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The lizards pair an aged H. Upmann No. 2 with Remy Martin VSOP Cognac. The guys discuss Poobah's favorite cigar, Senator introduces Cognac to the group and they discuss how age can turn a good Cuban cigar into a great one.
Released every Tuesday, the LOUNGE LIZARDS podcast helps listeners navigate the experience of finding and enjoying premium cigars (both Cuban and non-Cuban) and quality spirits. Episodes are normally around 90 minutes long and feature a variety of different topics including food, travel, life, sports and work.
The podcast features eight members: Rooster, Poobah, Gizmo, Senator, Pagoda, Chef Ricky, Grinder and Bam Bam.
This is not your typical cigar podcast. We’re a group of friends who love sharing cigars, whiskey and a good laugh.
Join us and become a card-carrying lounge lizard yourself! Email us at hello@loungelizardspod.com to join the conversation and be featured on an upcoming episode!
**Gizmo:** [00:00:00] Welcome to the Lounge List's podcast. 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 and tonight. Tonight I'm joined by Rooster Puba, Senator Pagoda, and bam.
Bam. And our plan is to smoke a cigar, drink some cognac, talk about life, and of course, have some laughs. So take this as your 40th official invitation to join us and become a card carrying lounge Lizard Planet. Meet us here once a week. We're gonna smoke at cubit cigar tonight, share our thoughts on it, and give you our formal lizard rating.
We do a deep dive on pub's favorite cigar. Senator introduces us to the world of cognac, and we discuss how age can turn a good Cuban cigar into a great one, all among a variety of other things for the next hour. So sit back, get your favorite drink, light up a cigar, and enjoy as we pair Remy Martin V S O P, with the Huppman number two.
We're back to the Battle of the Pyramids [00:01:00] tonight on the pod with the H up in number two. A very special cigar tonight for several reasons. Number one, we all love the cigar. Number two, it's pub's favorite cigar, so we're checking a couple boxes tonight. And number three, he has been so generously kind to bring us eight year aged Upmanu s from the Ahman factory.
Yeah.
**Poobah:** Wow. Love, love 14.
**Gizmo:** Love 14. We've made reference in the past 14,
**Poobah:** you know, people love the, uh, the box code in the year, particularly, you know, from Atman. So up 14, loving, there's a whole hashtag loving
**Gizmo:** loving up.
**Poobah:** So, uh, but I, I, I really love these. Um, I've procured some over the past couple of years and, and, uh, it's a pleasure to share these tonight because, um, Uh, what's better than, than sharing a cigar with friends?
I think if you, it's really a pleasure in smoking some of
**Gizmo:** these things [00:02:00] alone. So, yeah, I think I, it's very kind of you to bring these, these are awesome. And I know these are your, your, your secret stash of Lu 14 up. Yeah. I hope
**Poobah:** they smoke well for everybody. .
**Bam Bam:** Well, we'll, we'll remember you didn't roll them
**Gizmo:** what are you? Uh, let's cut this thing, boys. Let's see what we're getting on the, uh, cold draw on the wrapper. It's a beautiful cigar. The draw is wide open. No, I can't wait. I really love these cigars, man. Wow. I haven't had one this age, so this is a real treat for me tonight. Yeah, me too. Mm. Draws perfect.
Getting the cedar, little woody, little, little weather.
**Poobah:** Yeah. It taste like tobacco and cedar
**Gizmo:** and earthy. Yeah. . Yeah. And it, it's perfectly rolled too. I mean, the pack is just enough. It's not too dense. Nope. Yeah, it looks really, really nice. A little light
**Bam Bam:** colored
**Gizmo:** wrapper. Yeah. [00:03:00] Light colored wrapper.
**Poobah:** Yeah. Yeah.
When you feel the weight of it, like they're not overpacked. Yeah. And I kind of like that.
**Gizmo:** Yeah. This is great actually. Okay, let's, uh, let's light this thing boys. The H upk Ahman number two. It's a 52 ring gauge by six and an eighth. Again, back to the battle of the pyramids. We've done several of these now we only have one or two left, I think.
And, uh, we'll see who the clear winner is in a few weeks. , I have a feeling that this one's gonna have a head start on the, on the wind tonight.
**Bam Bam:** Yeah. I could smell the smoke coming off of the cigars. I'm lighting it. It's really
**Gizmo:** good. You can taste the age. I was just gonna say that right.
**Bam Bam:** Not dis, not disappointing.
Right off the bat.
