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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!
Welcome to the Lounge Lizards podcast presented by FabricAfi. It's so good to have you here. It's a leisure and lifestyle podcast founded 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. Today, I'm joined by senator, chef Ricky, Grindr, and Bam Bam, and I plan to smoke a cigar, drink some port, talk about life, and, of course, have some laughs.
Gizmo:So take this as your two hundred and eighteenth official invitation to join us and become a card carrying lounge lizard. Plan to be to see her once a week. We're gonna smoke a Nicaraguan cigar tonight, share our thoughts on it, and give you our formal lizard rating. We discuss even more cigar industry chaos caused by Habanos SA owner Chen G. Senator details his time in Panama, and we try our first port wine pairing all among a
Bam Bam:variety of other things for
Gizmo:the next two hours. So sit back, get your favorite drink, light up a cigar, enjoy as we pair 20 years age Graham's Tawny Port with my father lay Bijou 1922 in torpedo box pressed. A box pressed torpedo tonight on the pod, boys from Nicaragua. It's the my father Le Bijou nineteen twenty two torpedo box pressed, and it's a 52 ring gauge cigar by six and one eighths inches long. And, boys, I think Rooster may have been serious when he said last week was his last effing pod.
Bam Bam:You might be correct.
Gizmo:Have you heard anything on this issue, Bam?
Bam Bam:No. And I'm glad I haven't.
Gizmo:So Rooster is not here tonight, so it's up in the air as to what's happening. We'll see if he, ends up returning next week. Senator, have you heard anything?
Senator:I think he's on strike.
Gizmo:I can't blame him. Buzzer.
Bam Bam:Yeah. Right? I can't blame him.
Gizmo:Alright, boys. So we have this my father in hand. We've been up and down on my father. We love the Lancero. We did not love the judge, grand robusto that we did last year, the cigar of the year for cigar aficionados.
Gizmo:So this one came in very highly recommended. And I'm getting the vibe from a few of you guys that you've had this before and that this is to be a pretty full experience tonight on the pod.
Bam Bam:Very. I had this in a different Vitola.
Gizmo:Okay.
Bam Bam:I think it was a Corona size La Bijou. It was actually very good. Smaller diameter, about an inch and a
Senator:half shorter than this. Not bad. I had this exact Vitola over ten years ago, like close to the time that I think this made the list. I was probably five cigars deep this night. I was in DC, and I ran out of cigars.
Senator:So I was at this place 219 in Old Town, Alexandria, and some guy recommends this. I'm like, oh, yeah.
Bam Bam:Sure. I get it. This thing kicked my ass. Really?
Senator:I mean, I was five cigars in like, is not this is a meal of
Gizmo:a cigar.
Bam Bam:Yeah. It's not a for the faint of heart. I couldn't finish it the last time I had it.
Gizmo:No kidding. Not to
Bam Bam:mention the orange satin footband on the fucking thing.
Gizmo:Yeah. They got that at Michael's.
Bam Bam:You throw that in a bonfire, it'll burn for three hours. That's correct.
Gizmo:Well, let's cut this thing boys. Let's see what we're getting on the cold draw and the wrapper. Very, very defined point
Bam Bam:on this torpedo today. Beautifully made cigar.
Gizmo:Really nice construction,
Bam Bam:I think. Wide open draw. Very nice draw. Wide open and pretty nice.
Gizmo:Little greeny, not lettuce, but Hay. Yes. Fresh hay.
Chef Ricky:I'm getting hay. Some hay, some earth feels a little bit like
Bam Bam:A little minerality maybe.
Gizmo:Not bad though. I think my foot band is taped to the cigar.
Bam Bam:You got to ease it off.
Senator:I will say though, it's a handsome cigar.
Gizmo:It looks really good.
Senator:Really nice wrapper.
Bam Bam:Yep. No seams.
Senator:Yeah. I'm scared.
Bam Bam:Honestly, it looks like a machine made cigar. It's so perfect.
Gizmo:Yeah. There literally are no flaws on my cigar.
Chef Ricky:Yeah.
Gizmo:And the bands look great too.
Bam Bam:Yeah. I agree. Classic my father band.
Gizmo:Yeah. Alright, boys. Let's light this thing. The my father Les Bijou nineteen twenty two in torpedo box press.
Senator:It's a shame Rooster's not here. Had this probably when it first came out in 1922.
Bam Bam:That's correct.
Gizmo:The rocket 52 ring gauge cigar by six and one eighths inches long. Again, coming out of Nicaragua. It's one of five Vitola in the line. I'll go through those in a moment. And these cigars can be found anywhere between 12 and say based on tax and everything else could be 12 and 16, 12 and $17.
Gizmo:How
Bam Bam:long have you had these in your tower?
Gizmo:I've had these in the tower for about three months.
Bam Bam:Okay. They feel perfect.
Gizmo:And I dry box them for about three days. Very nice. Just to make sure that we did our best with them. They feel good.
Bam Bam:They feel good and it's great off the light.
Senator:Yeah, it's
Bam Bam:actually very good. Very nice.
Senator:Dare I say Pedron esque on the light.
Bam Bam:I agree. Yeah. Zero pepper. Yeah. Hint of like a dark, dark, dark chocolate.
Bam Bam:Correct.
Gizmo:It's almost like a bitter chocolate. Yeah.
Bam Bam:Yeah. Which I love.
Gizmo:I mean, does look like a dark chocolate bar.
Chef Ricky:Yeah. Dark chocolate and espresso right now. And I think the pepper is gonna come in another couple of rolls here.
Bam Bam:Dude, if it stayed like this It'd be perfect. Yeah.
Senator:This is really good. It's excellent.
Gizmo:Nice on the start.
Senator:And the funny thing is, I remember the one I had, on the light, I thought it was very strong, so I'm now worried that that was really wet and over humidified.
Gizmo:That's where I was going with my thinking on the dry boxing because let's be honest, it's early in the year in the Northeast here in The US. It's very dry. So instead of doing like a normal one day and and trying to rush the process, like I really tried to put the cigar in the best position to succeed tonight and tried to minimize how much excess humidity was in the cigar. So we'll see if we achieve that here with three and a half months or So three
Bam Bam:far so good.
Gizmo:But we'll see.
Bam Bam:Feels great because So on the retro, if you've ever had a very, very frothy espresso, that foam on the top, it's got a distinct Correct. That's what I'm getting on the retrohale and a lot of it. The traditional draw is a deep dark chocolate and like a regular coffee.
Gizmo:This is really nice.
Bam Bam:Wow. I'm actually very surprised.
Gizmo:Yeah. And I'm happy too. I mean even Padron. Sometimes I like to take a little bit more of the torpedo tip-off than I've done here. This one is wide open and I really didn't take that much off.
Bam Bam:Senator gave that one a good haircut. I did.
Gizmo:I did not. Yeah. And I'm pretty happy I did it.
Bam Bam:Pretty much with you maybe. I don't know. I can't see. Big haircut there. But you do get nervous about these cigars.
Bam Bam:You don't know. I want to love this marca in general because it's so available everywhere. I want to be able to pick up one of these and enjoy it. It just hasn't been the case. Just hasn't developed.
Gizmo:Smoke output is fantastic. Yeah. It's like a thick smoke too.
Chef Ricky:And you see this line a lot. You see the judge a lot. You don't see much of the blue line yet.
Gizmo:It's rolling out though. Yeah. I mean, Half Wheel, you know, as of recording this, it was in their top six cigars of the year that people have kind of moved through the brackets. Mhmm. And very well could be Half Wheel's top cigar of the year that my father blew.
Gizmo:So it's nice to see that because starting to get out there. We rated it well. A lot of other folks have rated it well. It's performing well. So it's nice to see smokers out there voting like that on Half Wheel as well.
Gizmo:I mean, it's nice to see them in Honduras. Oh, yeah.
Bam Bam:Grindere. What are you getting? I do get a little pepper on the finish. You get any pepper on the finish?
Gizmo:Not yet. A little bit. No? I like a good touch of it.
Bam Bam:I'm praying for it to stay at bay, so I'm not getting anything yet.
Chef Ricky:Yeah, it's almost like you don't want to speak it into existence.
Bam Bam:Just like you did. Mean, the coffee is there.
Grinder:The dark chocolate is prominent.
Bam Bam:I'm surprised how accessible the retro is I agree. From my I'm retroing every draw.
Grinder:Yeah, me too.
Bam Bam:It's a problem.
Grinder:It's shocking
Bam Bam:how surprisingly smooth the cigar is.
Gizmo:Great start. Now, as of right now, we talked on the open about it being a full cigar. Where would you put it flavor wise and where would you put it body strength wise?
Bam Bam:Surprisingly, this is firmly medium from the point of view of body and strength. I think the flavor is starting to push full, but it's not there yet in a beautiful, smooth way.
Senator:Yeah, I pretty much agree. I think definitely in strength medium, and flavor like medium full.
Gizmo:But
Senator:I surprisingly wouldn't say full yet. Because you light up like a Padron ninetieth or something like that, that's full flavored, like, right from the start. This is still very approachable, I feel like, for most cigar smokers.
Bam Bam:Right. Or you light up a judge and you have to run to the bathroom right after you're done. Am I wrong? It makes it makes me
Gizmo:Bad visuals, man.
Bam Bam:Bad visual. That cigar's ridiculous.
Grinder:It's so not what I was expecting that
Bam Bam:it makes me wonder if they changed the blend. Yeah, maybe. I hope so, because this is good. So how does this compare to when you had it years ago?
Senator:Dramatically different. From the first few puffs, I would not have described that as approachable for most smokers.
Bam Bam:I
Senator:feel like the overwhelming majority of people who smoke cigars could enjoy, at least so far, what we've had.
Bam Bam:No doubt.
Chef Ricky:See, so I'm curious. The first one I had came from a smoke shop in New York City. This particular Vitola? No, it was the Corona you had. It was a little smaller, and it definitely wasn't a torpedo.
Bam Bam:Would you say that's more like this than a typical full bodied Le Bijou?
Chef Ricky:No, the first one I had was very
Bam Bam:super peppery,
Chef Ricky:super full, super strong and I'm sure it was over humidified because it
Bam Bam:That's came from a correct.
Chef Ricky:Yeah. So how long ago was that roughly? Twenty eighteen, twenty seventeen?
Bam Bam:Pandemic times. I'm getting a little peanut here too, honestly. Just a touch of a nut of some kind. I can see that. On a finish for me of my traditional draw.
Bam Bam:Not a lot of smoke output here.
Senator:Mine's a decent amount.
Gizmo:Yeah. I'm feeling pretty good about my smoke output. I'm okay with it.
Chef Ricky:I would say for the where the body is on the cigar, you would think the smoke would be a little bit creamier. The smoke does feel a little thin. Like, there's lots of it, but it's a little thin for me.
Senator:For me, it's not so much thin. It's that it's not voluminous. A Liga nine, that thing is a chimney. Yep. This I would not describe as a chimney.
Senator:No. But the smoke you are getting, like, there is body to it.
Bam Bam:I'm happy with it regardless of the smoke output because the flavor's so damn good.
Grinder:Yeah. You know?
Senator:Yep. To your point about the peanut note, I'm getting a faint bit of saltiness like a salted peanut.
Bam Bam:Peanut, yeah. I could see that. Very, very nice cigar so far.
Gizmo:Great start.
Chef Ricky:Peanut note is great with the shell on. You got to work with it a
Bam Bam:little Is there a shallot in there too? No, because you know what? The
Chef Ricky:shell on.
Bam Bam:The shell
Chef Ricky:on peanut, you have to work through it and you're not exposed to the creaminess of the peanut.
Bam Bam:So you're actually putting the entire peanut with the shell in your mouth and when you're eating beef with the shell?
Chef Ricky:A 100%. Break it I in suck the salt off. I break it in half. What? Spit the shell out.
Chef Ricky:My Lord. Eat it like I do
Gizmo:some I more was trained at Long star or Longhorn steakhouse
Bam Bam:to do it like that.
Gizmo:You throw it on the floor.
Bam Bam:Well, yeah. But at baseball, forget about where you throw it. You don't put it in your mouth.
Senator:It's we're literally talking about do you crack the shell with your hands? Yes. Or do you put the entire shell in your mouth?
Gizmo:That's weird.
Chef Ricky:I put the shell on my mouth first. That is insane. Wow. And I crack it.
Gizmo:Damn. We might have to put them on a pip for a couple I think you
Bam Bam:might be on a pip.
Senator:There's like pieces everywhere. Your whole mouth's gotta be
Bam Bam:like No.
Chef Ricky:No. You just
Bam Bam:It's very fibrous too, tip. You just
Chef Ricky:break it in half and
Bam Bam:you spin Wow. I gotta see that.
Chef Ricky:Dude, this Interesting. Does some amazing shit.
Grinder:That's a little
Gizmo:Wow.
Bam Bam:That's Alrighty. That's that's
Bam Bam:too chef y for me, chef. Wow.
Chef Ricky:They eat sunflower seeds the same way.
Gizmo:Yeah.
Senator:Sunflower seeds, they don't break into a bunch of pieces.
Chef Ricky:About pistachios? Do you put pistachios in your mouth or no?
Senator:The difference with everything you're saying is pistachios I
Bam Bam:don't put the shell in my mouth for the pistachio. It's way too hard to crack I
Senator:don't do that either. You could in do the sense that a pistachio, each shell is just it's gonna split in half. They don't crumble into pieces. Peanuts, the shells crumble. I mean, you're It's fiberless Yeah.
Bam Bam:Overcoating, whatever you wanna call it.
Gizmo:It's not
Senator:a hard shell.
Chef Ricky:In its dry state, it is. But when you put it in your mouth and suckers
Bam Bam:it off,
Chef Ricky:you moisten the shell a
Gizmo:little bit,
Chef Ricky:and then it just kinda breaks.
Senator:Then you
Chef Ricky:spit out two halves.
Senator:On peanuts.
Gizmo:Have you
Senator:ever had boiled peanuts? Yes. No. Yes. So I'm gonna say
Bam Bam:They're very, very creamy. They're incredible. That's awesome.
Senator:I thought it was the most odd, disgusting thing.
Gizmo:Don't they come in a can like No. Sausages or something? No.
Senator:No. No. Jesus Christ. Maybe in Pennsylvania, can say. Yeah.
Senator:I had this for the first time in Charleston at this place, Hominy Grill. It was life changing. I've never even heard of it, and it was so good.
Bam Bam:Yeah. Had it once in Dallas, fantastic, years ago. Yeah. They're really creamy.
Senator:Yep. Yeah. And chef just boils them in his mouth and
Gizmo:just eats them. So boys, let's talk about the Les Bijou 1922 line from my father. Course Les Bijou means the jewel in French, and the blend is for Jose Pepin Garcia's father who was born in 1922. It's presented in this is odd. Boxes of 23 cigars.
Gizmo:Strange. Of course, it has the second label on it as we know here. So this is the traditional, I guess, my father band that you find on almost all of their cigars.
Bam Bam:Mhmm.
Gizmo:Obviously, the the Don Pappin line and those other lines aren't on there. Right. And then the second one has the Les Bijou in cursive font Mhmm. 1922 as well. Very ornate.
Gizmo:And then the third band, as we talked about, the cloth orange band on the bottom.
Bam Bam:Satin
Gizmo:cloth. So let's talk oh, it's satin. I'm sorry. Correct. So it is a Nicaraguan puro.
Gizmo:The wrapper is Nicaraguan Habano Oscuro, Pello do Oro. The binder and filler are both Nicaraguan not disclosed. Let's talk about the Vitols in the line. Of course, like we know, we have the torpedo box pressed 52 ring gauge by six and one eighth, which it's odd to include torpedo box pressed. That's like the Vitola.
