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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 seven members: Rooster, Poobah, Gizmo, Senator, Pagoda, 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!
**Gizmo:** [00:00:00] Welcome to the Lounge Lizards podcast presented by Fabrica5. 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. Tonight I'm joined by Rooster, Senator, Chef Ricky, Grinder, and Bam Bam.
And our plan is to smoke a cigar, drink some tequila, talk about life, and of course, have some laughs. So take this as your 150th official invitation to join us and become a card carrying lounge lizard. We plan to meet us here once a week. We're going to smoke a New World cigar tonight, share our thoughts on it, and give you our formal lizard rating.
The notorious Opus Dubai makes its long awaited debut. We discuss palate development and finding new flavor notes in cigars. And we compare two sister spirits, all among a variety of other things for the next two hours. So sit back, get your favorite drink, light up a cigar and enjoy as we pair Uno, Dos, Tres, Tequilas, Blanco and Añejo with the Fuente Fuente Opus X 2020, Viento d'Amor.
All right, boys, a very special episode of [00:01:00] the podcast tonight. It's episode 100. And 50, my Lord, if you can believe it. So we started the celebration last week. Of course, we did a little champagne. We celebrated Senator's birthday. It was a nice beginning to our celebration and tonight, because we don't like to repeat ourselves for the first time ever, the entire room has no idea what cigar we're smoking.
Correct. Is it a pre embargo Davidoff? It is not.
**Bam Bam:** I think it's a special. We
**Gizmo:** don't have that kind of, uh, we don't have that kind of budget. Is it roosters? Favorite Zeno? It could be so in the interest of doing something special and something we've referenced in the past we tonight are doing The Fuente Fuente Opus X 2020 the Opus Dubai.
There
**Grinder:** it is. I called it. I called it. You
**Gizmo:** did call it you fuck Such a downer Look at that box. Look at this presentation.
**Rooster:** Beautiful box. Look at that.
**Gizmo:** Now, is this Bam Bam's box? This is Bam Bam's box. Look at this. Indeed. So what I'm [00:02:00] going to do is I'm going to take one. So you knew
**Chef Ricky:** what it was going to be.
And I'm going to
**Gizmo:** pass it around. He did not. I have to act my part. Don't I? Thank you, man. For fuck's sake. Say he's, he's Bam
**Senator:** Bam by day, Alec Baldwin by day. And somewhere Miguelitos lurking around
**Gizmo:** somewhere in the depth. How many do we take? You take four each out of the box of 20. So this is our second Opus X on the podcast tonight.
This one is called the Opus X 2020 Viento de Amor. And it is a 58 ring gauge cigar by six inches long. I think this is the biggest ring gauge cigar we've done on the podcast tonight. So we continue boys to trend upwards.
**Bam Bam:** Yeah. And, um, if you haven't had this cigar, this is a long sip. Beautiful cigar.
Substantial.
**Grinder:** Senator's quivering in his seat right now for the long smoke. So this
**Gizmo:** cigar is finished with a piece of cedar. Yup. And a foot band wrapped on the bottom, [00:03:00] slides right off. A nylon
**Bam Bam:** foot band,
**Gizmo:** yeah. A nylon foot band with a little scotch tape. And boys, this is a beefy, beefy cigar. It is. She's thick.
Yeah. Smell the foot of the, sorry, the head of the cigar.
**Senator:** Smells like manure. It's kinda funky. Yeah, it's very funky. Very dirty Barney. Oh yeah. Horsefoot.
**Gizmo:** Jesus. Horsefoot. It does, Senator. It literally smells
**Rooster:** like horse shit. It's like a camel in Dubai. Yeah. Camel in Dubai. Camel takes a dump in the bush.
**Senator:** On the, on the head, not the foot.
**Gizmo:** It's up here at Bambi. Yeah, I don't know. It's funky. It's really funky. It's funky, which I don't mind. The other head.
**Bam Bam:** Yeah.
**Gizmo:** All right, boys, let's cut this thing. See, we're getting on the cold draw and the wrapper.
**Senator:** Wide open draw. You guys have disassembled the cigar
**Gizmo:** already?
**Senator:** It slides right off. Just slide it off.
Slide it off. Slides right off.
**Gizmo:** You don't have to fight the tape. So there are two [00:04:00] bands on this cigar, both very, very ornate. You have the Fuente Fuente Opus X band in the colors of United Arab Emirates, of course. And then a second band that says 2020 Amor del Desierto, celebrating the release. What are you guys getting on the cold draw?
**Bam Bam:** Mmm. Coltrane's really nice. It's nice. A little faint biscuit. Maybe a touch of honey.
**Chef Ricky:** I'm getting a wet raisin. A wet fruit. A wet
**Bam Bam:** raisin? A wet fruit. A wet raisin. That's an oxymoron. That's a wet dried fruit.
**Chef Ricky:** No, uh. You mean a grape? A raisin. Exactly.
No, a raisin that's been sort of reconstituted. So it still tastes like a raisin, but you know, it's a little bit
**Bam Bam:** juicier. A raisin that's been in oatmeal. That kind of, or a
**Grinder:** raisin that's been with a Boveda might be too chefy for us. Possibly chef. Come on guys.
**Gizmo:** All right, boys. For the 150th time, let's light this thing.
The [00:05:00] Fuente Fuente Opus X 2020 Viento de Amor. Again, it's a 58 ring gauge Toro Gordo. By six inches long,
**Chef Ricky:** you know, in episode one, if you guys were watching television while you were recording,
**Gizmo:** we
**Chef Ricky:** were,
**Senator:** it showed, by the way, it made for some great entertainment. It was tennis commentary. It was a plus that day.
**Grinder:** Micro fish all the way. That's right. All right, boys, let's get stuck in. This is going to be a long one. It is just lighting. It takes a while.
**Gizmo:** Hoping for a little redemption tonight for Fuentes Opus X line. Correct. We did one other cigar, the 888 Perfeccion, on episode 31, if you can believe it. 119 episodes ago.
At this ring gauge, it's impossible to be plugged like that other cigar was. Yeah, that was a, that was a really, really rough go. Senator, how was your draw? Wide open. It was. My tune. Wide
**Bam Bam:** open.[00:06:00]
**Gizmo:** It's very pleasant on the light. Mm hmm.
**Bam Bam:** Oh, I like it. You know, we didn't talk about the wrapper. It's got a nice, creamy, medium brown color. Slightly toothy, but beautifully wrapped.
**Gizmo:** It looks and feels very well constructed. It has a, like a subtle box press, I would say. Oh, yeah. And it comes, like we said, in this very ornate box of 20.
**Bam Bam:** Yeah. Beautiful box.
**Gizmo:** And this is definitely a big cigar. So, you know, what's interesting, boys, is two weeks ago, we did the, Romecraft Volstead, the 56 ring gauge, and that feels completely different in my hand, even though it's two, you know, two ring gauge sizes apart from 56 to 58, this 58 in this kind of box press, not the rectangle, this feels like a baseball bat.
It feels very big in the hand.
**Bam Bam:** Yeah. And I think the Volstead had more of a true, truer, box press. Yeah. Which is, you know, deceptive.
**Grinder:** It tastes like an opus. [00:07:00] That makes any sense. I don't know. Like it's just very smooth, very opus flavor.
**Rooster:** But sometimes opus is not that smooth. It can have like a bit of a bite.
This one is smooth. This one is very, maybe I'm thinking sharky.
**Gizmo:** There is an age pretty smooth. There's an aged tobacco thing about this that I really like at the moment. Yeah. Yeah. I can taste what seems like a little bit of aged tobacco in here.
**Bam Bam:** To me that's a, it's tasting like a sophisticated cigar.
Smokes velvety.
**Gizmo:** Yeah.
**Bam Bam:** Nothing unpleasant. Tremendous amount
**Gizmo:** of smoke
**Bam Bam:** already. Yeah, high smoke
**Chef Ricky:** output. I'd say to start, the finish is really short. So it just, you know, it starts really velvety and creamy and somewhat, you know, aged in flavor, but then it kind of, it just
**Bam Bam:** Has anyone retro'd yet? I have. I've been retroing a lot.
**Chef Ricky:** It's
**Gizmo:** awesome.
**Bam Bam:** I'm getting apple and still that graham cracker that I got in a cold draw is coming through still. [00:08:00] No complaints right
**Gizmo:** now. There's a touch of spice in the retro and also on the front of my tongue.
**Bam Bam:** So, yeah. Just a touch. On the retro, it's right at the beginning. Yeah. And in, in the typical draw, kind of in the middle of the tongue.
I'm getting it.
**Chef Ricky:** I'm getting some of that barnyard on the retro ale, but I, I don't know how to put that flavor into, or that aroma into flavor. I'm not getting any of that. It's not, it's not bad. It's not as, uh, I think on the cap or originally it was a little kind of feety, you know, like foot a little bit there, less, less like horse manure for me, but.
It's
**Grinder:** very smooth. It's very creamy to me. It's kind of like a chai latte.
**Gizmo:** Yeah. Wow. There is a, I don't know if it's like a honey sweetness or some sort of sweetness there. It's, it's very smooth and, and you use the word velvety. Yeah. It's, it's a [00:09:00] thick kind of sweetness on the middle of my tongue. So I
**Bam Bam:** will, this is the second time I've had this cigar.
I had one out of this box and for the size cigar that this is, For me, personally, it should, I would like it to have just a bit more oomph. Just a touch more. But it does develop as you go through, I think.
**Gizmo:** To your point there, I would say this is firmly medium.
**Rooster:** I think the body is
**Grinder:** mild to medium. Mild to medium for me.
What are you getting, Senator?
**Senator:** At first, I think it's medium. I don't think it starts mild. Um, and a lot of opuses I do think start mild, like you're saying, but this I feel like has a little bit more than most, which is nice. Um, The flavor profile, I feel like all the flavors and maybe this is where you're going with mild, they're, they're pretty subtle.
Like they're all there, but nothing is like really screaming in any loud way that it's like super obvious. So I get some of the sweetness. I think honey, someone mentioned, I think that that's there. There's definitely a creaminess about it. [00:10:00] Um, The barnyard thankfully is very faint, like probably the least prominent note of all the notes that you get, which I like because I don't like a heavy barnyard cigar.
I know Grindr obviously that's a flavored note that you like more, um, of, and I think there's like a, just a little like faint nuttiness. Um,
**Rooster:** that's a faint fruit also. It's apple for me. I don't know if it's, yeah. No, for me it's an apple.
**Chef Ricky:** Yeah. I'm gonna go out on a limb and say that the wrapper has something on it.
If you, cause I licked my lips and I'm getting a slight sweet, you know, normally coming off of, uh, the wrap row of the cigar, you get some bitterness, uh, but I almost feel and maybe that has something to do with the taste or I'm sorry, the, the smell coming out of the box. Maybe they spray, spray it with something prior.
You getting that guess?
**Senator:** I'll say this. That's not crazy. This has happened with Fuentes cigars because. I had the eye of the [00:11:00] bowl. That one every, everybody's talking about that short one. Yes. And when you, if for, I mean, if you don't cut that cigar, you do when you just, your mouth touches the head of the cigar, it is insanely sweet like candy.
There is something that they spray just on the head of the cigar. It's super obvious and I had never experienced that with a cigar, so it was shocking for me. I've had
**Bam Bam:** that. Cigar once and I agree with you,
**Chef Ricky:** but I'm definitely getting a flavor that's been added. I feel like to the rapper
**Bam Bam:** I disagree and
**Rooster:** what what flavor do you think that is?
**Chef Ricky:** It's it's definitely sweet I think it's where we're getting some of that honey and kind of biscuit ish notes and maybe even the Apple
**Bam Bam:** All right, guys, lick that wrapper. Well, it might be a little too big for that.
**Chef Ricky:** No, it started because I licked my lips at first. And then did you have dessert before you came in?
No, no. It's just a couple of turkey burgers. No, without the bread.
**Senator:** The apple note reminds me of like apple cider. Yeah. Like not a [00:12:00] fresh apple.
**Chef Ricky:** No. Like mulled apple or something. Yeah.
**Senator:** And like, because there's that little faint bit of spice in there, it's like kind of spice that would be like baking spices with apple cider, I feel like.
**Bam Bam:** Agreed. All pleasant things so far.
**Gizmo:** I'm finding this to be very, very pleasant. And I'm, I'm enjoying the, the amount of smoke output. There's a ton of smoke output. I'm finding it to be very pleasant on the palate. It feels
**Bam Bam:** great in the
**Gizmo:** hand. It feels great in the hand, even for its size. Yeah. It feels very good.
It feels very balanced. And if you look, like, you know, we're getting into quarter inch, you know, burn here. Mm hmm. It's burning really, really nicely. Yeah. Bright white ash. Seems to be burning quickly, though. Yeah. It does. I think the
**Rooster:** tobacco definitely is aged. Has some age on it. That's what they say, right?
It's very smooth. I agree, because
**Senator:** to Rooster's point, I think you mentioned that there's a bite sometimes with opus and, you know, I always say the irony of, you know, opus and, and kind of the Fuente mantra of, you know, we don't rush the hands of time. I feel like opus, a lot of the [00:13:00] time, they are young. And they need age.
And my frustration is you pay more for the Opus line than you do regular Fuente. And I don't ever light a regular Fuente and say this needs age. But I have lit several of like the standard Opus line. Maybe because this is, you know, a special kind of release. Those get some of the more premier age tobacco.
But I agree that there's definitely age tobacco in this.
**Rooster:** The box is so ornate, it would be cool if they sold like refills of this to put in the box. You know, like, what do you do with a discount at a significant discount? Yeah. I mean, it would be, it would be neat to get a,
**Bam Bam:** speaking of which, so I paid just under two grand for that box, 19 and change.
**Rooster:** Just the empty box. Cigars were extra. Cigars were extra. The refill. You could have got some Cohibas for that price. I can't wait for the Splitwise
**Grinder:** on this one.
**Bam Bam:** I opted out of Splitwise, but I'm going right back in for this night. This [00:14:00]
**Gizmo:** does feel like a celebratory cigar. Yeah. In my hand. It tastes refined. It tastes elegant. It'd be nice during the holidays,
**Grinder:** I think, maybe. I agree. Oh, yeah. This is a, this is a, this is a Christmas cigar, for sure. The green and white and
**Bam Bam:** That's also
**Grinder:** very And red.
It's true. It's true. It's colorful.
**Rooster:** Also, the flavors, if you're talking about apple and that Baking slice. Yeah. Biscuits. Falling spices. Mulled wine. Mulled wine.
**Grinder:** Horsefoot. Reindeer. That has to be one of the best comments. I love
**Senator:** that. I love that comment. I'll clip it. Ah, I will never forget that.
**Rooster:** Camel dump.
**Gizmo:** The only thing that's missing is the pumpkin spice. Correct. That's it. That's true. Oh, please don't start. We are back in pumpkin, pumpkin spices. I know. I know. I drink all my coffee black, so. So we have a lot to get to tonight. We have a lot of stuff going on. We're going to do two tequilas. We have a lot of listener email, a lot of things to go over.
I'll start with some of the info on this cigar. [00:15:00] So this is one of three released for the Opus X 2020 UAE Opus Dubai, as we've called it. There are two other sizes. The arena d'amore is a 52 by five, more like a Robusto and the soul d'amore, which is a 55 ring gauge cigar by six and an eighth all come in boxes of 20.