**Poobah:** Yeah, you can taste, it's got like a very deep earthy flavor. Yeah. And then it kind of transitions into some dessert flavors too, as it moves along.[00:04:00]
**Gizmo:** Yeah. That's really, really delicious on the light. Awesome. Right away, you
**Poobah:** know, I can have, there's almost like a peanut buttery thing that starts to happen
**Bam Bam:** too. Yeah. So we have younger UPNs that Gizmo and I bought 2019. And Senator
**Gizmo:** too. Yeah, we have, yeah, we have up in factory. I think they're eighteens or nineteens.
**Bam Bam:** I'll tell you something, I could have an up and two
**Gizmo:** every day. So now Puba, you know, you have, you said you, I think you said you have fourteens, fifteens 17. You have a, you have a nice collection of these, right? Yeah. I have
**Poobah:** it like staggered a little by year. So, uh, I have fourteens, fifteens, sixteens, seventeens, you know, just so I can, cause I like the cigar.
Yeah. You know? So,
**Gizmo:** so what do you find is kind of the, I don't wanna say the, the peak. age-wise, but where does it kind of get really
**Poobah:** good for you? I mean, for me, these, these are the oldest ones that I've got. I may have smoked a couple of, maybe, but these are the, pretty much the ones that I've [00:05:00] had experience with this from 14 on.
So I think the fourteens smoke really well. Um, I think the, uh, I actually have some seventeens that smoke very well. I mean, everyone shits on that year. But yeah,
**Gizmo:** I love, uh, the eighteens that I have, uh, like, like Bam said, I think are smoking great, but they're very different than this. Yes. Not in flavor, per se.
but in the complexity and the, the elegance and the smoothness of the delivery. Yeah. This,
**Rooster:** this, to me, it kind of tastes like a Sir
**Gizmo:** Winston almost.
**Bam Bam:** Mm-hmm. . Oh yeah. Great
**Gizmo:** parallel. Yeah. It's got smooth, like some of those characteristics. Good parallel. It has that leathery thing too. Yeah. Yeah. It's
**Rooster:** like earthy leather
**Bam Bam:** and uh, so the younger, the younger ones that Gizmo and Senator and I have, yeah.
It's the same for me, the same flavor profile just amped up where over the eight, over the years, it's really mellowed out beautifully.
**Poobah:** I I love the finish in the cigar. Yeah. I love the finish on it. Yeah. Like it's got like this sweet finish. Once your palette just kind of [00:06:00] adjust to what's happening with it and you start to roll with it.
To me it has this finish on it that's got a little complexity and I like that it's, it has, it has a little, this sweet but not too sweet finish on
**Senator:** the end. So Puba, I, I agree. I, I think of complexity whenever I think of an up in two and, and like an elegant cigar. , like the flavors are so complex in this compared to some of the other torpedoes or besos or whatever we want to call them, that I think the flavor profiles are more straightforward.
It's maybe two or three notes where I get a lot in this cigar. Yeah, and I mean, many of you guys probably remember this when I was in Greece on vacation, I'd obviously taken a ton of different Cubans, and to my complete surprise, I mean, Dubin Two's never been my favorite cigar. I love an up bin two, but it stole the show of every stick I brought on vacation with me.
This surprised me the most, was just so incredibly satisfying.
**Poobah:** I'm so glad you said that. I'm so happy that the cigar like presented itself to you in a [00:07:00] way where that was compelling, because you know, that's what happens. You're like, oh my God, well all of a sudden this thing, well, I'm thinking about it differently and maybe it, it could be acclimation, it could be the box, it could be whatever, but all of a sudden it presents itself to you in a way that's compelling and cool.
And that's what happened to me with the cigar. And I feel like it delivers, there's complexity to it. There. It delivers when you retro havel it, you can so easily through the, can go through the nose and you get a little bit of floral when you do that. And then off like the front of your tongue, you get like this sweetness when you want it.
So there's a lot going on
**Gizmo:** as I'm smoking this, like the Sir Winston, this cigar for me is demanding that I slow down, smoke it slower. Definitely just in the way that it's processing. It's like being processed by my brain. It's my mouth too. It's just, it's just, it's so nice in the hand and it's, it's demanding me to, to
**Senator:** smoke this properly.
So for me, I get the exact same thing, but, uh, I, I, I have a thought as to why this with [00:08:00] age is a lot creamier, like, and as in it coats your mouth in a way that the eighteens we have doesn't have that as much on the finish. Yeah. And I think that's why I'm smoking this slower. Because it, it just coats your mouth and it has like that, like a lingering finish that you just stop and appreciate exactly what you're experiencing and then you've gotta kind of wait till your, your next puff.