Gizmo:Like, to put box pressed in it, I thought that was a little Yeah. Interesting because we've never seen that before here on the pod. They have the Grand Robusto 55 ring gauge by five and five eighths inches long. That's a big cigar. The Toro is 52 by six, very close to this in size without the torpedo head on it.
Gizmo:The Petite Robusto 50 ring gauge by four and a half, and they have a Churchill 50 by seven. Oh boy. So there's nothing in this line, Bam, that's smaller than 50. So that's one of those two must have been what you have.
Bam Bam:Probably. The Petite Robusto.
Gizmo:It's been a long time
Bam Bam:Yeah, a long time ago. Very nice cigar.
Gizmo:The line was launched in July 2011, so this cigar has been around for quite some time. Mhmm. As this is performing right now, I mean, if you're looking for a cigar, you want something, you know, Nicaraguan that you can reach for anywhere, I mean, at a great price, you know, it's like this
Bam Bam:is pretty cool. I'll If this continues, I will be buying a box of these.
Senator:Yeah. It's delicious. I'm sorry. I worry we're apologizing for how much we're enjoying it because we
Bam Bam:Well, don't because love we the
Gizmo:should on this fucking Totally. I mean, yeah, been rough on My Father except for The Actually, have been three that have done well. The number four did well. Yeah. The Don Pippin Lancero did well.
Senator:That's a delicious cigar.
Gizmo:And the My Father Blue was one of the best cigars we did last year. That's right. So actually, think it's turning around.
Senator:Yeah. I'm just saying where this is, this is really, really enjoyable. I would give this a high score if the entire cigar
Bam Bam:No flips out of
Gizmo:doubt. I'm definitely hoping for a journey here.
Bam Bam:And honestly, the Padron Parallel, I think it's still very accurate. Lot of similarities there right now.
Grinder:Off the light, for sure.
Bam Bam:And still,
Gizmo:for me.
Senator:It's shocking. If this were blind and we were asked, What do you think this is? Right now, I'd still say Padron.
Gizmo:I'm not sure if I'd say Padron. Well, there's some What
Senator:would you say instead?
Gizmo:I knew you were gonna ask that question, and I don't have an answer for I'm not just saying it to be contrarian. I don't think this tastes like a Padron cigar.
Bam Bam:Would offer another one. It could be. It could have some nuances of the aging room concerto.
Gizmo:I think I'm closer there.
Senator:I can
Bam Bam:see that. Because there's chocolate, a lot of chocolate in that for me, a lot of cocoa.
Chef Ricky:What about the Not
Bam Bam:the cinna.
Chef Ricky:The cinna. Cinna.
Gizmo:What about the orange one?
Bam Bam:I was thinking about the cinna. I think that has higher body and strength than this.
Senator:Yeah. That cuatro, there's like a peppery Yeah. Quality about that. It hits the back of your throat. Like, this is very smooth.
Gizmo:I definitely think right now this is a better cigar than that orange aging room.
Senator:Agreed. And again, for me, the Padron Parallel, it's like for Nicaraguan tobacco that's full flavored, this is incredibly smooth.
Bam Bam:Mhmm.
Senator:We usually only say that about Padron, like that level of flavor delivered in such a smooth way. Yeah. And then, like, even the the Padron, the 1964 Torpedo has some, like, sweeter, like, cocoa That's true. Molasses notes that, like, you kinda get in this, so that's, like, the only thing that
Bam Bam:Have you had the number 44? That little torpedoesque type of cigars that that Padron has? That's there's some of that here too.
Senator:That Family Reserve?
Bam Bam:No. Part of their stand I think it's part of their standard production. 1926, I believe. Oh, then I probably have it. I don't remember it.
Bam Bam:Which line it's in? The number 44.
Gizmo:That's a Family Reserve.
Bam Bam:Oh, it is? Okay. Excellent cigar. A lot of coffee in that that I'm getting here too. But this is this is shocking.
Senator:It's so approachable. That's the thing I just can't believe.
Bam Bam:Yeah, man.
Gizmo:And I remain very happy that I did not take more off the top. I'm loving how much airflow It's I'm a slight bit resistant.
Bam Bam:Look, there's a lot of merit in what you did with this. You've had this for three months. Bringing these cigars down in humidity after purchase, it's a must.
Chef Ricky:Why don't difference. It's a must.
Gizmo:Honestly, and maybe we could talk about this for a minute because as we're smoking this, coming in with the expectations we did, the faces on Grindr and Senator when they sat down recalling that we were smoking this tonight.
Senator:I mean, Grindr said he was scared.
Gizmo:He said, I'm scared, guys. Yeah. And, you know, I I think it's important to, like, think about, like, I wonder in our very early days running to you know, we would last minute run to a humidor, run to a store, bam, go get this senator. Do you have this? Run to a store and grab it.
Gizmo:I wonder if those some of those cigars were. In the eyes of how we do things now, judged a little unfairly because of humidity.
Bam Bam:It's a great question.
Gizmo:But for consumers who are walking into a humidor and sitting down in the attached
Chef Ricky:lounge Exactly how I smoke wine.
Gizmo:That's how they probably smoke it.
Bam Bam:That's exactly how they
Gizmo:smoke it. So which one has more merit?
Bam Bam:Well, that's a good question.
Senator:I don't know. Honestly, Grindr said this, I am now of the same mindset. I think they had to change this blend at some point a little bit. There's just no way that only humidity made this I mean, you know, early in my smoking journey, I was smoking full cigars. You know, I told you I had started with that
Bam Bam:As we all did.
Senator:That Roma de Cuba, Miyamore, that's a full bodied cigar. The fact that this was so memorable, like the amount of strength, it can't just be humidity. And I got pepper, There's no way that just humidity brought out that level where, like, right now, it is faint to nonexistent. So I think they had to tone it down a little bit.
Chef Ricky:And I don't think it's just us because I remember hearing other people back then talk about how strong this cigar was.
Gizmo:So
Chef Ricky:yeah, I think maybe they've been hearing the feedback and they made some changes.
Senator:I mean,
Bam Bam:when I got I think the last one I had, I had it in a B and M restaurant in my town and pulled it. It was, you know, there's a dungeon bar in the basement and you go into the basement and they pull cigars out of the humidor and
Grinder:I was sat at the bar and smoked a cigar and I put it down like a third
Bam Bam:of the way through because I couldn't. I just couldn't take it anymore. But it was definitely, I wouldn't say wet, but it was from where it was.
Grinder:There was that factor, but I can't help but the flavor is so much more refined from what I recall. No doubt about it. It
Bam Bam:it doesn't bulldoze you.
Gizmo:Nope. Alright, boys. Let's go to some news.
Chef Ricky:I'm sorry, guys. I don't think we this did we cover the price point on this?
Gizmo:Yeah.
Bam Bam:Yes. We did. Well, I'm just
Gizmo:$12.12 to 17. Pay attention, bro.
Chef Ricky:Sorry. I changed my position in the room, and I'm all fucked
Gizmo:You're too comfortable today. You're in Rooster's chair.
Bam Bam:You're the
Senator:You're operating with You know who you are today.
Chef Ricky:I sit here, and all of a sudden, I get Alzheimer's.
Bam Bam:Yeah. You're the old boy today.
Gizmo:Alright, boys. So let's talk about some news. I am very, very excited about this because we are gonna be the first people in the world to share this information with anybody that we have learned that at the Habanos Festival in March for the sixtieth anniversary of Cohiba, they will be launching the cigar we've been talking about for, I guess, what, a year and a half now that we were calling the Bahike 59
Chef Ricky:Mhmm.
Gizmo:Or the Atabay at the time. Last year at this time, there was a lot of thinking that it was going to come out alongside the Bahike 58. Of course, we shared that that was not going to be the case, but we have it on very, very good authority from a couple folks in Cuba and outside that they are launching a new limited edition cigar called the Excellentis at the festival in March, which will be a 59 ring gauge torpedo with a pigtail on it Cool. By five and two thirds long, 144 millimeters. And the factory name of the cigar, it's called the Mitos, which is the myth.
Gizmo:So I guess they're playing with the last couple years of people positing that this was coming out. So it will have the the limited edition band on it, Edicion Limitada, as we're hearing right now, and it will be the highlight cigar released at the Habanos Festival this year, definitely during the gala dinner. So pretty cool, and I'm very excited that we're the first to be sharing that with the world.
Bam Bam:It sounds like a good looking cigar.
Gizmo:Well, we've smoked it.
Senator:Yeah, we were also one of the first to
Chef Ricky:smoke Oh yeah, we smoked it.
Bam Bam:Yeah, yeah. That was a long time ago.
Gizmo:Long time ago. Yeah. I found it to be pretty good. It was really good.
Senator:It was excellent.
Bam Bam:Yeah, delicious.
Gizmo:So the big thing on this, and we'll remind listeners who haven't heard it, but we talked about that cigar after we got the okay to chat about it, that there's no yajaro in the cigar. Only mediocampo.
Bam Bam:It was very smooth.
Gizmo:And of course the other tobaccos, but there is no yajaro in the cigar. Yeah. So playing with that bijique idea of introducing mediotempo, this is taking that to a whole another level where there is no liqueurro.
Senator:It has more mediotempo than anything else in the bijique line, which is crazy. It's because it's a shorter cigar, so it's actually easier to use Medio Tempo, where all the others are longer. It's harder to find longer Medio Tempo leaves to use that at scale.
Bam Bam:You said five and three quarter? It seems shorter.
Gizmo:Five and two thirds. Okay, five and two thirds. Yeah,
Bam Bam:yeah. I'm remembering it now, it seems shorter than that. Beautifully, beautifully constructed.
Gizmo:Great. Yeah. A great ring It's a tasty cigar. Yeah. So the thing that Danilo told us was that there is this myth playing with, you know, I'm playing with the factory name here, the Mito's.
Gizmo:There is this myth that Medio Tiempo in Cuba is scarce. Which, you know, Danilo Rodriguez, when we talked to him about Cohiba cigars and and Bijique cigars, I guess, probably going on a year and a two years ago now, he made it very clear to us that the problem with rolling great Cohiba, you know, great looking Cohiba cigars is wrapper. It's not Mediotiempo. So this there is this false narrative out there that it is scarce, and that is not the scarce piece of their production omen. They can't get enough good wrapper.
Gizmo:So anybody who's going to call our bluff on it only being Medio Tiempo, the fact is it's not as scarce as it's made out to be. I don't know what kind of production bowl
Bam Bam:at this size.
Senator:Definitely. Like Danilo made very clear why this was so much easier for them to produce is because it's a smaller cigar. They have so much more Medio Tempo leaf at that size than they do the longer Vitolas.
Gizmo:Wow. So he is not a man with a cell phone, so it's very, very hard to get in touch with him. So I'm gonna try now that we've heard this information to get in touch with him and congratulate him and and wish him well on this release. Very, very cool that our friend has this awesome cigar coming out from Habanos. I'm sure the price on it is going to be Oh, yes.
Gizmo:Absurd. I'm assuming somewhere probably around $200 a cigar would be my thinking. Yeah. Just just a touch below bijica.
Bam Bam:Gentlemen, I can't get over this. This is like
Gizmo:It's really good.
Bam Bam:This is really good. Yep. And it's so vastly different from my previous experience.
Grinder:I would wager that they changed it.
Senator:Has to be. For
Bam Bam:sure. It looks a little different from what I remember.
Grinder:Looks a little redder, like a little redder hue in the wrapper.
Senator:I agree with that too.
Bam Bam:Interesting.
Senator:Yeah. The one I had before was one of the darkest wrappers I've ever seen on a cigar.
Gizmo:Right. Alright, boys. Let's go into our pairing now. And we have a debut, a new category debut tonight on the podcast much asked for by our listeners.
Chef Ricky:Mhmm.
Gizmo:We are into Tawny Porte. We have a 20 year aged Tawny Porte tonight from Graham's. Nice. Cheers, boys.
Bam Bam:Cheers.
Gizmo:Good to see you. Tatani Port. I was shocked to learn as we sipped this that this is only a 20% spirit. I did not know that about port. It's 80% sugar.
Bam Bam:Tastes like cough medicine. Oh my god. You getting a little robotussin over there? Oh yeah. Wow.
Bam Bam:I've had a lot of port, but nothing like this. This is a little different. This
Senator:is what port tastes like.
Bam Bam:I know. I've had other ports that weren't so medicinal in character. I'm getting a lot of cough medicine esque type thing happening right
Chef Ricky:now.
Grinder:Don't get the cough medicine. Don't get that kind of flavor. It's just super sweet. It's
Gizmo:almost like a sour sweet in a way. It makes you want to
Senator:smack your lips sour It's like a grape juice.
Chef Ricky:I get sour cherry, citrus, and a ton of oak and like oxidized oak.
Bam Bam:Sour cherry for sure.
Chef Ricky:You could tell this has been in oak for a long time, exposed and yeah.
Bam Bam:It's wonderful on the nose.
Gizmo:So let me ask you this before we get into the story of port and stuff, because this is my initial I'm curious about. Am I gonna get blasted by listener emails saying you guys are drinking the Don Julio of Port?
Senator:No. Graham's is very famous.
Gizmo:Graham's is a
Bam Bam:don't know.
Gizmo:Strong brand? Oh, no.
Senator:It's standard fare. If you were to go into any restaurant and they have
Bam Bam:a bar, if they have pork, they're gonna have Graham's. Dude, my lips are sticky.
Chef Ricky:20 years' age.
Gizmo:Say it, Babb.
Chef Ricky:That's a memory.
Gizmo:I don't know what to say.
Bam Bam:First thing I thought of was to look at you. Try to think of something.
Gizmo:All right. So what is Tawny Port? Can somebody walk me through this? You said fortified wine.
Bam Bam:All right.
Senator:So let's let's start with what Port is. Okay. To Tawny Port. Great. So Port is a Portuguese fortified wine like we've been talking about.
Senator:And what that means is basically like the base is a regular wine. It's made with like 60 different varietals of Portuguese grapes. So like not grapes we're familiar with. It's not like Cab Merlot. It's like all these crazy varietals that they have in Portugal.
Senator:And then they add a distilled grape spirit, usually brandy, to that wine base, and that's what fortifies it and brings up the alcohol content. Because like most wine is like between like 1214%. What gets it up to 20 is the brandy that they add. And so that once they add the brandy, that stops fermentation and fortifies the wine. In terms of where it's made, anything to be able to call itself a port must be made in the Douro Valley in Portugal.
Senator:So kind of like champagne can only come from the Champagne region. Port can only come from
Bam Bam:the Douro Valley Interesting. In
Senator:And then as far as the types, there's two primary types. There's others. There's white ports. But what you would commonly find is ruby port and tawny port. Ruby port is redder in color like a traditional wine it kinda looks like in a glass.
Senator:It's fruitier. It's sweeter. Tawny port and ruby port is aged either in stainless steel or concrete tanks.
Chef Ricky:I feel that's also the usually the more affordable of
Senator:the Correct. It is. It is. Because it's not aged long intentionally. So ruby port is younger port.
Senator:That's why it has that red fresh color. It hasn't been aging so long. Now tawny port is aged longer and in oak barrels. So like all the oakiness that Jeff was talking about, that's exactly by design what tawny port is supposed to deliver. And usually it's a minimum of ten years.
Senator:It'll usually be like ten to thirty years that they age it. As they age it, that's why it gets that like rusty color. It's not like red like a traditional wine
Chef Ricky:would brown to it.