Interesting enough, based on what Bam said on what he paid for it, they range in MSRP price, which we could talk about this with Opus, the MSRP ranges from 800 to the top end one we're smoking. Now the MSRP on this is 912. So you paid. Uh, well over the top and well over double,
**Bam Bam:** you
**Gizmo:** know, and, and I'm seeing it online actually higher now than what you paid for it.
I saw it today for 2, 100 online
**Rooster:** for this box of 20 only efficient if he had known that before he went to brought the box, but you know, that
**Gizmo:** it is interesting how Opus is special night rooster is marketed and sold [00:16:00] around the world that, you know, the MSRP is not even a guide. For pricing on these because they are so sought after, you know, I saw a note in a cigar aficionado as I was prepping for the episode tonight, you know, they said that this is really the first cult cigar, the first kind of cigar that people chased, especially in the United States.
Really? You know, cause you think, obviously, of course there's Cohiba, Beheke, you know, there's some other things, but as far as like new world production cigars that are sought after and, you know, Chased like crazy Opus X has to be the number one.
**Rooster:** Yeah, I mean the Opus Marca itself is, you know, it doesn't come out that often.
Yeah, you would, you know, it's very few retailers get it, if any, and it's usually like a couple of times a year, like usually around Father's Day, Christmas, you know, holidays. And truth be told,
**Bam Bam:** we're not Opus fans in this room. We're just, we're just not. But from time to time you stumble on one that's really good.
Is that why you paid two grand for the [00:17:00] box? Honestly, I heard a lot about this. Guys around me were smoking this and they loved it. One guy gave me one. I liked it. Why not?
**Grinder:** I would
**Bam Bam:** consider paint.
**Grinder:** I mean, I, I, similar to his point, like it's not something I grab every day. No. But I. I mean, when I do have a good opus, I have, it's a good opus.
**Bam Bam:** Like the Opus Shark, by the way. That is a cigar I can smoke if I could find them and want to pay the, I'd smoke that every week. I love, love that cigar. This one I'd do maybe, I don't know, every few months.
**Grinder:** It does
**Bam Bam:** give me fall,
**Grinder:** winter vibes. It doesn't give me summer vibes. It's just so big too. I mean, yeah, it's significant, but it's easy to smoke though.
Isn't it? It's very easy.
**Gizmo:** So in November 2017, Fuente released the first exclusive creation for Dubai, which was appropriately named the Opus X Dubai Exclusivo. At this time, there were only two cigars in the line, 52 ring gauge and another was 56 ring gauge, and they [00:18:00] were only sold at Dubai duty free. In December 19, there was another Opus X blend release for Opus Dubai.
And again, that was sold exclusively in the area, but I guess some other folks that started getting out of Dubai and started reaching other places. This is the third release that we would call the Opus Dubai or the Dubai Exclusivo, and this is an actual regular production line now. So even though they're limited in their availability, this is a regular production Opus X now that you can get all three of these sizes and they should be continuing production.
Probably each year to be released in a new format or in, you know, a new size or something like that. But the blend should
**Senator:** be consistent. It
**Gizmo:** seems like now they've, they like where they're at and they've put it into a regular production type status as opposed to being limited, only available. UAE, right?
The
**Senator:** only thing that's bizarre to me about like the labels on this cigar, it doesn't mention Dubai anywhere. No, it does not. I'm looking, looking for
**Bam Bam:** Dubai. I actually took my magnifying glass out earlier 'cause my vision's going. I tried to zoom [00:19:00] in. I found nothing in reference to Dubai.
**Senator:** I mean, if you were in a humidor and you were looking for the Opus Dubai, you would've know.
You would have no idea. This is it. If you didn't like this, research, this, this. May as well
**Grinder:** be opus. Mexico City. Yeah. Mm-Hmm. . I mean, this is like,
**Gizmo:** so I'll read a quote from Carlito Fuente. The head of the Fuente family, of course, he says, quote, from the first moment, my foot touched the sand, my eyes fixed the horizon, and I experienced the unique scent only the desert can offer.
I immediately realized that might be that camel foot, camel foot, camel, camel, toast, rooster, rooster looks over at everyone, self assured grin, smile. That's not too crazy with some of the names he comes up for with, uh, for his cigars, true. He says, I immediately realized how much affection I had developed for the UAE.
What's cool about this is this release marks the 25th anniversary of Opus X, which is pretty wild. It's so they, you know, they started in 1995. I have some history on [00:20:00] that. We'll go through that in a little bit. But what's also great about these is that like other Opus X blend, the Fuente Family's Chateau de la Fuente Farm, uh, is where they manufacture these and they also give some of this money to charity to the Fuente Family Foundation and they build schools in the Dominican Republic and what not.
And often when you see Carlito traveling around doing events at local shops, etc. He's really there to raise money for those charities. And we've talked about that in the past. They raise a lot of money and they give a lot of money away. So, you know, hopefully some of that money that you paid for this box, not being facetious, but you know, hopefully that ends up in some good hands.
Do you know the blend on this? Everything's
**Rooster:** Dominican. That's all I know. Puro Dominican. So I wonder if they, when they release, uh, you know, a regional for Dubai, let's say, right. I mean, do they kind of go after like what, People in the UAE, like what, what flavor they, you know, would, uh,
**Grinder:** some oud want some, [00:21:00] a little hummus.
**Bam Bam:** I was throwing names out guys. I mean, I would think
**Gizmo:** that, you know, like we talk about, uh, the Asian market a lot. You know, what their taste preferences are and the stuff that they buy. Just a lot of being driven by hype, obviously Cohiba and those other things. But I would say the same for the UAE. They're just trying to get the most exclusive stuff that's produced anywhere in the world, show it off as status and hopefully smoke, smoke great cigars.
**Senator:** Is there a Cuban, like UAE regional? that
**Gizmo:** anybody's tried. There have been regionals. I've not tried them, but there have been because
**Senator:** I'd be curious. I mean, if the intent was to blend a cigar for the taste, you know, uh, preferences of that market, I'd be so curious to see what like a Cuban brand would have done.
I haven't heard of
**Rooster:** any.
**Senator:** I feel like I've heard of them, I've just never had one. Yeah,
**Rooster:** I believe there is. I just don't know which, which, [00:22:00] I think there was a Coahuila. I think there might have been a
**Gizmo:** Ramone for, uh, UAE, but I have not smoked it. It was a big ring gauge cigar like this. I don't think it was a 58.
Might have been a 55, 56, but, um.
**Bam Bam:** I gotta say. The burn line on everyone's cigar is beautiful. It looks great. The ash is structural and razor sharp. It is the mark of a great the
**Rooster:** construction is impeccable. This is
**Grinder:** phenomenal. They wouldn't, they wouldn't, they wouldn't mess this up. Right.
**Gizmo:** I will say that one we did on episode 31, construction wise, was one of the worst constructed high dollar cigars that any of us have ever smoked.
That was expensive. That was 42 a pack. I know.
Do you know how many boxes were released? I know this is a regular production, so I think the other ones in the past have been limited. This one, I think, is just an ongoing limited production, but they have not released box count numbers on these cigars. So what I did see, very much in line with what we're talking about with Habanos when they do regionals, I [00:23:00] see that this is a partnership between Fuente and Zainal Mohebi Holdings.
So what I'm wondering, to your question, Senator, is So let's say the regional distributor who services, uh, the UAE for Habanos. When Habanos is making a regional cigar, they'll send a few prototypes to the distributor and maybe one of the top retailers to taste and then start making blending decisions. I wonder if the same thing is happening here with Fuente with that partner, which then may align to the question of.
You know, is there influence from the local market on what the blend is or that blending decision or is Carlito saying, I know what I'm doing. I'm killing it. I know how to make great opus, great tobacco and shipping cigars.
**Grinder:** You know? That's a good question. I would trust Carlito's like, taste on anything,
**Bam Bam:** so.
Has anyone had a hookah in here?
**Grinder:** Yes. I've, I've never done that.
**Bam Bam:** So I've done it a lot. You've tried it? Yeah. Yeah. So one of my favorite tobacco flavors is [00:24:00] like a apple grape or apple watermelon. You're getting a little bit of that here, honestly. I'm not gonna, I'm not stretching this to say that Carlito thought about the hookah, but honestly, there's a lot of that here.
A little bit of it here. It's very subtle.
**Chef Ricky:** Well, I would say hookah is probably most popular outside of any Moroccan or Arab restaurant or Dominican restaurants. Yeah, yeah. Dominican lounges. Yeah, yeah. No, hookah's a pastime for That's surprising to hear. I did not
**Bam Bam:** know that.
**Grinder:** Really.
**Bam Bam:** Carlito! Maybe thought about this.
You never know. Dominoes and hootkas. Dominoes and
**Senator:** hootkas.
**Bam Bam:** Doma!
**Gizmo:** So boys, we'll do a little bit more on Opus X and what's special about that brand now that it's well over 25 years. But first, let's move in to our first of two tequila pairings tonight. We have the 1, 2, 3 tequila. Is it Ricky , UNO Unre [00:25:00] Tequila blanco.
Tonight on the podcast we have both. So
**Chef Ricky:** we have, uh, UNO, which is the Blanco Andres, which is I, Anejo dos would be the Reposado. Uh, but these guys were one of the first to get the, uh, certified organic label nice on their tequila.
**Gizmo:** The one thing I will say, boys, as we get ready to sip the Blanco, we have to raise our glass to our friend and listener, Lizard Mike, who for this and for the kind message he sent with these two bottles to us to drink on the podcast tonight is our lizard of the week.
Interesting. So we raise our glass to Lizard Mike and all the lizards out there who've been with us for now 150 years. Episodes. How cool is that? Incredible. Cheers, boys. Let's try. Cheers. Cheers. Cheers
**Chef Ricky:** to lizard nation. Lizard Mike. Thank you.
**Bam Bam:** That's a wonderful blog. I'm sorry. It is. This is delicious. This is
**Gizmo:** a
**Bam Bam:** great
**Gizmo:** pairing.
**Bam Bam:** I mean the [00:26:00] sweetness, the S the it's really elegant and drinks beautifully. It's juicy.
**Chef Ricky:** It is. This is really good. No, this is very crisp, very clean. The master distiller here, David Rivandi. Uh, he's an agave cultivator. These guys grow all their own agave.
They do not purchase. They do not sell their agave. Um, nor do they purchase from outside farms. And he specifically wants to. The focus of this tequila is to be on the terroir. So all of the agave here are grown at 42, 4200 feet in altitude or elevation. And he just wants to highlight that. And, uh, what he does here with the aging, he's using barrels.
So when we get to the añejo, it is a darker añejo than maybe what some are used to. Uh, and he's using barrels that are half a size. Then normal. So it's, um, it, you know, [00:27:00] ultimately what you're going to find here is that it's a very clean spirit. It's delicious. There's vanilla caramel. I think on the blanco, you'll get citrus and pepper.
**Bam Bam:** It's got, it's, it's full bodied from the point of view of its viscosity. It's got great legs on the glass. Even on the blanco. Yeah. It's unbelievable.
**Senator:** The Blanco is even creamy. I mean, I'm like just blown away by this. You know, it's nuts. I'm shocked at the viscosity. Honestly, that's exactly right. Like you think of like most Blancos, like Ricky's describing as like super clean to the point that like, they're like palate cleansing and just like refreshing.
And very light viscosity, typically. Exactly. Much lighter where this is like viscous and like rich in flavor and creamy. I mean, I don't. I don't know of another Blanco I've had that's like this full of an expression. Yeah. It's awesome. But I'm getting like
**Grinder:** coconut. Yeah. It's coconut. Yeah. Like
**Chef Ricky:** that is that there's some like tropical notes
**Bam Bam:** there.
Yeah. Yeah. Like coconut water.
**Gizmo:** Yeah.
**Bam Bam:** Oh, so how many bottles of this do we [00:28:00] have? One of each. Uno, dos,
**Rooster:** tres. So Ricky, do you guys sell this at Anejo? We do. We do.
**Chef Ricky:** Today is the first time I drink it in many years. We've had it maybe, I'd say over somewhere between eight to 10 years at this point. For me, honestly, it's gotten better over time.
I don't remember it being this delicious. It was always great. But tonight it's, it's, yeah, I, maybe, you know what it is? So we're drinking our tequila out of wine glasses and at the restaurant, this is something I've been doing maybe for the last three years. But I think at the time that we got this tequila, I was still drinking my tequila out of, you know, just kind of small rock glasses.
Um, and you guys know, I, I prefer the wine glass. And I, I do think it brings something to the spirit.
**Gizmo:** So all of us are drinking these tonight, just for the listener out there. We're drinking these out of wine glasses. Neat. No ice. Totally neat. Pagoda would be angry. Pagoda's not here. Yeah, that's cause Pagoda's not here.
We banished him from the room tonight. We have the, we have the ice chest in his, in his honor though. It's here. [00:29:00] It's in his seat, but he's not here. Yeah.
**Bam Bam:** I gotta tell you, uh, this for me would be a great end of meal drink for me right after dinner with a cigar. Of course. It's incredible. But there's such, for me, sweetness,
**Grinder:** it's like, it's like a digestif.
Yeah.
**Bam Bam:** Honestly, I'd have one or two of those and I'd be very happy after dinner done.
**Chef Ricky:** And it's great 'cause it's vi it's viscous, but it doesn't fall heavy like you don't feel. You know, it still has those sort of clean qualities of, of a beautiful block.
**Bam Bam:** Am I crazy? Or is it not sweet? I'm getting a lot of sweet.
I'm getting sweet. Sweet.
**Chef Ricky:** I didn't even touch. Okay. So
**Senator:** I'm sorry. I couldn't help myself. I just took a sip. Wow.
**Bam Bam:** The onion.
**Senator:** Wow. You're cheating. Let's try. Wow. Can we try now? Please do. I'm sorry. It's
**Gizmo:** let's try trace boys.
**Bam Bam:** First of all, caramel and vanilla on the nose the moment my nose hits that glass.
**Chef Ricky:** And not in a Don Julio kind of way, right?
Not in a [00:30:00] Casamigos kind of way, where those are clearly, clearly additive. You're saying
**Gizmo:** that this doesn't have the quality of Don Julio's products, is what you're saying?
**Chef Ricky:** Are we back on episode two or 150?
**Bam Bam:** Bro, uh, Again, they're so complimentary from the point of view of the sweetness, but the Añejo, of course, has a, it's more fuller bodied, richer, a bit more, um, Buttery.
Yeah, it's definitely buttery, but it's got almost like that, uh, caramelly vanilla thing happening. Yep. It's incredible. I've never had They're both I don't think I've ever had tequila like this tonight. The flavor
**Senator:** notes are different and distinct between the two. But the one thing that's in common, they both have such a creamy buttery finish.
It's ridiculous. Like it's like a wine when it has like the, you know, those described as like a really supple mouthfeel, like, You just want to keep drinking more because it's so soft and smooth and how it delivers the flavor. I mean, I feel like I could [00:31:00] gulp this whole glass and like feel great. I mean, it's really special what they've done with these tequilas.
You know what's
**Gizmo:** interesting too is I feel like maybe and for the listener is kind of like an example of what you're talking about. What I'm experiencing is the way that it coats your mouth. It almost puts this like light film or layer of just sweetness and body, but it's not burning on the way down. I think
**Bam Bam:** that's the product of the viscosity as it goes down.
You're capturing that and it's coating you. It coats your mouth literally like butter. It does. Wonderful. It's wonderful.
**Chef Ricky:** Excellent. Do you guys remember Tapatio Excellencia when we were going bonkers over that? Yes. So this has qualities of that where there is still some vanilla and caramel there, but there's some minerality present.
So to me, it's very complex, right? Sometimes one of my biggest complaints with some Añejo tequilas, sometimes they lack complexity because they're relying heavily on the wood influence. Uh, but no, this guy knows what he's doing and he's, he's respecting his agave and he's still highlighting it, [00:32:00] which is one of the reasons why the Tapatio Excellencia, which is an extra on your home.
It is. Yeah. Yeah. This is much easier to drink than a Tapatio.
**Gizmo:** That's what I was going to say. I love Tapatio Excellencia, but I, you know, I need it.
**Senator:** I need a chip
**Gizmo:** in that.
**Senator:** I have to, I gotta get a chip in that. It's,
**Gizmo:** it, it's, it runs a little hot. It's hot.
**Senator:** Oh
**Gizmo:** man, you're hurting me. The thing I'll say though is is with a cigar that we've called medium and it continues that way right now Correct.
I think both the Blanco and the Añejo Pairing wonderfully with this. Like I'm happy with both.
**Bam Bam:** Yeah. Yeah. Right now I'm probably regarding the pairing itself preferential to the Blanco with this particular cigar. But the I agree. But the anejo though, that is, that is special.
**Senator:** I, I have to side with GIZ on this.
I, I feel like both pair great. And the reason for me. The Anejo is so smooth in its delivery that it's never overpowering like the flavor in
**Bam Bam:** this
**Senator:** cigar, which is like firmly medium at best, where I do think like to [00:33:00] Ricky's point, I mean, an extra Anejo would overpower it. Like Tapatio Excellencia, I think would overpower this cigar.
**Bam Bam:** The Blanco for me, it's a bit, there's more fruit in that. For me, then the Añejo, which I think goes nicely with the fruit in this particular cigar. Not to say that they're not good because both are excellent with the particular stick, but that Blanco for me, just a step above for the pairing.
**Gizmo:** So I just want to talk briefly, the prices on both of these.
So the Blanco It's just a touch under 70. You can find it somewhere between 65 and 70 according to Tequila Matchmaker. And the Añejo is between 83 and 89. So you're still under 90 bucks for the Añejo. An organic tequila, which is important to a lot of folks. Um, I'm gonna put
**Bam Bam:** all my tequila that I have in my locker on eBay.
I'm buying this. I'm buying this. This is really good. I'd be happy with this tequila for quite a long time. It's excellent.
**Senator:** What do you guys think of those prices? I think it's [00:34:00] really fair. 65 and 90. I mean, when you were saying that, the Añejo, I was thinking about, um, what's that other Añejo we love? I've got a few of these at home.
Oh, Tesoro? Don Filano. Tesoro. Exactly. That's delicious, 90 a bottle. Yeah. And that's an Añejo. Yeah. And, um, the other one, Don Filano, their Añejo is amazing. We reviewed that on the podcast. And that's probably also about 90. So I think the price point is very fair.
**Gizmo:** I actually think Taro might be more than that.
Correct. I I feel like that might be like 110. The,
**Chef Ricky:** a's around 1 10, 1 20. Wow. I'll say, I'll say this, those guys, I don't remember that, you know, and, and I think,
**Senator:** did it go up recently? 'cause I'm positive, I think $90 in Waldwick.
**Chef Ricky:** Whereas Waldwick is in Jersey. Yeah. For the listener, it's about three miles from where
**Senator:** we're sitting.
You know, when Chef travels, he's blindfolded. Well, he is a driver. Exactly. He's very, he's listening to the pod. He's not very bougie.
**Chef Ricky:** I mean, it's a drive past the sign that says Waldwick, New Jersey.
Um, yeah, so I know with the [00:35:00] El Tesoro, his processes are, are very artisanal and there, there may be some loss there. Um, and he's also Carlos Camareño. So he's, you
**Senator:** know, it's your boy
**Chef Ricky:** and that's not to take away from this, but I know for, for the Tapatio products, you know, their fermentation vats are wood, whereas here they're using stainless steel fermentation.
It is still open air fermentation. So you're getting that great minerality. And those unique flavors, uh, but it is providing somewhat of a cleaner, more focused flavor as a result of the stainless steel tanks. At least that, you know, that's my opinion because of wood, it does impart a lot of flavor, um, while it's ferment, while the juices fermenting.
**Gizmo:** So I have a question for you, Ricky, you mentioned the altitude. And the Highlands level of Jalisco. What is, what are we tasting that is a product of it being grown at a specific high altitude? Like what is happening with organic? Like what about this process makes this spirit different?
**Chef Ricky:** I think first and foremost is the sweetness.
And you know, we're all [00:36:00] noticing just how sweet and smooth and rich and buttery that the Blanco is. Um, Whereas if you compare it to, let's say a Fortaleza, which is a lowland tequila, that leans slightly more vegetal, peppery, and a lot more mineral forward than this does. So what happens is when the agaves are grown at higher altitudes, they're stressed out, right?
Because at higher altitudes, there's more of a, of a dynamic in temperature. Days are hot. Yeah. Oxygen is lower. The nights are colder. Oxygen oxidizes up there. Thank you. Uh, so just in general, the agaves are more stressed out, which leads to them creating more sugars and yeah. And so ultimately what's going to happen is when you have any island tequila, generally speaking, and you know, more often than not, they should be sweeter than a lowland.
And it's not to say it's better, it just depends on what you're kind of going for. Yeah.
**Gizmo:** You know, for the listener out there, and I'm certainly calling back to this in my brain, we've [00:37:00] had a very similar conversation about the stress that is undergone by the growing of Cuban tobacco and how that stress on the plant, little fertilizer, little help, like those plants have to work very, very hard to produce leaves.
And often that's credited with, you know, Why Cuban tobacco is often referenced as some of the best in the world. That's
**Grinder:** right. It's amazing how some of the most strenuous things in life yield the most delicious results.
**Gizmo:** Yeah.
**Grinder:** And
**Gizmo:** wine, no different. And wine too, yeah. Like when there's a rainy season, a lot of, a lot of water, a lot of fertilizer.
You're not going to get
**Senator:** nearly as much flavor out of those grapes. Where some of the hottest summers in Napa, Like you get a really intense, amazing yield for cab grapes that need that heat to fully form all those flavors and produce the sweetness that you get. Very interesting.
**Gizmo:** So Ricky, one more question on the organic piece of this, this being one of the first tequila certified organic, etc.
Is there a, does that [00:38:00] impart flavor or does that just impart confidence in the process or impart like a more, Hey, we're more artisan than the next artisan. Like what is the organic piece of it? It makes it okay for a rooster to drink it. That's true. Let's get him a glass.
**Chef Ricky:** Correct. I think a lot of people would argue that most tequilas are organic or the, although they don't all carry the label.
Um, and it just comes down to number one, willing to pay for it and, and obviously committing to it. Uh, some find more value in it than others. Um, you know, if I were to guess, you know, I can't say a hundred percent, I, you know, I haven't read anything or heard of anything or been a part of a conversation where, you know, somebody is highlighting one versus the other.
But I would say that, you know. Rather than organic imparting flavor, I think it's just kind of keeping foreign flavors out because you're, you know, producing an agave or a tequila in a cleaner method. [00:39:00] Now are
**Bam Bam:** they hanging animal carcasses? No, no, no, no, no, no. That's only This isn't mezcal. This isn't mezcal.
That's
**Chef Ricky:** only Although I'll have the viewers, uh, or the listeners rather, uh, know that a couple of weeks ago, I gave everyone a Hikarita, which is a hollowed out gourd that you're given in Oaxaca. And, you know, people drink Mezcal out of these gourds. Ben brings his everywhere. He does. I do. Bathroom,
**Senator:** vacation.
Correct. And Ben walked in with a shower. He
**Rooster:** uses
**Gizmo:** it as a cup.
**Senator:** Clean my hair with it. That's
**Gizmo:** how he gets that Alec Baldwin. Look correct. Oh,
**Senator:** okay. But
**Chef Ricky:** yeah, I don't remember the question. I'm sorry. Alec Baldwin confused you.
**Gizmo:** My question really, and I think you answered it well by saying that the organic process just prevents the.
Outside flavors coming in and tainting it, you know,
**Chef Ricky:** and I'll add to that because you [00:40:00] know what, usually when you go the organic route, you're not relying on certain chemicals to yield a better product or, you know, a more resistant product. So. Maybe by going the organic route, he's ensuring that that agave is just really optimally, optimally stressed.
So that way it is producing those, those sweet notes that we're all getting.
**Rooster:** No Monsanto, no GMO
**Gizmo:** free agaves. Correct. So boys, we're coming to the end of the first third on the Opus X 2020, Biento de Amor. What's everybody thinking?
**Rooster:** It's gotten better for me. Picked up in strength, a tad, a touch.
**Gizmo:** I think that.
It's smoking faster than I anticipated. It's, it's really going quickly. Right? And I don't feel like we're smoking fast. I think it's just burning quickly.
**Bam Bam:** Yeah, it's not packed densely, right? So it's, it's going through pretty fast. I'm getting that continued apple on the retro and it's, For me getting creamier, it's velvety.
There's [00:41:00] a, there's
**Rooster:** a faint, like a cinnamon thing. Yeah, that goes
**Senator:** back to what Senator said earlier. That's where I was, when I said the um, apple cider, that's exactly what I was getting, cinnamon and apple. Yeah.
**Gizmo:** And I think it's working really well with both tequilas. It is. I agree. It is,
**Chef Ricky:** I'm getting cinnamon apple and even a little banana.
And I think it's because of the coconut found in the bro. So I had banana
**Bam Bam:** earlier and I didn't wanna say it 'cause I thought it'd be a lunatic in the room, but I, I'm getting a little bit of that
**Chef Ricky:** banana. Whether ripe or green is a no, I find in cigars often, but I also don't see it because I never hear anyone else saying it.
Uh, so just, you know, whatever you, whatever you're feeling, put it out there. 'cause thank you, chef. You never know. You never know . It
**Gizmo:** might blow someone's mind. So boys, like I said, let's talk briefly about our cigar and the Opus X line, which is now well over 25 years of history. It launched in 1995 and when it did the Opus X line, as we talked about, it changed the perception of Dominican tobacco.
Obviously we're talking about the cigar boom, that mid nineties [00:42:00] boom, where cigars were coming from everywhere, celebrities, every type of region, every type of quality and Opus X stood above that and became one of the first Cult status cigars. As we talked about Carlos Fuente Jr. was planting Cuban seeds in the Dominican Republic to produce quality wrapper leaf, a feat that many thought impossible.
And he proved them wrong with the Opus X line. The success of this wrapper set the foundation for Opus X demonstrating that premium grade wrappers could be indeed grown outside of Cuba. The exclusivity of course, has driven the market. Two crazy prices now for all Opus X. Not only are they hard to find a lot of retailers.
I hate to use the word play games with acquiring Opus. You know, you're having to buy other cigars to get these. They're also rationed and a lot of retailers are rationed. It's very hard to get consistent boxes of Opus X. So if this is a cigar that you're fortunate enough to be [00:43:00] able to reach for every day, doesn't make a lot of sense to because they're hard to find.
**Bam Bam:** Yeah. And pricing.
**Gizmo:** Exactly.
**Rooster:** I mean the
**Gizmo:** MSRP
**Rooster:** on this is 40 bucks. Good luck with that. So I paid
**Chef Ricky:** 40 bucks for, uh, Eye of the Bull, right? Wow. And the MSRP on that. Wow. That's a two and a
**Senator:** half inch cigar. Yep.
**Chef Ricky:** I
**Senator:** paid, I paid like 15, 17 dollars for that. Yeah. And this was at,
**Chef Ricky:** uh, Waldorf, I could say. Was
**Bam Bam:** this on a property, a vacation property?
**Chef Ricky:** No, this was in Lodi. Oh, wow. Oh, that's all. Okay. Um, that's Benaj. And I was like, man, that's an off and I don't, I enjoyed it. I did enjoy it. I hated that cigar. Did you? No, I enjoyed it. I thought mine was just like great. I thought it was, it had a lot of refined flavors in there. There was no bitterness, great balance, smooth, you know, just cocoa.
And
**Gizmo:** exactly what's happening in this room is the discourse that I've seen online. Yeah. That might be one of the most [00:44:00] polarizing releases that I've ever seen Fuente put out is the eye of the bull. It's exactly what Senator's saying for some folks and it's exactly what Ricky and Bam are saying for others.
It's, it's like you either love it or you hate
**Bam Bam:** it. But that's also, it aligns with the pricing which is all over the place from retailer to retailer if you can find it.
**Gizmo:** So a couple other things on Opus X before we move on. In 1996, the brand faced a lawsuit from California's Opus One winery claiming trademark infringement.
I'm guessing with the labels, et cetera. You don't want to mess
**Senator:** with
**Gizmo:** those guys. However,
**Senator:** Fuente
**Gizmo:** won the case in 1998. Carlito! With the judge ruling that the cigars were unlikely. To be confused with wine, my man, that seems pretty obvious to me. It also is ridiculous. You
**Chef Ricky:** know what? That judge is a genius. It might
**Gizmo:** be judge Mayta.
That's right. We should look at her. Each Opus X cigar is made using the end to bottom method at time consuming process that ensures perfect airflow for a superior smoking [00:45:00] experience. Rollers are carefully selected and trained exclusively for Opus X production with each roller focusing on one specific, but Tola.
And finally, the brand celebrated its 25th anniversary in 2020, obviously with special additions like the one we're smoking tonight, including the limited Opus X 25, which was packaged in luxury human ores designed by Ellie Blue. These commemorative releases highlighted the brand's ongoing appeal, and of course the price of these collectibles reaches well into the thousands.
**Senator:** Can we just know for the listener, as soon as you said, designed by LA blue rooster lit up like a Christmas tree. So is that a
**Rooster:** humidor?
**Bam Bam:** That thing right there? That box? Yeah. It's not an LA blue. I know that. No, it's not, but you should show rooster. It's really beautiful. I don't have it.
**Senator:** Careful, Bab. You better keep your eye on that.
Rooster's gonna leave home with it. Well, he's got a great humidor. I'll raid his tower. No problem.
**Gizmo:** So a couple of other quick little notes that I thought were cool. Like I said, in the early 1990s, Carlito Fuente was planting Cuban seed. [00:46:00] For the original releases, he planted 37 acres of Cuban seed in the Dominican Republic, defying the belief that those seeds could be grown and the proper wrapper could be grown from those seeds.
Obviously, he proved them wrong. The original name of Opus X was Project X from Planet Nine. That was the original name. Of course, it then went to Opus X, a name Fuente derived from a dictionary definition, noting he liked that it's, quote, sounds like sex. Opus X sounds like sex.
**Bam Bam:** Well, that's kind of a BAM approved thought process there.
**Gizmo:** So that's the story boys on Opus X and the cigar we're smoking tonight, of course, celebrating the 25th anniversary of the brand. And, uh, I am really enjoying the cigar and I feel a little bit relieved as we've talked about compared to some of the other Opus X experiences I've had. Obviously one was on the podcast.
I've had some others more recently, not special editions. And like Senator had said, they [00:47:00] just. Tasted very, very young. Yeah. For cigars that were supposed to be aged. So thankfully we're not having that experience so far tonight. So
**Bam Bam:** I've had this in my tower for about a year just sitting there. Um, rooster's listening intently.
Tell
**Gizmo:** us more. .
**Bam Bam:** That's all I'll say.
**Gizmo:** Alright boys, let's move into some listener email tonight. We have a lot of stuff to get through. This one comes from lizard Kyle. He says, I love the show. Honestly, at first I remember finding the show about a year ago after listening to the intro music, it turned me off.
That was the first time I ever got that comment about our intro about our jazz music
**Senator:** is a knife in gizmos underbelly.
**Gizmo:** Yeah, I was a little bummed out. He said, I revisited it and gave another shot and I'm sure glad I did. I've binged the entire catalog of episodes. And I even go back when smoking a certain cigar reviewed to pull some of the note call outs.
It's always enjoyable. It really does feel like you're all in the room with the listener coming from only liking bourbon. My dive into cognac came [00:48:00] exclusively, exclusively from listening to the pod. My favorite go to now is the Remy 1738, which of course is. Oh, yeah, that's a that's a best daily driver.
They're a staple. And my girlfriend's is the Covassie V. S. O. P. Another good
**Senator:** one.
**Gizmo:** And Lizard Kyle here asks, Have any of the lizards tried the Heinz Cigar Reserve? XO.
**Senator:** No, I saw, so when we first did Hein, uh, when we did the, the Rare. Yeah. That was the first one. We looked up all the other ones just because this was a revelation and obviously a great, great, uh, cognac, uh, brand.
Um, I saw it, but we, it's hard to find that. They don't, that's not something you can just pick up at any regular liquor store. Anytime
**Gizmo:** I've ever been in a liquor store, I've never seen it.
**Senator:** And I'm
**Gizmo:** always looking for, for cognac when we go, because we've enjoyed XO and the higher end stuff. I'm sure that's a very pricey, uh, release, but, um, I haven't seen it anywhere, but we'll have to get it for, uh, for the pod at some point.
Or,
**Senator:** you know, to win listener of the week, you can always send [00:49:00] us a bottle.
**Grinder:** That's Oh,
**Gizmo:** now
**Grinder:** we're cooking.
**Gizmo:** You're on the
**Grinder:** hot seat, Lizard Kyle. There is an exchange of goods for a listener of the week, by the way. There is. You do get cigars. I have to say though,
**Bam Bam:** I love this email. This is heartwarming. It makes me feel really, really good.
Great, great email. Awesome.
**Gizmo:** So lizard Kyle continues tip of the week. I recently found out that a golf tee works fantastic. And he puts in parentheses, Pagoda voice, fantastic for depressing the valve and purging your lighter. You know, like when you need to put gas in your lighter, I just use my perfect draw.
That's what I do. Yep. Yep. But the golf tee works as well. And finally he says, congratulations on the success of the podcast. Thank you for the education, laughs, banter, and the time you all put in to the program. It's a great email.
**Bam Bam:** Yeah.
**Gizmo:** So I have another one here from Lizard John from Boise, Idaho. He says, hi, Giz.
So I tried running water over a Liga Pravada year of the [00:50:00] rat, and it was a complete success. Yes.
**Senator:** I was waiting for disaster.
**Gizmo:** You were rooting for disaster. I'll tell you, I've gotten a bunch of emails of folks doing this with Exclusivos. With other cigars, as, as we've discussed on the podcast a few times, a few times now, like we're coming to the point boys, where vindication, we're going to have to try five.
We're going to have to try it. Oh, that's right. You did it with a fabric of five, the pyramid. Wow. And he says it was a success. I could swear the flavor notes were more rich. And identifiable than previous versions of this stick. I'm not sure how
**Senator:** proud Senator is right now.
**Gizmo:** I mean, he's loving it. I didn't invent this
**Senator:** method.
I was the biggest skeptic, but
**Gizmo:** this was exactly my experience. I'm not
**Grinder:** crazy. That's true.
**Gizmo:** He said, I'm not sure I'd try it with a thinner wrapper. The rat has a thick Connecticut broadleaf, but it may be worth a try. I'm still a bit shocked by the experience, but I'm glad I tried it out. Thanks to Senator for leading the [00:51:00] way.
Wow. Yes,
**Grinder:** indeed he did. Vindicated. Cheers, lizards.
**Gizmo:** Keep up the great work.
**Senator:** Lizard John. I appreciate this from Lizard John. I need all the backup I can get in this room with this water method. Not
**Bam Bam:** true. Not true.
**Senator:** But I will say for Lizard John, I had the same fear about a thinner wrapper. So actually, after the last episode we recorded, I took a Particus D4 at the lounge here, some of you were here for it, and I poured water all over it, and it smoked beautifully.
No problem. So even a thinner wrapper, I would encourage any listener that wants to try this or has been doing it, but with more New World cigars, With Cubans, you won't have a problem. I
**Rooster:** think you want to do this experiment with a cigar that you're familiar with. Yeah. So that you can compare. Good point.
And that's what Senator did. He did it on both
**Gizmo:** the Exclusivo I mean, what cigars do you smoke more than those? Exactly. Do you wet
**Grinder:** the foot? No, no, you
**Senator:** can't. Never wet the foot. So you, you only, before [00:52:00] you cut the cigar, you hold it down and just pour the water over the head of the cigar. It runs all the way down the wrapper, but you don't want anything to get into the cigar.
**Chef Ricky:** And I could assure you after doing it on a Vegas Urbana Classico, that a thin wrapper works fine.
**Gizmo:** Interesting. So my question for you guys, having done it with both Cubans and new worlds, did you notice a experience difference in like the enhancement from it on one versus the other? Obviously both. You smoke them a lot, right?
So did the Cuban benefit more from it? Did the exquisite or was it kind of neck and neck? I think it's
**Chef Ricky:** an equal benefit from my experience. It's it, it does the same for both.
**Senator:** I would agree with that a hundred percent. I think the flavor is a little bit enhanced in each. And I think the most noticeable thing when you do this, the cigar just burns flawlessly.
Like that D four, I mean, an inch and a half, like two inches of just [00:53:00] beautiful ash, razor sharp burn. Same thing on the, um, Davidoff Pellicoso, same thing on the Padrona Exclusivo. So I think at a minimum, you're going to guarantee like outstanding performance from the cigar. And then maximum benefit, you're going to have just a little bit of enhanced, more concentrated
**Rooster:** flavor.
It also makes the wrapper glisten a bit. It
**Bam Bam:** does
**Senator:** early on. And then as you're smoking it, all that moisture just dries and evaporates.
**Bam Bam:** So I did this with a Siglo 6 and Senator, a couple of guys were in the room. I have to admit. Oh, you did it. I did with a Siglo. It's the burn line stayed perfect from beginning to end.
The performance was flawless on that cigar. They're young. I was gonna say that's
**Gizmo:** a more recent. Exactly.
**Bam Bam:** So I've had some performance issues with that. So I think this this concept could help a performance issue possibly and the flavor was
**Senator:** outrageous. And I say the performance piece just because [00:54:00] it's almost comical when you're lighting it.
I mean, there's so much water down by the foot that has dripped down. It's
**Bam Bam:** almost doesn't make sense. Yeah. You're
**Senator:** like worried that the cigar is going to struggle to light because it's so wet and it lights perfectly. You
**Gizmo:** don't have any issue at all. Well, we got to try it on the pod boys. We've now, we've now gone past episode 150.
So that
**Senator:** means we're each going to have to have a bucket in front of us.
**Gizmo:** All right, let's continue on. This one is from Lizard Eric. He says, hi, lizards. Please try a few of the Hoya de Nicaragua cigars for your new world reviews. We did try Hoya de Nicaragua. We did, uh. The Antonio, which is
**Grinder:** one of my favorite cigars. And we're going to have to revisit. And it was not a good cigar.
Yeah. That
**Bam Bam:** was a wet cigar. It was very wet. I
**Grinder:** think it was.
**Bam Bam:** Yeah. Right from the retailer.
**Gizmo:** So Eric says that we should try, uh, their Maestro line. Okay. Jacinco's Decadas and the Numero Uno. And he says in his view, they are the best Nicaraguan factory. All Steve Saka's best cigars are rolled there. [00:55:00] Yeah. Which he says is no coincidence.
The Decadas
**Grinder:** is very good.
**Gizmo:** Yeah, we have to try that. I have to put that in the rotational order. Some says I love your show. I haven't missed one, but I think you guys need to drink better whiskey with an emoji. Oh, excuse me. Oh, we need better whiskey. According to Lizard Eric. Like I said, send us some whiskey.
Educated. You can't just, you can't just sign off with a comment like
**Grinder:** that.
**Gizmo:** Suggest some. Here's another one. This is from another lizard John just throwing out a suggestion for a future pod a blind tasting of the lizards favorite cognacs Most have scored really well, which is a great point Actually, if you think about the swing in ratings on cognacs, I don't if we were to look at the data I don't think the swing has been high as other Spirits that we've done on the podcast.
I mean, wine, I think has performed well, but you're curating every one of those experiences. We've probably only done five or seven wines in the time we've been recording, but other whiskeys, other, you know, bourbon, Scotch, et cetera. Like
**Senator:** we looked at this once on cognac. I mean, of spirits, [00:56:00]
**Gizmo:** cognacs have scored the highest.
**Senator:** Yeah.
**Gizmo:** So what he says is it would be fun to see if there's a clear consensus winner when they're stacked next to each other. He says, if that's too many for a single blind, maybe the three best scoring against each other as always, I love the pod. Yeah. Cheers and keep up the great work. I
**Grinder:** think that's a fun idea.
Do like a blind tasting, maybe of like the best. VSOPs.
**Gizmo:** We're
**Senator:** not going to do that with
**Gizmo:** XOs.
**Senator:** That's going to be a thousand dollar plus night.
**Gizmo:** You know when we could do that? We could do that at the end of the year on our, uh, you know, our last episode of the year that we released. Like a best of the best. We could do like a best of shootout on Cognacs because like we've said, almost all of them have performed well.
Yeah, you know, they've done very, very well. Here's another one from lizard. Paolo, dear wizards. I write to you from Brazil. English is my second language. So please forgive any confusion. And for this question for gizmo in each episodes intro, after you say. Consider this your however number official invitation.
So I consider [00:57:00] this your 148th official invitation to join us and become a card carrying lounge lizard. He's asking, what do I say after that? I can't figure it out after listening to almost all of the episodes. So to answer lizard Palos. Question here. What I say is become a card carrying lounge lizard.
Plan to meet us here once a week, plan to meet us here once a week. So I would say that a little quieter. So maybe I'll bump that up, but, uh, that, that, I guess he wasn't, wasn't clear on what I was saying there. Thank you for your love and passion for cigars and for sharing your podcast with the world with much love from Brazil.
Lizard, Paolo, Gizmo.
**Senator:** You need to practice your Portuguese. I know you're a
**Bam Bam:** Portuguese.
**Gizmo:** I resent that comment, Bam Bam.
I resent that comment. What movie
**Bam Bam:** is that with, uh, DiCaprio and, um, Oh, I thought you said Porta Gizzy. Porta [00:58:00] Gizzy.
**Senator:** That's how he pronounces it in the film.
**Gizmo:** All right. So, uh, I got one more for us tonight. This one is a good one. It comes from lizard Keith. He says, hello, lizards, lizard Keith here, AKA lover of the leaf. I'm a newbie to the pod, but I'm peddling fast to catch up. I like this question. My question is what. What was the process and how long did it take you guys to develop your palate where you were able to readily discern different flavors in a cigar?
**Bam Bam:** Excellent question. I
**Gizmo:** can't count the number of fellow smokers that asked me that question at lounges. Thank you and smoke and good health brothers, brothers of the leaf. Cheers. Lizard Keith. So boys, how did we, and how long did it take to develop our palate where we were able to readily discern different flavors in a cigar?
Brewster's been smoking since what? 19 1910. 1910. So maybe he should answer first. He smoked, he
**Grinder:** smoked, he smoked some cigars that went down on the [00:59:00] Titanic, right? I think so. I was on the Titanic. Laughter. So does anybody
**Gizmo:** want to take this? Because I feel I have a pretty short answer to it, but I
**Grinder:** think, I think for me.
It doesn't, it didn't pick up until I started smoking a lot of cigars at a cigar lounge. Probably around 2017 when I would like, live next door to the cigar lounge basically, and I would work there. And I'm smoking like 7 cigars in a day. Like, pretty bad, but also pretty wonderful. That's when I, who would smoke, by the way, can we just reflect on the lineup that Senator had 11 cigars for his birthday?
I hope you smoked them all. He's had a
**Senator:** world record, but his mouth went numb by the eighth. It wasn't my mouth. So I'll set this up for the listener. So it was my birthday. Gizmo said something to the effect of, you know, you need to have at least eight cigars today.
**Gizmo:** Yeah to [01:00:00] call it a success to call it and I was like,
**Senator:** I mean challenge accepted I know how to get them going You want to be
**Gizmo:** a man on your birthday?
I mean, come on
**Senator:** and so, um I had curated kind of this lineup for the day. I had two cigars in the morning. I think I started with, uh, Trinidad Fundadoras, uh, then Apartus D4, and then the rest I won't even go through. It's just too many cigars, but it was an incredible day, but the one problem was by the time I left the lounge here after my 11th cigar, I I was so wired with nicotine.
I couldn't go to sleep till like four in the morning. I mean, it was insane. Yeah. I'm not surprised.
**Grinder:** Nicotine does that. Um, so I think for me it was smoking a lot and it really didn't help. It really didn't start until I started talking about it with guys like you guys at the lounge, when you're smoking a cigar, especially together.
That's when the magic happens, when you can have that conversation about what are you [01:01:00] getting, what are you getting, and then, and then somebody says, oh, I'm getting banana, and you're like, oh, wait, that is banana, and then you remember it, and then it's part of your repertoire as well, and I think that, you know, smoking together with friends, And reflecting on the taste, uh, it, it doesn't need to take a long time, but you just need to smoke a lot.
You know, it doesn't need to take years, but it could, it could require a lot of smoking.
**Rooster:** Yeah. I think, I think for me, it was more like when you get into the Cuban journey, because you smoke a lot of Dominican and Nicaraguan cigars, Nicaraguans, you know, they tend to be a little bit heavier, but when you start getting into the Cuban cigars, you really get to.
Taste some notes and flavors. There's more nuance. There's a lot more nuance and, uh, you don't get that in the Nicaraguan tobacco. Yeah. It forces you to pay attention. Oh yeah. It does. And slow that
**Bam Bam:** and slow down.
**Rooster:** Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I was blown away when I got into the, uh, La Gloria Cubana, the MDO series. I mean, the floral notes [01:02:00] that you get out of those cigars.
I mean, it's, there's nothing else out there that you get that from. Off the charts. So it does, it does take a while for your. you know, to, to, uh, get, to develop those notes on how to get those notes. And it takes a while.
**Grinder:** I think that tracks to what Steve Saka said in our, in our interview, where you have a journey as a cigar smoker, you go, you try to get more and more and more, and then you hit a wall and then you start to try other things.
Yeah, you kind
**Rooster:** of, you kind of go into like a heavier, heavier blends. You
**Bam Bam:** start heavy. Most of us start heavy and you kind of, and I did that. When I, my very first cigars were very, very full, and you take it down as you go through the years and someone hands you a cigar that you've never had before, and that kind of takes you in a different direction.
So the collaborative experience in a room is a huge help to,
**Grinder:** experience something new. There were, there were probably a lot of tastings, tastes that I get, that I definitely could discern in the early [01:03:00] days. But I didn't put words to them. And when I started putting words to them, and having, you know, conversing with others, smoking the same cigar, or like, reflecting on different cigars, that's when it, that's when, My palate really started to open up because I was really intent.
I was really intentional on, on, on a discovery.
**Rooster:** And also once we started recording, I mean, we've been doing, this is the 150th episode, so we have smoked 150 different cigars on the pod at least. So, I mean, that, that's a, that's a journey and you look forward to recording every single. Monday because you're, you're recording and tasting a new cigar.
**Chef Ricky:** Yeah. And if I could add to that, I'd say the journey never stops, right? Like the, the, the best thing that you could do is put yourself in these situations, you know, whether it's at your local lounge or a community or a message board or something where you're, you just get lucky to meet a bunch of guys that are into the same hobby you are, you get to discuss it, but more importantly, try to do it.[01:04:00]
In other areas of your life. So, you know, whether, you know, you start getting into wine or you start getting into a different spirit and you start, you start tasting it with that intention of what am I getting here? And then it becomes a daily exercise. And the thing is, it never stops, right? Last week or, uh, One of our last recordings, we got mushroom in one of the cigars, right?
Like that. So it's always, you know, you never know what's going to come through.
**Bam Bam:** I think it also has a lot to do with paying attention to the cigar that you're smoking and it always refers back to foods that we've had over the years. And that's why it's important to keep eating and putting yourself first.
We know what things taste like when we're having a meal or a snack or a drink and. I try to recall those things whenever I'm smoking a cigar, and I'm not always capturing what I've had, so it's very selective, the particular cigar, so it's really always referring back to the, the meals that I've had over the years and [01:05:00] fruits and other things.
**Chef Ricky:** I think the broader your palate is in general, the better. Yeah. Because then you could, you know, just. One of my first pods with you guys, you know, where I had highlighted the fact that, you know, you could find ancho chili or guajillo chili in some cigars because when you smell the aroma, but no, when you smell the, the aromas on those chilies, you're getting dried fruit, you're getting prune, you're getting raisin, which are notes that are very prominent in cigars that we smoke.
Thank
**Senator:** you. I just think out of everything I've heard, there's like, Two things that really resonate with me. I think Grindr's point for me is spot on. Like quantity is critical to this. Like it takes time. I, I think of like people will say to me, you know, at different points in my life, how did, how do you know this about wine?
Or how do you have all these recommendations? It's just trying a ton of wine. It's no different than cigars. It's trying a ton of cigars.
**Bam Bam:** And that's
**Senator:** the only way that you start to be able to differentiate. Well, what did I like that? That had that, that other one [01:06:00] didn't. And you start to be able to pull out some of the notes.
The other factor in that is definitely like, The first time you have a truly great high quality cigar, number one, those cigars are more complex. So you start to experience flavors that you didn't get out of a more simple, straightforward cigar. So like a cigar, that's one note. You're sitting there smoking it.
There's not much to pick out. It's when you finally dive into something, you know, a little higher quality, a little more complex that you say like, wow, I'm getting all these different things. You don't know what they all are. Initially, when you smoke it enough, you start to figure out and piece together all those different things.
So, um, I think quantity more than anything. And then, you know, when you get purposeful about starting to pursue, um, some really high quality stuff, I think it makes it easier to find that.
**Gizmo:** I think for me, and I'm going to kind of sum up at what everybody's saying. I think when we came into the podcast, I was certainly maybe [01:07:00] aside from Pagoda, he and I were probably the greenest, as far as you were primitive palette.
I was primitive palette, but as far as by the
**Senator:** way,
**Gizmo:** it's true though. But you know, being with you guys and, and having this collaborative conversation. A year and a half before we ever hit record, but even when we hit record, it was first being in this room, eliminating distractions, the microscope coming in and, and that confirmation of tasting something and hearing someone else go, yes, I taste that too.
It kind of imprints on your brain, like, okay, this is a new note can be looked for now. It's like an index that you're constantly updating as you smoke the quantity of cigars that Senator's pointing to. And I think smoking the same cigar with other people and like. I don't know who said it grinder or, or Ricky said, if it's a forum, if it's in person in a lounge, if it's with a group of friends, like we do every week, the same people, uh, [01:08:00] that exercise is certainly what has developed all of our palates.
And obviously it's accelerated now that we've done this 150 some odd times. We're looking for it. And I don't think that I would call myself or any of us experts, but we're just a little further on the journey, maybe than some of the listeners. And we're all on this journey together. Yeah. Right. Trying to pick out what's next and pick out these other things that we're tasting.
So, I mean, I think anyone can develop a really excellent palate just by putting in the reps and eliminating distractions and focusing on what you're smoking.
**Senator:** An analogy for this. Like you think of a movie that you watch and you're like, you finished it for the first time. You're like, that was a great movie.
And you remember certain scenes in the movie, you watch that movie for like the fourth time and you're picking out like. Did you notice in that scene in the background is so-and-so who is in this movie? You see things. That's a great analogy. Yeah. That you just didn't see the first time. The second time it took the fourth time rewatching that movie to get that.
Yeah. And
**Gizmo:** I
**Senator:** think cigars
**Gizmo:** are really no different. Correct. I agree. And I think to to rooster's point, [01:09:00] my second secondary part of this comment is that changing the variety of what you're smoking and developing a rhythm or, or what we call a rotation, where you're smoking Cuban. Obviously we're smoking a lot of Honduran now with Fabrica 5, smoking Dominican, smoking Nicaraguan.
All of those things offer very different flavors and profiles and experiences. And once you're tasting all of that, it's like going to a restaurant that Chef Ricky curates and you're tasting the entire menu. And you go to another restaurant, you taste the entire menu. Like you're going to learn new things about food.
**Chef Ricky:** Yes. You have to challenge yourself to, to step outside of your comfort zone, right? I could say something tastes like Guajillo chili and, you know, Bam, you may think it's sophisticated, but it's not something you consume often. Exactly right. Right? But I work with the product on a daily basis. So it's, it's, it's imprinted in your experience.
Sure. Sure. So, you know, if, if, you know, you're a 44 year old man that, Whereas by chicken fingers and french [01:10:00] fries only, which I love too. But you have to be able to say, Hey, you know what this week, let's go to an Indian restaurant this week. Let's try this, this week. Oh, there's a free wine tasting.
Excellent point. Excellent. You know, you have to put yourself out there and be able to broaden your palate. So that way you could taste these and you're seeing the same exact thing with cigars. But the reality is if you've never had these things, um, and some other format or some, you know, you're not going to be able to, to register.
You're not going to be able to put a finger on what it is you're tasting.
**Gizmo:** Yeah. And you know, the other thing too, is we do have some listeners out there because we've gotten comments before that listeners will smoke along with us or go back and listen to an episode as, as one of the other listeners that we read an email from go back and smoke along with us, even if it's an older episode and they're journaling while they're doing it, they're taking their own notes.
You know, picking up what they're tasting that we agree with, or we don't agree with their notes we taste or don't. And they're creating this journal of what they're smoking. And as you do the exercise, you're going to get better at it. It's just like anything [01:11:00] else. And I love
**Grinder:** that about our podcast. Like one of my mentors and good friends, someone I respect a lot, he smokes.
With us, like he'll put on a podcast, he'll get the very sick, and he's a cigar, like he has, he has a collection that, that likens to all of ours. And he spends good money on cigars. He drinks a lot of booze. He's a lizard. He will sit in his backyard and smoke cigars and drink the same stuff with us and, He'll text me during it to text me after it and relate what's going on to share in that journey with us too, I think is, is, is very fruitful for your, for your palate as well.
**Bam Bam:** One thing I'll say about tonight's experience as I'm taking a drag on this beautiful cigar and taking a sip of this incredible tequila, there is something to be said about pairings and even a bad pairing will help you discern things that you may not like and an incredible pairing will start to align with what you really love and that.
That's really a higher level experience and over time, but there's a lot of value in [01:12:00] pairing cigars, trying, making an attempt to pair cigars with things that you read about, uh, in the spirits. To Bam's
**Senator:** point there, I mean, discovering what you don't like is just as important as discovering what you do.
Because you're saving money. Yeah. And I think people have a bad experience with a cigar, a wine, whatever it is. And they're like, Oh, I just wasted all this money. And they're so frustrated about it. And the reality is like, that is going to help you exactly figure out how to avoid a flavor profile that you don't like, how to avoid a type of cigar.
That's really not in your wheelhouse. So all of it is really important for the journey now.
**Chef Ricky:** Yeah. And it's not just about what you're getting on your palate. Right. It's, it's, what are you smelling? What are you seeing? Right. Ultimately it's, it's an all encompassing experience. You have to feel, see, taste, you know, I, I strongly encourage you to learn how to retrohale if you don't know how to, even if it's by accident.
**Gizmo:** He's talking to you, Senator.
**Chef Ricky:** Because it's, even
**Senator:** if it's by accident.[01:13:00]
**Chef Ricky:** Because The experience continues throughout, right, for the last 20 minutes or so that we've been talking, I've been wanting to kind of have an exercise with you guys. So real quick, if you pick up your Blanco Tequila. I'm at a Blanco. Right. And you could probably still do this because the aroma is still in your glass.
It is. Right. So something I've never gotten out of a fucking tequila, um, on this aroma, I'm getting white to milk chocolate. Yes.
**Gizmo:** I was
**Chef Ricky:** going to say like, I've never fucking gotten chocolate on a Blanco Tequila. Senator, you got to corroborate that. It's
**Senator:** white
**Bam Bam:** chocolate.
**Chef Ricky:** Yeah. 100%. Right. Yeah. And I'm just like, holy shit.
**Bam Bam:** Can you hand your glass to Rooster so he can sniff this glass?
**Rooster:** Well, I smelled
**Chef Ricky:** a
**Rooster:** bottle.
**Chef Ricky:** Rooster's afraid he's going to get drunk. Now, Rooster may not get it because he hasn't been ingesting it. Right. So his palate's not, you know, he may just be getting ethanol, [01:14:00] whatnot, or pepper.
**Bam Bam:** But that, that white chocolate's there.
**Chef Ricky:** But that, but that speaks to what I'm talking about. You have to be able to, it's not just about taste. It's about what you're feeling and what you're seeing. It's about, you know, the aroma on various parts of the cigars, right? Uh, the, the first thing we highlighted was the camel foot on the cap when we took it out of the humidor, right.
Which is completely gone. Uh, and then, you know, something that Gizmo does often, you know, smelling the burn line, which that, that was new to me until I came to you guys. Um, so it's just like, what else can we do? You know, now we're adding water onto some cigars. Like what else can we do to experience things differently that round out that?
I think there's a
**Gizmo:** sense that you tapped into there that we, you know, Had haven't talked about tonight in this experience. And Puba is probably the one that points to it most when you're having a good cigar flavor profile aside, but you're having a good cigar that's performing. Well, you're, you're enjoying whatever it is.
You have that kind of relaxation where you feel your heart rate go [01:15:00] down and you kind of sit back in your chair and you settle into the experience. And I think that's just as important to all these other things, to open your mind to. Find new flavors, find new ways that the cigar touches in a good way or bad way touches your palate.
Like, I think all of those things being a product of what we do here and what the listeners do with us and in their own groups and alone at home. You know, that's, that's really the benefit of, of this, this general exercise that we do.
**Senator:** And on that, you know, don't get frustrated early on because you can't pull out the notes that you are hoping to.
And I say that because the white chocolate note that Ricky just called out, look how long it It took for us to even figure that out an hour, 15 minutes, like, you know, don't get frustrated. These things don't happen right away. How much
**Bam Bam:** tequila have we had over the past many years? Exactly. Yeah. And so it's like,
**Gizmo:** I've never had this is an indictment on you.
**Senator:** You're indicted. [01:16:00]
**Gizmo:** Well, I think, you know, I really think this email from lizard Keith and this question was the perfect question to pose for episode one 50 today, because it really does encompass and, and highlight. Everything we try to
**Bam Bam:** do everything,
**Gizmo:** right? It's it's everything that we do in this podcast is trying to understand what we're tasting, how we're tasting it.
And really the biggest thing that I think pushes us further is why we're tasting it, you know, and, and being curious about it. So I think that it's a really wonderful email and a wonderful question and discussion for episode one 50 today. So thank you to lizard Keith for pointing that out. And I think boys, we might have to do something we've never done before.
I think we have, we, I think we have to award a second lizard of the week this week to lizard
**Senator:** Keith Gizmo's like Oprah right now. You get a car, you get a car, you get a car. It's like we're in Cuba with him all over again.
**Gizmo:** Am I wrong?
**Senator:** You're not wrong. Am I wrong?
**Gizmo:** Am I wrong? [01:17:00] So we're also going to give lizard Keith lizard of the week.
We have a dual lizard of the week this week for episode 150. That's
**Bam Bam:** big.
**Gizmo:** Because that. To me encompasses everything that we do with this podcast and with this friendship and with this group and also to lizard Mike who sent us these two brilliant tequilas tonight that have prompted so much wonderful discussion Tasting and pairing.
I mean those two things really encompass everything that our podcast is about and our community lizard nation Is about BAM's going to send them both Opus device. What was that? All right, boys. We are well beyond the halfway point. Now, I would say on the Opus X 2020. Biento Demore. What's everybody thinking?
Can I just lodge one quick
**Senator:** complaint? Oh boy. It's not about the flavor. I know. No, I know what it is. it's not a huge one. Go ahead. Flaky ash. That's it. Yes. I have looked at everyone's clothing and everyone's experiencing the same [01:18:00] thing. And it wasn't like that in the beginning. No, the first. Like half inch or even inch.
You're not wrong. You're not wrong. But once you get past that, it's still, it burns perfectly. It's an even burn, but the ass just flakes off and you constantly have little pieces of ash all over you. And I'm just like wiping away throughout and I'm looking at everyone's clothes and there's like pieces of ashes.
My
**Gizmo:** iPad has ash particles all over it. It's very,
**Bam Bam:** at this point it's very delicate. Ash
**Chef Ricky:** Senator, every cigar is in an exclusive.
**Rooster:** You know what? This reminds me of. The flakiness of the ash, there was one cigar we've had, it's the Davidoff, it was, you know, at the previous lounge. North Korea? It was there. It was, it was there, like, addition, do you remember that?
**Bam Bam:** The, yes, the Ridgewood.
**Rooster:** Davidoff Ridgewood. Very flaky ash. Yeah,
**Bam Bam:** I didn't like that cigar too much. It was okay. I liked that cigar. Says it all.
**Rooster:** Yeah, but the ash was very flaky. Yeah, interesting. Probably
**Gizmo:** by
**Rooster:** design. [01:19:00] Correct.
**Gizmo:** All right, boys. In celebration of Bam, who brought the wonderful opus to buy tonight, Thank you, Bam.
He's looking at you. He's not happy. You're welcome. He's not happy. I want to wrap up on episode 150 tonight. How long have you been waiting to do this? I'm not answering that question. I plead the fifth. I want to wrap up the conversation around dried fruit. I have a bunch of emails from listeners. I pulled a few that I think are pretty cool.
Pretty cool. So one is from Lizard Max In Australia, he writes, Gents, Max from Australia here, I hope you are all well. Prepare yourself. And this is in all caps bold. Uh huh. Oxygen oxidizes wet fruit into dry fruit. Ooh. He says that's definitely worth a 10 all day. Keep up the great work.
**Bam Bam:** You know, chemically, that's actually possible.
It's 100 percent true. That's that.
**Gizmo:** It's a compliment.
**Bam Bam:** [01:20:00] Correct. I take it as a compliment.
**Gizmo:** This one's from Lizard Sean. He says, to set the stage, a group of 12 or so guys sitting in chairs in a circle. Quote, I guess I will start. Hi, my name is Lizard Sean, and I also get dried fruit notes in all of my cigars.
Sean, you're a sophisticated man. The group responds, Hi, Lizard Sean. It started from the first one, and then everyone after seemed to have the same dried fruit. Not wet fruit. But dried fruit, but then the citrus creeped in and I thought this can't be where's the dried fruit? But happily the dried fruit came right back on the next one.
I smoked I got really nervous Anyways, thanks for letting me share
**Bam Bam:** boy. I feel like the compliments just kind of took a turn That was I think I think
**Gizmo:** BAM should sit in on these dried fruit anonymous meetings And there was another member of the circle who says you're sharing helps me immensely. That was lizard Tim So that was a discussion on one of the Facebook groups.
I love that. No, it's not Tuxedo Timmy. All right. This one comes from a long term listener. I thought this was actually really interesting. And this is dead serious. This is from [01:21:00] Lizard Bill. This is, uh, Lizard Bill has been writing us. I think it's an episode one, probably going on three years now. So cheers to Lizard Bill.
He says, Hey guys, I came across this book. pretty detailed flavor wheel from famous smoke. It was one I had not seen. I don't know if you guys have seen this. It's pretty useful in digging up all of these flavor notes. And when I tell you on this thing that I've seen, there must be 200 flavor notes around the edge.
You're talking the main component, all fruit,
**Bam Bam:** by the way,
**Gizmo:** animal, wood, vegetation, earth, plant, fruit, nuts. Um, spices, et cetera. And, and there are hundreds. Is there a horse flavor? Is horse foot on there? If there's a barnyard, I'm curious about animal. Yeah. Is petrichor on there? Petrichor. Let me see if it has to be.
It has
**Chef Ricky:** to be minerality. There's mulch.
**Gizmo:** There's dirt, moss, damp earth, petrichor. Hey, there we go. Of course, dried fruit is on there. Absolutely. It is, of course. But, uh, I really liked this. So I'm going to put that up on the [01:22:00] Instagram. That's nice. So credit to famous smoke. That's a really great flavor. It is.
So I think to answer, you know, going back to lizard Keith, who asked us that great question to answer some of those questions, printing this out or having this local on a phone or an iPad when you're smoking, you can say, Oh, this is wood. What kind of, when you can dial down into it. Yep. It's a pretty useful tool.
So I think that, um, frame that might be in your,
**Chef Ricky:** in your home lounge or something. Or
**Gizmo:** you can just put
**Senator:** one with dried fruit all the way around.
**Gizmo:** I'll make a custom one for you. This ain't right. So finally we have a gift from a listener for BAM. Tonight. This is from Lizard Luigi, who's written us a lot. He won Lizard of the Week a few weeks ago.
He says, Hey Lizards, I'm listening to the J. C. Neumann shark episode and hearing Bam being taken to task about his dried fruit notes has encouraged me to do my part and help Bam further hone his seemingly unsophisticated One act play, dried fruit palate.
**Senator:** That is a knife to the belly [01:23:00] if I've ever heard one.
**Gizmo:** So, Lizard Luigi says, Please accept this dried fruit platter. Wow. As a training to this.
**Bam Bam:** Look at this. To get
**Gizmo:** Bam to understand exactly what the hell he's tasting. That is awesome. That's from Costco. So this, this is actually dead serious. This is not cheap. This is a really high quality Harry and David.
Yeah. A platter.
**Bam Bam:** Lizard, the Weezy. Thank you so much. Like this is quite the gift. Very, very kind. That's very generous.
**Gizmo:** So I think, and I think that this is exactly what we're talking about for all the ball busting we do in this room of BAM and the rest of us. I, this is exactly what it's about. The listeners out there.
We love you. We love you and we know that you love us. Hundred percent. I think this is an, a awesome homage to this ongoing joke with bam that turned into something really cool. What can I say? I've got
**Bam Bam:** goosebumps right now. Thank you. That's pretty cool, man. So much. That's very cool. So that's a dry fruit, very, uh, plat for bam.
That's awesome. That's awesome. It's a dry fruit freight flavor, my man.
**Gizmo:** And he [01:24:00] says, as always, I enjoy the pod you guys make. Tuesday the best day of the's. Awesome. That's great. Yep. So thanks again guys. And that's from Lizard Luigi. Wonderful. Wonderful.
**Rooster:** I mean, I must say in BAM's defense rooster coming to Bev's defense, this is the first new, I would say 40 percent of the cigars on the cold row.
You do get dried fruit. You get a raisin, some kind
**Bam Bam:** of fig, apricot, a raisin.
**Chef Ricky:** You're going to get today. Today I got apple and you know what you find in dried apricots, citrus.
**Bam Bam:** Well,
**Chef Ricky:** yeah, a
**Bam Bam:** little bit. Yeah, sure. My man, thank you for corroborating. So
**Senator:** you're onto something. Yeah, you know, I think it's genius. In Bam's defense, every year it's a different note.
Last year was citrus, this is the year of the dried fruit, and next year we're gonna find out.
**Bam Bam:** Honestly, we haven't hit citrus except for the Sonata, the um, Aging Room. Yeah, the Aging Room.
**Grinder:** You've been on the dried fruit.
**Bam Bam:** I have been, but we haven't had many cigars with that citrus. I think you're right though.
**Gizmo:** I think, I think citrus has been a note that we haven't found in a lot of the recent [01:25:00] cigars we've been smoking. The, the notable one is that Agerum, which I get every time. I think of you every time, you know, as we smoke that cigar. Oh, the Corona's
**Rooster:** Claro. I mean, that's got a lot of citrus. Orange peel. Yeah.
Agreed.
**Gizmo:** So yeah, thanks to all the listeners. We had a ton of comments and emails on dried fruit. I've probably got more. Stuff on dried fruit than anything else in the last year, of
**Senator:** course. I am feeling the love tonight. You should with this dried fruit platter.
**Gizmo:** So that puts a button on that boys on episode 150 tonight.
I thought that was a fun little celebration. That just means they agree with Ben. Exactly. My
**Grinder:** shirt looks like an asterisk. Thank you, chef. I'm wearing a white shirt. We need a cigar bib. Yeah.
**Gizmo:** So boys, we are coming in the last third here tonight on the Opus X 2020 ent Dior. What is everybody thinking? Because it has remained very consistent for me. I, I, I wouldn't say that this is a two or three act play. Like, I feel like it's been pretty [01:26:00] consistent from the beginning with a slight pickup in intensity, but, I mean, very slight.
I think they, but there, there's a lot of different notes,
**Rooster:** but they're hard to pick. They're very famed. Right. They're not very pronounced. Nothing. Senator mentioned that in the beginning. So they're, they're not like you can't, you can't say, well, this is a dominating note, but they're all, I mean, they're there, but they're faint.
**Bam Bam:** One thing I enjoy about this is that whole experience where you can take your typical draw, do the retro simultaneously, and then get the aroma of the smoke around you. It's one of those cigars that you can continue that cycle over and over and over. And not get any harshness For me, that's really quite, no, it's very smooth.
The doubt. That's really quite the experience. Yeah. Yeah.
**Chef Ricky:** I wasn't here for that, uh, league of nine nine episode, but was the room this smoky for that one? Oh, yeah. Worse, I would think it was more, it was way more s Oh yeah. They're
**Senator:** right.
**Bam Bam:** Much smokier.
**Senator:** Yeah. Yeah. I, I mean, the difference is [01:27:00] like, this puts out a lot of smoke output, but the smoke outta the league of nine, it's heavy.
It's like a heavy viscous smoke. Oh yeah. It just like you, you blow out the smoke and it just lingers. Senator's still painting the walls.
It turned yellow. That's why we got
**Gizmo:** kicked out of there. He has a hazmat team, serve pros and they're cleaning it crazy. Yeah. The smoke was, it would, you, you would push your draw out of your mouth on the league of nine. I forget which one it was, but, uh, you would push it out and it would linger. It would just sit and talk and there's still be smoke.
It was just endless. It was awesome. We couldn't see each other. It was awesome. It really was. It was awesome. I'm enjoying this experience tonight, but I wouldn't say for the price, even at the MSRP of 40 something or the actual price that people are paying at retail 95, a hundred, whatever it is, I wouldn't say that this is.
A cigar that's demanding of that price based on the experience [01:28:00] I'm having right now.
**Grinder:** Does anyone have wrapper
**Bam Bam:** construction issues? I had a
**Gizmo:** little bit of a wrapper issue when I took the final band off.
**Bam Bam:** You know, honestly, at 45, 40, I would highly rate this cigar because I'm, the enjoyment that I'm getting, but at the higher price point, I think the ratings will reflect that, I think.
**Rooster:** So how would you compare this to the Eye of the Shark and the Opus Shark and then this?
Right. I mean, although Eye of the Shark is not an opus. Yeah. And that's a Don Carlos. Yeah. But still.
**Bam Bam:** Yeah.
**Senator:** I would just say with the cigar, for me, the, the last third gets much more savory than the rest of this cigar.
**Bam Bam:** Absolutely correct. So I
**Senator:** think like if there was any bit of a transition, it's just the final third.
I think the first two thirds are [01:29:00] pretty much consistent all the way through. Um, Grindr mentioned the wrapper issue. I did have before the secondary band. I had a crack in the wrapper, and I kept the band on to just try to hold it in place, and I was able to smoke through it, thankfully. Uh, but I did have a little bit of an issue.
**Chef Ricky:** I think for me it's more of a like a two and a half act play. The first maybe inch of the cigar, I wasn't crazy about it. I felt like it was a, it was a very short finish. It was rather dry, but as it developed, it got much sweeter. It got creamier. Uh, now it's getting savory. So that's my two, my, my 2. 5 there.
Um,
**Bam Bam:** what's cool is that, that for me, the savoriness is I'm capturing that on the front of the tongue. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And when I intentionally direct the draw just to the front of my tongue, it's very, very pleasurable. There's a lot of savoriness there. Um, and that's something that's evolved.
**Gizmo:** I will say what you guys are calling savory, I'm not [01:30:00] experiencing that in a positive way.
**Bam Bam:** It's a pronunci I think it's just a greater pronunciation of the p Previous notes for me, she's getting more robust.
**Gizmo:** I think it's changed a little bit, but I don't enjoy it as much as I did around the halfway point of the cigar when it was, I thought, yeah, I thought around the halfway point, that sweetness thing and what we were getting on the light, which was almost like a honey or maybe it was on the wrapper and it was deceiving our palate a little bit, but I don't think I'm enjoying it as much as I was call it.
45 minutes ago. I feel the same way. Same way
**Grinder:** here.
**Gizmo:** Cause the savoriness is not the kind of savory I'm looking for. It's not, it's not a steak. You're not getting any, you're not getting
**Senator:** any sweetness at all
**Grinder:** now.
**Senator:** I'm not getting a ton of sweetness.
**Grinder:** Not much. I actually never got sweetness.
**Bam Bam:** Wow. Oh wow. You must have had a crazy meal prior to the recording.
**Gizmo:** Like, like when I'm going for savory, like the cigar, I think when I think a little savory is like, I'm reaching for that bond Roberts petite one Oh one Oh nine. Now that's the kind of savory I'm looking for in a cigar or even some Patron's [01:31:00] like, uh, this savory is not. Ringing my bell at the moment and certainly at that price point, you know,
**Senator:** so you want what savory plus
**Gizmo:** We're hitting all the points tonight So boys a little bit of negative news we have to talk about tonight I don't know if you guys saw this agonorsa tobacco suffered a serious fire in esteli a tobacco processing facility owned by agonorsa leaf Like I said in esteli nicaragua Caught fire and burned well into the night, destroying thousands of pounds of raw leaf intended for premium cigars.
That's awful. The building was located on the Pan American Highway, some miles away from the main Aganorsa Leaf factory. Which produces cigar lines such as agonist leaf, of course, as well as other brands, which we, which we have smoked on the podcast at Lucien and warped. Wow. And the video of this fire. I mean, it [01:32:00] is bad, crazy.
It's crazy. And you know, it's like we've talked about. Uh, tobacco fires before at some of these facilities. I mean, I think all of the major manufacturers have experienced fire at some point. I mean, multiple fires, multiple fires. Like it's just, it's, it like, it like hits me in the heart when I see a premiums manufacturer dealing with this and losing that kind of product.
Just awful. I
**Rooster:** mean, I'm sure, I mean, these factories are insured, but you can't replace all that tobacco. So. You know, I mean, your productions tobacco, they're lost, but luckily they have other, uh, curing barns, I guess, uh, processing, uh, facilities. So that's not going to affect production according to them.
Yeah.
**Senator:** You're, you're definitely not going to replace any Medio Tempo. And I say that because Warped actually is one of like the few, if not only new world brands that has, uh, It's a version of the Maestro del Tiempo that we reviewed. That's exactly right. It has Medio Tiempo in it. [01:33:00] And, and for the listener out there, the reason why,
**Gizmo:** the reason why that's, uh, uh, an important leaf, as, as we discussed it on the podcast, is in Cuba and Cuban tobacco, when we talk about Cuban cigars, specifically Cohiba's Bejique line, that is what, separates Bihicay from the rest, according to Habanos and Tabacuba, is it's the only cigars coming out of Cuba that include Medio Tiempo, which is a relief that I think has only grown on 30 percent of the plants or something, uh, that is at the top of the, at the plant.
So, uh, it's not in a lot of cigars and like Senator said, uh, it's, it's not in many New World cigars. That's for sure. So what it says here, this, I found this interesting, obviously we know that the blaze was terrible, but they say, even if the blaze could have been contained, smoke from these flames and the water from the, the firefighters would have totally damaged and destroyed the tobacco inside anyway.
So once that fire got going, there was really no saving anything in there. The facility that was destroyed is called a pre industria. [01:34:00] The facility that burned down is used for sorting, fermenting, and aging raw tobacco. Barn cured tobacco while the loss they say is certainly significant. Agonors is saying that the other tobacco processing facilities in Nicaragua will guarantee that its operations continue smoothly.
Terrence Riley of Agonors Leaf said, quote, yesterday, one of our P and pre industrious caught fire. No one was hurt, which that's the best part of all of this. Nobody was hurt. So that's wonderful. Although this is a great loss, we are fortunate to have other facilities with plenty of tobacco to minimize the impact of our, on our operations.
So that is terribly unfortunate. And I just hate seeing any time that a premium cigar manufacturer has a fire. It's, it's tough. So at least they're not going to be stunted by this. I'm sure it's going to create some sort of impact, but hopefully they have enough to, uh, yeah. Manufacture what they need to.
So boys, we are coming to the end of our evening tonight on the Opus X. I'm sad to hear it. Biento de Amor. [01:35:00]
**Senator:** Ditto.
**Gizmo:** And the two tequilas from Unos Dos Tres. Tequila out of Mexico. I am, uh, really, really happy with how both tequilas have performed alongside this, and I'm feeling now in the last third that the tequilas have been the star of the show.
**Bam Bam:** I don't, I don't know. I find the cigar to still be really enjoyable for me. It's delicious. I'm about an inch and a half from the bottom so far.
**Grinder:** I think, I think the cigar for me was a very pleasant smoke throughout. I wouldn't say the tequila was the star of the show. I do, uh, second the, the, or maybe third thought that it got a little not as pleasant towards the back end.
Uh, it's not as smooth. It's a little harsher, a little more ashy. I
**Senator:** mean, I think it was an enjoyable experience all around, but I do agree with Gizmo. I think the tequilas have shined a little bit brighter than the cigar.
**Chef Ricky:** Yeah. Mm. Mm. Mm. No, the cigar has been exceptional, but the tequila [01:36:00] itself, um, it, it really brought something back for me.
Cause like I said, I haven't had this tequila in years and I, I mean, I called out white chocolate on this thing and it's, yeah, it's, it's been, it's been great and delicious, you know, to, to take a Blanco down with a hyper premium cigar like this, I think speaks volumes to the quality of the tequila itself.
And quite frankly, I've barely touched the Anejo. Wow. Yeah. Um, So, you know, maybe right now I'm just kind of like on a Blanco, on a Purity click. I love both. Honestly, I really do. No, I like the, I like the Añejo, but I love the Blanco. I love the Blanco. But you know what? In tasting the Añejo, you still, you, you still get that agave.
Through and through. So it's, it's, you know, it's just the same agave notes, the same chocolate, the same pepper, citrus minerality, but with some old present. So maybe the citrus dissipates a little bit, but it's very pleasant. It's it's delicious. [01:37:00] Citrus.
**Gizmo:** All right, boys, it's time to move into the formal liquor rating tonight on the tequila Blanco from Unos Dos Tres.
Bam, bam. You're up.
**Bam Bam:** Yeah. I can't speak as, I mean, I, I, I love this experience. I find myself going back and forth from the Blanco to the Anejo all night long. Each sip is a unique experience with the cigar. I'm giving both a 10. Wow. I love, I really love The, the drinking experience tonight. I mean, they're just outstanding.
They're delicious. Very complimentary. I mean, there are a lot of cigars that would pair beautifully with this particular cigar. I would love a RAS with this guy, with the Añejo.
**Gizmo:** That's a Ramon Iona, specially selected. Ramon Iona, specially select.
**Bam Bam:** And I would do with, I would do a Schwa Supreme with the Blanco all day long.
All day long. Yeah. Excellent. 10.
**Gizmo:** I like actually, they gave both scores at once. That's a first on the podcast. It is
**Bam Bam:** a first because I'm double fisting here. Like [01:38:00] literally I'm going back and forth between the Blanco and the Anejo. Excellent, excellent experience. It's a breach of protocol, but we'll allow it.
Credit to you, Bam.
**Gizmo:** True. Credit to you.
**Senator:** He's going
**Gizmo:** to be pissed when he hears this.
**Chef Ricky:** Oh, I got hell to pay. He's going to be like, not one fucking cube of ice guys.
**Grinder:** So for me, I found, uh, like, like, I think most, we know you're not a tequila guy. Like, like most, like most of the people in the room, I found the Blanco to be, to be Quite, quite a notch above the Añejo. It was creamy. It was There were so many flavors in it. So smooth. The sweetness was there. Um, and I, I don't think I've ever had that sweetness in a tequila that wasn't artificially.
Yeah. Yeah. So, um, I'm giving the Blanco a nine. I'm giving the Añejo an eight. I found the Añejo to be very, Very smooth. I [01:39:00] actually found the nose of these tequilas were outstanding. It's just so phenomenal. Like, I could just sniff it and enjoy it. Uh, but the, the sweetness, it was, there was more sweetness in the Blanco and the Añejo just had a bit of a bite, uh, on the finish that wasn't too appealing to me and was a little unexpected for an Añejo.
Um, so, that's why I'm giving it just a little below the, the Blanco. So, a nine and an eight for me.
**Gizmo:** All right, Senator.
**Senator:** So, this has been an especially memorable experience for me because when I first tried each of the tequilas, I thought both were excellent, but I always gravitate more toward an Añejo or a Reposado than I do a
**Bam Bam:** Blanco.
Yes, we know.
**Senator:** And I know Ricky being a purist, you know, he appreciates a Blanco so much. And when I started, I would have said that I enjoyed The Anejo a little bit more now that I've really spent time with each there's a big Delta I [01:40:00] this is the best Blanco I have ever had period I cannot get this white chocolate note out of my mind or off my palate It is so delicious.
I mean, if you didn't know anything about this manufacturer, you would assume it's almost like artificially, you know, flavored or enhanced in some way just because it's so remarkable to get this kind of, these kind of notes out of a blanco tequila. I said that earlier with out much HI mean, it's, I thought they added sugar into this fucking thing.
It's incredible. It's crazy. And so for me, the Blanco is a 10. I will. Absolutely. Buy a bottle of this and the Anejo was also excellent, but I'm going to give it a nine. It's not the best Anejo I've ever had, but this Blanco, I'll never forget. I'm so glad we did this and a huge thank you to the listener who sent us these bottles.
Lizard
**Gizmo:** Mike. Lizard Mike. So I'm in lockstep with Senator. I, I think the thing I would say, and we've always talked about this on the podcast, when it comes to how we rate our pairings, I always rate. [01:41:00] How it does with the cigar. I think about how it would do with a Cuban cigar. I think how it would do with a stronger, more mild cigar from any of the regions that we smoke from.
I think my experience with Blanco has been, this is a wonderful spirit, but it's not something I want to pair with a cigar. And I think tonight,
**Senator:** I've
**Gizmo:** never paired a Blanco tequila with a cigar. This one is the outlier. Tonight, this specific Blanco from Uno Dos Tres is the best Blanco I've ever had. And I think pairs, it's very comparable to some of the better Reposados we've had in how it pairs with cigars.
And I think that the body in this, the viscosity in this Blanco, the flavor, the creaminess, those notes we're calling out, white chocolate, all these other components of this that are enhancing the cigar for me. It's a 10. 10. Dude. The Blanco is a 10. My man. No question about it. Now, I expected coming in [01:42:00] tonight that I was going to be the opposite.
That the Blanco was going to be mediocre. Your Añejo, was going to be great. Especially as it pairs with a cigar. And tonight, what I've learned is that's not the case with Uno Dos Tres. Tonight, the Añejo for me is a 9. I've certainly had better Añejos. Ricky mentioned a few of them tonight. I think of some of those that he mentioned and that senator mentioned do pair better with cigars for me So for this one, it's a nine, but it's a really really excellent spirit at 90 bucks.
I think it's unbeatable.
**Bam Bam:** Hold on a nine and a 10. These are elite ratings, elite ratings. I want, I would have loved to give
**Gizmo:** both a 10, but I just don't think the idea, you don't have the
**Bam Bam:** unbridled enthusiasm that I do. That's true. That's
**Gizmo:** true. Exactly. As usual, 150 episodes later, you just didn't
**Senator:** get enough dried fruit out of that.
That's true. That's true.
**Gizmo:** Chef Ricky, I'm glad we saved you. For the last rating tonight, on the Blanco and the Añejo, I'm really curious where you're going to go on both of
**Senator:** these. [01:43:00] Elevens are not allowed.
**Chef Ricky:** Hey, Pagoda's
**Gizmo:** not here. That's right. You can go
**Chef Ricky:** 10. 5. Dude, Lizard Mike for president. Um, let me tell you.
I hate saying, let me tell you every freaking episode that guess, guess who's famous. Let me tell you, let me tell you. I was at
**Senator:** Carnegie with Shahid. You know what I have to say about that?
**Chef Ricky:** Fuck
**Senator:** Shahid.
**Chef Ricky:** That's an inside joke for the listeners. Correct. Literally. I listened to these parts and I'm like, I have to stop saying, let me tell you.
And it just comes out. And I, all this time, I never realized Pagoda was saying it. Also try it. Oh my Lord. No, this, this Blanco is exceptional. It is exceptional. It is, um, you know, [01:44:00] I'm, I'm, I'm, Borderline speechless. Um, this is the thing with the Blanco. Um, versus the Añejo. All right, my scores. I'm gonna give the Añejo a 9.
I want to give it an 8. But the Blanco is so fucking good. And I know that Añejo came from the Blanco. I can't do it. I'm giving the Blanco a 10. All right. This is by far one of the most delicious or the most delicious panko I've had in a long, uh, the viscosity, the butteriness, the creaminess, the chocolate, you know, the, the, the, there's even some caramel, some slight vanilla here.
And it's delivered so beautifully, right? Cause you hear these flavor notes. And if you understand additive versus additive free tequilas. You'd understand how in some additive laden Blancos, you'll get these notes, but they don't come across as pure and clean. They don't come across as creamy and viscous.
They [01:45:00] come across as like these soulless contributors to whatever you're experiencing. And it's almost nauseating. The Blanco here delivers it in a way where Especially the
**Senator:** next morning. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Well said. The
**Chef Ricky:** Blanco here delivers it in a way where it is. It's, dare I say, good for you, right? Like when we have these, when we have the mezcal episode and then we, we talked about how we felt like, you know, this was almost, you feel like as like what you're drinking is good for you.
And that's the, the feeling I'm getting from the Blanco. Um, I've, I've now refilled the Blanco two times, the Añejo I'm yet to finish. And again, it's not because the Añejo is not great. It's just that the Blanco is that much better for me. Um, and you. Even, you know, regardless of the pairing, I would have still given the Blanco a 10.
The cigar is going phenomenally with it, but this Blanco is, it's, It's amazing. [01:46:00] I mean, we didn't even talk about the bottle. It's a beautiful hand blown bottle. There's great details. Those labels are printed with like soy ink and they're vibrant. And they're, it's just, it's a gorgeous product all around from start to finish.
Kudos to the master distiller 4, 200 feet. I'm gonna find every fucking tequila that they just plant their agaves at 4, 200 feet. Yeah, that is, I mean, this is, that's exceptional. I think. Go out of your way to find this, get it, taste it, experience it, smoke it and drink it with, you know, smoke it too, but drink it with whatever you're smoking.
Hey,
**Gizmo:** Porter on your cigar, like
**Chef Ricky:** Arnold, you know, we may need to do it. We may need to try it now with one of those trays over the cigar, but yeah, no, this is, um, you know, it was a. I can't believe somebody brought a tequila on that I didn't, that I'm, that I fell in love with all over again.
**Gizmo:** It's fantastic.
It's, it's a, it's [01:47:00] huge. It's fucking mind blowing. Yeah. No people helping people.
**Chef Ricky:** MVP lizard. Mike, you're a fucking genius. Absolutely.
**Gizmo:** I love Lizard Mike. He's a great guy. So boys that puts the formal liquor ratings on the Tequila Blanco and the Tequila Anejo at a 9.8. And a nine respectively. So that's a 9.
8 for the Blanco and a flat 9. 0 for the Anejo, which are perfect scores. I think for both spirits tonight. I'm sorry guys. Actually, I think a 90 is a perfect score for, for the, the way the Anejo performed tonight. I think the, the formal liquor rating never lies.
**Chef Ricky:** Well, I want to touch on tequila matchmaker because I did look at some of the ratings and I believe the actually, I have them.
**Gizmo:** I have both of them. So the, uh, just to answer, uh, what was
**Chef Ricky:** the Blanco rated higher than the Añejo?
**Gizmo:** No, the Añejo is rated higher. So the community
**Chef Ricky:** guys have no nonsense.
**Gizmo:** The community rates, the Blanco and 83 and the Añejo and 85 respectively. And the panel who work for [01:48:00] tequila matchmaker rate both at an 82.
They're fired.
**Chef Ricky:** Yeah. No, I'm sorry. This Blanco is much higher than that. I've had a lot of Blanco tequila and I go out of my way to just not only drink Blancos, but to drink Blancos before anything else, before I even dive into any other expressions of that maker. And this Blanco is exceptional.
**Gizmo:** A ton of firsts tonight.
That is probably the first time that we've looked at a publication panel. And rated significantly higher as opposed to what we do with cigars. Most of the time is we find out a cigar is rated a 98 99. And then we rated a seven, six, you know, there's, that's another first tonight where these, both of these tequilas performing outperforming both the community and the.
Panel at tequila matchmaker.
**Chef Ricky:** Well, those guys make it easy because they give you a community and a panel rating, right? So I I tend to lean on the community rating because I always think the panel rating is somewhat influenced But you know, I think [01:49:00] they both have it wrong
**Gizmo:** All right, boys. It's time to move now into the formal lizard rating tonight on the Opus X 2020 Biento d'Amore Rooster, you're up.
**Bam Bam:** Here we go.
**Rooster:** So, uh, I'm just glad that this is not going to be on Splitwise. First of all, for reimbursement. But, uh, I mean, how do you know that? Don't hold your breath. I'm hoping, I'm praying. So, I mean, this cigar, it's an expensive cigar. Yes, it is.
**Bam Bam:** 95 bucks.
**Rooster:** 95, 95. I mean, it's a beautiful presentation. The boxes.
Thank you, Ben. Thank you. Of course, of course,
**Bam Bam:** of course.
**Rooster:** It's a stunning, stunning presentation. Uh, I mean, it is an Opus X. It's an Opus X to buy. We waited a long time to smoke the cigar. Did we?
**Gizmo:** I thought tonight was the first time we ever mentioned
**Senator:** it. Inside jokes, backward dealings for like a year. So did tuxedo Timmy.
I was waiting for that.
**Rooster:** You're [01:50:00] going to get a full Fiverr tuxedo Timmy,
**Senator:** Tim, you know, I love you, bro.
**Rooster:** Show him the love. His mailbox is going to determine how much you love him.
**Bam Bam:** PCA's in New Orleans, Timmy. Come on down. He's heard that before.
He's actually sent a photo of himself smoking an opus Dubai on a golf course. He waited for you. Who
**Rooster:** did
**Bam Bam:** that come from?
**Rooster:** Yeah. So, well, thank you, Ben, for bringing these, uh, these cigars. They were wonderful. Uh, we were all looking forward to smoke, smoking the cigar. I mean, it's, we've waited a long time and it's, uh,
find another way to say it. Hit the trifecta. How
**Senator:** many days do you think?
**Rooster:** I think 360 days. Yeah,
**Bam Bam:** my
**Senator:** representation is very quiet
**Bam Bam:** tonight.
**Rooster:** I think the retainer is done. I got to re up. [01:51:00] So, I mean the cigar did start out wonderful. Um, it was, you know, the construction was great. The smoke output was amazing.
Towards the, towards the, up till the middle point, I think the ash did hold up and then it did get a little bit of flaky flakiness going on. I think throughout the room, we noticed that. Only thing I find is like the flavor profile on this, the notes were not that distinct. And at that price point, you kind of want to be blown away by a cigar.
You do. And especially an Opus cigar, but you do, I mean, taste the age age tobacco in this. Uh, but overall, I'm at an eight on this cigar. Don't kill me.
**Bam Bam:** No, no, no. I, I, I think it makes sense. Yeah.
**Rooster:** So that's where I'm at. Yeah.
**Bam Bam:** All right. Chef Ricky. Yeah. Bam. First of all, thank you. Of course. Uh, you don't have to keep thanking me guys.
We're going,
**Chef Ricky:** no, no, no, no. You know what?[01:52:00]
I can't say I actually don't want you to, I can't say I personally giving you so much shit, but I've heard you get so much shit. And I know you've heard a lot of shit.
We love them. I'm resenting this. I want to say thank you. Uh, you know, I've, I've been a recipient of your generosity, uh, quite a bit and it always got catches everyone by surprise. Uh, we're all changing our name to Ricky.
But, uh, yeah, no, I, uh, initially the cigar started. It wasn't harsh, it started different for me and not what I was expecting based on, you know, I guess all of the pomp and circumstance around the cigar itself. It's true. Um, but right at that middle point, it, it was a wonderful experience. And, you know, a part of me was like, okay, is this the, you know, cause I know sometimes you would talk about how the pairing can [01:53:00] make the cigar better, but now I'm in the final third of the cigar.
And the tequila is not improving what I'm getting on the stick. Uh, so I can't say that, you know, I know for some listeners out, out there, they're, they, you know, at times you probably wonder, Hey, is what they're drinking, you know, influencing what they're tasting and sure it always is going to influence, but there's times where, you know, I could say that for the final third here, the pairing is not improving or, or, or heightening the, the, the flavor experience on the stick.
It's not unpleasant. But it's not as great as it was not the second, third, um, it is getting a little ashy, you know, as grinder said, um, and savory at the same time, but again, it's still, it's not unpleasant. And it's not uncommon for this to happen in the final third of a cigar, uh, but based on the price point.
And then everything surrounding this cigar and how many times I've heard it on the pod and, and, [01:54:00] and, and all the shit you've got for it.
**Rooster:** It's like pagodas here. You don't say this is what it takes, Ricky.
**Chef Ricky:** I'm going to give it an eight. Um, So, yeah, enjoyable cigar, it was still great, it, you know, if you could get your hands on it, I absolutely recommend it, uh, not at the price that Ben paid for it, but, um, yeah, no, it was, uh, again, thank you, um, and, and, yeah. Just for me, it's
**Gizmo:** an eight. Okay. I'm also at an eight. I think if the cigar kept up into the last third, what I was getting through most of the first half into the end of the second third, I would have absolutely given it a nine.
I think that last third for me dipped to a seven. I just did not enjoy the last piece of the cigar. I thought it smoked fast. I thought for the size of the cigar, Surprisingly fast. It actually smoked faster than [01:55:00] what I remember, even a few weeks ago from the Roma craft. The, the, uh, the Volstead and temperance VO, whatever it was for a 10 cigar.
I think we actually got more smoke time out of it, which was a smaller cigar than this in both ring gauge and length. So that has to factor in, I think the price is terribly. That's, that's outrageous. Terribly high. At almost 100 for this experience tonight. That's like Habanos level stuff. And I just don't think it even touches the value that that price would demand of a cigar like this.
I think it lacked in some complexity. I think like Rooster said some of those notes were muted. They were Timid, they were quiet. And while I enjoyed a lot of the cigar, it just doesn't align with the value that that price should, should command. And, you know, I, I'm, I'm disappointed to say it's an eight. I enjoyed the cigar.
I will not buy any, uh, unfortunately, but, um, you know, I'm, [01:56:00] this is a
**Chef Ricky:** little, of course I will, of course I
**Gizmo:** will, but there's, there's a little bit of a redemption here on Opus for me. So, uh, so it's an eight for sure. Senator, I can't believe
**Senator:** these
**Gizmo:** scores.
**Chef Ricky:** Senator's gonna give it a 7. No,
**Senator:** I'm kidding. I'm also at an 8. I think 8's the perfect score for this cigar. I think, I give it an 8 because If you love Opus, I definitely think it's worth trying. I think anybody who appreciates the Opus flavor profile would enjoy this cigar. I think for me, what prevented it from getting a nine or a 10, the last third.
And I think, you know, Grindr said this and I agree. I didn't particularly enjoy, I think. The kind of refined age, tobacco experience of the first two thirds was not present down the stretch. I think similar to my commentary when we started lighting [01:57:00] this cigar, there's a number of flavor notes, but you don't leave smoking this cigar saying this cigar is defined by this particular note.
If I want this note, I'm going to pick up this cigar. And so it wasn't. in any way unenjoyable. It just didn't have like a defining characteristic about it that I would go out and say, I'm going to go pursue this or buy another. Um, the price point obviously is high. I think if you can find it closer to its retail price and you love Opus, I think, you know, you'd probably say it's fair for what it is.
It's still a big cigar. I mean, I agree with Giz it, it burned a little bit fast, but it's still a big smoke. Um, And, and the most frustrating part, honestly, for me, is just, at this price point, and it's an opus, I should not be cleaning myself for half of the smoking experience. So we're grooming
**Bam Bam:** ourselves constantly.
I mean, it honestly was aggravating. Like,
**Senator:** I got to the point where I was leaning over. [01:58:00] I was honestly wondering what you were doing. I swear. I'm like, are you gonna get the, what's happening? Just keeping the cigar. cigar away from my clothes because I'm just tired of having to clean up. So it's just ridiculous.
I don't have to do that with a 10 cigar. There's no reason I should do that with a 40 to 90 cigar. So That really detracted from my smoking experience. Um, but all that considered it's not a bad cigar. It's a mild recommend. Um, I just personally wouldn't go out and pursue it at this price point or with some of the issues that I described.
**Grinder:** All right, grinder. I'm also at an eight. I really enjoy the cigar. It had very classic opus, uh, flavor profile, which I really do enjoy. The, I didn't really catch any transitions except for the last third when it got a little. like I said, a little harsher, uh, and the flavors that I enjoyed so much were kind of obliterated.
And I really hate to, to beat a dead horse, but the ash situation and the wrapper for me, [01:59:00] which exploded, was really bad. It's just fucking annoying. So that is, An eight.
**Gizmo:** Okay. Bam Bam.
**Grinder:** Yeah.
**Bam Bam:** Um, I've been at an eight from the beginning. I've had this before. I was always at an eight. I think it's a good score for this particular.
I was
**Senator:** going to give it a 10. No,
**Bam Bam:** no, because of the price really. So the big complaint about Opus is every, every cigar that they put out in the Opus line is very expensive. Is it worth the money for people that Senator, I think you put it perfectly. If you're an Opus fan, I think you'll enjoy this cigar. I happen to love the flavor notes that I got in this cigar.
I loved it all the way down, down to about a half an inch, but the price, it just, it's not something that, you know, I bought the box, but I don't think I'll ever do that again. So I think an eight is a very fair score.
**Senator:** Can I ask you a question? Yeah. A box purchase is a, it's an investment. It's a big commitment.
Yeah. What led you to immediately go for the box and not like just a few singles? Well, I
**Bam Bam:** couldn't get singles anywhere. And I was with a bunch of guys playing [02:00:00] espionage and the owner of
**Gizmo:** bingo, by the way, has hit, hit hard. Everybody won bingo. Is espionage
**Bam Bam:** on a big, Oh yeah. Okay. So I was playing espionage and I was with the other club owner.
He wanted to buy a box, so I was sitting there and it was an opportunity. Sure, I'll take a box, no problem. I will smoke this again because I have the box, but The price is, it's, it's, it's tough to kind of swallow, but an eight is a pretty respectable score for the cigar. Eight.
**Gizmo:** All right, boys, that puts the formal lizard rating tonight on the Opus X 2020.
Can you pull out
**Bam Bam:** the calculator please? Biento
**Gizmo:** DeMore puts that rating at an 8. 0, which I actually think is a very appropriate score for the cigar and the experience. And
**Bam Bam:** I'm surprised because we're not Opus fans. I thought it would score a little bit lower, but that's a pretty respectable score.
**Chef Ricky:** Is that, is that the highest rated?
Opix. Oh, yeah. Opix. Opix. Opix.
**Senator:** Opix.
**Chef Ricky:** Tequila
**Senator:** breaks out the best of
**Chef Ricky:** us.
**Senator:** Even in chef, that's drank more tequila than anybody in this [02:01:00] room.
**Gizmo:** So, I'm not gonna run through all the other Arturo Fuentes we've done. The list is too long. We'll specifically focus tonight on the only other Opus X we've done, which is the Perfection 888.
We did on episode 31, which scored a 6. 6 very, very weak experience with that. So scoring 14 points higher than that is certainly a little bit of a redemption redemption, but I don't think at this price point tonight and what we expected. It doesn't even come close to what it should have been. And I, I'm disappointed around the room.
I'm disappointed for all of us in this cigar tonight.
**Senator:** Now I have to ask, and I'm sure Tuxedo Timmy's going to appreciate this. Gizmo, how did you feel about the larger ring gauge?
**Gizmo:** It was fine. I actually enjoyed the, the Roma craft. We did a couple of weeks ago, way more than this. We're going to be doing the Rocky Patel 6060, which is a 60 ring gauge.
So hold on.
**Bam Bam:** What did
**Gizmo:** you give the Roma craft? It was high. I think it was a nine. Nine. Okay. Yeah. I think it was a nine on that cigar. I really enjoyed that cigar. [02:02:00] Would
**Senator:** you say that there's some merit to a larger ring gauge?
**Gizmo:** I will say there is. I certainly still am pulling more thin ring gauge cigars.
**Senator:** I like the line of questioning.
I'm just saying the smoke output when you have a large ring gauge cigar, he ain't wrong. So enjoyable. Like when you're smoking. When you just want to immerse yourself in a cigar and smoke, there's nothing better. He's not wrong. I think we should go back to the
**Gizmo:** land. Sarah. He's not wrong. Oh boy. All right.
So we have a lot of people to thank tonight. This is episode 150. We have to thank some folks.
**Bam Bam:** I'm going to be eating dried fruit and cashew tonight. Lizard, Luigi, Luigi. I love you for bringing the
**Chef Ricky:** dried food platter. Very generous.
**Bam Bam:** Incredible gift. Thank you so much.
**Chef Ricky:** Could I, could I just say, I'm going to make it my mission, right?
Because being an agave drinker, you know, from Mascara, I see it as with all the tequila. Oh boy. Uh,
**Gizmo:** I don't know what he just said. How many words was that? How many words was that? [02:03:00]
**Chef Ricky:** There is, you know, there's always such a focus on, on additive free, which, you know, there should be. Um, but I, I wonder, cause I, I can't get over that initial flavor from the beginning and you know, sometimes listening to that League of Nine episode and talking about the spray.
And, and just, you know, this isn't the first time I was caught off guard, um, by a sweet note that felt like it was artificially implanted.
**Bam Bam:** Wait, spray or spritzing? No, no, no.
**Chef Ricky:** Not spritzing. Okay. Um, well, yeah. Um, but yeah, I'm going to make my mission and look into this. I want to see if number one, anyone admits to it.
Number two, if it's a, uh, a common practice for some manufacturers. Um, but I'm, I'm really curious about it. I don't know that, you know, we. Um, you know, we, we really dive into, [02:04:00] well, at least on the agave front, we dive into, you know, any additives and things like that, you know, I, I don't know it's spoken about as much in, or as faux pas, you know, if it's as faux pas in whiskeys or whatnot, but I really want to dive into on the, on the cigar front and see if anybody is, you know, admitting to doing these things.
Um, and if it's as, if, if, It imparts as much of a negative impact on, on some cigars.
**Senator:** It's a great question because I'd love to have Saka back on and talk about this. Oh yeah. I feel like he's as much of an open book in the industry as he is. He is. Giz, I think you got to
**Bam Bam:** get on that. Let's do a second interview with him.
I think this is a great deep dive. It's for me, a negative. I agree. If that occurs more often than not. I didn't experience it on this cigar like you did, um, but on a Ligonine, possibly.
**Grinder:** Do you remember the, um, uh, the cigar I gave you at my house the one time, the, uh, special art, it [02:05:00] wasn't a special art, it was, uh, series R.
Something happened like three or four years ago where they changed the blend in some way. And I think it may have been done with new ownership or something for the brand. But they, they definitely put something on the cap. There's, there's something for
**Senator:** sure on that cigar. So I, I bought some from a place that won't be named.
North Korea. This is a North Korea. Long time ago. And I could swear I gave Rooster one and I was saying how this is like as chocolatey a cigar as I've ever had. ever had in my life. And I had the first one at grinder's place and then I bought some from that shop and I could swear I gave Rooster one and you were like, this is ridiculous.
Like the amount of chocolate, like it's almost unnatural. Like, I don't know how you, you literally feel like you're just eating chocolate.
**Bam Bam:** So, so you're questioning how does the tobacco produce that flavor profile? To that extent. It was so extreme.
**Rooster:** Are you talking about the series R? Yes. Yeah. Like the original number
**Grinder:** seven.
It's like one of the First super [02:06:00] big ring gauges number seven market back years ago. Um, and you know, it, it's a really good stick. I love that stick, but something changed and that's boxes since I've got, well, I got one box, actually the one with you. I'm like, that's when it was like, something was way off and you and I both and immediately noticed it, it was a new box that I'd opened and it just, it just.
You know, the, the blend was kind of still there, but it was, I think it detracted from the experience because it, all you got was this rush of glucose in your mouth.
**Gizmo:** It sounds like we have now opened our first official lizard investigation. I agree. I don't know that it's
**Senator:** the first, but we've definitely opened an investigation.
**Gizmo:** I'm not counting the BAMBAM investigations.
**Chef Ricky:** All right. I think we need one of those Law and Order clips. Yes. Dun, dun, dun, dun.
**Gizmo:** All right, boys. We have a lot of folks to thank tonight before we wrap up. Of course, first, even though he's uncomfortable, Bam, [02:07:00] thanks for bringing in the Opus Dubai tonight. Of course.
All ball busting aside, we really appreciate it. Of course. It's an expensive cigar. Yeah. It's a hard cigar to find. So that was a great cigar to do for our episode 150. We have to thank and congratulate both of our wizards of the week. Lizard Mike, of course, for sending these two wonderful tequilas to us.
**Bam Bam:** Incredible tequila, Mike. Thank you. As you
**Gizmo:** said, incredible.
**Chef Ricky:** I want to know what else Lizard Mike is drinking. Yeah, that's a great, great question. Yeah, this this uno, dos y tres was a phenomenal call out. He had no idea. I mean, we had no idea what we were smoking. So the fact that it went as well as it did today and a Blanco of all things.
Yeah. You know.
**Gizmo:** Excellent. And of course, to lizard Keith as well, prompting us with that great question about discerning tasting notes and developing palates. Love to hear from listeners. Of course, congratulations to both of them. They're going to win some stuff from us. Anybody out there in our listening audience, we're 150 episodes in now.
Send us an email, send us a great comment. Can, you know, send something to us. Every [02:08:00] week someone is going to win lizard of the week and it's going to win some stuff from us. So please, please contribute to the show.
**Bam Bam:** Lizzy Luigi, thank you for the dry fruit. Thank you.
**Gizmo:** Look at, look at Bam embracing. I can't wait to snack on that tonight.
So of course I want to thank Fabrica 5 for supporting the podcast. They've been a great partner to us. We love you. We really appreciate it. And the cigars are fantastic. We have to thank our listeners. We're 150 episodes in. We have listeners who've been with us since day one, and we have listeners who've been with us since today.
One day, and we appreciate each and every one of you, and we couldn't do it without you. We are terribly grateful. Thank you so much for your support. And they hold us accountable. They do hold us accountable. Each of us. They are the real investigators. Each of us. Yeah. Yep. We have to shout out Puba and Pagoda, who unfortunately aren't here tonight.
Our brothers, our lizard brothers, who couldn't be here with us tonight.
**Bam Bam:** Opus Divi is waiting for both those guys. Ooh. Oh, yeah. Very nice. And
**Gizmo:** [02:09:00] cheers to you boys in the room here. We have a wonderful thing, 150 episodes into a thousand and 1500 more, whatever it may be, this is awesome and I'm grateful for each of you.
This has been a fantastic journey so far and we are just getting started. Thank
**Bam Bam:** you so much.
**Gizmo:** That is the end of episode 150 tonight, boys, on the Tequila Blanco from Uno Dos Tres. We had a 9. 8 and the Tequila Añejo. We had a flat 9. 8. 9. 0 and on the Opus X 2020, Biento d'Amor, we had an 8. 0.
**Senator:** Yeah, baby.
**Gizmo:** May the lizard investigations continue.
**Senator:** Oh,
**Gizmo:** yeah, we might get sued. Here comes the cease and desist. Correct. All right, guys. A great night tonight. Again, Bam. Thanks so much for the cigar. Thanks to Lizard Mite for these great tequilas. Thanks, guys. It was a fantastic night. I appreciate each of you. This was great. And, uh, we'll [02:10:00] see everybody next week.
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. If you have any comments, questions, if you want to reach out, say hello, tell us what you're smoking, we'd Email us hello at lounge lizards, pod.
com. You can also find us on Instagram at lounge lizards pod. We really appreciate your time and we'll, uh, we'll see you next week.