So I, I agree. Like you, you, you are forced to take your time with this cigar in a really great way. And I
**Gizmo:** think that's the mark of a, a really elegant cigar. This,
**Rooster:** this might be the best mond I've
**Gizmo:** had. Yeah. This is pretty incredible. Of all the,
**Rooster:** I don't, I don't have a lot of monds, but I mean, I have some 54, 46, but you know, with this kind of age on this, I don't, I don't, I don't have, I don't have many Sir Winston's, but I kind of relate this to, uh,
**Gizmo:** aged.
This is very Sir Winston, this is very similar to that 13th Sir Winston I had a few months ago. Yeah. Yeah. It's feeling like that
**Poobah:** the, the, yeah, it, the, it, the, [00:09:00] the finishes on the finish, on the pallet, it hangs and it's very pleasant. Yeah. Is a very pleasant finish on the pallet. And you're just like, . I like that.
And it gets a little com, there's a little caramel, there's a little like almost peanut butter aspect to it with all that earth underneath just in the background. And you're just like, you know what? There's a good fucking cigar that deserves like Yeah, absolutely. My attention. And it's, and it's, it's, it's really, that's why I like 'em so much.
**Gizmo:** I mean, you, you hit the gold mine with this, this, these boxes for sure. I mean, this is really special.
**Poobah:** And the way they're packed, like they're consistently, these, this factory code, like they're not overpacked, but they're not under packed. The dis come they're, they're, they're you. But, but, so you burn the open draw to you.
I mean, you just kiss it and it combusts and you're just like, wow. You know, it's not packed. So tight
**Bam Bam:** dress box or a
**Gizmo:** sliding lid box for these, these only come in a dress box. Unfortunately, they're only [00:10:00] a dress box. They only come in a dress box at 25. Um, they've been around since I, I'm somewhere in the 1950s it seems.
they listed as a pre 1960 release. Um, there have been other various, um, versions of this. They've had a reserve of Ceia in 2010. Um, they've had, uh, it obviously appears in the selection pyramids, which is, you can buy that from, uh, ho bonos. It's the selection of, of six pyramids of the various global, uh, markers.
Uh, and they had, uh, a few other things, um, special releases. But this cigar, as it is, only comes in that dress box of 25.
**Poobah:** See, like, to me, this blows my hair back a little. Like, like to me, I like, I'm, I know it's my, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm a fan of this and this is my thing, and you guys don't have to agree with me, but I, no, I, I I, we'd love to, to me, it blows my hair back a little in terms of like what it delivers.
It's, it's, I think it's at the mat, the maturation stage at this point where hopefully [00:11:00] these other cigars will get to in a, in a few more years where you're like, this is a special box. Well, this
**Gizmo:** is, now, I use that word demanding of me. Like I have two or three boxes of those b r e 18 or 19. Like I'm going to save them to get them.
At this point I do. You were on a need to know basis, , and you don't need to know . I, I
**Poobah:** know now , but it's the, the difference is, the difference is night and day between this and like an 18.
**Gizmo:** What's funny, like when I sent you, remember when I sent you that the 18 B, I'm like, dude, you gotta try this. We're loving it.
You gotta try this. . I was like, fucking poop is shitting on my this 18 and I'm smoking this now. I'm like, you were totally right as far as just where this is at in its maturation. Well, even the
**Rooster:** b r e nineteens, those are really good. But this
**Gizmo:** is, this is, this is on another
**Senator:** way. I mean, I think what's encouraging my fear in having this cigar was that I'm not gonna wanna smoke any of the like 18 bre, you know, uh, monds we have, what encourages me is that the flavor profiles are [00:12:00] similar and I love them in both, but the finish and that creaminess that I've talked about, that only comes through on this in a way that you don't get as much on that.
And, um, that's what you expect, you know, age to do. And, and it makes me wanna even just kind of let those sit longer and see how they develop. It's
**Poobah:** a thing, I think with the Eman two that I've read anecdotally, and, um, they also, it's not like they're super ubiquitous. I think the output on 'em is not, certainly, probably they make, they must, they make less of these than like a Monte two or something, you know?
and they would always go up and come down. They'd always go, they'd be in stock and then they'd never last along. And there was never tons of quantity that you'd see in them, because I think people do like to take these and tuck 'em away. I do, I I, I believe that peop these is a cigar that sets up well for aging, maybe a little bit better than some other, um, besos, torpedoes, whatever you want to call them.
Um, so [00:13:00] there's demand for them and people like them. People like them who like them, like them. Anybody
**Rooster:** getting
**Gizmo:** any nuttiness out of this? Oh, definitely. Yeah. A little bit. Any taste that? Yeah, almost like an, uh, peanut, like I think Puma mentioned like a peanut buttery type of, uh, like a K nut, like a very sweet, I I do get
**Senator:** a sweetness.
I get saltiness too. A little on unfinished, which is, which is why the peanut butter analogy worked for me. Absolutely. Which I think that's the
**Poobah:** note. So it's, I sent one of these to a friend, a mutual friend of ours. Um, and, uh, as a gift, uh, from one of our, our social media group. And he, he wrote back peanut butter bomb
And he was right. He was right. Cuz it does taste like he goes peanut butter bomb. So let me ask you a question, Cuba, it was creamy and
**Gizmo:** nutty. How did you, we talked about this, um, on the other episodes where we did the, the, the lizard's favorite cigars. How did you find [00:14:00] the upmanu? How did you find through our group?
Just the specific age that worked. You just
**Poobah:** bought stuff through, through talking the people and just like, yeah, and, and, and just watching, um, took a, took, you know, I, I think I took a gamble on a box because people I respected were smoking these at, at the time. Discovered them because I, I feel like I was an Upton fan and maybe not everybody was a Upton fan earlier, uh, going a couple years ago.
And I just kind of stumbled upon them. And then I started to explore the, explore the market a little bit more. And I just found out like, I liked this, this is, put it this way, this is one of the first ups I I bought were, were number twos. And then I liked it so much. I looked at the half Corona, then I looked at, of course it was like, well, dude, the Sir Winstons, right?
And we all try, we all love those. Um, and the half Coronas we all love. So there's a quality, I think, to the market that to, that's, that's it's, it really [00:15:00] fits into any humidor, um, pretty well. So I,
**Rooster:** I remember that evening pretty. , we had to kind of twist your arm to get
**Gizmo:** those Sir Winstons who didn't wanna part with
Cause
**Rooster:** they were, they were, he was right. I mean they were young and we're like, pba, we need, we need to try that cigar. I haven't never had one. We need to try it. Yeah. So he reluctantly brought a couple and I think me and GIZ tried the uh, sir Winstons and uh, it was a treat. But I think definitely, you know, if they said for like
**Poobah:** few years they would.
Yeah. Well those are 17, so it's not the best year of the Sir Winston and
**Gizmo:** I have a box. I just got of the 2014 Sir Winstons. You did? Wow. Wow. Just got 'em Next, next pod .
**Poobah:** You must have paid a fortune for those. Uh, they were
**Gizmo:** not as been as a fortune. They were not as bad as you'd think. They were. Not as bad as you'd think.
There's 2020s on bond. Roberts going for way more than what I paid for the 20 fourteens. [00:16:00] You, you got 'em a while back. Uh, I got 'em about two months ago, but I got 'em from someone that I've done business with before. That I, you know, that I have a good relationship with, that we've all done business with before, but, so we'll try that at some point.
That, that
**Poobah:** sounds, that sounds like it's magnificent. Yeah.
**Gizmo:** I'll try. I I can't get over. We're about three quarters of an inch into this thing. The burn is razor sharp. Yeah, it is beautiful ash on it. The flavor is just mm-hmm.
**Bam Bam:** phenomenal. Yeah. And going very well with this spirit
**Gizmo:** tonight. Yeah. Let's talk about the, uh, the cognac.
So our first cognac on the pod tonight, uh, Senator, uh, and a few of the guys were talking about doing cognac, and, and we decided to do it tonight. I gotta say as, as with every other thing we've done on this pod, I have no idea what cognac even is, why it's here, but I know it tastes good. So , I, I'm teeing it up.
Is that my cue? That's your cue, baby. . Teach me. Teach me.
**Senator:** So I, I've been wanting to do cognac for a while, [00:17:00] just because I feel like it's, uh, underappreciated and, and kind of misunderstood spirit and, and myself included in that. Um, you know, cognac is sort of known as like a, you know, an older man's drink, something that's not as in style anymore.
And, uh, my only experience with cognac has been, you know, my dad loves every now and then to have a little Remy Martin with a cigar. And, um, I remember trying once at, at, at their place, um, a glass with a cigar and I said, wow, this pair is shockingly well. And for us to start taking this dive into Koac, um, I wanted to start with stuff that is relatively ubiquitous and, and that, um, is accessible in price.
And I think we'll just kind of work our way through it. So in us doing this, I just did a little bit of homework because I even couldn't really well distinguish a brandy versus a cogn. And, and even the eight statements and things like that. So just a, a little quick, uh, overview. Even, even you couldn't distinguish.
No, this is one spirit that I, I've never [00:18:00] really dove deep on. I mean, I've, I've had a little bit of cognac here and there, but I've never known a whole lot about it. But this is something I wanna start to appreciate, especially because in so many ways it was meant, um, it, it's intended to be one of the best pairings with a cigar.
And so I feel like I've just not done my job as a cigar smoker, as a lizard to not understand this spirit that is meant to pair so well. So just a, a quick overview. Um, this is kind of like the whole whiskey scotch debate. . All cognacs are brandies. Not all brandies are cognacs. Oh, okay. So sort of like all SCOs or whiskeys, but not all whiskeys are SCOs.
Right. So Brandy, the broad category is distill is a distilled spirit made from fermented fruit or grapes. So it can be white grapes, red grapes. It can be apples. There's like apple brandy and all blackberry brandy. Yeah. Blackberry
**Poobah:** Bay. Putting that in your back pocket. Going to the St. Pats
**Gizmo:** state parade. .
**Bam Bam:** Uh, how about, how about taking it into the algebra, algebra finals sophomore [00:19:00] year,
**Poobah:** tuck, tucking, taping that bottle behind the, behind the toilet in the, in the high school bathroom.
Brandy .
**Gizmo:** That's amazing.
**Senator:** So brandy, there's not many rules. And, and so like the price point is insanely accessible. Right? It, it's made from just about anything. Cognac on the other hand, has to be made from white grapes. and the, it has to be grown in the cognac region in France. Oh, oh, okay. Uh, the cognac region is in the, the southwest part of France.
And the most common grape, like 90 something percent of cognacs are made from a grape called Uny Blanc, um, which is a white grape. Uh, I can't, uh, I, I wouldn't even be able to adequately compare it to like white grapes that we're familiar with, like a EO blanc or, um, uh, you know, Chardonnay grape or something like that.
Cuz they obviously don't make a ton of wine with this. I've never heard of it outside of cognac. Um, after this is [00:20:00] distilled, it's blended and then aged, so very similar to a number of, you know, scotches or bourbons or other whiskeys that we drink. And the age statements or, or the names on the bottles, you'll see VS.
V S O P xo. Um, similar to our tequila conversation around a blanco Rapsodo Anejo indicate how much age it has. So a Vs has at least two years of age in French Oak, A V S O P. Um, and sorry VS. Stands for very special. I have no idea where they came up with these names. Uh, V S O P is very superior, old pale that has at least four years in French Oak and an xo, which is extra old, um, has at least six years in French Oak.
**Gizmo:** I always thought XO was a brand thing that, that some of these did. I had no idea that it was a, uh, a marker of, of how age the, the, the,
**Poobah:** the product is. Yeah, I think that, um, Like we, we have an, uh, an age difference in this room that spans, you know, [00:21:00] between us some, some of us more than a decade, let's just
**Gizmo:** say significance.
I'm an xo , so ,
**Poobah:** me and Rooster are definitely exo. We're exo baby. Um,
**Gizmo:** uh, you guys are like VPs. I'm always,
**Bam Bam:** you know, I'm always marginalized when it comes to the age statements. That's
**Poobah:** cause you look, that's cuz you look so handsome. Oh, that's why. I mean, you know, I gotta call you Portland. You know, the great you got.
I mean, look at his calves, his calves Stallone are fantastic. He's got great calves. He's got great calves. Indeed, indeed. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, but I think that, uh, I, I I, I, I think that we're having this, it's good that we're having this conversation because, and I'm, I'm really glad that, that, that, that senator put this idea forward because I, I recall.
during the cigar boom, let's call it the early two thousands, where there was a little bit of a, like a cognac, like when cigars, cigars and Coney cigars and cog kind of going back to the old school. It's an old school drink, you just don't see people ordering this that often. [00:22:00] Um, and I think that other spirits kind of fell into favor, particularly scotch in terms of popularity and demand and things like that.
Um, so I've really never was in the circle of acquaintance. And these are people, you know, across. Different groups of friends who drank a lot of great stuff. N were never really into cognac. So I never really got exposed to good cognac or was had a friend who was like, dude, you gotta try this. You know what I mean?
And, and, and, and really drank it. And even friends who smoked cigars, I just hadn't some glad we're bringing it forward. I think a lot of people, it's could revisit it and, and, and explore it a little bit more and maybe, who knows, maybe there's some deals out there, , maybe
**Senator:** it's not demand. No. There, there are.
And, and, and I, I think this spirit may make a comeback and I just say that because I've been wanting to do this since we started this podcast, but it's not something that stays top of mind for me. Yeah. And we were at our clubhouse the other day and I saw a guy walk in with a bottle of cognac that he was sipping [00:23:00] with his cigar.
And I was like, wow. I, I, you don't even see that happen, right? In lounges. In lounges, yeah. You just see everyone bring scotch or bourbon or something like that. So, um, it was just a good reminder for me and a little bit about the cognac we're drinking. So this is, uh, Remy Martin, V s O P, um, which I think is like the best entry.
into cognac. And I say that, so you said, just
**Gizmo:** to clarify again, you said vsop P'S kind of the middle grade?
**Senator:** Exactly. Okay. So like a reito in TE tequila. Got it. Okay. And, um, I think it's the best entry point, and I say that because I've had a number of the VSOP that are, are very common. Um, Corvassier, Remi Martin, there are obviously a number of others.
And Remi has always stuck with me. Like I remember years ago, you know, Morton's Steakhouse back when Morton's made amazing steaks and, and now I can't really say that anymore. But, uh, when they did, if you were a, a, a really good customer at Morton's, you got like this special card they gave and you would kind of whip this out and it had all these benefits.
And at the end of dinner, it didn't matter how many people you brought with you, you could have a table of 20, they would give free a free [00:24:00] after dinner drink for everyone at the table and you could do scotch, cognac, whatever the case was. And I would occasionally get a Remy Martin. And I liked it. Like I really enjoyed it.
Like in a sniffer. Yeah, exactly. And, and just really loved it. And so, um, I thought this is a good. , um, entry point into the world of cognac and just a little bit about Remy Martin and, and some of that. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah.
**Gizmo:** I know nothing about this. This is great. Yeah, this is great. You know, I'll,
**Bam Bam:** I'll admit something.
I've never had cognac until tonight.
**Gizmo:** I don't think I did. My dad may have given me some at some point, but I think this is the first time I remember.
**Bam Bam:** So, like, Senator, you having, I'd watched my dad drink cognac when I was a kid with a beer chaser. Yeah. That happened. And, uh, I've never tried it. I just thought it was an old guy's drink and I didn't, wasn't interested.
But this is really, really good.
**Gizmo:** It's really good. Really good. Really
**Poobah:** nice. You guys have, and I bet you there are a bunch of people out there like you're crazy cognac's awesome. But this is just us. I mean, we, not a, not a lot of
**Gizmo:** exposure. Yeah. It's also Armon. Yeah. . [00:25:00]
**Poobah:** What? That went over my head. What, what is that?
What is that? Is that like a, is that like a video game also? There's the early eighties or something?
**Gizmo:** No, it's like, it's like cognac.
**Rooster:** It's, uh, ORAC is, I think distilled once and cognac is distilled
**Gizmo:** twice. Oh, wow.
**Senator:** Apparently. And I must, there must be another region as well that that would be Yeah. Made in.
Yeah. Um, but just a little bit on the history of some of the big cognac makers. So the, the oldest cognac brand is Martel, which folks may have heard of, um, they, their history stretches back to 1715. Wow. Remi is pretty close. They're the second oldest, uh, founded in 1724. So these go way, way back
**Gizmo:** here. I'm thinking that like the scotch stuff, that, that, that, yeah.
I know the scotch makers have been around for 200 years. I'm Wow, that's a long time. This
**Poobah:** is 500 years. The French, the, the French 300 years, excuse me, this is France. , the French have been making stuff forever, right? Yeah. It's crazy.
**Senator:** Exactly right. You know, I mean, it's [00:26:00] crazy. Like even a brand as ubiquitous as Hennessy, right?
Like, and I, I, I associate Hennessy with like a nightclub drink. That's why I could never even take cognac. Seriously. I think part of it was because of that Hennessy was found in 1765. I mean, like the history of these companies, these brands, it's unbelievable. Um, it really is. So, um, what this Remy Martin, V s O P is made of, so essentially it's, it's from two crews.
They call them within the, the cognac region. It's grand Champaign and petite Champagne. And so when you look at the bottle,
**Poobah:** so this is in, this is in, is this is close to the burgundy area of France? Near Champaign. Near Dejan.
**Senator:** No. So that's the other thing. I didn't know this so thi this was a learning experience for me very recently.
I assume that this was like right near the Champaign region. It is not. The Champaign region is in the northeastern part of France. This is, uh, southwest. This is [00:27:00] actually closer to Bordeaux and, and, and some of those regions. Okay, gotcha. And so it's so funny, you see on the bottle of Remi and it says cognac fine champagne.
Now I assume that meant that champaign grapes were used or it was made in the Champaign region, but it's neither of those things. When it has the fine champagne designation, it means it's a blend from the Grand Champaign and petite Champaign cruise within the cognac region. This Wow. So it gets a little complicated, but the, the takeaway is they're totally separate from the Champaign region of France.
It's not champaign grapes, it's not from that region. It's just so happens that a region within cog. Is called Grand Champaign and Petite Champaign. Can
**Gizmo:** I see that bottle? Yeah. Interesting.
**Poobah:** This is a really interest, you know, I've, I've, I've been to, to, I'm not gonna dwell on it, but I mean, I've been to, to Burgundy, I've been to the Champaign region of France.
You know what the, the crazy thing is the, how these fields are set up and just to reinforce with, uh, senator's Point is, is that [00:28:00] like across the street, you could have, I can only really speak to Burgundy, cuz that's only, that's the only place I've really been, but you could have like a Vage field and then you throw a stone.
and there's a grand crew field of grapes, and it could be the same, the the same winemaker could own those fields or two different ones can own them. And I mean, it's like a stones throw sometimes it feels like they're so close together and it's just so, and then the naming and everything is, it goes back so far that it doesn't make logical
**Senator:** sense.
Well that, that's, it's funny you say that song. I was even so confused. I'm like, why are there so many things called champaign within France that are not from the champaign region? Apparently Champaign is just meant to, uh, to, to essentially, It's like very clay driven, uh, sorry, very chalky soil, they say.
So it's like very ripe for certain white grapes that produce cognac in that one part of France and Champaign and another. Right. But there are a zillion different crews within France that have the [00:29:00] word champagne in it that aren't even part of the champaign region, which was very confusing for me. And I feel like for
**Poobah:** most people.
Well, yeah, I mean, when you go back hundreds of years when all these designations were made, it's not like they had an internet where they're like, we're gonna coordinate and I'm gonna call that guy up there. We're gonna coordinate how, what we call this stuff, dude, people didn't even talk to each other.
You gotta drive like 27 days to get about horseback and talk to some guy, you know, . It's true.
**Senator:** And the the other thing on Remy Martin, I just, I think everyone, even if you've never had cognac, has everyone heard of the bottle Louie the 14th? Yes. Yes. This is like a famous dollar bottle. If you got a bottle bottle of that.
it goes for four or five grand. A bottle? Yeah. Like you can go on total wine right now it's gonna be 4,000. Dan Baer,
**Gizmo:** chugs that.
**Senator:** There you go. . And that's made by Remy Martin. And so like, they make some really, really high-end stuff. So why didn't we start
**Gizmo:** there tonight? Senator ,
**Bam Bam:** put the investment. He's got,
**Gizmo:** he's got stairs, air conditioning units.
Yeah. [00:30:00] Plumbing's, plumbing, I mean new cement. He's got a lot, lot of CapEx going on right now. , I got a question. Uh, so this is in a 3 75? Uh, yes.
**Senator:** I, I
**Gizmo:** bought a half bottle. Okay,
**Senator:** so how much is, so, uh, a seven 50 is $50. Okay. And this is half that. Got it. Okay, cool. I mean, slightly more
**Gizmo:** like 20. So then how much is the, uh, the vs.
Entry level? It's a good question. Is it, um,
**Senator:** it's probably like 25 to
**Poobah:** 30. 20. Okay. So how much is that
**Gizmo:** split? 25 bucks for the
**Poobah:** 3 75? Yeah. So like every bar you just put that in and just have it, you have some guests and Absolutely you go on, you know, like after the bad couple's dinner, you know what I mean?
Like where you're like, oh my God, I gotta go on a couple's dinner. And you go out with a couple from
**Gizmo:** town and the wife set it up. Yeah, the wife sets
**Poobah:** it up and there's the conversation in the car afterwards where you're like, where they're like, how do you think that guy that went Mark is really nice , [00:31:00] but you think, why did you say that?
And then they do the audit. You embarrassed me. Why did you say that? When he was ordering and then you said that, and then, you know, why did you say who doesn't like black olives or whatever, like, you know, who doesn't like that? And you get reamed out and then afterwards you come to the house and you pour a little Remy Martin for the guy.
**Gizmo:** I gotta say he .
**Pagoda:** It's like, it's like confirming you really don't want him back
**Poobah:** again. That's,
**Gizmo:** yeah. Which is nine times outta 10.
**Poobah:** Let's be real. I mean, no, but you can, you know, have a nice little bonding moment with it. You know,
**Gizmo:** so I'm, it, it does drink like a sc, like a b, like a whiskey. Excuse me. I almost said bourbon, but it's very ob obviously very fruit forward.
**Senator:** It is, but still is. Yeah. But the, the thing I, why I like this, cuz I'm not a fan of very sweet things. That's why I, like, I always will prefer scotch to bourbon. I, I think this drinks more like a scotch in like the Balvin, Macallan [00:32:00] family, right? Not anything ped. No. Than it does a bourbon. Like this is not, it finishes dry.
Yeah, that's what I like about this. Well, yeah, it finishes, you get the fruit out, the dried fruit up front, and it finishes dry.
**Poobah:** It's, it does finish. Nice. Ander, can you
**Bam Bam:** put a little, it's warm my chest.
**Senator:** Yeah. And actually pour delicious. Pour the next one. Neat. Because when we poured this, when I took a sip of this before any ice had melted, I thought it was perfect.
And as the ice melted, opened it up, I liked some of the notes I was getting, but I think I prefer this. Just neat.
**Bam Bam:** Yeah. Pass that bottle around please. You
**Poobah:** got it. Um, do you
**Rooster:** usually put ice in cognac though? I've never,
**Senator:** I mean, most purists would not, would not, but some do. You can, yeah. I mean, it's sort of like the same thing.
You know, we had Ricky on to talk about tequila, right? Yep. And you know, for him, he'll never put ice in a tequila, but obviously there are tons of us that do. So yeah, it's personal preference, but a true connoisseur of that spirit would advise against
**Gizmo:** it. By the way, speaking of Ricky, I, I love sending text messages to Rick.
With a, a glass of Don Julio full of ice, and his head just [00:33:00] explodes. Oh, it's the greatest. I do it every
**Poobah:** time. Yeah. Yeah. That was Theri, the Ricky Camacho, uh, uh, the tequila episode. I will say did listen to it and take a listen. If you're out there, take a listen to that episode. It's good. It's good episode.
I
**Gizmo:** interrupted you. I'm sorry.
**Poobah:** What about
**Gizmo:** in regard to when I said about Ricky? You were about to say something. Oh. Oh, I don't
**Poobah:** know. I can't remember what that was. I lost my train of thought. I guess. It's all good. Oh, uh, this is better. Neat. Yeah. I'm gonna try it neat in a second. It's really good. It's way better.
Neat. I think that's probably the way you're supposed to drink it. And then it does finish dry. I mean, I think it
**Gizmo:** drinks very nicely with this cigar. It does, yeah. It's, it's pairing up perfectly with this. So we're, you know, we're about halfway through this now. I'm finding this to pick up a little bit.
Yeah. Um, it's, it's still really smooth and elegant. Mm-hmm. , but it's just, it's. , it's really starting to take me on a journey here. It's a fabulous
**Senator:** cigar. Yeah. It's the perfect cigar to do with cognac in the sense that I always associate upmanu with just [00:34:00] like an elegant cigar. Yeah. And I just feel like cognac ha, you know, if there's one thing that cognac's known for, it's being a very elegant spirit.
And, uh, I think the pairing works extremely
**Gizmo:** well. What's funny about cognac is, uh, we, we touched on it briefly, but I've always seen it, and I, I've ignored it. I've seen it ignored. I mean, it's, it's buried on the right hand page all the way at the bottom of any spirit or wine list that you get at a restaurant.
I've never seen anyone order it. I've never been at a restaurant when anybody orders it. