa Leaf. Like I said, this is the debut from them technically on the pod. And the reason why I say that, and we'll talk about it in a little bit, is they've made some other cigars that we've smoked on the pod, but this is the first proper aor leaf branded cigar from them.
They were founded in 1998, so Eduardo Antonio Fernandez, ols, a Havana born cu uh, Cuban, who grew up in the US [00:09:00] helped build a company called Tele Pizza with his brother in Spain, which became their largest pizza chain. And I guess they were bought out. And then he set off to Nicaragua to just start an agriculture business.
He had no intention to start with cigars. That's just kinda where he ended up. And, uh, it was right as the cigar boom was collapsing, kind of late nineties, of course, that 97, 98. So he founded Agan nor Gera nor Tenya sa and hired Cuban agronomists to reproduce traditional Cuban growing and fermentation methods using Cuban seed, ROHO 99 and Creo 98 in Nicaraguan soil.
In 2002, AOR bought tropical tobacco from a guy named Pedro Martin gaining a factory and brands and major turning point, of course, that then accelerated their ability to produce cigars. Today, AOR is one of the largest growers in Nicaragua and supplies tobacco. [00:10:00] To an enormous portion of the industry, Ellucian Vahe Warped and many boutique houses rely heavily on Aor Sa Leaf.
Their own brands include Aor Sa Leaf Guardian of the Farm, Casa Fernandez, and JFR. Of course. Tonight we have an anniversary edition for their 25th. And in 2018, the Cigar division officially changed its name from Casa Fernandez to AOR Saif to unify identity around the Fernandez family tobacco. So this cigar is, like I said, a Nicaraguan Pirro only produced 10,000 total cigars, 10 count boxes, so a thousand boxes.
And each retailer has been capped at five boxes each. So each retailer is receiving no more than five. So what's cool about this too, and why talking about the Nicaraguan Pirro is. Like Padron, AOR Saif is completely verti, vertically integrated. They control every aspect of their production. So, you know, we were talking a couple weeks ago about [00:11:00] the issue that Carlito was having with Cameroon Tobacco, for example, where his, something happened and, and, and this story came out about wrapper.
You know, obviously that's not a vertically integrated company, right? And he's reliant on other suppliers and whatnot. This company, just like Padron, is self-reliant completely. They own the farms, they own the production, they own the branding, they own the mark. Everything is completely owned by Aor Sa Leaf.
So they feel that that's a significant advantage for them, uh, in Nicaragua and of course in the US here, where a lot of Nicaragua cigars are coming in. So it's Cuban seed. They use Cuban methods, of course, Nicaraguan soil and single source leaf from their farms. Aor Leaf represents 25 years of Eduardo Fernandez's vision.
His goal, of course, taking Cuban tradition and then replanting it in Nicaragua. Pretty cool story from Ganor. So do we have information on the blend? It's all Nicaraguan from their farm. Oh, that's ev It's a Nicaraguan Piro. Oh, okay. Everything. And I was trying to find where they [00:12:00] fit into the volume, you know, kind of game.
Uh, they don't have specific numbers out there. What I found is that they're making somewhere around six to 7 million cigars a year. That's what I've heard.
Bam Bam: So across all their brands
Gizmo: and, uh, uh, they're producing a lot for others, tobacco, including, including tobacco, including Elucion, warped, and some others.
So. I
Rooster: mean, not, not just growing tobacco actually making cigars for other brands. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. They roll it at their factory. Yeah. That's a, that's a good size, good size production. Yeah.
Gizmo: What's everybody thinking right now? 10 minutes in.
Senator: I'm, I'm on the fence. Really? Um, I don't know. The way this has been burning is not.
Particularly sharp. Um, really, it's, it's not terrible. It's just like, I can tell I'm already gonna, I had to correct it once and I can tell I'm gonna be back to having to do that. I think this wrapper actually, it's not that it's thin, it's like mine is actually thick. Um, and the flavor profile like this jury is still [00:13:00] out for me.
Like I keep getting that faint pepper in the back and I'm just like hoping. 'cause on some draws it picks up a bit, so I'm just hoping that it doesn't overpower it. The other notes I'm getting, I like, yeah, but nothing's like grabbing me yet where I'm saying, wow, I'm really excited about this.
Bam Bam: So, so the pepper I'm getting is, I think for me, due to the fact that now my drawer is super wide open, mine is too, and I actually hate that.
I don't like that in a cigar. I wish there was a little more resistance. Yeah. Because I'm always taking in more smoke than I want. And that's for this, for this cigar, I'm getting that pepper way back in the, at the finish and that's not particularly nice. But I do love the balance. I am still getting a good deal of sweetness and savoriness, which I don't mind at all.
Kind of like that.
Chef Ricky: Yeah, I'm, I'm getting a bit of like a banana bread. Marshmallow meat. Oh, carbohydrate. I didn't wanna say it. Put a dollar in the jar. That's a carb, but it's, it's not being delivered the way it would that, that i, that I needed for me to go, oh my [00:14:00] god. Or Hmm. Like it's hard to get into a rhythm with the cigars so far.
Sometimes I get those sweet sort of marshmallowy banana bready notes and then I get a blast of red pepper. And then you try, you know, I'm purging, I'm trying to reset it. So what I'm, you know, usually when we get those notes, I feel like we're all kind of at this point talking about how amazing it's coming through and Yeah.
I feel like we're still sort of, kind of get into, I'm trying to get into a rhythm with this cigar
Senator: chef, you perfectly describe my experience that I did a Yeah. Much worse job trying to articulate. Yeah, that's exactly what what I'm doing.
Chef Ricky: That usually doesn't happen, by the way, the other way around. I think it's the shirt.
It's the shirt.
Bam Bam: It's definitely the shirt. He feels invigorated. Exactly. I find he's feeling sporty. Yeah, correct. Um, I'm taking shallower draws. I am too. I think that's a must for the cigar.
Gizmo: I, and what I'm finding, I, I think maybe I'm having a little bit different of experience. 'cause I've been talking for the last few minutes and I've probably only taken 2, 3, 4 draws.
And when I take a draw it's a [00:15:00] lot of smoke. It's very cool smoke. It's not peppery. It is cool. Like I'm no pepper at all for you. I'm not really getting a pepper thing That's unusual except in the retro.
Bam Bam: So there's something wrong with your palate today because that's not possible.
Gizmo: Yeah. Fix your palate
Bam Bam: is I'm, I'm getting
Gizmo: a
Chef Ricky: significant amount in the retro.
Gizmo: I'm getting it in the retro. I'm not getting it on the regular draw. Like even
Chef Ricky: though I'm done retro hailing and a part of my nose is kind of tingling.
Bam Bam: Definitely in a retro, but if you take a full draw, you're gonna get it on the finish. You get
Rooster: it on the back of your throat. Exactly. That's where you feel it.
Yeah.
Bam Bam: But I will say when you take a nice shallow draw. I get a really beautiful peanutty, almost that banana bread type thing happening. Yeah, I
Gizmo: was gonna say, I'm getting like a chewy kind of nutty thing, but cashew has to be
Bam Bam: cashew. But here's the problem. I also don't like taking shallow draws. I do like to take a deep draw, but I want a little bit of resistance in a cigar.
So that gives me the balance of volume of smoke. It's frustrating. I'm a little frustrated with the cigar, the performance of it, because I have to control my pace.
Rooster: Yeah.
Chef Ricky: [00:16:00] I, I'm just, I'm right now, I'm not a fan of that kind of peppery, savory finish. I want more of those, those sweet notes to kind of taper off into some buttery nuttiness.
And it's kind of taken like a big detour. So we'll see. We'll see how it goes. And yeah, the burn is, is wonky at the very least. And
Senator: the ash is flaky. Like I'm looking at other cigars. I mean's, oh, you're look epic. Good. You don't look at, I mean, any of them. I mean, that one doesn't count. Even, even giz you could see it's like a flaky ash.
It's not like it's a tightly packed strong, there's no structure to it.
Chef Ricky: Yeah, it's, it's, it's not,
Gizmo: it's not smoking by the way. A 30 score, like gave it like a love tap on the ashtray. Mm-hmm. Like just a little. And it fell right off, crumbled right off.
Bam Bam: Yep. So I think you hit it on the head again, chef. Yeah.
This is not smoking. Like a
Gizmo: chef might be the lizard of the weak tonight between all the commentaries. It's not smoking like shirts. Don't, don't say
Chef Ricky: it. 'cause I need, I need those bon robbers in my life. Correct. Let's see what questions he has for us. I finished the last ones this weekend.
Bam Bam: Pagoda. Whatcha you feeling about him?
Pagoda: It's, it's definitely become much [00:17:00] better for me. I, I think, uh, initially it was very, very peppery. It's cooled off a bit now. Uh, less peppery, but I haven't been able to. Um, I think you got a bit of a GIZ cut there Beta.
Bam Bam: I, I have one too. I'll
Pagoda: admit.
Bam Bam: Oh my gosh.
Chef Ricky: I think we
Bam Bam: should put a, get a vacuum on the
Chef Ricky: market and named that the pagoda.
I'll show you a co. Put that on the mer store. Look at
Bam Bam: this. Wow. Your burn lines are wonky. Guys, look this.
Chef Ricky: Yeah,
Bam Bam: mine's doing okay. Yours is not bad. It's not bad, but it's not. $30 is pretty good. Mine's okay. It's not a $30 burn line. It's just a good burn.
Senator: Alright, so
Gizmo: what's
Senator: going over here? We're talking about burn lines and puff.
Hold. Show. Show Ben. Show Ben the head of your cigar.
Chef Ricky: Mine's not much better. I'm Goda. Cigar is popular tonight.
Rooster: Take, take another one.
Bam Bam: Cut it. Mine's not much better.
Gizmo: So boys, let's talk about some news. I was excited to see this one. Obviously, given all the negative things that have been happening around cigars and cigar lounges that we talk about politically and socially and all that stuff, I like [00:18:00] to see this.
So work has begun to restore Ibor City's cigar lounge to how it was 115 years ago. The JC Newman Cigar Company broke ground on the Sanchez IH Building Restoration Project on Tuesday, it was a couple weeks ago. The dilapidated building sits across from the company's iconic cigar factory off of Columbus Drive, of course, again in Ybor City, built in 1910.
The building first served as a restaurant and cigar lounge with a small hotel upstairs. According to city officials, the building was also the first in Tampa to be made with rebar and concrete. Bam. Interesting. How exciting is that?
Bam Bam: Very.
Gizmo: Its strong structure outlasted the years, and over time it became many other things operating as a grocery store, coffee mill, distillery, knitting shop, and even a speakeasy during prohibition.
I wonder if there was like a secret door or something. The building was last known as the chip in a local dive bar before it was abandoned for decades. So now. They are going to spend a lot of money, [00:19:00] completely restoring it to the look and feel from 115 years ago. And I guess that's probably gonna be a part of JC Newman headquarters and they're gonna have restaurants and alcohol.
So they'll have a
Bam Bam: food component.
Gizmo: Yeah. It's gonna be exactly what it was,
Bam Bam: offices above, maybe
Gizmo: 115 years ago. Pretty cool. It's
Bam Bam: kind of cool. Yeah. In this current economy to put money, something like that. It's kind of a little risky, maybe.
Gizmo: Probably like a saloon.
Bam Bam: Yeah.
Gizmo: But I wonder if, because it's a restoration, uh, you know, kind of like they do in the city where they're restoring it to, you know.
Mm-hmm. Olden days. I wonder if there's a component of grants or tax relief. Only if it's in a historic district. Well, I would assume, I would assume in Ibor City that's a historic district to I would think so. Right. It has to be, it has
Bam Bam: to have a designation for you then to apply for grants. Interesting.
Yeah.
Gizmo: Alright, so let's uh, go the opposite way here. We're gonna talk about London. There's a big article in the Times over there and it says, the Ritz is among the cigar lounges at risk if indoor smoking [00:20:00] loophole ends. So I guess what is happening here, as we always talk about with politicians trying to change the game and change the rules of the game, apparently the future of these high-end lounges are in doubt as the government is under pressured to co to close a sampling loophole in the 2000 legislation, which allowed customers to smoke on site.
So when they banned indoor smoking in 2007, they carved out a sampling provision for cigar lounges that if a customer went into the cigar, you know, cigar shop, they could sample the cigars that they were gonna purchase, or they did purchase on site. Now they're trying to close. That loophole or that, that carve out that they made 20 years ago.
And the reason why I'm sharing this with you is of course, JJ Fox, our friend Rob Fox, who was here with us in April, JJ Fox is a big Irish importer of Hano cigars. They have a bunch of London stores and they have [00:21:00] high-end, you know, high-end lounges that like we're talking about here. So they are very much in the conversation as far as potentially being closed, uh, for this 2007 legislation gap that they're trying to shut down here.
Rooster: It is such a stupid law. It's so dumb. You know? I mean, think about it. If you own a cigar lounge, every single person in there is a cigar smoker, right? You, nobody who does not smoke a cigar or is not a smoker, is not gonna go in that lounge. So who are you affecting? Who's that law for?
Gizmo: And you know, they have ridiculous air, you know, purification and, you know, getting, whether they do, I mean, I'm sure they
Rooster: do, but a non-smoker is not going in that lounge.
So how does that affect that person? So, I mean, yeah. And
Pagoda: London has no other problems, by the way. Correct?
Rooster: I mean, it's made said cigar smokers. Yeah, a hundred percent. I mean, even if you smoke cigarettes, it's, you're not affecting somebody else who's, you know, it's, it's everybody is a cigar smoker or a cigarette [00:22:00] smoker.
Correct. They're a smoker. Leave
Gizmo: them alone.
Bam Bam: Good point.
Gizmo: And you think about the Saha Sahakian, you know, you think about the, the chair that folks go and sit in at Churchill, sat in to smoke a cigar. They go sit in that chair. They, you know, enjoy. I mean, one of the most famous cigar smokers of all time, Winston Churchill.
I mean, he, it's absurd. He was purchasing and, and spending time in all these places Yeah. When he was alive. And the idea that they're gonna eliminate that from their culture is just so crazy. And I don't understand, like Rooster's saying, I don't understand the mentality of mm-hmm. Going after these things that are working just fine.
They're not bothering anybody. I mean, cigar loungers are probably the quietest, calmest place, especially the ones in London. Right. Not here, but Yes. Not, not specifically here, but Correct. You know. But in London, I would think that these, these, they probably run a pretty tight ship.
Bam Bam: Yeah.
Gizmo: You know,
Senator: I've never been senator's been, I have, it's absolutely ridiculous.
I mean, the, the, the irony of this, these places are all small. In London, there is no such thing as [00:23:00] like, yeah. So a big sprawling, can we talk about cigar Lounge? Like you can find here.
Bam Bam: We, how big are these places on average, it's very small,
Senator: tiny.
Bam Bam: Like the ddo
Senator: shop. Tiny like Soder. Very famous place there.
I'm not kidding. I remember, I was so excited the first time I got to walk in there. There's probably six chairs in the entire place and it's so small and tight there. The chairs are right on top of each other. And I was there, I remember this vividly. It was, um, the week after Thanksgiving a few years ago.
'cause I flew like the day after Thanksgiving out there. And, um. It's freezing. So I needed to smoke inside and there was like four other guys in there. And so I just had to take a seat, shoulder to shoulder with some random guy and we're just sitting there puffing away in this tiny little shop. Like, that's
Bam Bam: crazy.
Senator: These are not sprawling places. And it's like even hotels that have the tent setups with heaters, like you have maybe four to six tables there, like they're tiny. They're not bothering [00:24:00] anyone. I, this whole thing
Gizmo: is so silly. Just leave them
Senator: alone.
Gizmo: So what I'm seeing here is the original exemption in 2007 legislation for cigar lounges, of course, like I said, was to allow sampling of the products.
Which Cigar Shop said was necessary because they are fairly niche and expensive items. Now imagine they're saying that in 2007. Oh, okay. When, how much was a D four in 2007? $8. So what do you, what do eight pounds, I mean, now over there, I mean a D four. How much is a D four in, in 33 K Right now? No. Six. Six.
It's probably 60 or $70 with tax. Unbelievable.
Rooster: So when you say sampling, what do you mean by sampling? They, they can just light up a cigar and then put it out. Well, don't forget,
Gizmo: I think it was Minnesota.
Chef Ricky: Remember that? No, you just, you pass it around. Everyone tries to say what? Correct. That's where Cigar Schau goes to do their, you gotta put a, a plastic, you gotta put a plastic tip on it though.
It's absurd.
Gizmo: It's crazy. So apparently, I guess what the legislators or the politicians are saying, they're saying the loophole has been exploited and they see much more [00:25:00] than sampling. So I guess people are actually sitting there and enjoying themselves and relaxing. Oh, God forbid, sharing in community and conversation.
I mean, well, everything hor all horrendous stuff.
Bam Bam: Everything that politician in, uh, great Britain said was spot on the money. Yeah. What member of Parliament was this? And that's, and that's what they're killing. They're killing that experience.
Gizmo: So what they're pointing to is it's point, uh, putting workers in the cafe, serving food and drink at risk of inhaling secondhand smoke from cigars.
There's another thing too. A new cigar lounge opened in Sheffield within 400 meters of a school. The council's public health team argued it would normalize, quote, tobacco use in a deprived area, but their objections were ignored.
Senator: This is outrageous.
Gizmo: So I'd love to know what they feel is exploiting the idea of sampling.
Like, is there like rooster saying like, is it 15 minutes that you're allowed to sample? Is it an hour? No, I think people are sitting there having
Senator: a full cigar, having a cigar. [00:26:00] That's definitely what it is. Like there's question, nobody's gonna sample a cigar, but again, who is it harming? Right? Every person that walks in there is there to purchase cigars and smoke it.
Rooster: Right? Well, well, it gives, I mean, you mentioned about the employees. I mean, that's, that's the concern, right? Yeah. That the, the servers, the, the staff, the, you know, the, the cooks, uh,
Bam Bam: every, every, every lounge I've ever been to staff smoke. Yeah. Even, even if they don't, they choice's a choice. Go work somewhere else's.
Correct. They don't have to work there.
Rooster: Yeah. Have them sign a waiver. Exactly. Like, listen, if you wanna work here, if you of you don't smoke, this is a part of it. Otherwise go get another job somewhere else. Right.
Chef Ricky: These, the business. Why work somewhere where you can't, nobody use your employee discount. You serve
Senator: in the military, like you risk your life.
Like that's a risk that you choose to take. The same thing if you're working a cigar lounge, you assume the risk of secondhand smoke. Or if you are ever in a coal mine, you assume any risks. Right? Like Right. These are all choices in every single field Yeah. That individuals [00:27:00] make. Why would cigars be treated any differently?
It's,
Bam Bam: it's, it's called common sense and clearly it doesn't apply here. Exactly.
Rooster: It's like, you know, joining the army, but I'm not gonna carry a gun. You work in a kitchen, you might get burnt.
Gizmo: Correct. So Gemma Freeman, we've talked about Gemma before. She's the chairman of Hunters and Franco, the UK sole importer of Cuban cigars.
Of course. She said London is historically significant for cigars because there is a longstanding history of merchants, many of whom who remain here and still operate today. And the specialist service that they can provide these merchants, this history is the par is part of the soul of St. James. Chris Bischoff for the sales manager for Rob Fox and his family at JJ Fox in London said, quote, we get some regulars who come in every single day.
There are groups of friends, tourists, and even a few politicians. Cigars are like wine. You age them and they become better in time. You drink a fine bottle of wine, not because you wanna get drunk, but because you want to taste something beautiful. Unlike [00:28:00] cigarettes, you just smoke. Mm-hmm. The taste doesn't matter.
I mean, that's all great, great stuff. And again, I can't understand, you know, why they are going after this. I'll finish here. Jimmy McGee, who also works for JJ Fox, said quote, significant tourism impacts would be had for the country and would mainly affect small family run businesses. He finished, we feel any serious calls to close this exemption are without any proportionality as the health risk to the general non-consenting public, especially children is zero.
Correct.
Bam Bam: Right. Yeah.
Senator: I mean, I'm sorry. Hearing this, it's lunacy makes me infinitely less interested in ever visiting London again. I agree. Well, unless you have to go for work.
Gizmo: So has this law been passed? No, they're talking about they're closing the loophole. They're, it's, it's not even passing a law, I guess it's just, you know, you can't sample revisiting, you can't sample, you can't smoke indoors at any time.
Now I wonder, like you're saying [00:29:00] about the restaurants that have tents and stuff, right. Bars that have tents. Does that is, do they consider that quote indoors? Are there walls there?
Rooster: That's, to me, that's worse off because you're outdoors. Mm-hmm. A lot of the smoke is going outside. Mm. At least inside. It's contained.
You have these smoke eaters and all of that. Wow. That's also
Bam Bam: going out
Rooster: eventually.
Bam Bam: Yeah. Through venting.
Rooster: Yeah, but you know, maybe it's going up. I mean, as opposed to a small tent. That's kind of, if you're pa, if you're walking by that's true. You're gonna smell that more than, that's also a good point. You were
Bam Bam: inside.
Rooster: Very
Bam Bam: good. The Brewster. Thanks. A buddying architect. Well done. Old boy.
Gizmo: All right, boys. We're a little later tonight, my apologies. But it's time to go to our pairing now, and we are back to the Macallan, which is a favorite in this room, especially the 12 year.
Bam Bam: Cheers.
Gizmo: Well, I'm getting there, man. All right.
Sherry cask edition. Speed it up. I mean, Jesus. I haven't even said what it is yet. My arm's up. Hey, please be expeditious. It's expeditious, please. It's called [00:30:00] A Night On Earth.
Senator: I'm sorry. That's pagoda. Reverend Zig, Joe Clark, and Lead On Me.
Gizmo: It's called A Night On Earth, the First Light. That's what we're drinking tonight.
Long name Cheers, boys. Cheers. Cheers. Macallan tonight. Is everybody drinking it? Neat? Mm-hmm. Oh yeah. Oh, where's the ice? Pretty good.
Bam Bam: That's nice.
I think it's very good. It is. It's unique to their line though, I think. It's a little different. It's lighter than most of their stuff. Yeah. It's bright, right? They're bright and light. Um, a little honey, I'm getting on the,
Chef Ricky: I love how everyone looks like giz when you said that we
Gizmo: have a good voice memo today about honey.
So the reason why I wanted to bring this one in, uh, kind of my thinking in tying it back to what we've kind of viewed as a, a pivot in the cigar industry away from the celebration of the [00:31:00] tobacco and the blending and the construction and all those things to the packaging. And we're selling packaging.
We're selling boxes, we're selling coins, we're selling fancy lighters and everything else. Like that's the primary marketing thing. Of course, we went through that at length with the davidoff year of the horse thing and that packaging presentation, which by the way, I wanted to share, I think we did talk about this or we shared it on our group chat.
I mean, I've seen several retailers, davi off retailers talking about that release, and the only stuff they're talking about is the box, the packaging, the fact that inside there's leather that matches a horse's saddle. They're talking about the collectible coin. Nobody is talking about the tobacco, the blend, the cigar experience, and exactly what we just talked about with this London, you know, closing the loophole of sitting down with a community or even yourself and enjoying a cigar.
Rooster: Hmm.
Gizmo: It's called a gimmick. Correct. So why I wanted to bring this up as it relates to the Macallan is I wanted to show you the packaging on this thing.
Bam Bam: Hmm. [00:32:00]
Gizmo: What? Check this out.
Bam Bam: Oh yeah.
Gizmo: So this opens Happy Valentine's Day. Yeah, thank you.
Bam Bam: Oh yeah.
Gizmo: It's a massive red box. Of what kind of shape is this? Ba I know you probably took a course on that Roid.
It's a rhomboid
Bam Bam: something. It's a thrombus
Chef Ricky: rom. It's
Bam Bam: like a pyramid. Yeah. It looks like the monument in dc It's got a cylinder bot, cylindrical bottom, and it has a door that
Gizmo: opens.
Bam Bam: Wow. Very ornate.
Gizmo: And then watch this inside a door opens like this.
Bam Bam: Wow. That is quite expensive. And flips up. That's a very expensive package.
Gizmo: And then the bottle sits in there.
Bam Bam: Wow. This is a circus. I mean
Chef Ricky: this, it's like you're robing a geisha. It's too much. You're not. You're
Gizmo: not. What were those Russian dolls? Like they just keep coming. Yeah. What are those things called? They nest inside each other. The nesting dolls or something. Faberg.
Faberge
Bam Bam: eggs. Yeah.
Gizmo: No. Yeah. I don't know. It's a
Pagoda: fabric or nesting doll. Nesting dolls. Nesting dolls. Nesting dolls. You know what, chef, you got it right? It looks like a GE shade of kimono, [00:33:00] correct?
Gizmo: It does. It's, it's pretty wild. What's going on here? Well, oh shit. I just hit my cigar with it. Oh shit. Oh, Mike is, oh no.
Chef Ricky: Oh, my cigar went from a seven to a six.
Gizmo: Oh,
Chef Ricky: hold on. Probably right.
Gizmo: So the reason why I wanted to bring this in, this packaging with that spirit in it is $105 with no age statement.
Rooster: Mm-hmm.
Gizmo: So my question for you is. What do you think of the spirit that we're drinking in relation to its price? Not having an age statement.
What does Lizard J say all the time? Big bullshit. Correct. But I don't think the, the spirit tastes like big bullshit. No, that's true. I think as it relates to the price and the
Chef Ricky: packaging, it is, I I think this is out because of the time of year, right? Like you're looking to buy a gif for someone. This, this packaging is gonna make a statement.
But
Senator: Yeah, I, I mean, I actually, I'm sorry, I, I don't think the price is crazy. You have to, you know, I think we have to recognize like Macallan twelves, Sherry [00:34:00] is what, 80, 85 a bottle? It's
Chef Ricky: 85. Fine. And
Senator: so this is, what did you say? A hundred? Yeah, but there's no age statement, Senator. I I'm just saying it. It's not, it could be, it could be eight year, 10 year.
It's still delicious. It's not a big outlier from their price point. I think we can very safely say, drinking this, this is at least 12 years. What's in here? You think So? I do. The fact that we're, why would they not put it on there? The fact that we're, because I, I think for them. There's more to telling this story from a marketing perspective than think about how many 12 years they already have.
They have the sherry, they have the double cast, and then apparently there's even some other type of double cast. Now, someone was talking to me about this in the lounge the other night, so I'm not sure if there's three versions of this. Having three more bottles with a 12 year statement helps. I mean, that sounds incredibly confusing.
So I think that's why that's the case. But I'm just saying from a price point standpoint, a hundred dollars I don't think is crazy for something. Look, we normally don't drink Macallan 12, Sherry neat. Everyone in this room always puts at least a chip of ice in [00:35:00] that. That is a fair point.
Chef Ricky: I don't That's true.
And
Senator: the fact that I'm sipping this right now and not even thinking about wanting any ice like this is drinking like a premium refined spirit. You're not wrong. That's all I'm saying in terms of price. At least I
Bam Bam: think you're, that's right on the money.
Gizmo: So let's talk about what's going on in this packaging here.
I think Chef was right. As I dig a little deeper, this is certainly pointing to the holidays and they have a, a few additions like this that you can look at variations
Bam Bam: of this.
Gizmo: They do. There's several. Hold on it. It is meant to be hol Did you read this whole thing about New Year? I, yes, I did. I read it, yeah.
Yeah. So it's designed for that.
Rooster: Wow.
Gizmo: But at, but I guess the same thing that we're talking about with cigars is it's a, it's a pivot away from what Scotch drinkers love about scotch, correct. Right. Which is age, which is time, which is. You know, consistency, flavor, profile and uniqueness.
Bam Bam: Not hidden behind the fancy veil.
Not hidden
Gizmo: behind. Like this is just odd. Yeah. And also you wanna talk about distinguishing it. Every single bottle of [00:36:00] Macallan now is coming out with red all over it. It's true that I don't like, there's no more blue, black, red, you know, different colors. Correct. Everything is the same color.
Bam Bam: What I loved about the blue, I just walk up to the shelf and grab it.
I don't even need to look at it. I know what it is. Well, you were buying the wrong color. Oh, the black. Black. You know what I mean? That's, that's what the Freud, now I've gotta read, I've gotta read Now
Senator: when
Bam Bam: I go to liquor store,
Senator: I'll just say I, I, I, I wanna present both sides here. And I, I actually disagree with the notion that like.
If a single malt doesn't have an age statement, it it, it's like a horrible thing or cause for tremendous concern. I mean, it, it definitely raises questions, but when you drink the spirit, if it's satisfying and you have no reason to believe that it's, you know, some kind of inferior product that doesn't have age.
I think those are different things. I think like a great example of this, Johnny Black, um, Jesus Christ with, with a slo, um, [00:37:00] actually Johnny Black now has a 12 year, eight statement. They started that years ago. Yeah,
Gizmo: that's right. Yeah, yeah, we talked about that.
Senator: Um, Glen Morange has a bottle called the cnet, which is like a $300 bottle.
It is outstanding. We should do that. We should I multiple years. This was like a after dinner drink on Thanksgiving. I would always have so good. There's no age statement. You drink that, you know that it's got serious age. I mean, probably 18 years and so I, you know, I just don't. I don't think it's fair to automatically bash any single malt if it doesn't have an age statement.
I think it's only fair if it doesn't have an age statement, and we try it and it tastes, it drinks young or we have reason to be concerned, but this to me, doesn't fall in that category at all.
Gizmo: Hmm. I just feel like cigars that. This is the new, new, the packaging. I'll you on the new, the packaging on this is the most important thing that's going on at Macallan.
Like the most important thing that go, that's going [00:38:00] on at Doff is talking about this woman named Bonnie. Bonnie Brown from New Zealand, who created artwork, invoking themes of Dawn renewal, celebration, and hope inspired by sunrise celebrations in New Zealand, one of the first places globally to see the new year.
That.
Senator: I agree. That's the conversation that I agree with. A hundred percent. That's too much. It's too much. The packaging is ridiculous. Yeah.
Rooster: Well it is a holiday release, right? It's a limited time holiday release. So yeah. It's meant to look, maybe the packaging will change
Bam Bam: after. So you mean like the annual davidoff releases?
Yeah.
Senator: That we laugh at that. We laugh
Gizmo: so much,
Senator: but I'm, I'm defending this because I actually think the spirit is very good. It is good. I agree. Agree. The spirit is
Gizmo: good. There's no question about that. Sure. Obviously we, you know, haven't had the doff year of the horse and the same thing, but given the history
Senator: here, the thing in fairness, like if Doffs like Chinese New Year releases or any of those other special releases smoked great, like we thought those were really high quality cigars.
I would defend them putting these out every year. The reason that [00:39:00] I bash 'em, I think we all do is because they usually suck. This is in a whole different camp. Mm-hmm. Like this is a really premium spirit.
Bam Bam: Correct.
Gizmo: So, like I said, this is one of four that exists in this night on Earth Line, and I'm looking at the Macallan website.
It says, A Night On Earth is our annual gifting series that connects the seasonal joy of coming together, celebrating, and well wishes. Again here, there is no mention on this sub page anything about the spirit and what you're getting inside. The bottle. That's not good. It's all about the packages.
Chef Ricky: We know it has to have at least a 3-year-old Whiskey Spart bread, the blend.
It can't be younger than three years. That's great. That we do
Gizmo: know. That's a nice metric though. Oh
Chef Ricky: yeah. Three years. Nice baseline. Awesome.
Gizmo: So it's the first light, the one we're drinking tonight. They have another one called in Jez La Frontera. Then they have one called The Journey and then they have in Scotland.
Okay. So all of these are available and I guess are different blends and stuff with different packaging. And this one [00:40:00] I got a Costco for 105 bucks, but I'm assuming some of these others are a little bit more expensive. Be interesting. It
Chef Ricky: may cost even more than 1 0 5. 'cause Costco usually has decent pricing.
Careful rooster's in front of you or
Rooster: he, he's not wrong.
Bam Bam: Or that may just be a Costco has decent pricing release spoken as a part owner, I'm sure. Yeah,
Gizmo: it's definitely not a Costco only release. It's not Okay.
Bam Bam: Rooster doesn't
Pagoda: go to the liquor section.
Gizmo: I'm seeing an online for between 110 and 150.
Chef Ricky: You know, when I look at the packaging, I see a geisha or one of those chocolate covered, uh, cherries.
That's what I see. But, and more, more than the box. What I hate is the actual label on the bottle. I dunno if you've seen this, but that's, yeah, we talked about that. It's, I'm not crazy about the, the, the red paisley, whatever.
Senator: I also a Night on Earth. What the hell does that even mean? As if, what other planet are we inhabiting?
I mean, like, what is special about that? [00:41:00] Every night, newsflash is on earth.
Bam Bam: It's like a Seinfeld episode. Hey, do you know where we're right now, earth
Gizmo: Who came up with this? That's what I'm saying. My whole point and, and I think we're all touching on various aspects of it, is that Macallan, like doff, like Haos has pivoted away from the purity of it, the purity and the creative.
Yes. And has focused now on the fancy, you know, banding on the cigars, the, the, the marks on the bottle, these boxes and, and. It's just, it's such a departure from the whole point of what we do. Yeah. But look,
Rooster: at least the product is good.
Senator: Yeah. That's why I think there's two separate issues here. I'm with you a hundred percent on the packaging.
As I just said, I think the name is unbelievably stupid. Mm-hmm. But I do really like this spirit, and especially from Macallan, where if you drink the 12 year, the 15, 18, any of it, it's a full [00:42:00] bodied scotch. Oh
Rooster: yeah.
Senator: This is lighter, but still so flavorful. And I would've never honestly thought Macallan could or would put something out like this.
So for me, like if this were part of their actual regular portfolio, I would drink it like mm-hmm. It, it solves for something that they lack in their line. So for all those reasons, the spirit itself, I'm very high on, you know,
Rooster: unlike doff, this product, I mean, it's maybe about 15, $20 more than regular Macallan, but on davidov their ear of the, uh, you know, the special releases horse hoof.
Yeah. I mean, it's like twice the price, triple the price. Yeah. So that, that's where the difference is. I think
Chef Ricky: I could, I could see a, a woman who enjoys scotch, loving this bottle. It has a very feminine design to it. I, I could see that being a thing. You know, if your wife enjoys a scotch, Mrs. Gizmo drinks scotch all the time.
I bet she loved this bottle.
Rooster: All right. [00:43:00] This cigar is very flaky. Yeah. Yeah.
Gizmo: So boys, we're coming to the end of the first third here on the aor saif anniversary of 25th. I Tata, what's everybody thinking?
Bam Bam: I'm still getting that pepper. The As is flaky. That too.
Chef Ricky: I'm not getting to pepper so much anymore. I, that's secondary cut for me.
Helped a lot. It could have just been a cigar developing, but I am seeing like some canoeing that wants to happen. Then it kind of self-corrects, but I don't think it's gonna come back from this one. I might need to touch it up, but it's really flaky and just kind of all over the place. What do you think of the
Bam Bam: Flavor Chef
Chef Ricky: flavor's decent.
I'm, I'm getting still some of that banana bread, a little nuttiness, but it's not coming through in a very rich manner. The
Rooster: notes are noting consistent. Yeah. You, you get some notes, it hits, goes your palate and it just dissipates. It's gone and then you get nothing and then you get it again. Mm-hmm. Like it's, you know, it's, it's not consistent.
Chef Ricky: It's true. Yeah. It, it, it tastes the way the ash is building on the cigar, like [00:44:00] it feel, the, it all feels very flaky and kind of disconnected. Yeah.
Senator: Yeah. I mean, I, I think, I agree on the construction. The construction is very poor. I mean, just looking at most of the cigars in the room, they, they don't look, they're not nice to look at.
No. I mean, it's burning unevenly, the ashes flaking constantly. In terms of the flavor, I, I think what Rooster said resonates with me in the sense that. The cigar has gotten better for me. The pepper has definitely dialed down, which I'm happy about, but it's like every few puffs. I'm not getting a consistent experience where like I take two draws and I'm like, oh, wow, I'm getting more sweetness.
It's not harsh, it's smooth, and I'm enjoying it. Then I take two more puffs and I'm like, oh, there the peppers back. And now I'm not sure which way we're going. So I, I don't like that there's like no chef said earlier, like, I'm, we're, I'm not able to settle in from the beginning. And here I am, well into the first third and I'm still not settled in on this cigar.
Bam Bam: Yeah, GIZ is finished with his second [00:45:00] third.
Gizmo: Jesus
Bam Bam: Whatcha talking about? Same point you. Look that I, I've never, I haven't ever seen you smoke that fast. Look
Chef Ricky: at what he knocked off half of it when he hit it with the unbelievable packaging of the bottle.
Gizmo: No. At Oh yeah. That's don't, don't forget it. It did go for a ride.
Yeah. That should be the ash though. The
Bam Bam: ash, it didn't knock off part of the actual cigar.
Gizmo: Maybe it did. You didn't. See we are in reality, we're on Earth. We're on earth. It's a
Rooster: night
Bam Bam: on
Rooster: earth.
Gizmo: Let's enjoy this one. Special night on Earth, boys. We had the first light. Now we have the second light. I will say that.
Uh, what are you getting? I was feeling that the flavor, actually, I was kind of in disagreement with you guys through most of the first third here. And I know I'm cultured to the second, you know, uh, coming to the end of the first half. But, um, I, I, I felt good about it. I felt it was balanced. I felt the mouth feel was good on, on the, the smoke.
I wasn't getting any harshness. And now it's kind of turned in a way that it does feel disjointed. It feels like every draw [00:46:00] feels different. I think maybe that's what's going on for me right now mm-hmm. Is I'm like, well, that was a good, let me try a next one. You know? Yeah. Try the next one. Like, I'm playing like
Bam Bam: Yeah.
Gizmo: Russian roulette on my draws here.
Bam Bam: Yep.
Gizmo: Which is causing me to smoke it too fast, which is clearly happening despite the fact that I'm talking a lot. That's true. So, you know, I, I don't really know what's going on here right now, but it's not a cigar that is worth $30.
Bam Bam: No,
Gizmo: it's not a cigar that. For me lines up with celebrating 25 years in business.
No. Um, and, and it's just not certainly what I expected here tonight. No.
Bam Bam: On this cigar. So I'm actually loving what I'm getting now, but I didn't get it early on and I'm, I'm probably gonna lose it in a few minutes. It's very, like you said, guys, it's very inconsistent
Senator: and now my cigar is tunneling and there's a giant hole in the middle.
Do you see that? Oh wow. Look at this. What the hell?
Rooster: Hmm.
Senator: Yeah. The construction is awful on this. I'm sorry.
Rooster: I mean for $30 at least the construction should be spot on.
Bam Bam: Correct?
Chef Ricky: Yep. I think they've used short filler. I'm just kidding. I think [00:47:00] the one consistent thing on this is a small output be the smoke output has been insane.
Yes. The combust is good. I'm getting smoke out of the head of the cigar. The foot of the cigar.
Bam Bam: But so I noted it early. I'll say it again. I'm still frustrated with the cigar overall.
Gizmo: Mm-hmm. Oh, I'm with you now. Yeah. Yeah. There's no doubt about that. That's frustrating. Especially for 30 bucks. I think a lot of what we're talking about here is completely unacceptable for $30 cigar.
Yeah. Should we just rate it if you want? Yeah, we can do that. So boys, I was talking earlier about how we've actually had some other AOR Saif cigars just not branded as such. Like we said, we know that they work with Elucion, they work with Warped, and we talked about this new story last year, but Foundation Cigars actually were rolled by AA Leaf.
Wow. They announced that they were leaving them. Last PCA and they were discontinuing the l uh, WZE and the original Wise Man Maduro, which were all made by AOR Saif. And now Nick Maleo and Foundation have pivoted away from Agon. Norsen [00:48:00] are going to my father.
Senator: Mm-hmm.
Gizmo: And everybody was wondering what had happened there or why it was a pretty big wonder why.
Yeah. I'm a new story
Senator: based on this experience, but,
Gizmo: uh, I am kind of understanding it at this point. I don't know if it was financial construction consistency, I don't know, but I'm not happy here. Yeah.
Bam Bam: Nick's
Gizmo: a difficult
Bam Bam: guy.
Rooster: So how does that work? If Foundation wants to pivot from them and go to my father?
They were using tobaccos from, well, they discontinue the lines. That's why they discontinued. They discontinued the lines. Yeah.
Gizmo: Yeah. It's probably a complete rebrand. Wow. Complete relaunch, which is what he did. Exactly. So
Senator: to me, I'm sorry, that signals that there were some real. Quality and consistency issues because if that cigar was selling and flying off the shelves and the feedback was that it was consistent.
Oh dear. You would not discontinue that. I mean, no way. He's in business. Correct. And there had to be an issue
Pagoda: and have been around for a long time. Yeah, that's true.
Gizmo: And it's gone now.
Pagoda: Yeah.
Gizmo: They actually replaced it with two completely new blends, [00:49:00] the Wiseman Roho, and the Wise Man Maduro, both made by uh, my father.
The Wiseman Roho uses a Roho seed wrapper from Nicaragua, while the Maduro uses a Mexican son Andres wrapper. Both cigars use tobaccos from Nicaragua. The binders are from Es Lee and Hal. The fillers are coming from Conga, ESLI, and Halah, and they're offered in four sizes. That was something that happened when we were at PCA 2024.
We did talk about it then, but I thought bringing in AOR Ali for the first time tonight, uh, its own mark, uh, I thought it was interesting to point that out and I'm assuming I, I, I did not dig in specifically 'cause not that we really loved any of them per se, but, uh, I, I, I'm not sure which Elucion and Warped cigars are made by AOR Saif.
Um, but I know for a fact that the Maestro Typo is not a Nicaraguan cigar. So it definitely was not made by AOR Saif. So that's the only one outta the three, which is why we love, that's the cigar we love. But out of the three that we've smoked from [00:50:00] Warped, uh, that's the only one that we actually liked.
Mm-hmm. The other two rated very poorly. So boys, let's continue on with our celebration of the year of the horse. Horses can't get enough of this. So first up we're going to go to Estee DuPont's celebration of year of the horse. They've announced year of the horse collection has begun shipping. They have 10 different items.
What very exciting. So they have a stand, uh, for a, you know, a stand cutter year of the horse. They have a fountain pen, a roller ball for. A line two year of the horse that's 1800 bucks, a slim seven and a slimy. So all of these range between $335 and $1,795.
Bam Bam: I can't believe that there's a market for this stuff.
Gizmo: I just don't understand a full line of accessories. 10 for the year of the horse for a cigar.
Chef Ricky: I guarantee you Rooster is the only one that owns this stuff. Not [00:51:00] yet. It's in his den. Just the Ashray.
Gizmo: Wow. So as we know, a lot of these brands are doing Year of the Horse. We obviously railed on Doff, but some others here according to Half Wheel, shout out to them.
Always reliable for us on the pod here. Backer Rat Lara, we'll talk about in a second. Maya Selva, Oliva Placencia, Estee DuPont, vena and Villager all have year of the horse themed products. And let's not forget, Haos of course is going to have Year of the Horse. They always do. So let's go to another one.
This one I actually like boys and not because we rated the cigar perfectly a couple weeks ago because we did, but Lara is releasing a year of the horse limited edition 2026 in January. And I think that their box, it is ornate. It's crazy, the whole thing, but I really think this one, they actually put some thought into.
Wow. Like the drawers pull out individually. There's four of them. They have accessories that come with it. Like, actually, I'm impressed.
Bam Bam: [00:52:00] Yeah,
Gizmo: that's pretty cool. Out of all the brands, look at this.
Bam Bam: That's a beautiful, it's a time, it's a beautiful
Gizmo: presentation. So you see how there's four sections where the drawers come out around the square presentation of the cigar.
Wow. 12 cigars, $690.
Chef Ricky: Wow.
Gizmo: Seems pretty reasonable to me. The fact that you get a, can
Bam Bam: I ask everyone stand a cutter and a lighter? Would any of you buy that?
Gizmo: No. No, no, but it's not unreasonable. The cigars are $57 a piece. Okay. If you don't factor in the other accessories, I'd love to hear
Bam Bam: from listeners if they're buying into gimmicks like this, and if they're chasing these types of branding opportunities by cigar makers.
I'm very, very curious.
Rooster: I'm surprised that Lara would actually do that.
Senator: I'm surprised that La Gallera has any consumer that is willing to spend $57 on any cigar that they make. I mean, that's crazy. Yeah. All their cigars are very affordable. I mean, you know,
Chef Ricky: that's relatively affordable as well for what, what it is, what you're getting.
Yeah. I mean you
Gizmo: are getting a stand [00:53:00] cutter and a lighter and it looks like quality stuff, but I'm saying and 12 cigars. But
Senator: people, the people that spend the most on cigars, new world, cigar smokers would definitely be consumers of Davi off or Perron. They're the highest price point. Right. I don't know of any Davi offer for Perone Smoker that smokes Lara regularly.
We just discovered this brand. That's correct. None of us, we've been in, God knows how many lounges. I've never seen it. It wasn't until this year that one person in our lounge happened to light a Lara that gave me one and I happened to try it. Bam happened to have that box, like Correct. How are these people possibly paying $57 for a cigar from
Rooster: them?
And if you're going to collect a lighter, a cutter, an ashtray, it's gonna be off a brand that's like really well known. Mm-hmm. You know, it's gonna be an SD DuPont. It's gonna be a Dunhill or Davidoff. Or a Padron. Yeah. Correct. Other than that, yeah, it's, well, don't
Senator: forget Xeno. You've got the Ashtrays. Xeno.
That's correct. The Big ZI was,
Rooster: I was gifted that
Bam Bam: Ashray, you know, other than the ashtrays, [00:54:00] I don't see the attraction to getting a cutter that's got any marker on it. Right. I like the purity, simplicity of accessories and the case. Right. Once you start getting into collectibles, when does it end? Yeah. I think it just departs, it.
Just de distraction I think, more than anything else. Well, that's a nice cutter you have
Pagoda: there.
Bam Bam: Thank you.
Gizmo: So they're making 2026 numbered boxes. So 2000 boxes of 12 cigars and all the accessories. And again, the retail price on these is $690. The cigar itself is a 56 by five double robusto that uses a Brazilian era PICA wrapper over a Dominican allure binder, and four Dominican fillers, CLIA 98, allure P, the Oro, and Pito Banano.
So that's what Lago uh, has coming out, and I'll be honest, out of all of them, I think that one is honestly the best looking and the best value there. So speaking of lighters, I [00:55:00] found Rooster's Next lighter, Estee DuPont has introduced the $70,000 Jackpot Lighter. Yeah,
Pagoda: that looks wonderful. That's ridiculous.
Didn't,
Gizmo: didn't we see that at PCAT? No. Days ago they had a, I think it was either a roulette table or, or another ridiculous. It was another type of thing. But this one is actually a jackpot. It's like quite literally. And can you spin the wheel? I believe So these items, which are a functional, lighter, also feature a working casino game.
The first model was simply called Casino, which is the one that we saw at PCA and had a spinning roulette wheel. The second was Lucky's skull, which had three small dice, and the newest is called Jackpot, which has a working slot machine. I'm gonna sell
Bam Bam: my DuPont sum out. You said $70,000. $70,000,
Gizmo: yeah.
This is for people rubies money isn't real. Yeah, and have, and you have poor taste. The lighter is 2.6 [00:56:00] inches tall by a little under two inches wide and an inch thick. The lighter is a double soft flame. So on the front is a miniature slot machine that features six different icons, cherries, crown diamond double bar, and the DuPont D logo.
And of course you're applying, you're trying to hit the triple seven on this thing. Oh, of course. And if
Chef Ricky: you do, what happens?
Gizmo: Um, you get 75, you get your money back. I think you, I think you just feel joy. Yeah. Yeah. You know, another night on Earth Chef. So it's offered in four colorways, the multicolor lacquer, the palladium, the palladium, black lap lacquer, and yellow gold.
So which one would you guys be buying here? Out of all these, would you go for the color boys or would you go for yellow gold? Of course, there's the yellow gold Rooster there. 70,000.
Bam Bam: I don't know.
Gizmo: So I guess people are buying this stuff, but, um, who's
Rooster: buying this
Gizmo: stuff? You could push the button and play the slot.
Chef Ricky: $70,000 for a lighter people that are running, uh, pig butchering schemes [00:57:00] buying this shit. Oh yeah.
Gizmo: So let's go to another one. This is a new release from Haos Boys. Diplomatico has announced that they're launching the Conci, the newest addition to the brand. It's a 50 ring gauge cigar by a little over five inches long.
Of course, they have not announced pricing yet. They're celebrating the diplomatic host range. The new factory name on this is the Centro Fino. So what they're saying is that these are gonna be presented in boxes of 25. And the launch took place at the One exclusive club, which is one of the most iconic v uh, venues in the heart of Sophia.
They launched it in some historic building, renowned for hosting the city's most distinguished cultural and social events, providing the perfect setting for, as they say, the eagerly anticipated debut. So I'm curious how this cigar is gonna do. I mean, [00:58:00] Diplomatico is not a Marco out of Haos, that folks are really celebrating.
Rooster: Mm-hmm.
Gizmo: I mean, are you guys looking for Diplomatico?
Senator: Well, hold on. You bury the lead on that. Yeah. Did you hear what happened with the pigtail? No. Okay. So this, this is the best part of this whole story. I,
Gizmo: I'm, I'm just reading a haos. Uh, all the ears Ted. All
Senator: ears. I saw this, uh, very recently. So the funny thing is, at the Haos Festival, when they announced this cigar, it had a pigtail.
It had a pigtail. Oh. And then they released the cigar and everyone said, what the hell happened in the pigtail? They released it in Bulgaria. So it turns out that Hano, they made a mistake in the marketing materials it presented at Hano Festival. Um, so there's no pigtail, but this whole time everyone's been anticipating was gonna have this.
That's cute. And now rooster's definitely out on this. Yeah, definitely out. Yeah.
Gizmo: You're not buying that anymore? Nope. The concierges. So,
Senator: oh, that's actually, this is, this is funny. Whoever wrote this ca article, because it said the, the word conci isn't Spanish for, uh, chancellor, uh, [00:59:00] cancel like that pigtail.
Instead it translates to chancellor in Spanish.
Gizmo: It looks like cancel like banno right now between the pig butchering and it's well written like that, the prison labor and all that stuff. So a lot of stuff going on with Haos new release from Diplomatico. And uh, we'll see if that ends up on the pot at some point.
Boys, what do
Chef Ricky: you think that's gonna cost?
Gizmo: I think they'll probably keep that pretty reasonable. I would bet under 25 30.
Senator: Uh, so under 25 is correct. So they, this is on ca it says, uh, A box is being sold for five 20 US 2080 per cigar. There you go. Which actually is, that's a reasonable price. Very reasonable for Steve.
It's effectively a Rob Robusto.
Gizmo: Yeah,
Senator: yeah,
Gizmo: yeah. Wow. So here's another one. We're going back to JC Newman for a second and we'll get to some email here. Boys. JC Newman and I bring this up because of the name of the cigar, they're shipping the cigar called the Brick House is on Fire. The reason why it's called that is it comes with an unfinished foot, [01:00:00] and when you light it, I guess it looks like a flame because.
There's no wrapper on it and it just exposed foot. It's an exposed foot,
Bam Bam: so it's a fire hazard. Just keep waving your head like that because it's very attractive.
Gizmo: Don't smoke this in, uh, one of those London lounges. The brick house is on fire, so it's a 50 ring gauge Toro by six inches long. Suggested retail price of $12 per cigar.
Drew Newman, fourth generation owner of JC Newman, of course, says, when you light the brick house is on fire, the cigar ignites in flames. The brick house is on fire's wrapper and binder are cut back to expose the filler leaves. And it's a TAA exclusive. Another gimmick. Another gimmick. Look at this thing.
Chef Ricky: Wow. Wow. Maybe two years ago I had a cigar with a shaggy foot like that. It, uh, the pencil, or I forgot the name, but I think that's it's made by a leaf, by Oscar or something like that. Yes, I've seen that. I just bought it outta curiosity. 'cause I've never seen a [01:01:00] shaggy foot on a cigar. Um, nothing to write home about, but I don't remember it flaming up like that.
So I wonder if they added anything to it to make it,
Gizmo: it's a good question. Or they just left it really loose. I, I don't know what's going on there, but,
Senator: sorry. Just an update on the cigar in our, our Night on Earth that keeps taking a turn. Pagoda just showed me, he's got a hole in the middle of his cigar too.
That's not good. Two outta six. Yeah.
Bam Bam: I'm not sure if I can finish this cigar.
Gizmo: Really? See, I don't think it's that bad. I'm not liking it at all. It's not that bad.
Senator: I can finish it, but this honestly is one of the worst constructed cigars I've had in years. The worst. This is tunneled
Bam Bam: multiple times. Yeah. I know you're gonna get some email, but it's very bitter for me right now.
Rooster: Ooh. I don't know. It's actually very boring. Yeah. Like there's nothing, there's, I would, I would agree with that. Yeah. No, there's nothing you're getting out of it that keeps you, doesn't keep your attention, keeps you wanting to smoke more.
Chef Ricky: Ex my point. Exactly. Right. And despite its open draw, it's kind of smoking really slow for me.
Like I, I don't know [01:02:00] how GIZ got to that point as Gizmo just
Senator: took the final band of three off of his cigar. Yeah.
Chef Ricky: I, I feel like I'm at exactly the same point when we were all surprised at where Gizmo was with his cigar. We are not progressing at all. I'm humming along over here. Yeah.
Gizmo: All right boys. Well let's go to some listener feedback.
We'll talk about our D four episode that we did with the GGE Hills Estate, Cabernet Sauvignon. Of course we did the Thanksgiving snake draft of our, I was worried you weren't gonna bring it up 'cause there was a clear, resounding winner on our social media. I don't know about that because the competition is still open.
'cause we're gonna announce a winner on our New Year's Eve episode, uh, which is gonna come out next week. So anybody out there who wants to go vote on Instagram for the winner of the five of us who were here. For our best Thanksgiving plate, the Lizard edition, please, please go to our Instagram. Does remind
Bam Bam: me, what does the winner get?
Gizmo: 10 count box of Bon Robert Cigars. Motherfucker. Come on [01:03:00] ba.
Pagoda: I think I'll have to do that because I missed that episode. Yeah, you can
Gizmo: vote.
Pagoda: Oh, I'm gonna vote.
Gizmo: So there is some feedback here. So I'll read the FOH thread and then we can go through some of the ones I missed. I know who's
Rooster: gonna be on the bottom.
Senator: You got one vote, but I think it was a pity vote. Well, there was someone else not far based on the commentary A lot that's what I of complaints about. Pigs in a blanket from someone I know I
Gizmo: What's going on with the pigs in the blanket complaints?
Bam Bam: Did my broccoli get votes?
Gizmo: Nobody mentioned
Bam Bam: the bro. Sure.
Gizmo: So NY Guido said I think Lizard Gizmo nailed this Thanksgiving cigar and he is got me thinking very hard about whether to light a 2020 Sir Winston or a 2020 Lucy. After everyone leaves my house, I think either will be great, but I'm leaning towards Lucy because it could stand up better to a heavy dinner and a heavy dessert Separately.
Wondering what other folks have going today pre-holiday. So obviously we're talking about Thanksgiving a couple weeks ago. He said he was a, about to light up a poor Lauren Young Monte Carlo, and then later in the afternoon a millennium rib Robusto [01:04:00] from Davidov, or a Trinity rib Robusto from Fabrica five.
There you go. Got a 2024 Churchill or a petite Corona from RYJ going later tonight because I want that cherry flavor before the big day. Thanks again for a wonderful episode and a few hours hanging out with folks who, though I've never met them except giz, I've seen once on the FOH chat, feel like they're my friends.
Happy Thanksgiving to Lizard Nation. RKP OG on FOH said, no, Turin for the main dish. Bunch of exclamation points. I do feel like that was a miss, you know, celebrating John Madden. Of course. Yeah. People
Chef Ricky: haven't been talking about Turin for a
Bam Bam: few years now. Do you re remember when they actually were filming Madden opening up a Turin, I feel like it was every year.
It's disgusting. He's got his hand. I love him, but he's got his hands. He's ripping a carcass open. There's a chicken inside a duck, inside a tur. It's disgusting.
Chef Ricky: Yeah, and I, I, I, I can never get on board with that. No, because the, the skin on duck is so thick and it's delicious when it's beautifully [01:05:00] rendered.
Oh yeah. But if it's sitting inside of Turkey, just kind of steaming away, that's not something I want.
Rooster: It's a vegan nightmare. Yeah.
Chef Ricky: I'm
Bam Bam: like a soy boiler,
Chef Ricky: although I think, oh boy. Next year I'm gonna try my hand at a Turkey ade. I'm a debone. An entire Turkey. What does that mean? So you deone the entire Turkey, you remove the tendons from like the drumstick area, and then you just layer the inside with like a beautiful herb butter.
You roll it and you roll it, right? So you have the cylinder. How do you know this? Well, he cooks. Oh, a chef. Oh, people chef know what means
Rooster: he's a chef of the future. Like I'm sure Senator knows what a roll lot
Chef Ricky: is. Um, and you just have this beautiful layer of crispy skin on the outside and boneless Wow.
You know, various cuts of dark and white meat in there. And I'm, I'm, I'm, there's no, and you still brine it, right? Mm-hmm. So it's still gonna be flavor for when Juicy. Uh, but I think that's what I'm gonna do next year. I'd still like to try a fried Turkey. Yeah, those are, [01:06:00] they're, they've never had that.
Anyone spatch cock that Turkey this year? My Turkey cooked so freaking quick. It was insane. Mine, mine cooked. I did
Gizmo: not sp cock it, but I, I put mine on my smoker. It was done in like three and a half hours and it was amazing. Great. Dude. My Turkey,
Chef Ricky: two hours. It was about 16 pounds, two hours in and out the oven.
Hmm.
Senator: How long did the pigs in the blanket take of the oven giz?
Chef Ricky: Two and a half minutes.
Gizmo: I'm ignoring that Kyle. Those
Senator: went
Gizmo: into the air fryer. So Lizard Enrique says it was one of the best non anniversary or New Year's Eve episodes out there. This was fun. And the Lizard holiday episodes always deliver. I don't know where it will stand in the catalog, but it's on par with the recent H Uppin two and the Kba Guidos episode that were solid from intro to outro.
And then he lists, and I like this, his Mount Rushmore of non celebratory episodes. Hmm. He says, I'm gonna go backwards. He says, number four, parer Gustos. Episode 1 33 are rare episodes when the lizards [01:07:00] discuss matters of the heart, when Gizmo's mom passed and the boys toast her life, they then show the ties that bind between the podcast, the friendship, and the import of cigars.
The cigar is also a catastrophe and the boys dunk on it. Like Spud Web in the 1986 Spud Web NBA Slam Dunk contest number three, episode 1 21 with dla. The single most educational thing I've heard on cubit cigars and an incredible bookend to the work done by Min Ron Knee. The interview with Danila Rodriguez felt like getting an interview with Pin Sean.
I don't know who that is. I feel uneducated or salinger.
Rooster: Mm-hmm.
Gizmo: Number two, the HVEC ion number one in Asencia episode 162. Of course that was around this holiday time last year. The Kon Spoon episode talked about holiday food. Bam doesn't shop. The price is right. He says it's the funniest episode that there has ever
Bam Bam: been.
So I was accused the other day in the house, you never go shopping, honey. She just figured [01:08:00] this out. Wow.
Rooster: She listened to the episode
Senator: and I would love to hear what was your response? Correct?
Bam Bam: Because I was, I was complaining about, you know, we do like a budget in the house. Oh. And you know,
Senator: bam adheres to this very strictly
Bam Bam: he does.
Well,
Chef Ricky: Pam's like, I spend no money.
Bam Bam: $22 for a gallon of milk change order.
Gizmo: Lot of change orders there.
Bam Bam: Correct.
Gizmo: All right. And number one, Parus Colus. Episode 14. This is when the podcast became what we know and Love. The rough edges had been smooth, and it felt like being the empty chair philosophy took hold in a real tactile way. I love that. Mm-hmm. That was a great episode. Yeah.
And he finishes here, the episodes in a different class. All of their own are the bam bam accountability episodes, which were like Carlton Fisk's Home Run in game six of the 1975 World Series incorrect, only more consequential, and of course, the Rabbi Ala Hamlet [01:09:00] episode, which was like a sequel to Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.
That was
Bam Bam: fun though, man.
Gizmo: El Nino, uh, continues here. It was so much fun hearing you guys complain about your North Korea lounge. I love this episode, and I'm super jealous of those D fours. I gotta track down a good box. And NY Guido chimed in again. He loved hearing our venting session about the North Korea lounge.
Oh, yeah. So boys, let's touch on because I, and listen, let's don't, uh, push for votes here. Let's touch on some of the comments that are coming in on the Thanksgiving plate, the lizard edition. Of the Thanksgiving lineup here. And uh, first of course Lizard Enrique says, I'll choose Rooster so I can be the only one Lizard.
Rito says, damn Giz, I really wanted to pick you, but you lost me at pigs in a blanket. I'm going with Senator. Chef got a vote from J Horse 0 1 3. He's a professional after all. Another one for Senator Lamb [01:10:00] chops, baked potato, cranberry sauce, all Dino Cameroon Elante and Angels envy. Rye was his choice of five.
I think what
Chef Ricky: took Senator over the top were the lamb chops. Mm-hmm. Which I think, I think
Senator: he was hesitating on and I got, I was the last pick on the, the main.
Chef Ricky: Yep.
Senator: The entree
Chef Ricky: lamb chops during a holiday are fantastic. Yeah. But I'm sorry if I don't get Turkey. It just doesn't feel like Thanksgiving. Correct.
I know. Yeah.
Gizmo: Here's one from Lizard Greg who said, what? No soy ball this year. What happened? Rooster Mad did a roast. I'll go with roosters if I can swap to real beef. Wellington and Paul Roge, another one here from the Cigar Pursuit Gizmo's lineup for me. BG Cigars, chef and GIZ got a good battle going on between their lineup.
Hard to pick. This was a tough one, says Jay Co. Pats 57, but my win has to go to giz. The lineup would have to be mac and cheese bites. Sweet potato casserole. Beef tenderloin, rare. H up in Magnum 46 and Elijah Craig, barrel proof bourbon. All right, couple going for senator, [01:11:00] actually. Oh my God. Four in a row here for Senator.
Correct. Oh, this is ridiculous. He's so proud. Another one for Gizmo. Another one for Gizmo. Senator. Again, this is ridiculous. Well,
Bam Bam: giz, you're in there.
Gizmo: User leaves and lions said Happy Thanksgiving to all American lizards on a whole, I'd go with chef though. Gizmos, Maine and Senator Cigar pairing and Senator Cigar pairing are top contenders.
Bam. Bam is a close runner up. Look, you got mentioned. Bam. All right. I'm sorry, rooster. You got mentioned. You grasp just said I'll take it. I'll take it. Participation trophy. That's, it was a bro, it was a broccoli. I'm open-minded. I'm willing to do the soy ball, but not the impossible meat stuff. I do drink, but I might purchase that alcohol Free champagne for the holidays, though.
We are gonna bring that in next week for our New Year's Eve episode. I do wanna try the bloom for sure.
Chef Ricky: Could we bring an alcoholic variant? Oh, we're gonna have alcoholic for sure. Oh, we sure are, but yeah, we're,
Rooster: yeah. Yes, please.
Gizmo: So another one here from Ryan and [01:12:00] Ryan Mess. 90. Tough choice. Some solid lineups debated, bam, giz and Rooster.
Final vote goes to giz. Personally, I'd go with the mini corn ducks, green bean casserole, Turkey, Romeo, Juliet, to preserve a real. And Johnny Walker Black.
Senator: This is how we know GIZ is writing Some of these I
Gizmo: What are you talking about? There's another one
Senator: for Thanksgiving, always the county mayor. Another
Gizmo: one Lizard Gizmo, another one.
Lizard Gizmo, uh, another and two more senators. So we'll see what happens. We're leaving this voting open for one more week, so go vote and uh, we'll see who the final tally goes to here in the room. And somebody on that list who voted and tagged two of their friends is gonna win a 10 count box of cigars from Bon Roberts.
Chef Ricky: Come on guys. I, I could understand losing to Senator 'cause he has caviar and lamb chops. But come on, gizmo. I know.
Gizmo: I think my list was pretty damn good. Anyone can win except Gizmo's List that,
Senator: that is
Gizmo: offensive. Listen, the people are speaking and you guys aren't listening. Oh. Oh, the people are speaking and I'm in the lead.
Oh, I don't think
Senator: so.
Gizmo: I think you should count it [01:13:00] again. Count them up. Count it again. I'm telling you,
Chef Ricky: the people that are picking you have never cooked on Thanksgiving Day. Bam. Bam. Are you talking about bam. Well, also true.
Gizmo: Alright boys, we're coming to the end of the second, third here on the aor Saif anniversary 25th iis.
Liata and the Macallan. Hold on. A Night On Earth.
Chef Ricky: The Macallan Kimono
Gizmo: the first light. What's everybody thinking?
Bam Bam: Well, thank God for the drink. Macallan is good. Exactly what I was thinking. Thank God for the drink. 'cause this is, I'm not enjoying the cigar at all.
Senator: So I, I'll say this on the cigar, I, I, you know, the frustrating part for me is that there are parts of this blend that work, it's just not complete.
I still, every now and then I get a few puffs and draws that are actually enjoyable and more sweet than they are peppery. But then, you know, wait five minutes and I'm getting the exact opposite [01:14:00] experience. So for me it's just still frustratingly inconsistent and I've had to touch this cigar up more than probably anything that we've reviewed this year.
Oh yeah. Really? I mean, I had to smoke through a giant crater that was in the middle of my cigar where I was just sucking air with no combustion. And so I'm having to just re-light to try to get through. That's the worst. Wherever that was. Worst. The worst. Big problems. The worst. It's horrible.
Chef Ricky: Yeah. It sounds like you're not on earth.
Yeah. Correct. You're in hell
Pagoda: smoking through
Chef Ricky: cra
Pagoda: and
Chef Ricky: you
Pagoda: pagoda. How's yours? Uh, you know, pretty much the same thing. It's actually become a little better now, but it's been a frustrating experience. Just like, uh, the rest, um, should have brought that
Bam Bam: vacuum in here.
Pagoda: Yeah. Should have got the vacuum. Yeah.
Damn. But you can't blame me for this one. I'm even Ash. Yeah, everyone. I'm
Bam Bam: out on
Pagoda: this
Bam Bam: cigar. I'm done.
Gizmo: You're dropping it? I am. Alright, so I just wanna point out for the listener, bam, how many times in 214 Never some odd episodes, have you? I don't, I've ever, the cigar dropped. The cigar. [01:15:00] I I don't remember you ever doing that.
No, I can't. That's okay.
Senator: He's still gonna give it to Ted. No,
Bam Bam: no, I can't do it.
Gizmo: Alright boys, let's go into some listener email. Now this one is from Lizard John from Boise who writes us a lot. He says, hi giz, thanks for my second lizard of the Week award last month. I love contributing to the show in some small way.
I'm hoping for an unprecedented third designation at some point so I can enjoy some bond Robert cigars. Anyway, I just wanted to suggest you boys might try out the Dunbarton Tobacco and trust red meat lovers, specifically in Ribeye, which is the Toro for a future show. It's a unique flavor profile and I'd be interested to hear your take on it.
Thanks again and best wishes to you all lizard John from Boise. So we haven't done a saka since the Brule, so I was wondering what you guys think about bringing in the red meat lovers.
Senator: We should do it. We, yeah. At at PCA in New Orleans this year. That was [01:16:00] the cigar that he handed out to everybody. Mm-hmm.
I smoked it on our rooftop. Um, it, it, it's worth reviewing. It was not
Bam Bam: bad. It was good. I remember it being good. I had at the show it was okay. Yeah.
Gizmo: I don't think I smoked it. I think I probably still have. It's a dipped in. Yeah, you were in bed.
Bam Bam: It's dipped in barbecue sauce.
Gizmo: All right boys, let's go to some emails from Lizard Seagull.
Now he said Gizmo. I think it would be helpful if in the opening or on the Instagram page, you guys list, list which cigars will be smoked on what dates, letting people know what to buy to smoke along with you guys. Let 'em to purchase or look for cigars for future episodes. Thanks, lizard Segal. So I, I'll be honest, I don't think we can do any more than what I'm doing now because sometimes we have to kind of be fly by night.
Something comes in, we impromptu the D four a couple weeks ago. The Kaba Igan was kind of an impromptu cigar, so I list out the next two [01:17:00] months effectively. But you need to pivot at the beginning of each month, time to time. And, uh, you know, I just don't wanna be tied down to specific weeks, you know, at a time because it just kind of doesn't allow us to be flexible.
So that's really the, uh, the best we're gonna be able to do. And I love this one from Lizard. S Seagull also sent, you guys have mentioned that cigars are the great equalizer. People of different backgrounds come together to enjoy our common love of cigars. So today my wife and I went to our favorite cigar lounge, Corona Cigar, or in Orlando.
We usually sit at an outside table that sits for. That table was occupied already. So we took a table with seating for eight. A gentleman approached us and asked if he could join us. Sure, we'd love to have a guest. Come to find out he was from the Netherlands and was heading home from a conference in San Francisco.
He told us horror stories of homelessness, drug use, et cetera, on the streets. Very, very sad. He stopped in Orlando for a small layover and had been to the cigar lounge before. It was interesting hearing about a cigar smoking experience in his home country with Cubans being [01:18:00] left behind for multiple reasons.
His lounge of choice has even replaced two large Humidors with one tray only of Cubans. That's pretty crazy. He also mentioned he travels a lot. He works for Microsoft, and when he goes to Germany, he stocks up way cheaper there than in his home country. Anyway, I told him about the great podcast Lounge Lizards, and I told him how informative and fun it is.
So Eric from the Netherlands, if you're listening. Welcome to the Best Cigar podcast in the world, lizard sequel. Oh, no, you mean this is the first light for lizard Eric in the Netherlands. All right, boys, here's another one. This one's from Lizard. Anthony says, hello, lizard team, as you guys are turning into a watch and lifestyle podcast, I found, I found it matching to show my new pickup for my collection.
Ooh. He purchased a new Rolex oyster perpetual in a new color from 2025 after submitting his interest on January 4th of this year, waiting two hundred and [01:19:00] four, forty one days until he got it. Of course, I'm celebrating with a Cuban cigar. He says, keep up the podcast and don't forget about our Cubans. And there's his new watch, ah, mint
Bam Bam: face,
Gizmo: the Oyster Perpetual from Rolex.
Good for him. I agree. I agree with It's beautiful. Congratulations. I mean, it's, it's a, yeah, it's pretty awesome. Nice watch. He, he's
Senator: got a a, a great watch. Um, I'm a traditionalist. So, you know, we were, it's actually very appropriate to talk about this in the context of these new limited releases and the colorful boxes and packaging.
You know, I don't love when every year all these watchmakers announce, you know, their new releases and people are looking for like an update of an old model, a new, you know, model. Something like that changes they're making. Changing the dial color on a watch that's been around for a long time to just some, you know, more colorful options is not like, don't particularly, they have multiple
Bam Bam: face colors now.
[01:20:00] Oh my God. Now there's
Senator: a ton beige. I've seen a ton. There's like some multicolor one that looks like orange. Absolutely ridiculous. Yeah, so that's the only thing. It just as a purist that there's too many colors. I think they're going a little dab it off esque right now, which I don't really love. Out of a brand like And Macallan esque.
Macallan esque.
Gizmo: I will say though, I do like the watch. It's a beautiful watch. It looks great. Congratulations to him. All right, so let's go to an email now from Lizard Jarret. He says, Hey lizards. Recently on the UA Kaba Igan episode, some of you mentioned wanting to try other olas in that line, if you do, please report back on which ones you try and what you think.
Has anybody tried any of the other Olas in the Kaba Igan series or is still just the Imperials? Just that one for me so far. A
Bam Bam: few of the guys in the lounge have had the re robusto. Um, I don't know. They said it was okay.
Gizmo: He says here, it was helpful for me when you did this a while ago with the Padron 1964 series listing each ola discussing how they differ and calling out [01:21:00] favorites.
So of course that line is an outlier, as most of us have smoked, probably almost every variation of it. Maybe not in the natural side of things. Mm-hmm. Definitely in the Maduro side. For most of us, we've dabbled in the natural side. But, um, he says here, can you do the same thing with other new worlds that you've explored, like the Aging Room, Sonata series, the All Dino and Classic and Cameroon Stoic.
Cetera.
What happened? Pagoda. Oh no, nothing. It just, I want to dust you off.
Senator: I mean, we were talking about what that like frayed cigar. Look at this thing, like just lighting it up like a bottle of fire. That, that
Bam Bam: was Whoa. Looks like a Christmas tree.
Gizmo: Happy
Bam Bam: holidays. Correct.
Gizmo: So other vi iss, aging room, sonata, uh, aging room, Sonata, all Dino classic, Cameroon, stoic, et cetera.
What other VITs have you guys tried there that you've enjoyed? Outside the ones we've done on the podcast? I think Pagoda has done [01:22:00] the, uh,
Bam Bam: oh yeah, the big, uh,
Gizmo: aging room. Uh, the Gordo. The Godo,
Bam Bam: the baseball bat. Yeah.
Pagoda: Not by Choice. Is that the concerto? Yeah, the concert. Yes. In
Gizmo: Gordo.
Pagoda: Right? In Gordo, yeah. How is it?
I, I'll tell you, the first half is pretty good. The second half, you know, it just doesn't work. I think it just becomes a bit too much. Um, yeah, having said that, you know, I'll smoke it, but uh, it's not something I would like to buy again.
Gizmo: Senator, have you tried any of the All Dinos in classic or Cameroon?
Outside of the vitals we've done,
Senator: so I've had the Cameroon in Landero. Hmm. Um, I didn't love it. I think the Reto is a lot better. Yes. And I think the classic Ante Lan wipes the floor where the Cameroon and Lan, um, I. I think I had the classic ante. I dunno if ante is Vi Elante
Gizmo: is the Ola Vila. Yeah. Classic.
So I've the
Senator: classic [01:23:00] line in Rib Robusto and I think the LAN's way better.
Gizmo: I'm with you. I had that actually in Corona and Rib Robusto and both of them didn't even come close to the Lanzaro. So there's definitely specific Olas in each of these lines that's working the best. Correct. Thankfully I think we've found them.
Mm-hmm. But some of the others certainly weren't working for me. And I know that you feel the same. I also had the Cameroon Reserve recently on a recommendation from a listener.
Rooster: Mm.
Gizmo: And I didn't really enjoy it. Okay. And I was kind of bummed out about it. Like I was thinking that would be an elevated experience from the Cameroon.
I think it was a Toro, but it just didn't, uh, it didn't work on stoic by the way. I wanted to share that. I think the Churchill in both stoic lines, the original stoic line and the equanimity, the Churchill is really great.
Bam Bam: Really?
Gizmo: Yeah. I highly recommend it. Of course. It's a longer smoke than Theto is, but um, definitely wanna check that out.
He says it would also be great to get an update from you guys on which Fabrica five cigars you guys have tried and what you think of them. So we've tried a lot of them. I think [01:24:00] most recently we've been talking about the Lonsdale, the N nine, which is Yeah. The N nine Lonsdale has been smoking brilliantly.
Yeah. And it's one of the more recent releases. I love the Half Corona. Mm-hmm. The Sovereign Sons. I think the Trinity re robusto is slam dunk. Of course in that line, that thing
Bam Bam: just continues to get better. It's incredible. If you, if you're fortunate enough to get a bunch of bundles, do it. Keep 'em for a while, have enough where you can slowly go through them.
They get better over time. They're just, I had one last week. I find it hard to find something that gives me that kind of flavor and that delivery. It's it incredible. Just off the
Senator: charts, I agree with Bam. On the aging potential. I mean, I feel like, oh yeah, any cigar that we have found that has a Cubans quality about it does really well with even more age.
So it's like they're ready to smoke, but if you buy in volume, you're just gonna enjoy them even more. The ones that just get, you know, age [01:25:00] over time. Yeah. So I think that's a great call out. It's insane.
Rooster: I, I think the Trinity re boosto is a, is a home run. And the NFAs too. I like the, I love ones once in a while.
Yeah.
Gizmo: Alright, continuing on here from Lizard. Jared says similarly, you guys sometimes mention that a particular cigar is quote, smoking. Great. Right Now, I imagine you guys often buy boxes around the same time, so you know how old each other's cigars are, but the listener usually doesn't. Can you run through which new worlds you think Age well as we were just discussing, how long you recommend keeping them and how they change over time?
So, I think as a general rule, I don't think there's any cigar that we have. That we've smoked a lot of or a little of. Mm-hmm. That doesn't benefit from time. True. Would anybody disagree with that? No.
Chef Ricky: No.
Gizmo: So now when you talk about Cuban cigars, I think there's a longer window there because they're not fermented or aged before they're shipped.
As long as non Cuban cigars are Right. Except for one,
Bam Bam: [01:26:00] um, that partica short, I had one the other day, they actually increase in strength. It's unusual for me, or th th those, I like a little younger for some reason. It just smokes very bold and it gets a little peppery for me. It's really strange and I've got a ton of those.
Um, they are unusual in the way they're performing as they age. But most of the Cubans, you're right. Bigger window.
Rooster: Could you expand on a ton of those? Yeah. How many?
Bam Bam: I think I have three
Pagoda: boxes of those 200 bid done. So he has six. You can have us.
Gizmo: So as a rule, I think Honduran cigars are very similar to Cubans.
I think that they just benefit from time, obviously the Honduran cigars that you get. Are gonna be aged more than Cuban cigars. So they're closer to being ready to smoke after 30 or 60 days. Dominican cigars, I think same. You know, they benefit from time. Nicaraguan, obviously Padron, [01:27:00] we've had some success with age boxes.
Senator: Oh, absolutely. Senator. I I will say also, uh, for Nicaraguan, the aging room Sonata, when those sit and age dude, they are fucking delicious over time. Unbelievable. Like even it's ridiculous. Even six months, right? It, it is. I mean, crazy. It starts already such a great cigar, but it's like the flavor just gets more concentrated and like this citrus note becomes more prevalent mm-hmm.
With some age. And I think they get creamier. It's
Chef Ricky: fantastic. I agree. Over time. So I just had one over the weekend and now my sonatas are just over a year old from when I bought them. Awesome. Perfect. But what I am noticing, and this is uh, uh, a tower update if you will. This is my first real winter with them.
'cause when I got this tower, it was the tail end of winter. We were coming into the spring and one thing that's kind of lived in my head since you said it, Senator, was about [01:28:00] light. Appearing through the cracks of your door. And I'm noticing now to see some light, and I think what's happening in my tower is that those gaskets have sort of constricted a little bit because the air is dried out.
And I find myself filling my cigar oasis almost once a week. Hmm. Wow. Wow. That's a lot. That is a lot. I did shut the fan off on my tower. That'll help. Uh, so that's helping, but I think I'm gonna need to get some weather stripping in there. Sure. Just to kind of compensate for those, for the ones that are in, uh, tightening up a bit.
Mm-hmm. Uh, and I felt like my, like some of the essential oils in my sonatas have, uh, disappeared and it felt somewhat. Crispy, not crispy, but the smoke kind of felt soulless. Mm-hmm. So I've increased the humidity a bit in my tower and I have some weather stripping on the way. I'm gonna let that sit for like a month and see what happens.
But I feel like my son oughta suffered a little bit. It'll come, they'll come back.
Gizmo: It's not been so [01:29:00] long that it, they won. Won't. I think they'll come back.
Senator: Yeah. And, and my advice on the weather stripping, like literally the thinnest you can possibly buy. Sure. Yeah. Because I remember, uh, I went through, you know, several different options and realized like just the tiniest bit is all you're gonna need.
Gizmo: And I think that's a great kind of red alert for listeners out there as we get into colder months. Especially in the northeast. Yeah. In the northeast and, and Midwest here in, in the United States, if you're filling your cigar oasis, if you're having to fill that once a week, week and a half, two weeks, I, I mean maybe if, if you live in Michigan and you have lake effect weather and it's, you know, the humidity is like 20% or something.
It's crazy. But if you're filling it that often, you have a leakage problem. Yeah. And you have to solve for your air transfer happening too quickly because not only are you having to waste distilled water, that's the secondary or, you know Yeah. Tertiary problem. Right. The primary problem is your cigars are experiencing crazy shifts.
Yes. In their humidity and it's really gonna affect your smoke. [01:30:00] You could always spritz
Chef Ricky: three gallon, you could spritz. Yeah. And I actually did. 'cause I was getting that paranoid. You spritz, I spritzed a little bit. Did you? Because I was getting that paranoid about the, the moisture level. I wish you called me before you spritzed shame on you.
So he
Rooster: called grinder.
Chef Ricky: Well, I figured it can't hurt. Right. I mean I just, I didn't spritz the cigars. I spritzed the wood itself hoping that it would absorb it and just kind of, um, you know, but are your new
Rooster: world cigars on like they're in the middle. In the middle. Yeah. So how about moving them lower? Like lower.
Senator: So hang on. My advice in instead of spritzing, you know, those like, um, uh, what's that like florist material that's in those spec? The sponge? Yeah, those things. So like I have a few of those from like old desktop Humidors that like, you know, it came with one of those if ever like, I forget, let's say for many weeks to fill my cigar oasis.
And I notice that it's kind of starting to drop and I want to quickly [01:31:00] pick that up like pretty much overnight in 24 hours. Just take one of those and just, you know, fill it with distilled water. What are those call, I don't want the listener to be confused. Flos, a sponges
Rooster: floral sponge. Yeah. Those like, they're the green sponges that are inside and they dis integrate quickly.
Exactly. Yeah.
Senator: Just fill one of those things with distilled water. Make sure it's nicely soaked, you know, drain it so it's not dripping distilled water. Mm-hmm. And throw one of those at the top of your tower and I'm telling you in 24, at most, 48 hours, like it will dramatically improve your Rh Yeah. I think fast than spritzing or anything else would you
Rooster: could also add a above the pack on each shelf?
Yeah, I can. Or
Bam Bam: that's a good way to hedge it, is I like the canisters of silica. Take the top off and it's got the, the screen. I put three of those in. Top, middle and bottom. Those actually help pretty quickly too.
Senator: I just say the, the florist thing over boda in this situation because like boda can regulate up and down, so like it's kind of trying to [01:32:00] fight to stay where it's supposed to.
It's two way. Yeah. With that other thing. Like it's, it's just only just creating humidity. It's just dispersing. Exactly. It's like a perfect way when you need to quickly try to bring that back to where it needs to be. Senators
Rooster: of florist. Correct. Where is your tower in the house? Is it
Chef Ricky: basement?
Rooster: Yeah.
Chef Ricky: And the ambient humidity in the basement Right now it's about 48%.
So that mean that tells you a lot, right? Like usually basements are higher.
Gizmo: And listen with that air transfer that, that, that 48% getting in your tower.
Chef Ricky: Yeah.
Gizmo: That's, that's a shock to the system. Yeah. You know, if it's constantly happening, not just when you open the door. Can't let
Bam Bam: that air
Gizmo: transfer transfer.
Do you know how many words I say?
Lizard jar finishes up here. Thank you lizards, and keep up the great work. Oh, and a special thank you to Senator for his wine recommendations.
Rooster: Mm.
Gizmo: All of his Cabernet Sauvignon res have been hits in my household and recently my wife and I tried the Kav Lauren, the Pascal Joliet Sanair and the Segal [01:33:00] Santorini sico.
All of which were fantastic. Unfortunately those three aren't available near me in Virginia, but I was able to do an online order from Bottle King up by you guys. That may be an option for other lizards in the us. Smart $15 for Kaz is insane. That's awesome by the way. That's awesome. As we talked about, thanks again, lizard Jarrett.
Alright boys. So let's go to a voice memo now from Lizard Cody who, uh, shared this with us on Instagram.
Lizard Cody: All right, gizmo. I'm sitting here with that bag of kitty litter and I'm looking at this humidor and I'm not quite sure I understand. I'm hoping you'll walk me through this. Alright, I'm just kidding.
Now that gizmo's checked out, I did want to ask the rest of you lizard the question, what is your guys' favorite cigars and drinks with hunting notes in it? Because it's one of my favorite things in the world. Some of my favorite memories as a kid were my dad and me out hunting [01:34:00] and the only hot drink he has is coffee.
And him showing me you can put some honey in it to sweeten it up, that's disgusting and make it easier to drink when I was about 12 or going swimming out at the lake all day with my family. And coming home and mom making peanut butter and honey sandwiches for everyone. Yes. I don't have, um, a traumatized memory about honey.
I have some very good core memories. I would love any recommendations you guys have with, uh, cigars or drinks with honey notes. Hmm. I want y'all to know I appreciate your time and I appreciate this podcast and, uh, thank you again. You guys have a good one. Lizard Cody out.
Chef Ricky: You know, I don't have any cigars or drinks with honey notes, but I wanna shut off the oven sandwich 'cause it is a rather delicious sandwich.
Oh yeah. Peanut butter, honey and banana. Correct. I gotta say putting honey and coffee,
Gizmo: it's so disgusting.
Chef Ricky: If there's a little milk there, I could, I could see how that works, but I would definitely need, I mean, I, I don't wanna
Gizmo: put honey in anything but C [01:35:00] honey and coffee honey and tea is very common.
Chef Ricky: Oh, sure.
Gizmo: Are there any cigars that you guys know of that have course? The black
Rooster: honey. Oh, the black hoodie. Oh yeah.
Bam Bam: That was a hit.
Chef Ricky: That's the first thing that came to mind for, for me. That's, but I had no honey in mind. You, you have special Oh, oh yeah.
Senator: I, I'll give two though. Two things definitely come to mind for me.
On, on, on a, on a cigar with some honey notes. Definitely a Trinidad Fund of Doris. Okay. Creamy honey, I get that every time. And on a spirit, Glen Margie. 18.
Bam Bam: Yeah.
Senator: You get a lot of honey notes. Yeah.
Bam Bam: Yeah.
Pagoda: Wasn't one of the albanese or almos? I, I can't remember. Very, very honey.
Gizmo: Yeah,
Bam Bam: not many come to mind.
Gizmo: I don't have any reference points in my brain for honey.
So
Bam Bam: yes, we know
Gizmo: I'm out on this one, but I'm sorry I don't like honey. It's okay. But. I appreciate that you guys do. No problem. Old boy. But I'm, I'm just not [01:36:00] into the honey and coffee thing. Does anybody like honey and coffee? I've never tried it. I mean, I've never tried it. No. All right, well go home and try it.
Alright,
Chef Ricky: so hold on. I do have a spirit that I remembered from years ago, maybe 12 or 13 or 15 years ago that I've had this in. Senator may be able to help me with the, uh, pronunciation here. No, the gizmo's gonna be all over it. Yeah, I got that. Go ahead. It's a fortified wine. I believe it's a Pinot des or something like that.
That is very honey forward. It is very sweet. It's a dessert wine. But I could see that pairing well with a fuller cigar. Um, definitely not a, a Cuban 'cause I think it'll overpower it 'cause it is that sweet, uh, being a fortified wine. But I think that could pair well with a Nicaragua cigar that's maybe trying to offer some.
Some of some dried fruit notes or you know, or even a peppery one may he'll balance it. What was the bourbon
Gizmo: that we had that's honey infused?
Chef Ricky: Yeah, we could do that. [01:37:00] That was not on that episode. Do you
Gizmo: remember that? It was like, was it, is it Maker's Mark maybe has a honey some, there's some sort of whiskey that it has a honey infusion.
I don't know if we've done it. Jack Daniel. Jack Daniels is Tennessee honey, but we would not. Oh, Tennessee honey. Possibly. Maybe I'm of that. We wouldn't that. Yeah, we wouldn't touch that.
Senator: No, but I mean, since you mentioned wine, uh, I mean a wine that has a ton of honey notes, ice wine. Mm-hmm. Dunno if any of you have ever had also a
Gizmo: dessert wine.
Senator: Yeah, dessert wine. Is that a
Gizmo: brand or a type?
Senator: No, it's a type. It's a type. Okay. So basically like they, they literally, the grapes are frozen on the vines before they actually harvest them. Um, it's big in like Canada and British Columbia, like they make a lot of ice wine. But like
Rooster: Niagara,
Senator: there you go.
Exactly. Like anywhere. Basically colder, essentially up north. Um, but tons of honey notes in that interesting pair. Amazingly well with broth. So the grape, the grapes
Rooster: are frozen so the sugar gets concentrated. Interesting. That's cool.
Gizmo: Hmm. Alright boys, it's time now to go to our lizard of the Week presented by our friends at Bon [01:38:00] Roberts.
And as we know, every week we give away a 10 count box. Of Bond Roberts cigars to one of our listeners and Lizard Luigi this week is going to win a 10 count box of Bond Roberts cigars for his two emails here. I'm gonna save the best one for last, first up, and we're gonna go to, uh, lizard Senator on this.
He says, Hey guys, if you need a suggestion for a luxury New Year's Eve spirit, I suggest the Dalmore King Alexander iii. It's a single malt aged in six different casks. The bottle runs between 275 and $300. However, the real reason I suggest this is not only because it's a fantastic spirit, the man behind the spirit is one of a kind.
You guys should Google Richard Patterson, who is the Dalmore master distiller, the Raphael Nadal of Scotch. Just watch a video of him and you can see why he and Senator would instantly fall in love. [01:39:00] Enjoy lizard Luigi. Little man. Love going
Senator: there, little man. Love. All
Bam Bam: right,
Senator: have you heard of that spirit?
So yes, I've definitely heard of it. This is, I'm actually thrilled to hear this because I've never had it. It's very well known. Um, it's supposed to be great. We've had kind of a mixed experience with Damore, but like their higher end stuff. I mean, that's Cigar Mall. The cigar Malt was amazing. I mean, was incredible.
Yes, I still have that. It's good. So I would definitely, definitely love for us to try that at some point. Let's do that.
Gizmo: All right, and now let's go to the reason why I've chosen Lizard Luigi as Lizard of the Week, and I think you guys are gonna love this email. Genuinely. The subject was a big moment and he says, hello lizards.
I just wanted to let you guys in on a big moment in my life and how you guys were indirectly involved with it. It was a Tuesday, of course, and I was navigating the Black Horse Pike in Southern New Jersey, taking my 2-year-old daughter to daycare while listening to the TWA Kaba [01:40:00] Igan episode. When I saw a little notification on my dashboard indicating I had received a text from my wife thinking nothing of it, I waited until I dropped my daughter off to look at my, what my wife had sent.
What I read would be three words that would forever change my life. Oh, it's a boy. Oh boy. I just wanted to share with you guys that it was the lounge lizards I was listening to when I found out that my second child would be a masculine child. Good reference there to the Godfather, Don Goon. I don't know if you guys have an idea the impact you have on people's lives, but hopefully you do.
Now, I've certainly purchased a box of Kaba Igan in the Maduro version. I'm not a fan of the Connecticut to always remember this occasion. Please let me know if I can ship the box to you guys and have the guy and have the gang sign it for me as a little homage to you guys for being a part of this little moment.
Keep up the good work lizard Luigi.
Chef Ricky: Yeah, [01:41:00] it'll cost you six cigars, but you know. Yeah,
Gizmo: I mean it might not go back full, but we will sign it. Nice email. Isn't that awesome? Awesome. It's a boy. When I saw that I was like, oh my gosh. That is gonna be our Wizard of Lu week. So congratulations to Lizard Luigi and his wife Oh
Bam Bam: yeah.
Gizmo: On their upcoming second child, and, uh, congratulations to him, of course, for winning a 10 count box of cigars from our friends at Bon Roberts. So boys, we have come to the end of our evening now with the Macallan, A Night On Earth, the first light and the aor saif anniversary. 25th Addision Liata. Any final thoughts here before we go into the ratings portion of our program?
Ba,
Rooster: have you
Gizmo: relit the cigar?
Bam Bam: I did Pick it up again 'cause I'm bored. I need to smoke.
Gizmo: Are we boring?
Bam Bam: No. The cigar is very boring, but I will say letting it sit, it did get a little bit better. Um, but, you know, a little too late. Yeah. Gotta be tough. Uh, tough
Senator: on a rating here. I [01:42:00] mean, for me it is co consistently inconsistent.
That's correct. Even down to the very end where the wrappers exploded on me. I mean, I continue to have construction issues. Me too. But I still, every now and then get a draw or two. That is actually good. It's like, what is it, one in six?
Gizmo: Yeah.
Senator: Yeah. One in four. What is No, no more like one in six, one in
Bam Bam: eight.
Yeah. One in 10. It's a ee.
Gizmo: All right, boys. It's time now to move into the formal liquoring. Tonight on the Macallan, A Night On Earth, the first light single malt scotch whiskey. Bam. Bam, you're up.
Bam Bam: So this is a nine for me. There we go. Yeah, I do like this a lot. Um, Senator, you mentioned it without a single chip of ice. We haven't done that with most macallans that we drink.
I, I really do love this. I think I can interchange this in every sit here in a club easily. Uh, the price is okay, uh, for what we're getting. It's really high quality. Delicious. I get, I do get vanilla. A little bit of honey on this.
Chef Ricky: I was [01:43:00] gonna say, I I'm getting some kind of burnt honey. No, you do get honey on this.
Yeah. So for that listener that's looking wizard jar. Yeah, I think that would, this would work. Maybe I'm just laughing 'cause I look at the packaging and it reminds me of a traffic cone sitting on top of the table.
Bam Bam: Yeah. So that would go right in the fire pit the moment I take the bottle out. But, um, excellent Spirit.
Nine.
Chef Ricky: All right, chef. Yeah. I'm also at a nine. Uh, I thought this spirit was delicious. You know, quite frankly, I, you know, there's no each statement on it, but this, the flavor of this is great. The nose is beautiful. It actually helps a cigar a little bit also. Um, but I could see myself drinking this and, you know, I know we're making fun of the packaging, but I really do think that if you gave this to someone as a holiday gift or something like that, it could make a statement and they would actually appreciate it.
So for me, it's a nice, alright,
Gizmo: pagoda.
Pagoda: Yeah, I've been between a eight and nine, but I'll, I'll go with a nine. Um, what I like about it, what's really interesting about this is for me, it's less viscous than [01:44:00] most of, uh, uh, you know, the scotches I have. But it's lighter and you know, bright and um, obviously a little bit of the sweetness coming from, uh, the vanilla and so on, so forth.
But overall, I think it really helped me today because without this I wouldn't have been able to get through the cigar. And, you know, I'll talk a little bit about the cigar became a bit dry, so it kind of really just helped me through it as well. And so it seems that it's very versatile. I think this is one of the sculptures I would have even in the summer on a nice afternoon.
Oh yeah. It's like thinking about it that way. Definitely. It is bright enough to do that. Yeah. Yeah. So it's a nine for me,
Gizmo: so it's also a nine for me. I mean, despite my frustration with the packaging and the fact that Macallan doesn't talk about the experience we had in the room tonight, and that's what's bothering me about this.
Yeah. 'cause it is a really good scotch. It's, I'd argue it's an excellent scotch at a nine. I think the price point's a little high. Of course this packaging probably cost them 20 or $30 for each of these bottles that we [01:45:00] have. But it was so good. And I think, you know, you touched on this chef. The best thing about this is how, well, I think this scotch and this Macallan specifically mm-hmm.
Compliments a wide range of cigars. Correct. I think this would pair well. With a Honduran cigar, a Dominican cigar, a Nicaraguan like we had tonight. Mm-hmm. Even a more full Nicaraguan. Mm-hmm. I just think this is a really nice companion for it and I wish that instead of it being packaged like this for the holidays, a night on earth, all this bullshit, I wish it was just offered as another alternative to the Macallan in call it lighter, call it a different age statement, a a different type of offering.
I think it's really good and it pairs great with cigars. I just don't like that it's 105 bucks or even more than that for some of our listeners out there. But I thought it was really great. It was a nine, I loved every sip and like you said, bam. No ice, no water, no anything other than scotch in the glass.
It was really good today. Yeah.
Chef Ricky: To your point, 'cause if they got rid of the [01:46:00] packaging and this was all of a sudden an $80 bottle, it's home run or even 70. Yeah. It's a home run.
Gizmo: Absolutely. Alright, Senator.
Senator: Um, I'm at a strong nine. I mean, the name is ridiculous. Uh, I'll never be able to get over that. But the spirit itself, pagoda said versatile.
That, that's what I'll always remember about this. I mean, I think for Mo, almost any cigar, I think Cuban cigars would pair perfectly with this and I think even something with some more body is gonna hold up to this. I think what Macallans done is something so unique in their line and differentiated that I actually wish that they make.
Like a permanent part of the portfolio. That's what I'm saying. Yeah. Like it's really that good. Correct. And there's nothing else like it. You know, I, I never really reach for a Macallan in hot weather. No. I, like Pagoda said, I would [01:47:00] drink this in the summer, like this would be perfect. And yet where it has the Macallan character, it's still like so flavorful that we're sitting here in cold weather and we're all giving it a nine and enjoying it.
Correct. So like there's brilliance to be able to have that level of versatility. Mm-hmm. I think any scotch we've ever reviewed that we would call a lighter scotch, we've said we would pretty much exclusively drink in warm weather. Correct. That's true. This is like the only one that we're saying is just as satisfying in cold weather.
So, uh, you know, the master blender has done an absolutely spectacular job. I think with this, I think the price point is fair. Like there's, there's no other light scotch that I would sit here and say, you know what, if you wanna save $20, you're gonna have almost as satisfying experience. I wouldn't say that like this is that good for what they've tried to do.
Um, so for all those reasons, I'm at a strong nine. I think the only reason I didn't give it the 10, and I actually thought about it, like I, I literally was teetering between the two is just for [01:48:00] a lighter scotch that I'm not necessarily going to reach for all the time at a hundred dollars. That's, that's where it becomes difficult.
And it's the same reason even Macallan 12, that we all really like at $85 a bottle when you can buy Balvin E 12 at like $65 a bottle. That's what makes it hard for Macallan 12 even to be like a perfect 10 for me and that it's $20 more, but I don't necessarily think it delivers that much more satisfaction.
So price is really the only reason, um, that I couldn't give it the 10. But I still think for what it's done it, it's reasonably priced and definitely worth trying if you like Macallan. And even if you don't, I think this is something worth trying if you're just a single malt drinker that likes something lighter than Macallan normally puts out.
Gizmo: Yeah. Alright boys. So the formal liquoring tonight on the Macallan, A Night On Earth, the first light single malt scotch whiskey, I hate saying that is a very nice [01:49:00] 9.0. Correct. So I have a question for you, Senator, if this bottle or really any of the nines in the room, but if this bottle Oh, thank you. Came in at a $70 price point, $75, I'd buy it tomorrow.
Would you be at a 10?
Senator: Yeah, I would be probably, yes. I'd be at a 10000%. Do you think I'm crazy
Gizmo: in saying dropping this packaging and getting something more realistic
Bam Bam: Yeah.
Senator: Would drop that price down to that point? No, because I mean, Macallans like base price for, I think what we would consider their their best stuff, which starts at like the Macallan 12, Sherry, not the other stuff.
85 is 85 bucks. So I really don't think they can go lower than that.
Pagoda: But if they did, I think, uh, there'll be a lot more people who would be buying that for sure. I agree. Even it'll come into our rotation. I think for, I think it
Senator: would, and for the same reason I said if Mackel and 12 Sherry were dropped in price from 85, like that's a 10.
I mean it's, it's so delicious. It's so rich. But $85, like none of us every day are just sipping from an [01:50:00] $85 bottle of any spirit. That's like more of an occasion spirit, especially when there's so many great options we found. So the price is really the only challenge that Macallan has, but there's no question they've made amazing scotch.
Rooster: Yeah.
Senator: Bam. Do you
Gizmo: agree? Would you go to a, would you go to a 10 if it was cheaper?
Bam Bam: I noted that I, I didn't mind the price for what I was getting, but if this were 70 bucks, yeah, then I'd probably buy three bottles. That's my point. Yeah. So would I at that price,
Chef Ricky: you know? Yeah.
Gizmo: What about you, chef? Same
Chef Ricky: agree.
A thousand percent agree. Yeah.
Gizmo: Alright boys. So let's compare this rating to the other Macallans we've done on the podcast. Of course, we've done a bunch of Macallan twelves. The first one we did was the Macallan 12, Sherry Cask on episode 11. We did not rate that on episode 64, we did the Macallan 15, scored a 6.5.
On episode 77, the Macallan 12 Sherry Cask scored a 9.8, and on episode 206, the Macallan 12 double cask scored an [01:51:00] 8.3. So this nine certainly is who didn't give the Macallan 12, Sherry a 10. I don't know that it's gotta be a
Pagoda: gr it's gotta be grinder.
Gizmo: Gotta be grinder. So Senator, let's talk about this for one second.
You have been saying that the 15 Macallan, we rated that a 6.5. If you were to rate it today based on the experience you had this weekend, you were texting us about what would you have given that spirit?
Senator: Oh, it was a strong nine really. So I, I have historically of Macallans line, the 15 has always been my least favorite to me.
It drinks, historically it was harsher than the 12, which it should not be. It should drink more refined with extra age. Um, it oddly was even almost thinner than the 12 where like the 18 is richer, the 15 should be somewhere in between. And it was not the recent stuff that I tried the other night. [01:52:00] It was rich.
It was a more full, complete experience than the 12, which is what I would hope for. And to not have to shell out some absolutely ridiculous price for the 18 and get a similar experience at the 15. I, I thoroughly enjoyed it. I, I really think we need to revisit it. Something has changed. The bottles are different, the boxes are different.
The spirit even looks to me, the color of it different. Um, I think we should revisit it.
Gizmo: Alright, we'll have to look at, uh, look to that in the first half of next year. And boys, it's time now to go into the formal lizard reading tonight on the aor sa Leaf anniversary 25th Ionata. You up. So the scotch was a night
Rooster: on Earth?
Yes. Yeah. It was the first light, the first night on earth? No, the first light. First light of first a night on Earth. Night of a night on earth. Get
Bam Bam: it right. Old boy.
Rooster: I don't drink, so I don't know what, [01:53:00] so the, the cigar is actually hell on earth. It's a, it's a very poorly constructed cigar. I mean, the cigar was, you know, it tunneled, the wrapper has cracked.
It's the wrapper. It's actually peeling off right now. We're almost two hours
Chef Ricky: in. And you're, you're just starting your final third over there. No, I
Rooster: put it out. I mean, it's out. It's like, I'm, I'm, I'm tired of relighting this cigar almost. You're just like holding it. I'm almost, almost out of butane. Uh, I think the, the cigar, you know, the construction is poor.
Even the blend is very poor. And for $30 for this cigar, for a new world cigar, you expect more, you expect a cigar to be at least well constructed. The flavors on the cigar, you know, it started out like really peppery and then whatever notes were pleasing, they were fleeting. They were just, you know, you would, you would get a note and then they would just dissipate.
So every, like 10 draws you would get like a decent note. [01:54:00] And, uh, for that reason, I'm at a six. All right, Senator. So
Senator: Well, that's generous. That, that's how I feel. I, I honestly think the six is generous. I'm at a five. Um, this is one of the most frustrating cigars I've ever smoked from a construction standpoint.
It's, it easily one of the poorest constructed cigars. I mean, I went from a wonky burn to tunneling to a crater in the middle of my cigar for at least an inch of it that I had to smoke through. I was getting no combustion at all. Oh, you don't like that? And no, and constantly relighting it just to try to get past it, to keep smoking it.
Then I'd finally thought construction wise, I'd hit it, hit it stride where I wasn't having issues. And then I get in the last third and the whole wrapper started to explode like Roos was talking about.
Rooster: Exactly. Yeah.
Senator: That is unacceptable. Unacceptable for a $10 cigar. Correct. Let alone a $30 cigar. So [01:55:00] construction is a com complete failure in terms of the blend, you know, like Rooster was saying, there were moments that I actually got some notes that I enjoyed where it was balanced between like sweet and savory, but for most of it, it was either too peppery or just muddled.
And I wasn't really sure what to make of what I was getting. Um, so for all those reasons, you know, I'm giving it the five somewhat generously because there were some. Moments, some puffs of this cigar that were enjoyable, but the overwhelming majority of it was not. And um, I mean you said that this is a limited release.
Yeah,
Gizmo: yeah. Only 10,000 cigars. Go ahead. They need, they need to shelve this and never That's a good thing. Put this
Senator: out again. I mean, there's no place for this at even a $10 price point, so I wanna be clear, like I'm not just rating this a five on price. Yeah. Because it's [01:56:00] $30, it's even more unacceptable that it is priced at that level, but if this were $10, it'd still be a five.
There are $10 cigars that don't smoke like this. Yeah.
Gizmo: So it's a five for me. So it's also a five for me. And I wanna say that in the first third I was like, this could be a seven, an eight, a nine. Uh, it didn't get, you know, to perfection level for me, but I was actually really kind of enjoying it in that first third.
And man, as soon as it hit the second, third, it started to just completely fall off. And what's crazy for me is I didn't have the construction issues. But I did have the frustration of what is going on here. Every other draw is terrible. Every third draw is okay. Every fourth draw is decent. Every sixth or seventh draw is like, holy shit.
Like what is going on with this thing? And I didn't have construction issues. The idea that this is a $30 cigar, this, this cigar, is to celebrate the [01:57:00] 25th anniversary of this company. This is supposed to be the best of the best that they offer. I I am embarrassed that I brought this in tonight as our first AOR of product on this podcast with that Marco that they've released on their own.
And second, like, how is this the best that they've got? It makes me not wanna try anything else that they've got. Yeah. It's,
Bam Bam: it's a big miss that they have.
Gizmo: I, I, so I'm, I'm really, really disappointed in it. And, uh, you know, I went through it faster than anybody else. I think I was just trying to chase some sort of goodness in it.
I got it in the first third and the last two thirds were just not there. And really, really disappointing cigar. It's unacceptable for $30 cigar to smoke like this. So for me it's a five pagoda.
Pagoda: Yeah. I, you know, I think, um, I rated a four and I'm gonna give a few reasons for it. Uh. Obviously in terms of the construction, really horrible.
I think I've left more than half the cigar over there. Um, and the other half on your, on
Chef Ricky: yourself?
Pagoda: On myself. He's got a mountain of ash on [01:58:00] his stomach. Lit it multiple times for me. I thought it was also a bit dry and uh, thank God we had a really good scotch along with it. But the dryness along with the pepperiness in the back, my throat was feeling a little, you know, you know when, when you smoke these cigars which get to you the back of your throat, like it's just wasn't pleasant at all.
Like, and you're paying $30 for something that's not pleasant. It just, you know, I can't have been come close to recommending it. Um, although what's really interesting is I, I don't know, I'd read a little bit about it. I think, um, from, you know, in Nicaragua, if the cigars from, in the Halah reason I believe, or halah, uh, leaves tend to have, uh, structural problems in any case.
And I don't know whether this cigar had a lot of those, uh, but um, you could see that why, like I'm sure that there's, that's could have had some kind of influence on the cigar, but, [01:59:00] um, just a poor, poor experience here. It's a four.
Chef Ricky: Alright, chef. So early in my cigar journey, I've always come across aor. So Leaf and, you know, before I found lounge lizards, I'd listened to some other podcasts and these other podcasts always gave aor, so Leaf.
Some pretty favorable, favorable ratings. Uh, so based on those ratings, I'd pick up an aor, a leaf cigar, and I'd never had a great experience with them. I always found 'em to be sort of grassy green in flavor, uh, drying, um, not pleasant. And uh, I always thought maybe it was just me. Maybe it was a cigar wasn't ready for or whatnot.
And maybe, I don't know, five years have passed and we're on this 25th anniversary. Um, this is the best cigar that I've had from an AOR leaf. What? Yes. This is the best cigar stop. Are you serious? Yes. [02:00:00] I've never had an AOR leaf that even tried to What? To deliver the flavors. That's not possible.
Bam Bam: I was hoping to actually try another one.
No, me too.
Chef Ricky: I was like, no, I don't. We should get another one in there. I honestly think we don't need to. I've never had another cigar that even
Senator: This is our last night on Earth. That's correct.
Chef Ricky: So definitely our, the final light. It's definitely our last night on hell. Uh, because this, oh my gosh. This cigar was like the never ending story.
You couldn't just, you couldn't progress through it. But I will say that I'm at a six because I'm probably one of the only ones in the room that I've reached the final inch of the cigar and it's de delivered the most consistent flavor that I've had in this entire experience now, uh, where it's consistently sweet, but it's still not a full sweetness.
It's, it's still disconnected. It's still fleeting, as Rooster said. Um, the burn issues were insane, you know, just a horrible looking burn line. Even looking at this thing now, it, it looks like, [02:01:00] I don't know, the, the witch from Hansel and Greta after they, she reveals her real form or something. Um, you, you know that reference, right, Pam?
Correct. But yeah, it just wasn't, you know, I haven't given up on it. I've continued smoking it, so I've experienced some pleasure in that final inch and, and you know, at least it's been consistent. But this was a big cigar. It was a lot of cigar to get through. It was going really slowly and it wasn't a fun experience.
It was hard to get into a stride with it. It was hard to sit and, you know, even though we had a lot of conversation today and a lot of great topics, it was just kind of hard to get into that, that sort of trance, if you will, when you smoke a great cigar and, you know, and you could probably hear it, right, like there's been some laughter here and there, but it definitely wasn't one of those episodes where things are just kind of flowing nicely.
You know? There's been a lot of speed bumps along the way.
Gizmo: It's good for everybody's been picking up their lighter. Yeah.
Chef Ricky: So, yeah, it's, it's a six for me at best.
Gizmo: All right. [02:02:00] Bam.
Bam Bam: Yeah. So I, I, my energy level is plummeted. I, I'm not, by the
Gizmo: way, I looked at Bam during one of the ratings. I don't know who was doing it.
And he was just sitting there rubbing the bridge of his nose. Yeah. Just trying to keep, that's awful
Bam Bam: experience tonight. Um, I think pagoda, you're rating at a, as a, at a four, it could be a four, it could be a three, a five at that point. It's all kind of all the same. Yeah. I, I'm gonna give it a four, uh, 'cause I re, I'm really unhappy with the cigar now.
I did take, I put it down and then I kind of entered that final inch, and it was actually decent. It settled in. But as you noted earlier, chef, too little, too late. Um, very, very frustrating. Smoke. And even you're saying decent. Yeah, it's, that's a problem for $30. Everything you've all noted for that price.
It's absurd. It's, it's colossal disappointment. It's a big failure. I don't think they know what they're fucking doing. Um, they should stick to just producing [02:03:00] leaves for other makers and stop making cigars. So I'm at a four
Gizmo: very strong statement from Bam and Boys. The formal e rating tonight on the Agin Ora Leaf anniversary of 25th, the Aion limit.
A very poor and flat 5.00
Bam Bam: my Lord. Wow. For a
Pagoda: $30 cigar, that was more like fright on earth.
Yeah.
Rooster: I think you should put the cigar down like every 20 minutes. Let it sit for like 10 and then pick it up and Or just don
Bam Bam: buy it. Yeah.
Rooster: I just,
Gizmo: I mean, for a $30 cigar, I just for a five, think about every si. Lemme just point this out. We had a couple emails asking us for cigars recommendations. What do we like, what we don't like?
Every cigar that we talked about tonight was a third of the price of the cigar.
Senator: A third. Yeah. I've never seen cigars just look so ugly in, in people's [02:04:00] hands. I just, every time I looked around the room, like, you know, there's a beauty about a well-constructed cigar and you're like, at $30, none of us were worrying or wondering if construction should be a problem.
Correct. And every time I looked around, it's like ashes crumbling on people. Rapper burning on, burning, uneven, the, the wrappers cracking. I, I mean, I just still can't believe the basics. Even were met
Rooster: here, even, you know, if you were getting some kind of a decent flavor out of a cigar, you could deal with, of course, badly constructed cigar.
And, and we have, and we have. Yeah. And but when the construction is bad, the blend is bad. The flavor is off. Mm-hmm. Yeah. There's, there's no point. No. And, and then you're charging $30 for a cigar like this. Yeah. And it's your 25th anniversary cigar. It's insulting. It's insulting. Yeah.
Chef Ricky: All the red flags were there.
$30 price point from a brand that's mediocre at best. The, the, the bands, you know, they covered half of the cigar with, with, uh, a full [02:05:00] band and the other two thirds with oth with two other bands. And for me, I know someone noted earlier, it might've been bam, about how good the foot smelt. Now I was a cigarette smoker.
20, it's been 20 years since I've smoked a cigarette. But when I smelled the foot of the cigar, it smelled like a fresh pack of cigarettes. For me, that's usually, that's not good. A really bad sign. And I didn't mention it 'cause I didn't know if any of you guys have smoked cigarettes before, so maybe you could relate or not.
No, but to me that's usually a really bad. Sign that, you know, or a good sign that the cigars is not gonna perform well. Mm-hmm. They did price
Pagoda: into the pack of cigarettes.
Well, at least you get a pack for that.
Chef Ricky: That's true. Yeah. You get 12 miserable experiences, not just one. 2020. Oh, sorry, 20. I don't even know. Yeah, that was, it was horrible. Yeah. And you know, I didn't even take the, the freaking price into consideration of my rating. So yeah, I probably really had a five. I heard they wanna [02:06:00] sponsor us.
I hope not. Not anymore. Definitely not in the business of lying. No. All
Gizmo: right, boys, one more time on the ratings. The Macallan, A Night On Earth, the first light single mal Scotch whiskey scored a 9.0 and the AOR Saif anniversary 25th, hell on Idi Liata scored a 5.0. Of course, we have to thank all the lizards who wrote in, and especially our lizard of the week tonight, lizard Luigi, who's having a boy, that's awesome.
Congratulations to him. Awesome. And of course, congratulations to him for winning a box of Bon Roberts Cigars, a 10 count box. We really appreciate them sponsoring that segment. We, of course, have to thank our sponsors, boys Small Batch Cigars. They just came out of a great holiday, black Friday, cyber Monday sale going into the holidays.
Now you have to use our Code Lizard 15 for 15% off your entire order. Of course, every order ships for free and you get 5% of the entire order back. In small batch rewards that [02:07:00] you can use it anytime. It's a great deal. I love it. And uh, of course all of us are using it, so check that out. Of course, some exclusions do apply, so look out for that.
Chef Ricky: I'm sorry. Guess you know what's insane, those Bonna Roberts 1 0 9, that this lizard or the week is gonna get, that lizard, Luigi's gonna get. It's cheaper than the shit we smoke tonight. Way cheaper
Bam Bam: and incredibly tedious. Incredible. And wipes the
Rooster: floor with it. Oh yeah. Wipes the floor.
Gizmo: And boys, we have to thank Fabrica five, of course, our presenting sponsor to make great cigars.
The opposite of the experience we had tonight. The opposite of the experience we had last week with that warp cigar, or two weeks ago, whatever it was.
Chef Ricky: Giz you out. You can't pick
Gizmo: cigars anymore. I'm sorry. Let's, let's get together. We need to reorganize. We need to reorg here. I don't know what the fuck's going on.
So go to, uh, fabrica zero zero five.com and use our code Lizard Pod for 10% off the entire store. And Boys Scotch was great tonight. Oh yeah, it sure was. Thank God for that. Did we smoke a cigar? I don't even remember. Correct. Oh, it was so brutal. All right, boys. Uh, we'll see everybody next week. [02:08:00] Hope you enjoyed this episode.
Thanks for joining us. You can find our merch store and ratings archive at our brand new website, lounge lizards pod.com. That's lounge lizards PO d.com. Don't forget to leave us a rating and subscribe on your favorite podcast platform. If you have any comments, questions, if you wanna reach out, say hello, tell us what you're smoking, email us hello@loungelizardspod.com.
You can also find us on Instagram at Lounge Lizards Pod. We really appreciate your time and we'll, uh, we'll see you next week.