Senator:And then what that does with the oak and the age is like instead of just the fruit notes that you get in ruby pour, it adds, like, a nuttiness. There's even, like, a fig like quality that you get in tawny ports. So that's that's basically the the gist of
Bam Bam:of port. Does the brandy increase the sweetness? Is that where the sweetness comes from?
Gizmo:They're not
Bam Bam:adding a sweetener to this, correct?
Senator:It definitely adds some sweetness.
Bam Bam:It does, yeah.
Senator:But not knowing what type of brandy they use, it's hard to say, but all brandies are pretty sweet. They are. That's why cognac is like a drier version of brandy. So
Gizmo:I will say that first sip was kind of jarring, and as I've sipped it while Senator was talking
Bam Bam:Your palate will adjust.
Gizmo:I'm adjusting very quickly, and I'm really enjoying It actually tastes very good. It's amazing how shocking that first sip is though.
Chef Ricky:I think what happens with when they add the brandy, stops the fermentation so that's why it stays sweet.
Bam Bam:I see.
Chef Ricky:Yeah, it doesn't.
Gizmo:Okay. So this bottle, boys, I purchased for $60, a total wine. Okay. So what I don't understand, and maybe you guys can clue me in on this, versus agave spirits, other wines that certainly don't sit that long, you know, whiskeys. How can something sit in a barrel?
Gizmo:Or you said stainless steel or whatever. How can it sit in something for twenty years and a bottle be only $60 in 2020 Very
Senator:simple. I mean, these are like traditional oak barrels that they're able to use for this. They don't need to use they don't need to use a sherry cask or something like that that is scarce and really hard to find. So the process for this is as simple as it gets. Like, you don't see port bottles with different cask statements on it, you know, aged in this type or that type.
Senator:Like, it's kind of standard fare. And this is so like viscous and syrupy. It doesn't need a whole lot to impart
Bam Bam:character. Would you say that the many varietals of grapes that you really can't put your finger on which they are, could also have something to do with the lower price?
Senator:Totally. So a lot of the grape varietals that are used, they're very cheap, very accessible grapes in Portugal. There's nothing really fancy needed to make port. And similarly, it's like they're adding brandy to it, which is super cheap. Know, brandy to cognac price point wise, you can buy brandy for like $20 for cognac, you'd start at like $40 $50
Chef Ricky:I'd also assume the Andrew share is a lot less because it's not a spirit per se, it's a wine, so you're getting as much evaporation and waste.
Senator:So the process is lot simpler, is I think why the price point is more affordable.
Gizmo:And how is this pairing with this Nicaraguan Pure that we have in
Bam Bam:our hands tonight? What do you think?
Gizmo:I think it's really nice actually.
Bam Bam:Yeah. It's actually nice.
Senator:I actually like that. Like, this cigar doesn't have a ton of sweetness. No. So I do think that, like, it helps bring out the faint sweetness that's in the cigar.
Gizmo:Mhmm.
Senator:And since it's full flavored, like, I would never drink this pork with, like, mild or even medium flavored So, like, the amount of flavor this delivers, I feel like, can
Bam Bam:hold up to a port. But with this Chef
Senator:chef looks like he does not agree.
Bam Bam:I would actually like to try this cigar with some of the rums that we love.
Gizmo:I would like to try it with scotch as well. Yeah. Like, I'd like to try this with a balcony. Oh, for sure. You know?
Bam Bam:Florida cana too, would do.
Gizmo:You know what would be great was that whiskey we did last week. We did the The writer's The writer's tears, the Irish whiskey.
Bam Bam:Yeah. Don't know.
Gizmo:Because that had a little bit of a sweet thing to it. I disagree.
Chef Ricky:So La Marialita will
Senator:go great. This. Would be great. So, like, just my philosophy, I think that any spirit that you pair with this needs to be somewhat viscous and a bit fuller bodied. So, like, I love Flor de Cana seven, but that's a light rum.
Senator:Yeah. Mariolita, even though it's light in color, it has a viscosity about it that I think can hold up against a cigar with this much flavor.
Bam Bam:I think the Belvenu would be great with this.
Senator:I agree with that. Double cask. No doubt about Writer's tear, as I worry, is a little too soft and light for this cigar.
Gizmo:It'd be fine. Feel like it's medium. I we were talking last week about that working well with medium cigars. Our expectation of this being full, it's not even close to that right now.
Senator:I don't I don't mean the the body or anything like that. I more mean the flavor notes you get in the cigar are really rich deep notes. So we talked about like dark chocolate. Mhmm. Like, every note we're describing is like a rich flavor note.
Bam Bam:The crema.
Senator:It's not faint or light. It's not like we're like, oh, we get some, like, cinnamon and milk chocolate. Like, that's a lighter palate. I'd have a glass of Cabernet
Bam Bam:with this in that heartbeat.
Gizmo:A 100%. I think red wine would be very nice. I mean, obviously, we're drinking a Yeah. Fortified red wine.
Bam Bam:But on Cabernet, I probably would prefer
Chef Ricky:this is jammy and
Bam Bam:I'd prefer the Cabernet to this, honestly.
Senator:I agree.
Bam Bam:Yeah. Belveny, not sure what else. I'm not sure if I'm feeling the tequila with this thing.
Senator:Not with this.
Gizmo:I don't think so.
Senator:Only tequila,
Chef Ricky:like an El Desoto, and maybe more aged on the Anejo side,
Senator:or I would do the Don Filano Anejo with this. Cause that's like
Bam Bam:bourbon like. And it's Richard. That's true.
Gizmo:So boys, we're coming to the end of the first third here on the My Father Les Bijou nineteen twenty two in torpedo box pressed. We've been talking about it a little bit, but what's everybody getting right now on flavor notes in the cigar? And how is it for
Bam Bam:you? It's excellent. I'm still getting a lot of deep dark chocolate. And that crema, as you noted on on that little froth on my espresso, that's exactly what I'm getting. That and dark chocolate.
Bam Bam:Fantastic.
Grinder:I'm not getting any, enhancement or alteration from the
Bam Bam:You've got a rose growing though. What's that? Your ashes blooming.
Senator:Oh yeah,
Grinder:I got a little stray guy. I'm not getting any change in flavor profile from the port. You know, it pairs nicely, but it's not like
Bam Bam:altering. Yeah,
Grinder:you know what I mean? Like sometimes you have the pairing in it. It melds in a certain way and it changes into something a
Chef Ricky:little different.
Bam Bam:It does drink nice with it, though. Yeah. I will say that.
Senator:The lingering sweetness on my palate with this cigar because it doesn't have that much sweetness.
Bam Bam:No. That's true.
Senator:That's the only thing I think the pairing is helping with. And then for me, I get, like, still, but even a little bit more like that saltiness in the background is present for me.
Grinder:I think the saltiness is more prominent now that we're Agree. Going down now. Mhmm.
Chef Ricky:Yeah. Yeah. I'm I'm Especially on the retro.
Bam Bam:I'm not as far as you guys just yet. You're I'm actually you're behind me, and Chef and I are probably the same.
Gizmo:Yeah. I feel like I'm a little behind.
Senator:But you've got a band off already.
Gizmo:I always take the band off early though.
Bam Bam:Yeah. So do I. Okay.
Gizmo:I'm an early band. Take her
Bam Bam:off a fret. Aristocrat.
Senator:Alright. Well, Giz is gonna be too shy, but there's some other breaking news
Bam Bam:Well, you know globally. Well, he is a global insider.
Senator:That's right.
Bam Bam:Which has now Verified.
Gizmo:He had correct. Blue check mark.
Senator:He has evolved. The two biggest news stories so far this year, Venezuela and Gizmo being named man of the year on FOH.
Bam Bam:That's correct.
Gizmo:Complete surprise. Honestly, it was. I had no idea, and I knew it was gonna be great fodder for you
Chef Ricky:guys. Congratulations.
Bam Bam:No, we're very proud of
Senator:you. We can't wait to get you some pigs in a blanket to celebrate.
Bam Bam:Yeah. Correct. With spicy brown mustard.
Gizmo:Oh, very hot mustard. Correct.
Senator:You are a
Bam Bam:guy, man. We're proud of you.
Gizmo:Thank you, man. Yeah, it's a nice, real nice honor. I was totally surprised. Rob put up a great note today on FOH. I started getting tagged.
Gizmo:I was getting notifications like you've been mentioned, you've been mentioned. And I'm thinking, I put something up on one of the other threads, or I commented on the box Gizmo. Code
Senator:Oh, incorrectly uploaded the pod. Like, something's wrong.
Gizmo:Was like, what what's going on here? And I clicked it, and, yeah, Rob put up put up that note.
Chef Ricky:Let's see here. And here it says, I'm very proud to announce Lizard Gizmo, George, as our FOH Man of the Year. Gizmo is a FOH stalwart
Gizmo:Stalwart, bam. Who lends
Bam Bam:Very sexy.
Chef Ricky:To all. This is very true. Whose interaction with FOH members set the standard of how this course should be in the modern world. Great bloke online and in person. Keeper of the box cold list.
Chef Ricky:Thank you.
Gizmo:By the way, updated version coming q one this year. Q one this year.
Senator:Excellent. This is already going for a man of the year back to back years. Look at this guy.
Gizmo:You gotta you gotta work, bitch. Gotta work. Spears said, that's
Bam Bam:a work motherfucker.
Chef Ricky:That's and here's my favorite part. Head of the much loved Lounge Lizard podcast, lover of the leaf, George Gizmos Fowl. We don't care about that guy. But Giz, congratulations man. Fantastic.
Chef Ricky:This is amazing. You deserve it.
Gizmo:Thank you, man.
Chef Ricky:The graphic here is a little strange, but nicely done.
Gizmo:The graphic was the funniest It looks good.
Chef Ricky:No, no. He looks great. It's from the tail down that gets me. You Yeah.
Senator:It's strange but fitting.
Bam Bam:Strangely fitting.
Chef Ricky:I can't wait to see this
Senator:in the It's like a gremlin and a lizard
Bam Bam:maiden. Correct.
Gizmo:So, yeah, Rob Rob had his graphics team put my head from I guess it was a screenshot from our f o h. We did a Probably just from Zoom. It was from Zoom. But it was I
Chef Ricky:don't guess. I'm I'm getting John Stamos vibes from this picture. Really? Oh.
Chef Ricky:Good job, man. Oh, hello.
Chef Ricky:You stare at it long enough and squint with the left eye. You
Gizmo:And you close the right eye.
Bam Bam:After three drinks.
Gizmo:Three glasses of port. Yeah. So Rob took the they took the the the lizard logo and replaced the head with a cartoony version of my head with a cigar in my mouth. And it says, f o h man of the year 2025. Wizard Gizmo, of course, it's all in black and white.
Gizmo:Yeah. Says that he's going to send me a t shirt so I'll be sure to get you guys some shirts so you can wear these. Yeah. I will be wearing this every week here by
Bam Bam:the way. Alright. Every week. And the entire club will get a shirt too.
Gizmo:I'll get the club shirts.
Grinder:Yeah, be it's black.
Chef Ricky:We should just put the image on your locker.
Bam Bam:Yeah, right.
Senator:But should get a decal for the side of his truck.
Gizmo:Yeah, a magnet. Honestly, I, you know, I put a note up on Foch. I was completely stunned by this and shocked. It's it's a real honor. I mean, I'm the fifth person named this, and I'm alongside some real other heavy hitters on FOH.
Gizmo:Like real Cool. I'm incredible company. Kind of like that Wayne. I put in my note like that Wayne's World. Like, we are not worthy, not worthy.
Gizmo:Like, that's it really feels like that. And and I'm not trying to be humble, but, you know, I'm a newcomer to FOH. I've only been there probably five years or so. These guys have been there forever. So, you know, it's a real nice honor.
Gizmo:Rob, you know, listen. Rob and the forum have been such supporters of us since day one
Bam Bam:Correct.
Gizmo:Of this podcast that, you know, FOH has been a a huge piece of the launch and growth of of what we do here more than anywhere else really outside of this room. So, you know, shout out to him, shout out to Fabrica Five who of course been a presenting sponsor for over a year and a half now. And they'll be all through 2026. I mean, really believe in us. They love what we do.
Gizmo:Rob personally loves what we do. Obviously they came to ten eighty six here with us last April,
Bam Bam:spent
Gizmo:three, four days with us. We smoked Yeah, twenty, twenty five they slept in the hotel down the street.
Bam Bam:10 bottles of wine a day.
Gizmo:It was awesome. We did a podcast of course. It was very memorable and to see this, like I said, is a complete surprise. It's pretty amazing. So thanks to Rob and thanks to the entire FOH community.
Gizmo:I'm very grateful.
Bam Bam:It's awesome. I
Chef Ricky:think it's your year because you got the Rolex, now you're man of the year. I don't know, man.
Senator:The Rolex was last year, so that means he needs another watch to
Chef Ricky:see. Oh.
Gizmo:Yeah. I don't think that's gonna happen. Yeah. So thank you, guys. So let's move on now.
Gizmo:Let's I wanna go to a voice memo. We named Lizard Jose from the Dominican Republic was named our lizard of the week a few weeks ago, and we asked him some questions, and we were looking for some context of what he sent us, what he smokes, and what he can find down there. So I love always hearing from international listeners.
Bam Bam:That was a good email.
Gizmo:Great email. And I I love hearing from international listeners, especially on a voice memo, you know, what they're smoking, what their experience is like. So I wanna play this for you guys now.
Chef Ricky:Wow. Lizard of the week. I really, really would enjoy those, Von Roberts. I've been trying to buy a few of them, but I didn't know exactly which ones to start start with. So now I can get to explore this line.
Chef Ricky:I would also like to learn which cigars from the fabric of five lines you each enjoy. And that way, I can maybe purchase a few of them and try them out. Here's a story from my trip to New York. I'm sorry that I read this heard this podcast a little late. So I'm already back from Thanksgiving, and I already smoked a few cigars, some legally in bars and other illegally on the streets.
Chef Ricky:But here's a funny thing that happened to me and what it's so good, I think, about the society that we create when we smoke cigars and the bond we create. I belong to this business organization. It's a worldwide organization. And we share many interests in the community. And one of the interests that we share is cigars.
Chef Ricky:So we have a cigar club, let's say, for this organization. I posted a photo of me smoking a cigar on the streets of New York. And, one of the members wrote to me within the hour and invited me me to his house at night so that I could could enjoy a cigar in a nice atmosphere and, with good people. So, of course, I took advantage of the invitation. I had dinner with my family, and then afterwards, I head over headed over to my new friend's house.
Chef Ricky:We had a couple of database that he shared, which they were very appreciated and very well manufactured and good flavored cigar that I enjoyed a lot. So it's something that only happens in communities where people enjoy the same things. And I think the pressure also of not being allowed to enjoy it freely makes it even more pleasurable when you have friends that, without any interest, just invite you over to your house and, share your passion. That's the story. I heard this podcast a little late, so I'm sorry to respond.
Chef Ricky:I will include in my email my address so that I can receive and, enjoy the Bond Roberts regards, and I will report once I receive them and try them which one I liked. Thank you very much, and I keep doing a good job.
Gizmo:Thanks, Lizard Jose.
Bam Bam:Very nice.
Gizmo:What a great voice memo. Yeah. Thanks. Love hearing a nice story of an international traveler coming to New York City
Bam Bam:Correct.
Gizmo:Connecting with a smoker from his international business group that he's in. Hospitality. Hospitality that's so fantastic. So we appreciate that and thank you to him for sending that voice memo in. Very awesome.
Gizmo:So he asked a question about our favorite Fabrica five cigars. I know we talk about different cigars that we're smoking all the time, but let's say right now in 2026, as we begin 2026 here, what are your kind of top two or three Fabrica five cigars that are in your rotation today? I know, senator, you were just raving recently about the Pyramidhi.
Senator:Yeah. I hadn't had that until recently. It's it's really good. I mean, we've said this about a lot of their cigars that they're Cubanesque. That's another one that definitely checks the box.
Senator:Like, It's got a good amount of flavor, very balanced, really smooth, just a great cigar.
Grinder:I like the Trinity Robusto.
Gizmo:Yeah. To use Rob's word, that's like the stalwart. I mean, I think that's just
Bam Bam:It's an incredible stalwart.
Gizmo:It's perfect every time.
Bam Bam:Absolutely. And they get better over time.
Grinder:Yeah. It's just so smooth, you know? Yeah. And it's, I probably do one a week of those.
Gizmo:Oh, yeah. I'm loving the new Lonsdale, too.
Bam Bam:Fantastic. You gave me one.
Gizmo:It was incredible.
Senator:Is that the N9?
Gizmo:I believe so.
Senator:Yeah. That is good. I believe so.
Bam Bam:Great vitola, too.
Gizmo:I think the Ninfas is you know, it's an interesting Vitola. It's very small. I don't know if it's 38, maybe something like that. I love that cigar. Yeah.
Gizmo:And for me in the car, if I have a if I need a quick smoke, but I don't want to smoke like a half Corona or something little bit longer.
Chef Ricky:My first one, and that's why I gravitated towards it. Great, great
Bam Bam:car smell. Have you had the Trinity robusta yet?
Grinder:Yeah.
Gizmo:Okay. Yep. Good. So they're all smoking great. So my suggestion to lizards like Lizard Jose here is to go to Fabrica zero zero five dot com.
Gizmo:As we always say, pick up the sampler, which they send you two cigars of the 13 different Vitolas available. 26 cigars, discounted price. Use our code. You'll you'll be able to try everything. It's incredible.
Gizmo:That's incredible. And you can find which ones work for your lifestyle, like the time you have each day or week.
Bam Bam:Very cool.
Gizmo:You know, find the vitola that tastes the best for your palate. Try them all. Yep. You know? And it's a great reasonable way to do it.
Gizmo:So that would be my suggestion. Read
Chef Ricky:the description and see, you know, maybe there's a cigar listed there that it parallels with that floats your boat. Definitely that's a great starting point.
Gizmo:Alright. Let's go to another one now. This one's from Lizard Maxwell. He says, guys, I have a different topic for you guys, but I have a question for senator. We just talked about wine.
Gizmo:In February, I'm gonna be making a beef Wellington. And I was one by the way, beef Wellington I love beef Wellington. And one of my favorite videos ever on the Internet is Gordon Ramsay making beef Wellington on YouTube. Highly recommended.
Chef Ricky:My favorite my favorite videos are when other people make beef Wellingsons, and they send them to him. And he
Gizmo:Oh, yeah. Like, he does it on roast them. On Instagram and TikTok. Yeah. So he says, in February, I'm gonna be making a beef Wellington, and I was wondering what wine pairing senator would recommend for that.
Gizmo:Mizzard Maxwell. So definitely a cab. Okay.
Senator:And one that we did that would pair perfectly with that. Actually, I'm gonna give two recommendations. The one we've done on the pod, Orange Swift Papillon. That got a 10.
Gizmo:Great wine.
Senator:Yeah. That's perfect with any kind of red meat. It's rich, it can hold its own really against just about anything, so I think that would pair perfectly. And then a wine we have not done that in Giswold know this wine because we had bought some and I recently had it this past Christmas. A wine by Montes, a Chilean producer, which is called Purple Angel.
Senator:Similar price point to Papillon. Papillon's maybe 90 a bottle. This is like 100. But man, so smooth, yet rich and flavorful, balanced. It was outstanding.
Senator:I had it with steaks. That would be perfect with a beef Wellington. Nice. Alright.
Gizmo:Great great recommendation, senator. And of course, if you want to hear the reviews on those wines, we did them on the pod. Well, not the purple angel. We did the the other one, but we should do the purple angel. Oh, yeah.
Gizmo:It's a pretty damn it's cool too because the bottle comes in this like tissue paper. It's a white tissue paper that the bottle comes in. Nice presentation on it. It's it's really, really good. Nice.
Gizmo:Alright, boys. Let's go to another one. This one's coming from lizard Jimmy. He says, hey, Giz. I wanted to reach out to you guys and see if you have been able to acquire any of the Romeo y Julieta bellicosos from Cuba.
Gizmo:I know the lizards are not really keen on r y j, but it would allow for the completion of the battle of the Pyramides slash bellicosos. I'd like to send you send them to you guys if you've not been able to attain any. So let me know. That's pretty cool because Wow. We don't have that cigar.
Bam Bam:Very generous.
Gizmo:I did put that in my brain, but it's just not something that I've seen available anywhere. So No. That'll be a really good cigar to put. Because actually, we did have some success with Romeo Oh, that's Churchill. Churchill.
Gizmo:The Wyatt Churchill did okay. And then, of course, the Dionis did not perform well. So the Bellicosus is one that's a regular production cigar. So I would definitely like to see how that one does here. He says one last thing, and it's not a small one.
Gizmo:This is another proposition changing how the cigars and spearing spirit ratings are determined. He said, yes. I realize
Bam Bam:Where's Pagoda?
Gizmo:What you guys do is kinda sacred, but I have noticed more and more over the last year or so that the lizards had to defend their rating more and more. A lot of fighting during the ratings, as well as some wavering on what is factored into the rating and what isn't. Here's what I'm thinking. It would be a weighted scale as such. 50% for flavor, construction draw for 25%, value 15%, appearance slash marketing
Bam Bam:Mhmm.
Gizmo:At 10%. Each percent is worth one point, and each category has points available equal to its percent, of course, totaling a 100. Feel free to adjust the weighting percentage based on the guy's values. The above is just my suggestion. Total the points at the end, round up or down, and provide the formal lizard rating.
Gizmo:Yes. I realize this adds some complexity to things, but also provides a standardized way to measure all cigars on the same scale and a defendable position when one lizard by the way, I think all of our positions when senators yelling at us, Pam, are defendable. Knock gizmos. Also also provides a standardized way to measure all cigars on the same scale and a defendable position when one lizard knocks a cigar that another doesn't. Mhmm.
Gizmo:Naturally, this is just a suggestion, but I think it could provide some good discussion either way. You guys are doing great things. Keep up the great work, and you've got me as a lifelong fan. You may need Cheers, wizard Jimmy. You may
Bam Bam:need a scientific calculator to calculate that.
Gizmo:Yeah. Yeah, does sound like a lot of work for me. Correct. So what do you think? We've had folks asking us over the years, especially over the last year, talking about changing how we rate and being more scientific and whatnot, my gut reaction to it, and I'm curious if where you guys stand on this, my gut reaction is I think the thing that doesn't factor into this kind of plan to rate for me is like the X factor of the experience.
Bam Bam:And
Gizmo:there's something about that that I think we have become very good at putting our finger on even if at times you can't really define that X factor in an experience. And I think that we, the listeners can hear it in our mood. Yeah. You know, when the room is buzzing like it was when we smoked that Kellner cigar last week, right? Tonight, this cigar is very very good.
Gizmo:You know, the energy in the room, there's an x factor to a cigar in this room performing brilliantly that I think is why the former lizard rating, the way we've done it has worked where it is subjective. Correct.
Senator:I'll say this, Pagoda's not here, and I'm sure he'd have an aneurysm if he heard this email because he came up with the rating system. He did. And the thing that I really do like about it, and I think maybe this context will help for the listener, You know, if we had a rigid formula where, you know, x percent or points for all these different factors and you just total it up, and if we were to use decimals, it it'd be incredibly simple to rate. Okay. So on construction, I give it this.
Senator:On flavor, I give it that, and it spits out a 9.5. And chef does the same thing, and he spits out a 9.3. Are me and him really going to have a disagreement or a difference of opinion over 93 or 95? Absolutely not.
Bam Bam:It actually takes out that emotional factor of whole numbers, because when you're so close That's the thing.
Senator:There's it doesn't force you to make tough decisions and to really parse out just how great that cigar was. Correct. And then you you kinda have to plant a flag on a whole number. Mhmm. And I think what I've enjoyed about it is like, you know, I'm in between a nine and a 10, or a seven and an eight, and by using whole numbers, like, it really forces me to consider, am I going to chase this experience again?
Gizmo:Yes.
Senator:And so if I'm debating between a seven and an eight, and I cannot honestly say to myself I am gonna chase it again, I need to round down to the seven. Is it a good cigar? Sure. Would I have it again? Yes.
Senator:But am I gonna go pursue this? Is this something I need to have? No. And that's what I really like about the whole numbers. And the same thing with a nine and a 10.
Senator:It's like a nine is an outstanding score, but when someone gives it a 10, like, that's saying at that price point for what that was trying to do, it was perfect. And we do have disagreements when some give something a nine and others a 10, and we feel
Gizmo:disagreements we give something a nine and the other guy gives it a nine. Correct.
Senator:Some for the wrong reasons.
Bam Bam:Correct. I think the whole number essentially forces the dialogue to develop. And I think
Gizmo:the thing that I believe that we have done, and we've kind of figured out how to do, is incorporate a little bit of what that I wanna call it a lounge experience or the community experience and sitting with your friends and smoking the same cigar, what that feels like. I feel like that is in all of our ratings, you know, individually. And I think we've kind of said it all the time. Even when we disagree, most of the time, I don't think the formal wizard rating lies. The FLR
Chef Ricky:is always
Gizmo:The FLR is always is fair and accurate. Even if we're arguing, it always ends up being when I look at the ratings of all the cigars we've smoked on this podcast, I don't think many I would go back and change.
Bam Bam:Is it fair?
Grinder:Is it just?
Gizmo:Yes. It is fair. It
Bam Bam:is just.
Gizmo:It is fair. It is just.
Bam Bam:What do think? Agreed. I agree.
Grinder:Yeah. I think no one wants to do all that
Gizmo:math, especially me, you know? Because I'd the one doing it.
Grinder:That's not part of what you know, that's not part of
Gizmo:what we're You don't wanna run
Senator:a spreadsheet first grader? No.
Bam Bam:I work in spreadsheets all day. No PowerPoint. We're not looking to do that.
Chef Ricky:We'd all have
Grinder:to I think I think that would deteriorate the overall experience and would would be. Yeah, it just it's there's there's too many other emotional factors that go into the score that you can't put a waiting on. And the X factor comment that you mentioned something I would have, you know, I echo if you hadn't said it, I would have said it. So
Chef Ricky:yeah, the only way I could even see that remotely working is if we have all like iPad minis in front of us and we're punching in our scores and you see it on a remote app what we're doing and you could spit out that number, but that just takes us out of the lounge experience.
Gizmo:Do you think Pagoda would charge his iPad before we record?
Chef Ricky:I think Pagoda would lose it on the way. Exactly.
Senator:Our iPad budget would be, like,
Bam Bam:$20,000 just replacing Pagodis every week.
Gizmo:Well, I do love hearing from listeners on this. And listen, if we get the right email, the right idea, maybe it'll prompt some change. But I really believe right now, and I'm not being stubborn, and I don't think we're being stubborn, I do think that the formal lizard rating works out pretty damn close to how all of us are feeling. Even when we disagree, I do think the pagoda nailing down that we're giving it whole numbers, not decimals, ended up being really good for the show. Correct.
Gizmo:And I think for the listeners out there. So I'm gonna stand by that for now, boys. Alright, boys. We're coming now to the end of the second third on the my father laid Bijou nineteen twenty two in torpedo box press and the Gram's twenty year Tawny Porte. What's everybody think of the pairing right now?
Bam Bam:I love the cigar. I think there isn't a single rough edge on this thing. The aroma is fantastic. I get a little cocoa in it, and it's not harsh at all. The retrohale for me is still very velvety and smooth.
Bam Bam:I still get this dark chocolate, but for me now, as I enter the final third, a touch of minerality has entered, which I don't mind. It's still very elegant and smooth. It's, I think, stepped up in body a bit.
Chef Ricky:Are you finding the hay to make a reintroduction now from earlier on from
Bam Bam:the No, not yet.
Chef Ricky:I feel like I'm getting some hair. Maybe it's presenting as minerality.
Bam Bam:Could be. That's what I'm getting a touch of. Not a lot.
Chef Ricky:Yeah, not a lot of it.
Grinder:I would to use the word again, echo, it's definitely leveling up in body, I guess.
Bam Bam:But maybe just a notch. Not a lot.
Gizmo:I do think the bitterness has faded for me. I I I don't think that bitter chocolate thing that we were talking about
Bam Bam:It was never bitter for me.
Gizmo:It was like a bitter dark chocolate. Like, on the scale of dark chocolate, would push it more to like the higher percentage dark chocolate. In the And first third at I think in the second third here, it's kind of
Bam Bam:I happen to love that, but
Gizmo:I do too, but I just think it's changed a little bit
Senator:for For me in the second third, it's less chocolate like we were getting in the first third, and more like coffee espresso type notes. Well, I guess espresso was present early on. Now for me, it's like coffee, and there's like maybe a little cream. It's not like a dark, you know, coffee bean. It's like a brewed coffee with some cream that's like
Bam Bam:Easy drinking coffee?
Senator:Yeah. And and it's so enjoyable still. It's awesome. Even with a little bit more body, it's not It's aggressive at
Bam Bam:fantastic.
Grinder:Rooster would say this would go great with a cup of coffee.
Gizmo:He'd probably be drinking coffee.
Bam Bam:I actually think it would be great with a dark cup of coffee. No doubt. I'm not sure if I'd have this in the morning or lunchtime for me.
Gizmo:Is this an after dinner cigar for you guys?
Bam Bam:For me, it is.
Gizmo:Based on I'm I'm saying not just in flavor, but I'm also saying based on how you map out your rotation that we've talked about so many times, you know, and where would you slot this?
Bam Bam:I'm not the right guy to comment on this. I've haven't smoked a midday cigar in a very, very, very long time. So I probably wouldn't for me just because of habit.
Gizmo:But you used to. I used to.
Senator:If you were on the road somewhere, I feel like you'd pop in a cigar place.
Bam Bam:Yeah. That's true. But I'd always go, well, honestly, I've done Padrons and all that other. Yeah, maybe I'll take that back. I think I could
Senator:I know Bev's life better than he does.
Bam Bam:After a lunch with a coffee, I think this would be pretty nice.
Gizmo:What an about face.
Bam Bam:Yeah, mean, it's so smooth. There's not a single rough edge on it. So yeah, maybe a midday cigar, this could be a good candidate for that.
Gizmo:I think the moments where I would reach for this midday would be probably only when I was in a situation where I was trying to find a cigar at a brick and mortar place where I didn't have my own stuff or I wasn't near something that I knew maybe I'd reach for this. But to me right now, where I map this out in my brain, it would be later in my day, probably after dinner.
Bam Bam:Yeah, me too.
Gizmo:That's probably where
Bam Bam:I would put. I'd do it there too, of course.
Senator:I don't think anyone would disagree. That's the obvious place for this, but I think to Bam's point, it it is so smooth for how flavorful and full in flavor it is that like
Bam Bam:You can pull that in earlier in
Senator:the day. You could. Yeah. And you know, maybe in the afternoon if you're like, I'm not gonna be able to have a cigar later in the evening
Bam Bam:Oh, so for sure.
Senator:And you just want like one really flavorful rich experience, like, you could absolutely have this. It's not gonna kick you around, and you're gonna leave super satisfied.
Chef Ricky:Yeah. Yeah. I I think after steak dinner is the perfect time for this. I think the darkness of the wrapper, the richness of this wrapper, psychologically for me, it's hard to pull it out midday.
Bam Bam:Well, I think that's how most Have you ever
Senator:had an exclusive in an afternoon?
Chef Ricky:I can't say that I have. Maybe a winter afternoon where the sun goes down earlier, but I can't see myself smoking this like, you know.
Bam Bam:But now that you know the cigar, regardless of how dark it is, but knowing its smoothness could be a candidate for midday I
Chef Ricky:don't know why, I still have a hard time, but don't know if its reputation or, you know, what it used to be. But yeah, I I based on flavored. Yeah, there's no wrong time for this. Mhmm. I
Senator:could see except the morning,
Chef Ricky:for rooster or not. I could see rooster drinking this in
Bam Bam:the morning
Chef Ricky:with a cup of coffee. But, yeah, I I mean, with all that said, things perform well. It's smoking well. It tastes great. It's nothing like what we all thought this was gonna be.
Chef Ricky:So it's it's over delivering.
Gizmo:I would say too for listeners who smoke primarily stronger cigars, Nicaraguan cigars, the the folks who love those, you know, pepper bomb spicy stuff. This might be at the front of their rotation. That's true. You know, for that kind of smoker. I mean, we're smoking, you know, Honduran, Cuban, Dominican.
Gizmo:We're we're kinda mapping out our our sessions.
Bam Bam:But I could start my session with this as well.
Senator:I could too.
Bam Bam:And I'm not I had I haven't chased a cigar like that in fifteen years.
Senator:I would just say anywhere I would slot a Pedronix Lusivo, I could smoke this in its place if I didn't have one because it's that smooth for how flavorful it is.
Gizmo:So senator, I wanna talk about your travels. You just went to Panama again.
Senator:Oh,
Gizmo:yeah. You were raving about your experience in Panama.
Chef Ricky:Yeah, baby. Yeah.
Chef Ricky:Yeah, baby. Yeah.
Gizmo:So Lizard Johnny. Lizard Johnny. So I was hoping that you could share with, you know, listeners and the rest of the guys who haven't heard it here some of the stuff you were telling me, especially about the food hospitality and the experience.
Senator:Yeah, I'm just gonna say, this is my third straight year visiting Panama. I'm a 100% gonna retire there. I'm like in love with Panama. Damn. Every place you visit Sorry, Dominican Republic.
Senator:Every place you visit, you know, no matter how great it is, there's always some trade off. It's just natural. Right? It's like, oh, this place has all these things, but it's inconvenient to get to certain things you might wanna do, or I love this place, but it's not really the safest. I wouldn't necessarily go there alone or be out at night, you know, with a small group.
Senator:In Panama, to my just shock, like, there's not a single trade off there. Panama City, everything you could possibly want is incredibly accessible. Including the canal. Sorry. Gizmo's favorite.
Senator:It's so cheap and affordable. I mean, you know, you can have at a five star hotel there, a beautiful suite for like a $150 a night. It's crazy. Uber there. Like, literally anywhere I would need to go in Panama City, my Uber is between 2 and $5 US.
Senator:It's insane. You can't go from the front door of the retail shop here to the front door of the member lounge here
Gizmo:for $2 No. Or $5.
Senator:No. Correct.
Chef Ricky:And it's five feet away.
Bam Bam:Yeah. Exactly. It's insane. It's crazy. It's unbelievable.
Senator:It's insane. The food there is amazing. I would literally go as far as saying Panama City is one of the best food cities in the world. I mean, the diversity of cuisine there, I mean
Bam Bam:Is it primarily Latina based foods and
Senator:It's everything. I mean, like, Panamanian food, it's like a lot of ceviche, fish, patacones, which is like tostones that we would eat in Cuba.
Bam Bam:Like that, man.
Senator:It's got a lot of that, but you can find I was stunned. My last night in Panama, I went to a Japanese place called Makoto that's like five minutes from the hotel that I was walking from the hotel I normally stay at. It was some of the best sushi I have had anywhere in the world. Jesus. Like crazy.
Senator:I got like some bluefin tuna, nigiri, some toro. Not cheap, like for Panama prices, this place was pricier, but unbelievable. Like melt in your mouth, incredible quality fish. The food scene there, I'm telling you, is spectacular. They have and I think the the chef there like earned a Michelin star somewhere else that he was before.
Senator:They have places with like these amazing tasting menus. I did one last year when I was there. The place I wanted to go this time, they were booked up, I couldn't get in. I'm hoping that next time I go. But it's like a 12 course tasting menu for like a $150
Bam Bam:Holy moly.
Senator:I mean, The US, that would be like a 300 to $500 experience.
Grinder:Easily fantastic.
Senator:That's crazy. The other thing about Panama, I mean, we're obviously we really love rum. The rum in Panama is incredible. So we did on the pod the Mariolita, the eighteen year. We love that.
Senator:That rum is made
Gizmo:in Panama. Don Pancho is the blender of that. Correct?
Senator:Yes. Now the crazy thing is I'm in the LCDH in Panama City, and this guy walks in, and he's asking for this rum called, like, Don Pancho something. I hear this. I'm like, I've not heard of a brand, Don Pancho. We know Marilita, but not a stand alone brand.
Senator:And he's giving the owner's son a hard time about not having this bottle, and then he's like, I'm just kidding. He says, that's my brand. So I'm over here. That's it. He now my take is he's an investor in this brand.
Senator:And so I briefly chat with the guy, and he's like, have you had the Don Pancho eighteen year? Like, I've never had it. So I get a glass. It was so delicious. And then I'm understanding that, like, this Don Pancho guy is the Marilita guy.
Senator:He, you know, came from Cuba, blends Cuban style rum, made Marilita, created his own brand. I think they have three expressions in their line, and it's like smooth, Cubanesque, but super flavorful, balanced, like not overly sweet, just delicious quality rum. I mean, even in Panama, the like the local kind of rail rum like in Cuba, what would be like Havana Club is Abuelo. The Abuelo seven year, it's awesome. It's like its own version of like Havana Club seven year.
Senator:So from all that
Bam Bam:Did you say Abuelo?
Senator:Who's then? Correct.
Gizmo:He's not here, so we gotta bust his balls.
Senator:So it's like the the food, the the rum, the cigars, they've got a great LCDH there. And and it's funny because the guy that owns it, he's this older guy, man of very few words. Every time I'm in there, he'll say hi, but that's about it. And he, for the first time, like, came up to me while I sitting there smoking a cigar. I was smoking a Juan Lopez number one.
Senator:And he's like, how are you? I'm like, good. We're talking in Spanish. He doesn't speak much English. And he's like, Were you here last December?
Senator:You were talking Spanish?
Bam Bam:Yeah. Whole trip. I speak in Spanish from these places. Wow. Yeah.
Bam Bam:Impressive. He's seen me in action.
Gizmo:Big dog.
Chef Ricky:He's gonna
Bam Bam:roll his eyes by
Gizmo:the way.
Senator:He says, Were you here last December? I'm like, You have a really good memory. I'm like, yeah, was. This is my third straight December that I've come here to visit. And I said, where are you from?
Senator:And he says Cuba. I'm like, where in Cuba? He says, I grew up in Havana. We start talking about Cuba. His son and daughter were there.
Senator:I mean, we had such a great conversation. And it just the thing I really really appreciate culturally in Panama, when you go to Cuba, everybody's Cuban. You go to Dominican Republic, everyone's Dominican. In Panama, it is a melting pot of Latin America. It's like New York.
Senator:Mhmm. You meet Panamanians, you meet Venezuelans, you meet Colombians, you meet Cubans, people from all over the place, and there's something so cool about that for me. The other thing I'll say, and I'll wrap up this monologue about how much I love Panama, it's incredibly safe. I love that, you know, I can be there by myself, out and about, any time of day, never have to worry. You see people wearing $30,000 watches and not at all, you know, concerned that they're gonna get robbed or anything like that.
Senator:Now obviously, there are not nice parts of Panama City, but anywhere that you would really spend time, you don't have to worry. Now there's definitely a police and military presence. They enforce it, and they make sure that there's no trouble there. There's a casino in two hotels there. Like when you go in, they wand you with a metal detector.
Senator:Like, they don't mess around.
Bam Bam:You gotta like that.
Senator:It's always very funny when I walk in with my cigar case, they're always like, what's inside there? I open up, I'm like, just just cigars. One of the hotels there, they have this amazing it's like an outdoor patio. It's off of the 3rd Floor, right off the casino. There's two three hundred inch TV screens.
Senator:300? No joke. At each end, playing all American football games that you could possibly wanna see, college or NFL. There's a full length bar that runs along it. They've got 10 more, like, 55 inch screens above the bar.
Senator:Wow. It is the greatest place to watch sports I have found anywhere in the world, tops anywhere in The US. You can smoke cigars, order food, order drinks. Everything you can want is there. That's crazy.
Gizmo:How do the TVs compare to the North Korea lounge?
Bam Bam:It's like a post It's movie.
Gizmo:Michael Scott
Bam Bam:with the Correct. LCD. Let me get my spectacles out.
Senator:So for all those reasons, I really just can't say enough. And Casco Viejo, which is the old city it's like Panama City's version of Old Havana. Like, it is so beautiful. Like, all the buildings are painted different colors. Like, it's what Old Havana probably looked like in its heyday, but bigger and nicer.
Senator:And like I said, I
Bam Bam:just crumbling?
Senator:No. Not crumbling. It's a special place. I I highly recommend anybody that's even remotely thought about visiting, or if you've never thought of visiting it, I certainly had it until Pagoda went and told me about it. It it's just spectacular.
Senator:You can mention speeches. You can do so many things there.
Gizmo:You mentioned smoking the Juan Lopez Leccio number one, which you're not a big fan of that cigar. Pretty loud on this podcast not loving that cigar and that marker. So you went into an LCDH there, picked it up, and what was that like?
Senator:So it was very surprising because normally, that LCDH is super well stocked. Like, anytime I've gone there in the past, I've been able to pick up, like, a Ramon Iona specially selected or d four or any of the staples they normally have. This year, they were cleared out, and the guy was telling me, he's like, I'm not gonna basically get the stuff that I would normally buy out of there until, like, Thursday that week, and I was leaving, like, Tuesday or Wednesday, so I had missed that. But from what was available, I picked up a Juan Lopez number one and Port Lauranaga, the PLPC
Gizmo:Yeah.
Senator:The Petite Corona. And both of those are cigars that I don't particularly like, and I said, let me just give it another shot. That Juan Lopez number one, first of all, that guy's humidor. He keeps his stuff really well. Good.
Senator:I mean, it's not wet, it smokes. I mean, I have photos like
Bam Bam:That's rare.
Senator:Stacking dimes the ash, perfect storage. And that Juan Lopez number one had a sweetness to it that for me, the ones I've had in the past was completely lacking. It was like a woodier experience that I had before. It was so well balanced. I loved it.
Senator:I mean, like, it was a nine or a 10. That's how good that was that day.
Gizmo:Yeah.
Senator:And then the PLPC, which I would normally describe as a very earthy, woody cigar, had a faint sweetness that balanced it out, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. So even the cigars down there smoke better.
Gizmo:Nice. And you were saying how welcoming the cigar culture is
Senator:there. Oh my gosh.
Gizmo:You talked about that the last time you went, and you tripled down on it this time.
Senator:A 100%. I mean, most places, some restaurants with outdoor patios, they're very happy to have you smoke out there. So awesome. It is. The fact that they have this unbelievable lounge off this casino that you can smoke cigars.
Senator:There's so many places there that you can enjoy a cigar without a hassle. And my favorite story ever there with cigars is just me sitting at a restaurant on their patio, another table complaining about my cigar smoke. And I actually felt bad. I'm not trying to disturb anyone while they're eating.
Gizmo:Mhmm.
Senator:And I asked them if it was okay. They told me it was. And the woman comes over and she's like Did
Gizmo:you shoot him with his hand?
Bam Bam:You know
Gizmo:how this really went bad.
Bam Bam:Oh, I've seen that.
Senator:No. No. Not here. Not here. I love the
Bam Bam:people. Somewhere else.
Gizmo:To us. Correct.
Bam Bam:Not nice.
Senator:And the hostess comes over, and she goes, you don't need to move. Goes She over to their table and she says, if the cigar smoke's bothering you, you can move and find another
Bam Bam:drink. Wow. I was blown apart. Prioritizing the cigar.
Gizmo:We we talked about customer service a couple weeks ago. That's customer service.
Bam Bam:A plus. I love that. That's huge.
Senator:So for all those reasons, that's my retirement plan.
Bam Bam:Alright. It's very nice.
Gizmo:Love it.
Bam Bam:Well, you gotta get over there.
Gizmo:Yeah. I I wish I was able to make it this year, but I just wasn't. So hopefully, in 2026, we'll be able to pull it off. Alright, boys. Let's move on now.
Gizmo:Let's go to another listener email. This one is from lizard l b cigars. Speaking of Portugal Port, hey, lizards. This is l b cigars writing from Portugal. I've been reflecting a lot on this topic lately, and the dramatic developments finally pushed me to reach out to you guys.
Gizmo:I'd really love to hear your take on it when you discuss this. On January 3, The United States captured Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro and his wife. By the time this hits your podcast, and we talked about this last week, of course, I'm sure a ton more will have unfolded. My big question is about the potential ripple effects on Cuba and specifically on the Cuban cigar industry. Venezuela has been Cuba's closest ally and economic lifeline for years as we talked about last week, providing heavily subsidized oil that keeps the regime afloat.
Gizmo:With Maduro gone, that support could collapse quickly, potentially destabilizing the Cuban government and opening the door to real regime change. Even if things get messy or worse in the short term before they improve, I think most of us in the cigar community would agree that a positive regime regime change in Cuba is long overdue. What happens to the Cuban cigar industry in that scenario? Now we touched on this last week, but I wanted to bring this email in because I like these questions. What happens to the cigar industry in that scenario?
Gizmo:What is your view on the most likely outcome? And would Habanos SA and or Tabakuba get dismantled or privatized? Could the famous brands Cohiba, Monte Cristo, Bartagas, etcetera, end up with new private owners or maybe other international companies? Or worse, are we looking at the possible end of truly 100% pure Cuban cigars as we've known them for decades? And what about new world cigars?
Gizmo:Do you expect that if Cuban producers start paying higher wages after some kind of regime change, new world cigar prices would then go up too? I'm super curious about your thoughts on the best case and worst case scenario for us cigar lovers. Thanks for reading this and sharing your insights. Best regards, Lizard LB cigars.
Bam Bam:Great email.
Gizmo:Great email and a lot of questions there. And a lot of question marks around this situation going on.
Bam Bam:Yeah. I personally can't see the cigar industry collapsing.
Gizmo:I agree with you on that.
Bam Bam:Could there be a shift in in in structure? Maybe. And a shift in ownership? That's a big question. That's difficult to answer.
Bam Bam:But I think there could be a production issue for a short time, and then they relapse back into production. Who knows? But I can't see them abolishing it or it going away. Impossible.
Senator:I completely agree. One
Bam Bam:thing that's possible that's interesting, if a new regime comes in and becomes a democratized country, maybe you can pick up a Padron there. You can pick up something else. Maybe other makers can end up there.
Gizmo:Or conversely, maybe if that happens and something changes, Cuban tobacco is now being exported to the factories that we talk about smoking with New World cigars, and now they're incorporating Cuban tobacco
Bam Bam:I hope that does not happen.
Gizmo:With Honduran and Dominican and Nicaragua. I'm not making an opinion on it, but it is very positive.
Bam Bam:I don't know. I wouldn't like to hear that. Well, let's see. It's an export,
Grinder:and it's a valuable export. And if you have free trade,
Bam Bam:it's But they're probably barely able to keep up with production now. They're not able to produce.
Grinder:But if you have the resources,
Bam Bam:and you're not constrained by resources
Gizmo:And
Bam Bam:you need the cash fast. True.
Grinder:It's kind of a crazy question because who the hell knows?
Senator:I'll just say this. I I I don't see anything meaningfully or dramatically changing about the cigar industry in Cuba no matter what
Bam Bam:happens there. I agree with
Grinder:that.
Senator:And the reason I say this is because to me, any notion that, like, Cuba will ever democratize, I I don't buy. Mhmm. I think the thing that's been most shocking to me when I've visited Cuba, especially like talking to like locals I don't know well, like cab drivers, just people you meet, and I'm always just curious to kind of pick their brain. And I vividly remember conversations with cab drivers about like and I was shocked. Like, obviously, they're railing on the Cuban government and talking about like democracy and socialism.
Senator:And every single time, you would think like they're railing on this failed socialist experiment in Cuba, but they also are not at all comfortable with full scale capitalism moving to an entirely democratic capitalist setup. And for them, the best I've heard is like, Well, we element, want half of the socialist system we have, and maybe half of capitalism, but capitalism in and of itself is horrible. So I just think culturally, it is impossible that anyone ever comes to power there that is looking to build this capitalistic society Cuba, I just don't see
Gizmo:It's not gonna be the godfather.
Senator:Right.
Gizmo:You know? I just don't
Senator:see that happening. And so for all those reasons, I really think, obviously tobacco is so valuable for their economy, I don't see no matter what happens, that meaningfully changes. I think the best parts of what will change hopefully is that workers will have better conditions Lifestyle, health. Health, wages will increase, all those things
Bam Bam:which Consistency will power. Yeah.
Senator:Yes, which will produce a better product. But as far as exporting tobacco or privatizing the brands, I
Bam Bam:really don't
Gizmo:see that.
Bam Bam:I don't see that either.
Gizmo:I see best case scenario though being exactly what you just said. Best case scenario from where we sit, I I speak for all of us. I think best case scenario is that the Cuban people do have a voice in their own future. I think that would be a good thing, whatever that looks like for them. And two, for cigars, exactly what you just said, that the people manufacturing, producing, their hands are making this.
Gizmo:You know, they're 151 sets of hands go into every single cigar from seed to when it's put on the retail shelf, right? So those people actually having a better experience in Cuba and not all that money being distributed to people outside of Cuba, that would be best case scenario.
Bam Bam:I kind of feel like the best case scenario for me would be to see it go back to pre Castro regime lifestyle. If you look at old clips and old videos, streets are bustling. People were happy. There was lot of commerce taking place. Kind of what you described, senator, a combination of things, certain types of control, and then release of control in other areas.
Bam Bam:That's what it felt like to me in the fifties. It's a possibility.
Gizmo:Yeah. Mean, at this point, it's like anything is possible. Yeah. And it's such a crazy situation going on with the power and everything else.
Bam Bam:Well, that's a huge problem, and a massive investment's gonna be And required for
Gizmo:we've talked about this. Massive. When we've talked about walking through Havana, when we've been there, I mean, you kind of threw around figures and numbers, but I mean, to bring Cuba infrastructure up to I wouldn't even say modern.
Chef Ricky:Who's gonna pay
Gizmo:for A decent level. You're talking trillions of dollars, right? Yeah.
Bam Bam:Have to do higher power. Sure. For example, the city itself, it's gonna be in the billions to build a new grid and to generate power. And it's probably gonna be generator, which can either be run on oil, coal, or renewable energy. That's an expensive infrastructure and a lot of engineering.
Bam Bam:Who's gonna pay for
Gizmo:that? And to do that for eight, nine, ten million people island wide, it's crazy. Mean, your point,
Senator:China's already invested billions of dollars in solar that they're allegedly building in Cuba. Are they
Gizmo:really? Just for solar.
Bam Bam:Are they building in Billions, yeah.
Senator:Wow. They claim by like 2030, they'll have x megawatts they'll be able to produce in solar.
Bam Bam:That's incredible. But the problem is how do you distribute it on that archaic grid? Totally. That's the problem.
Gizmo:I just hope that whatever happens here, that it's limited suffering for the Cuban people. I'm I'm hoping that whatever happens that their lives can be better. And selfishly, of course, in answering the the questions that so many listeners have and cigar smokers have, Hopefully, the cigar industry can continue to make great Cuban cigars and take care of the people who are doing it, improve the quality, you know, and just all of those things can be better. Yeah. The business is there.
Gizmo:It's just it's not run right.
Bam Bam:Yeah, and there's no opportunity for the citizens, so creating opportunities for them to
Senator:Yeah, they simply need to be able to make a living Right. I mean, it is outrageous that there is not a single job in Cuba that pays a living wage. Correct.
Gizmo:Yeah.
Senator:The only way people live is finding all these odds and ends, you know, jobs to make ends meet. There's no, like, singular job. Oh, I'm gonna be a doctor. I'm gonna drive a cab. I'm gonna roll cigars.
Senator:They can't live on
Bam Bam:what they're paid. Doctors are waiters in Cuba.
Gizmo:So they're driving taxis.
Bam Bam:Restore the professional industries, restore the legal system, restore the medical system, restore
Gizmo:the Restore the currency.
Bam Bam:Well, when you restore the currency, you're gonna restore the financial system, which then requires your financial houses to be there, accountants, CPAs. So it creates a robust environment.
Gizmo:Yeah. It's tough situation. And again, we're just kind of throwing the magic eight ball around right now and seeing what comes up.
Bam Bam:Mean, who
Gizmo:knows what's going
Bam Bam:happen seems unattainable.
Gizmo:It's, you know, it seems very out of reach. Let's see what happens. Well, let's go to another story while we're on this because this is crazy, and we've talked about this guy before. But Chen Ji, who we've talked about, the famous pig butchering fella. Yep.
Gizmo:Who was running massive scam organizations in Cambodia targeting pretty much every country that has any money anywhere in the world.
Bam Bam:I think I've gotten their phone calls.
Gizmo:Specifically The United States, Europe and China issued indictments, etcetera. And Chengdu is a majority owner in Habanos SA alongside the Cuban government. And he was arrested
Senator:Well, he's a minority owner. He's the largest aside from the Cuban government. Correct.
Gizmo:I'm sorry. Exactly. He's the largest single non Cuban government owner of Habanos. And he was arrested in Cambodia and deported to China. Uh-oh.
Gizmo:And I watched his perp walk. Okay? They had a bag over his head walking him through like this dude is definitely in trouble.
Bam Bam:You can see his face.
Gizmo:Yeah. I mean, they took it off to show the camera that it was him and then they put it back
Bam Bam:on. That's important.
Gizmo:I mean, it it it was a crazy perp walk that I mean
Senator:they do have due process, though.
Gizmo:That was the funniest thing said tonight.
Bam Bam:So so,
Gizmo:of course, we discussed in October and November, the United States Attorney's Office in the Eastern District Of New York put out an indictment against him saying that he stole $15,000,000,000 or more. They confiscated a bunch of crypto, etcetera. You know, criminal enterprise engaging in a pig butchering scam. Of course, I think a lot of those proceeds ended up being what allowed him to purchase a good piece of Habanos. But what's crazy here is that Halfwheel and I wanna shout out Charlie Manato at Halfwheel.
Gizmo:This dude put together a brilliant report that nobody had heard about of how this same guy is affecting the cigar industry outside of Cuba as well, including in The United States, causing major problems for Altadis and Tabaklari USA here in The United States. And the reason why is after Charlie Manato's massive report, and I encourage everybody to go check this out on halfwheel.com. Major, major shout out to these guys. It says here, as we reported last month, Chen Xie has extensive ties to the global handmade cigar business as he became the largest shareholder of the assets formerly owned by Imperial Brands. In 2020, the British cigarette company Imperial Brands, of course, sold its handmade cigar portfolio, which included the following.
Gizmo:A 50% stake in Habanos SA. So we knew that already. Stakes in every local Habanos SA distributor. Let's earmark that. We're gonna come back to that.
Gizmo:Wow. Come back to that in a second. 100% of Tabaclera USA, Altadis USA, Casa de Monte Cristo, JR cigar, Santa Clara. 100% of Tabaclera SL. 99.9% of Tabaclara de Garcia, which is one of the biggest manufacturing facilities.
Gizmo:They employ 2,000 people at that factory. And 100% of another massive factory called La Flor de Copan. Okay? So now what's crazy about this is that because of these ownership things and the sanctions against him, Altadis cannot import cigars made at Tabaclera de Garcia or La Flor de Copan. So we're talking all non Cuban Monte Cristo, Romeo y Julieta.
Gizmo:Massive, massive amounts of cigars cannot be imported to The United
Bam Bam:States. Okay.
Gizmo:But I'm saying JR Cigar, Altadis, all of these places
Bam Bam:are fucking
Gizmo:massive amounts of cigars unable to be imported because this guy's the owner. Unbelievable. And what's wild too now is they're saying the Taboclar de Garcia, which is one of the most prominent manufacturing facilities for cigars, might never reopen. Now with him arrested and in custody in China, I mean and I don't think it's looking very good for him if we're you know, senator joked before. It's not looking good for him being in China.
Gizmo:He'd have
Bam Bam:a much better time in
Gizmo:The United States than he did getting deported to China. Okay? Yeah. He's not gonna have a fun time in 2026 over there. It's wild how this guy took his scam money and absolutely infiltrated every aspect of this industry that we live in.
Gizmo:Unbelievable. And it's crazy that the people the people were willing to do business with this guy and his organizations and the people that work for him.
Bam Bam:Were they aware?
Gizmo:I I don't know if you can claim ignorance here, Bam. This is pretty significant.
Bam Bam:I mean, every contract that you sign, you're not a felon or an illegal, you know, a criminal. You're not gonna know you're signing with a criminal, will you?
Grinder:What the hell is a pig butchering scheme?
Bam Bam:Oh, let's go into this. You gotta
Gizmo:It's okay. So we talked about this at Lent. It's a it's a pretty crazy term. The idea is it's a long term scam. Instead of it being a short term scam where it's like, get them on the phone, take their money and run.
Gizmo:Send them to Walgreens to buy gift cards, charge them up, steal the gift cards and run. What these people do, these pig butchering things, is it's a long term thing. So they, especially during COVID, were reaching out to people, finding lonely people, pretending to be whatever that person needed at that time. If it was a love interest, a friend, an investor, whatever, pretending to be these people. And what they call the pig butchering is they take the pig, fatten them up over time, and then once they get access to their accounts, emails, information, all this stuff, they butcher them, they clear them out.
Gizmo:So you're talking people have lost millions of dollars, tens of millions of dollars. One bank, I forget what state it was, in Kansas or something, the CEO was caught up in this wired like $50,000,000 out and the bank collapsed. And the FDIC had to come in and guarantee the accounts. So he is one of the biggest perpetrators of this of all time. And like I said, the $15,000,000,000 seizure that the United States Department of Justice did was the biggest of all time, and it was on him.
Gizmo:Wow. So when you have The United States and China and Europe on your ass, like, you're you're a pretty big jerk off. Yeah. You know, you're you're doing some pretty bad shit. The entire world Yeah.
Gizmo:Is all over you. So and getting back to the cigar piece of it. I mean, the idea that that this guy has affected the Cuban cigar industry, Europe is not happy with Habanos right now, we'll talk about that in a second, affecting the American cigar industry, international cigar industry where you can't move cigars around because of sanctions. This guy has really messed things up.
Bam Bam:I wonder those companies may have to reimburse that money or refund it back to some government agency that's controlling his funds, I'm guessing.
Gizmo:I have no idea how this is going work. Can't keep that money. People have been positing online since he got arrested, does the Chinese government going to seize all his assets? Are they going to be the new owner in Habanos? Are they going to try to sell that off?
Bam Bam:I don't think you can do that.
Gizmo:I mean, who knows what you can do in China, Bam? You're not in New
Bam Bam:York City. Well, are agreements you're signing with fail safes built into them. I would think I don't
Gizmo:think that applies in China. Senator?
Bam Bam:Yeah. I don't know.
Senator:Don't think it's the same.
Gizmo:Probably not. I think it's probably a little different. Now one more thing that's pretty wild is that a Swedish cigar club has a blog that we talked about. I I discussed this a while ago where the Swedes discovered that Chenji was a major shareholder in the distributor of Habanos cigars in Sweden. Sweden now has banned Habanos SA from doing business in the entire country.
Gizmo:So Habanos SA cannot bring cigars into Sweden cigar Cuban cigars right now till they figure this stuff out. There are no Cuban cigars coming into Sweden right now. So I think that there's gonna be a domino effect falling here, especially throughout Europe.
Bam Bam:Deep discounts. I
Gizmo:just can't believe one guy, one guy was able to do all this.
Senator:He's gonna make a hell of a Netflix documentary.
Bam Bam:Oh, yeah. And a great movie.
Gizmo:Great movie. For it. 38 year old Cambodian Chinese guy did all of this.
Bam Bam:Missed money, Penny. Get my flights ready, please.
Gizmo:I mean, is it not the craziest story? Wow. Like think about the year, the six months that Habanos SA has had between the prison rolling stuff. That's This guy Brutal. Now being arrested, now that ownership share is up in the air, now think about what Cuba's going through.
Gizmo:I can't believe how this entire thing has really come this micro focus like a laser on cigars.
Senator:So are we gonna start, like, a GoFundMe with Lizard Nations so we can buy that steak in a Benel's S. A? Correct.
Gizmo:You think we can raise about 3,000,000,000? So, I mean, this is just a crazy story. I I just can't believe how this has turned out. And like the Cuba story, the developments on this just keep coming and keep coming. So as I always say, we'll keep you updated, especially as it relates to the Cuban people and Cuban cigars.
Gizmo:And now the Altanis USA, Tabaclera USA cigars that are affected by this. I mean
Bam Bam:That's a big deal.
Gizmo:A lot of people lost their jobs, you know, at Taboclaro de Garcia because of this. There's there's no mechanism to get those cigars unsanctioned. Like, I don't know if they're gonna have to trash them, throw them out. I'm curious if any of the aging room stuff is affected. I I I'm really curious how this is gonna play out.
Gizmo:So keep your eye on it, boys. We got a lot of interesting cigar stuff happening.
Bam Bam:Crazy. Wow.
Gizmo:So before we get to our ratings portion of the program tonight, boys, we have to do one more email, and this email is gonna be our lizard of the week presented by Bond Roberts. And our lizard of the week this week is gonna be lizard Tyler, and he's gonna win a 10 count box of cigars from Bon Roberts like Lizard Jose was talking about before. Every week, a lizard of the week, thanks to Bon Roberts, wins a 10 count box of those amazing cigars. So thanks to them, and congratulations to our friend Lizard Tyler, this week's Lizard of the Week. And he writes, first, I'd like to thank you all for this podcast.
Gizmo:I truly appreciate the honest takes on cigars that go way beyond the maybe influenced takes on cigars at some of the bigger websites and magazines. I truly find your insights to cigars to be helping me along in my journey, as I've started enjoying this hobby seriously for the first time after spending many years just blindly smoking a few cigars here and there. First, a recent writer asked about honey notes in cigars, and I had a cigar on Christmas day that sings honey from start to finish as a primary flavor note with the other flavors dancing in and out. So I'd like to say first that despite my bias against honey, I did name lizard Tyler lizard of the week this week. So I want that noted Noted.
Gizmo:On the record here.
Bam Bam:It's in the ledger.
Gizmo:Thank you. Correct. He's saying to try the Deseret PC by Apostate Cigars. The name fits the smoke as it means honeybee. The question I have this week for the lizards is about Vitolas, as you recently had a Lancero, and I could not wait to listen to that episode as I really prefer smaller ring gauge cigars.
Gizmo:You see that, boys? Correct. All the hell I got in here bringing Lanceros in over you see?
Bam Bam:Another one, boys. That's why you're man of the year. I
Gizmo:feel like I can sense that a lot of the lizards prefer a small ring gauge, but on the pod, and maybe I'm wrong, I feel like there are a lot of Toros and other large ring gauge cigars. I have a couple questions here for you guys. What are some of your favorite Lanceros, Lonsdales, and or Coronas you would recommend? So let's start there, and then I'll go to part two. So what are some of our favorite Lanceros, Lonsdales, and or Coronas that we would recommend?
Bam Bam:Well, you mentioned a few Lancero's earlier. The Don Pepin is excellent.
Gizmo:Don Pepin's great. My father number four, the sister
Chef Ricky:Delicious. To
Bam Bam:Again, those get better and better the longer you hold on to them. Very incredible.
Chef Ricky:The Warped is an oldie but a goodie.
Gizmo:That's a Lonsdale. Yeah, that's a good one. Very good.
Grinder:I smoked a Aleva V before the pod tonight, and I've been smoking
Gizmo:that Oh, for a The Lancero? Yeah. And we talked about this, I don't know how long ago, a couple weeks ago. Kind of four We were 100 talking and about thousand the construction issues where it's a constant relight. Did you have that experience?
Gizmo:Not at all. I'm happy to hear that because I've had a hell of a time with those.
Bam Bam:Okay.
Gizmo:Where it's like constantly fighting them to keep them wet. I think we talked about that, senator.
Senator:Oh, yeah. Just on Lanceras. I mean, my two favorite right now for sure, the Aladino classic Elagante
Bam Bam:Yep.
Senator:And that La Galera did.
Gizmo:Oh, of course. The That is
Bam Bam:so spectacular that La Gallera. It's really special. You gotta try that.
Grinder:I think
Gizmo:we rated that a 10.
Bam Bam:Yeah. Oh, yeah. Resounding.
Gizmo:We talked about it before. The cigar I'm probably smoking the most of right now is the Fabric of Five Lonsdale. The upcoming Bond Roberts Dahlias, which is a Lonsdale type size, I think is fantastic. As far as coronas go, I I really think I only reach for Cubans in that Votola. You know, like the Magnum 46, which we have coming up on the pod.
Gizmo:The Yeah. Juan Lopez Alekcio number one is a Corona Gorda. I love that. Same size as Magnum 46.
Bam Bam:I happen to love that cigar.
Gizmo:Siglo Four is an expensive one out of Cuba. You know, there's there's a lot of cigars of that size that I think I smoke out of Cuba that I don't really smoke.
Grinder:Yeah. You could you could tell it We've done a lot of ratings.
Bam Bam:Yeah. Like True. The ratings.
Gizmo:Check the ratings. We did do a lot of Lanceros. So the reason why we haven't been bringing in a lot of Lanceros is I went on a tear where I think in a half a year, I think we did about 20 Lanceros. So that didn't go over too well around here. I loved it.
Gizmo:So let's go to the second part of his question If anybody has any other Lancero's, Coronas, Lonsdales that come to mind, let's shout them out. But he says, Is there any reason that you don't do many Lancero's, Coronas, and Lonsdales? Is it for smoking time to align with your standard podcast length? Or is it because the American market seems to be making and selling more of those for what feels like a self perpetuating cycle? As always, thank you to the Lizards.
Gizmo:Your pod is something that I look forward to learning from weekly. I find to be hugely educational as I continue on my journey. Thanks so much, Lizard Tyler, our lizard of the week boys.
Chef Ricky:Nice. What episode was it where you got the lovely gift?
Gizmo:That was the end of
Bam Bam:There were many. '24.
Gizmo:End of '24, I think, yeah. Last episode of the year, next to the last
Chef Ricky:I think that episode put the
Gizmo:Few latex based ones No, think End of the year.
Chef Ricky:Yeah, baby. Yeah.
Gizmo:Yeah. So okay. So a couple things. I think I I think the serious answer to that is I did bring in too many Lanceros at the beginning. Number one, we did go on a tear with those.
Gizmo:Think number two, we did. I think all of us kind of moved back to some larger ring gauge cigars. I think we had a lot of good experiences with cigars that were Robusto, Robusto Extra, even some Toros. I'm thinking like the Avowed cigar that we love, the New Dawn in That's a cigar that I smoke today. I mean, it's just fantastic.
Gizmo:So I do think that our preferences have shift back. All jokes aside, I definitely want to be bringing in more Lancero's. If we're going to do a petite Lancero, something smaller, yes, I mean, maybe the consideration is there for how long the smoke is going to be. But I mean, we've had cigars that are robustos that last two hours, we've had Toro extras that last an hour and ten. So a lot of time, you can't even guess how long the cigar is going to smoke.
Gizmo:And a lot of the times we're not smoking these cigars before we come in here. So are there any other factors that you guys think are playing into our decision making here? Obviously, we're getting a lot of listener recommendations of what to smoke, so we're pulling those.
Senator:The only thing I would add is I think for any line of cigars within any brand, there's a Vitola that smokes best, and I think that's what we really look for. Of all the Lanceros that we just named, you know, the Aladino Classic El Agante, I've had that in Robusto, it does not smoke as great as it does in Lancero. Mhmm. That's why we reach for that. Correct.
Senator:So I think, you know, by each line, each cigar, we're optimizing for what's gonna be the best smoking experience regardless of what shape or size it is. We just want the best experience of that cigar.
Bam Bam:That's the case with the La Galera. I haven't had any other Vitola, but I know people that have, they like, they prefer the Lancero.
Gizmo:And to point out what Grindr was saying about the Olivaviv Lancero, we did do the Olivaviv Churchill, which we heard was very good on the podcast and did not perform as well as Lancero. No. And we've smoked some other cigars in that specific line outside of podcasts that did not smoke to that degree. So I think the point that Senator's making that we're talking about here, it's a very good one in that. I think ultimately, we're trying to do a little more research.
Gizmo:We're trying to listen to the noise and kinda pick through it, and find the vitola we think is going to be the one that makes the most sense.
Senator:Like this cigar we're smoking tonight. It's not that we all sat here and said, oh, we only want a torpedo. We've heard that it this cigar smokes best in torpedo. That's why we tried it.
Bam Bam:Yeah. And it did very well. It did very, well.
Gizmo:Alright, boys. We're coming to the end of our evening now with the Gram's twenty year Tawny Port and the My Father Les Bijou 1922 Torpedo Box Press. Any final thoughts here before we move into the ratings tonight?
Chef Ricky:I was really waiting for this to pick up and kind of, you know, kick back with some pepper, and it really hasn't. If anything, the final third here, it got a little sweeter for me and creamier, and that's shocking.
Bam Bam:So you're at about an inch kind of where I am. What are you getting right now?
Chef Ricky:Right now, it dried out just a bit. But prior to It's a little
Bam Bam:chalky now.
Chef Ricky:Yeah, prior to this, I was getting some toffee, some cream. It got really smooth.
Bam Bam:I got a little molasses type thing happening just right before this point.
Chef Ricky:Right now it's kind of dried out. It's definitely ending.
Gizmo:Yeah. I put mine down. I don't think I would go so far as molasses and stuff. I think I would kind of describe my experience. You mentioned earthy.
Gizmo:I think mine kind of moved into a more of an earthy place.
Bam Bam:Well, that's where I am now.
Gizmo:You know, it Earthy, a
Bam Bam:little chalky, a little dry.
Gizmo:It finished nicely. I put it down probably with an inch and a quarter left.
Bam Bam:I
Grinder:would say the flavor profile was pretty consistent.
Bam Bam:Yeah, I think so. From 95% of it for me. Correct. I actually had I put mine down sooner than I would have liked. I had
Senator:a fracture in
Grinder:the wrapper that was causing me some
Bam Bam:trouble. Think it was just The construction was good. The wrapper was good. There was this little tiny
Gizmo:User error? That's what we're going
Grinder:call it? No, no. Was this little tiny,
Bam Bam:know, tear in the wrapper that just kind of got worse with it.
Gizmo:You know what we call this in the electronics in the audio industry? ESO situation. Equipment superior to operator.
Senator:That's what Gizmo says at Best Buy on
Bam Bam:the Geek Squad. Correct. Yeah, when I had my polo on. He said the electronics. When he does house calls.
Gizmo:I kinda do, don't I?
Bam Bam:Yeah. You do.
Gizmo:Alright, boys. Let's go into the formal liquor rating tonight on the Gram's twenty year Tawny Port. Bam bam, you're up.
Bam Bam:I don't wanna be too hard on this thing. I liked it. My palate didn't adjust fully for me to really appreciate it. I've been between a seven and eight the whole time, closer to a seven early on. It's a for me, it always had that touch of medicinal quality to it, which I don't like at all.
Bam Bam:But the flavor was pretty nice, so I'm gonna give it an eight. I do like the nose was aroma was fantastic. I'm not a super fan of Tony Port. I'm being slightly generous with an eight. With an eight?
Bam Bam:Yes. Alright. Grinder. I'm also not
Grinder:a fan of Tony Port.
Gizmo:Didn't you tell me to get it?
Bam Bam:No. Yes. Yes you did. It was me?
Grinder:Yes. Well, to try it.
Bam Bam:User error.
Grinder:ESO. ESO. Maybe to try it. Wow. Because it's highly recommended.
Grinder:But I don't like it. Just it So didn't really do much for me. It was just very sweet, not very complex. I didn't really get any interesting flavor profiles out of it. And I'm giving it a seven.
Gizmo:So I'm going to give it an eight. I thought it was pretty good. My first sip, I would have been at a five, but that was just primitive palette on this. First time really trying it, and then adjusting. I thought it performed very well with the cigar tonight.
Gizmo:I'm not sure how well it would perform with a lot of other cigars. I don't know if I would be reaching for this. But for what it is, for the price, for the time, for the experience, I I thought it was I thought it was pretty good.
Bam Bam:Are there different types of ports? I don't know anything about this. Are there other the Tawny port and a port. And a Ruby.
Chef Ricky:Yeah. So I
Senator:think Ruby and tawny.
Bam Bam:We went out with Ruby and tawny. Okay.
Gizmo:I Bam tuned out during that portion of the program.
Bam Bam:I was enjoying my cigar. Concrete. What was the other one? The stainless steel.
Senator:Stainless steel for ruby and oak barrels for
Bam Bam:I see. Okay. Interesting.
Senator:Now the wild part of this, we're all saying how sweet this is, which I agree with, so ruby's sweeter. Much it's a lot sweeter, that's the crazy part.
Bam Bam:Yeah, and I think that's the port that I've had years and years ago, presidente something, a la presidente, I'm not sure. Deep dark bottle.
Chef Ricky:Yeah, it
Gizmo:was a Ruby
Bam Bam:port. Yeah, really rich, a bit more drinkable for me. Really? Yeah, as sweet as that is compared to this, it didn't have that medicinal quality that I got here. And I think that's maybe the oak barrel that's infusing that.
Bam Bam:Maybe. Not sure.
Senator:We'll we'll do a ruby port Yeah. Because there's a cheap one that a friend of mine who went to Portugal, and then he came back obsessed with port and, like, was drinking this way more than you should. I don't know how you have more than like a couple of glass of this and a month. That's play. But maybe it's a pork called Pinto Ramos.
Senator:We should be able to find it. We can try their
Bam Bam:I'd like to try that. Ruby pork.
Gizmo:Yeah. So for me, it's an eight. I I thought this was pretty good. K. You know, I'm I'm looking forward to trying more.
Gizmo:You know? Duly noted. Do alright, chef.
Chef Ricky:I, you know, I actually enjoyed this. I really liked the sour cherry notes that were coming through. I like its fortification with brandy because it has a cognac like quality to me on the finish, I like. I think it paired well with the cigar. Think it was a very fitting pairing, especially because the cigar leaned a little bit on the drier side at times.
Chef Ricky:But it wasn't sweet to the point where I thought it interfered with the cigar. It didn't overpower the cigar. I think had it been a ruby port where it's just kind of more syrupy and much richer, I
Senator:think it would do that. Everything was not it's not richer. It's just sweeter.
Chef Ricky:It's not thicker. I remember it being thicker. No? Okay. I I for some reason, I remember
Bam Bam:it But
Chef Ricky:yeah. It's been twenty years since I had a ruby boy.
Gizmo:I mean,
Senator:it it may be stickier, but
Bam Bam:that's Well, not twenty years is about the good frequency to drink that
Gizmo:again. I'm not wrong.
Chef Ricky:But with all that aside, I actually really enjoyed this. I think it presented as sophisticated. Think $60 is not a bad price point because this bottle, it's not really something you could drink the entire thing of. It's a good after dinner drink. It's good for a cigar like this.
Bam Bam:Good for a cough.
Chef Ricky:No, I think for me this was a nine.
Bam Bam:Oh, wow.
Gizmo:Yeah, that was a wow. All right, Senator.
Senator:So I'm at an eight. You know, what I like about tawny port, just having had ruby port, is I don't like overly sweet things. So like ruby port for me was just like sugar in a bottle. Mhmm. This is more balanced than that, but still not nearly as balanced as I would like.
Senator:I wish. And you know, should we do some other ports? You know, I think one of the things I'm certainly going to try to scour the internet to find is like a drier tawny port. That would be good. Something, you know, maybe I could enjoy more.
Senator:For me, it definitely worked really well with this cigar exactly like chef said, like this cigar leans on the drier side, so I liked kinda counterbalancing that with this some of the sweetness from the port. You know, in terms of flavor notes with the port, like, I did like that, you know, obviously, you get the fruit and and the you get the fruit in the port, but also, like, a nuttiness that only exists in tawny port. I'm not sure that Graham's is my favorite expression of that. And I wish I knew some of the other, like, brands of Port. I've had, like, you know, I've been in random hotels and they'll do like a port hour or a sherry hour or something like that, and I've tried something and I've had better versions of this.
Senator:I just don't know what brand, so I need to do a little more homework on that. But, you know, it was good for what it is. It's not something I'm gonna stock in my bar. It's not something I'm gonna pursue personally. And I think the only thing that confuses me about this notion that Porton cigars are like this long time pairing, outside of full bodied Nicaraguan cigars, I don't know why I would want to drink a port with just about any other cigar.
Gizmo:Agreed. I'm feeling on that.
Chef Ricky:Agreed. You know who this works for? There's a lot of guys out there that like smoking their cigars with a soda. See Doctor or Coke or things like this.
Gizmo:There's guy in the lounge who crushes a two liter of Pepsi every time he smokes.
Chef Ricky:That's a little too sweet. But yeah, I've seen people many times, they prefer a Doctor Pepper or cream soda or something like that. I think this, with its low alcohol content and its sweet delivery, but it's still, you know, that oakiness brings some interest. I could see someone like that enjoying this over going with a high proof bourbon or something like that.
Senator:And I just say that because it's far easier for me to understand this is an after dinner drink, So if you're, like, almost going to forego dessert, like, this is dessert in glass.
Chef Ricky:Oh, yeah.
Senator:That I get. But the whole, like, cigar piece, for me, it's a subset of cigars that this can work with, but by no means do I think, like, writ large, that port is an ideal pairing with most cigars.
Gizmo:Alright, boys. The formal liquor rating tonight on the Gram's twenty year Tani port is an eight point zero.
Bam Bam:Alright.
Gizmo:And it's time now to move into the formal lizard rating on the My Father Les Bijou 1922 in Torpedo Box Press. Senator, you're up. I don't know the last time I said that.
Senator:Yeah. Senator Golden first.
Gizmo:Was caught off guard.
Bam Bam:Pressure.
Senator:I'm not gonna overthink this. I really can't complain about this cigar. I'm gonna give it a 10.
Bam Bam:There you go.
Gizmo:Wow.
Bam Bam:Yeah. I
Gizmo:am surprised to hear that.
Bam Bam:I am not surprised. I
Senator:really can't. The fact that a cigar with this much flavor, the entire way through was so smooth in delivery, and that's why I stand by. The only thing that this makes me think of is Padron of like how you can deliver that much flavor that smoothly. It's shocking that my father was able to do that.
Chef Ricky:Yep.
Senator:You know, the cigar didn't change much, but I didn't want it to. Like, the flavor notes were awesome, and the changes were subtle in all the right ways. Like, you know, I mentioned before, it was more espresso early on, then it became like some coffee with some cream. You know, the the dark chocolate, that kind of faded. So there were small transitions, but like all the right ones,
Chef Ricky:they were
Senator:all notes that I pursue, and I think most if not all of us in this room pursue in a Nicaraguan cigar. The cigar, it it's a handsome looking cigar before you even light it. Like, I will I still vividly remember just how surprised I was. Like, invisible seams, impeccably rolled, the draw was great. I'm even shocked like I took too much off of my cigar because my experience with torpedoes is you don't take enough off, and you'll end up getting a tar blast that starts, you know, heating up, and you need a more open draw.
Senator:But this was so perfectly rolled, I didn't even need to take off as much as I did, which actually damaged some of the wrappers, started to unravel a little bit. And then the price point, mean, said 12 to $17? Yeah. Depending on where
Gizmo:you find it. Yeah.
Bam Bam:I mean, this is what saying. Cheaper might even find
Gizmo:with the crazy sales that happen. You can always find stuff. And what have we
Senator:smoked this for? Two hours?
Gizmo:This yeah. I think most of us were just a touch, I would say an hour forty five And is the that size torpedo,
Bam Bam:that's Great value.
Gizmo:A
Senator:amount of time. I really can't complain at all at that price point. I'm at a 10.
Bam Bam:I really enjoyed it. I'm not surprised.
Gizmo:Chef.
Chef Ricky:Wow. Yeah, I guess I shouldn't overthink this either because the only thing I have in terms of comparing it to a Padron, cause it is very much like an Eskisevo, the ash build on an Eskisevo is a little bit sturdier.
Senator:Oh, for sure.
Chef Ricky:I'd say the ash here is a little flakier. It was on me at times.
Bam Bam:Well, know, you can rate for what it was, not comparing it if you want.
Chef Ricky:Sure. No.
Bam Bam:Oh. Oh, wow. Because that's what I'm gonna do. I'm just giving you some advice. Bang.
Gizmo:Where's your buzzer?
Bam Bam:You don't have a buzzer.
Chef Ricky:So with that aside, because that was really a minor thing, the flavor didn't suffer, delivery didn't suffer, the body of the smoke didn't suffer. So yeah, think the price point and just overall how we all came into this pod with the preconceived notion or just even the history that we've had with the cigar and the different.
Bam Bam:Were all skeptical.
Chef Ricky:Yeah, we were all nervous. Really, probably not even really looking forward to recording because of the cigar.
Bam Bam:Correct.
Chef Ricky:And it it did a made us do a complete 180. So I think that deserves a 10. There you go. So I'm going to give it a 10. I think I would definitely buy this again.
Chef Ricky:And these cigars are often on sale, to your point. I think, yeah, you'll
Gizmo:be The line's been around a long time. Yeah.
Chef Ricky:And again, there's some merit to be able to find us wherever you go. You know, you find yourself in a brick and mortar or some random smoke shop in the city while you're walking around and you need a cigar and you don't have one, you're probably going to find us there. You might need to bring it down, the touch and humidity, and kudos to you Giz for the magic you've worked on this cigar, because I think that had a big thing to do with it.
Gizmo:Magic. Correct.
Bam Bam:You got some brown on your nose. Man of the year.
Chef Ricky:Wipe your nose. Man, yeah, end of the year.
Bam Bam:You should wipe your nose a little bit. He's got something that's
Chef Ricky:I'm supporter of the year.
Senator:He's such a great roller. I mean, couldn't believe it.
Gizmo:Correct. I made these at home.
Bam Bam:Did you roll them on your thighs?
Chef Ricky:Pluff it between them.
Bam Bam:Oh. Oh. Bad visual.
Chef Ricky:But, yeah, with all that, it's a 10 for me.
Gizmo:So for me, it's not a 10. It's a nine. Alright. I I thought the construction was excellent. I thought the flavor was very, very good.
Gizmo:The cigar from the beginning, it wasn't in my wheelhouse. It performed brilliantly. Construction was great. I thought the combustion was great, But it wasn't the perfect cigar for me. It it honestly, I I would put it closer to a nine point zero than I would even a 9.5.
Gizmo:Okay? I kind of resent the comparison to the Exclusivo in a way. I don't think this thing touches an exclusivo. I don't think it comes close. I don't think it has the pop that an exclusivo has.
Gizmo:Even we've talked about the exclusivo as a one act play, which I think this was tonight. Exclusivo has pop. It has that thing that is just it keeps you coming back every day. I mean, all of us smoke like a box of those a month. I don't see this cigar entering anybody's rotation in this room to that degree.
Senator:I agree with that, but it doesn't have to be an ex Lucivo.
Gizmo:I'm not saying it is. I'm just saying that that comparison was made tonight. I don't think it's that cigar.
Bam Bam:I think both
Gizmo:takes I'm not knocking it.
Bam Bam:You could rate rate it for what it's worth. Yeah, that's what I said earlier.
Gizmo:Think both am rating it for what it
Bam Bam:is. Think both takes are
Senator:Fam, you're man of the year.
Bam Bam:Alright. Somebody call Rob. I need a shirt.
Gizmo:You're gonna get a shirt with my face on it. Alright. It's not an exquisite. Listen, it was a very, very good cigar. I am not gonna run out and buy a box of this.
Gizmo:However So
Senator:what was wrong with it? I would love to just understand this without the exquisite The
Gizmo:very bitter chocolate thing that was most of it is not I don't like. I'm not a bitter chocolate guy. I don't like that very, very dark chocolate, which I think is why I really like the aging room concerto, the blue label It's in like a milky chocolate. I'm smoking that almost every day.
Senator:Big Bouchard guy.
Gizmo:That is correct. That is more where my palate leans. This was not the perfect cigar for me on flavor. Everything else was great. And that's why I'm giving it the nine.
Gizmo:But it is not a 10. I'm not gonna run out and buy a box. However, if one of you guys walked in the in the room and you had one and I needed a cigar, I'd be thrilled to smoke it. Aw. If I walked into a brick and mortar and and was buying a cigar and it it wasn't wet, I'd be thrilled to smoke it.
Gizmo:I'm not gonna be buying a box of this.
Bam Bam:A nine however,
Gizmo:I'd be very happy to smoke the cigar again. Okay. And I wanna make one more point on the X factor comment we made earlier when we were discussing changing the rating pro you know, all that stuff. I do think that it's interesting the tens that were in the room tonight. I do think that a factor in that and you guys can disagree with me if you want.
Gizmo:There was an element of that in this, the surprise that this brought to the room tonight versus our expectation. The mass availability of this cigar, you can find this, I would argue, at 95% of brick and mortar stores in The United States and probably 80% around the world, Maybe 75. Seriously, I think that that is a really
Senator:important I'll just thing say for my rating. It didn't factor. It didn't, and the reason was, I I was sitting here, of course I prefer an exquisite mortise. But I had to ask myself, what is my complaint with this cigar? And I couldn't think of one.
Senator:My complaint is not one. How can I not give it a 10?
Gizmo:That's Flavor was not perfect for me. That's my argument there. But I do think that the x factor thing does play in here, I think that's why it's so important for this room because I think price, I think availability, I think the surprise of it, I think that the the change that it made even for the guys who've already had it in the room, I think is really, really important. So I wanted to note that. But for me, it's a nine, a very good nine.
Gizmo:I thought it was a really, really good cigar tonight.
Grinder:Grinder. I think you took a lot of the words out of my mouth as far as sentiment. Definitely surprised. Definitely have some suspicion that they changed maybe the blend from previous experiences I've had with this. The monolithic flavor profile was good because I liked it.
Grinder:I didn't like it as much as an Exclusivo, right? I don't want to do this comparison to Exclusivo this morning.
Bam Bam:Well, you just did. I thought I just did.
Chef Ricky:Too late. How dare you?
Grinder:I felt like the flavor profile was really, really the dark chocolate, the coffee, it was actually almost too subdued from what I was trying to search for. They brought it down a lot, maybe a little too much for me to make it a 10. I've been debating between a nine and a 10 the whole time, and I do love the fact that it's very, very affordable. I do love the fact that it's everywhere. It's ubiquitous, right?
Grinder:You can go anywhere and get it. But again, I just didn't have. There are other tens out there that I just couldn't put it in that echelon, so for me, it's a nine.
Gizmo:Alright, Bam.
Bam Bam:So I love this cigar from beginning to end. I noted earlier how good it was, and if this continued, I'm buying a box. I'm gonna have this in my rotation, and I will. I'm at a strong 10.
Chef Ricky:I think Rooster will happily sell you one. No problem. Jesus.
Bam Bam:I'll take a box and then resell it. I love the dark chocolate. I love the cream that had on the espresso that I got a lot of in the first two thirds. The final third got, as I noted, a little minerality, which I loved because it was still elegant and smooth. You can't you noted it, sir senator, you can't there's nothing to complain about the cigar.
Bam Bam:And I love that I can pick it up anywhere. So for me, those are all great reasons to rate give this a perfect rating. So I'm at a 10.
Gizmo:Alright, boys. That puts the formal lizard rating tonight on the my father, les bijou nineteen twenty two in torpedo box press at a 9.6. That's incredible. That's perfect.
Bam Bam:I'm And shocking.
Senator:It's good
Gizmo:to As we said, the former lizard rating never lasts. Perfect and shocking. So let's compare that to the other My Father cigars we've done on this podcast. On episode 23, we did the judge in Toro, scored a 5.6. On episode 63, the number four, the Lancero scored an 8.3.
Gizmo:And I think we've noted, I wanna put an asterisk on that. Everybody in this room who smoked that after has said that that cigar has gotten better with time. So I think that that is a cigar. I went back to it. Definitely higher than an 83 for me.
Gizmo:Know That you were
Bam Bam:was excellent.
Gizmo:You were loving that cigar. Sorry, number four.
Senator:That was not my experience.
Gizmo:Really? Really?
Bam Bam:I'm hard out on
Gizmo:that cigar.
Senator:Even after time? I've let that thing sit for how long ago?
Gizmo:Alright. I'll delete the asterisk.
Bam Bam:I'm gonna Two years. Give him
Gizmo:No. It's probably more than that. Yeah. Is episode 63.
Senator:Okay. Three years. That cigar has a harshness that you get in the back of your throat when you smoke. Wow. I am done with that Lancero.
Senator:My Don Peppin ones Those are amazing. With age. And then you literal I had back to back that, and then the my father number four, and the my father number four was so harsh in comparison. Even after all that time, same conditions, same everything, I'm out
Chef Ricky:on that one.
Bam Bam:Maybe you had a bad meal in between.
Gizmo:Could be. No. I'm not. A little too much tawny pork.
Senator:I mean, even when we first bought the boxes, like, that was my experience. There was a little bit of a bite. Nice flavor, but a little bite. See if I
Bam Bam:have any. I'm gonna bring them in. I'm gonna have him try one.
Gizmo:Yeah. I'll bring one for my buck.
Bam Bam:Honestly, for me, the graham cracker and both those Lanceras that you mentioned escalated as time went by. So that's unusual.
Senator:It lacks a creaminess that the Don Peppin has.
Bam Bam:I don't know. I love that. I loved it.
Gizmo:We're gonna do a lounge experiment.
Bam Bam:Yeah. We'll do
Gizmo:that. So ten weeks later, boys, we did the Don Pippin Blue in Lancero that you guys are talking about right now. Scored a nine point zero, so seven points higher.
Bam Bam:Okay.
Gizmo:Then we skipped out on my father for a little while. On episode 169, we did the judge, Gran Robusto. We scored a four point zero. Unbelievably awful.
Bam Bam:We have I wish the buzzer for that.
Gizmo:Brutal. And then we came back and talk about a triumphant return on episode 204. The my father MF blue in Toro scored a 9.8. So that just edges this one by two points, boys.
Senator:Which is accurate.
Gizmo:So that's pretty cool.
Senator:So I mean, we have to say it. Clearly, we're my father fans.
Gizmo:Yeah. We're getting there.
Senator:There's a lot of cigars that just got named that guy.
Bam Bam:I can't believe we just admitted that. I mean, it's crazy,
Gizmo:but it's So by the way, I wanted to share that on September 9, Grindr said maybe we can finally do a port. And then on September 10, we were recording, he sent me another text. Am I gonna miss the Tawny port tonight? Oh, boy.
Bam Bam:Oh, by the way, here's how much is left in his glass.
Gizmo:Give it to him.
Bam Bam:Tell us. No. Don't know. Don't receipts.
Grinder:I don't have a leg
Bam Bam:Alright, stand
Gizmo:boys. A great night tonight. Once again, let's go through the ratings. The Gram's 20 port the Gram's twenty year Tani port scored an eight point zero, and the my father Les Bijou 1922 in torpedo box press scored a very impressive 9.6. Of course, boys, we have to congratulate again Lizard Tyler, our lizard of the week.
Gizmo:He's gonna win that 10 count box of cigars from Bon Roberts, BAM's favorite website as we know. Yep. We really appreciate those guys for, for supporting us in in our lizards of the week. And of course, Fabrica five, our presenting sponsor. We love those guys.
Gizmo:Try out some of their cigars. Use our code lizard pod for 10% off your entire order. And, of course, small batch cigar, the preferred retail partner of the Lounge Lizards podcast. I want to shout out the my father lady Bijou is available there for, like, under $12. So run to small batch cigar.
Gizmo:Use our code. When you use our code, it's a great discount, 15% off. Plus, get 5% rewards back on every order. So it's a great deal over there. And, boys, a great night tonight.
Bam Bam:Don't forget our FOH man of the year.
Gizmo:My man. Appreciate you, boys. A great night tonight, and, we'll see everybody next week.
Bam Bam:Hope you enjoyed this episode. Thanks for joining us. You can find our merch store and ratings archive at our brand new website, loungelizardspod.com. That's loungelizardspod.com. Don't forget to leave us a rating and subscribe on your favorite podcast platform.
Bam Bam:If you have any comments, questions, if you wanna reach out, say hello, tell us
Gizmo:what you're smoking, email us.
Bam Bam:Hello at loungelizardspod.com. You can also find us on Instagram at lounge lizards pod. We really appreciate your time, and we'll, we'll see you next week.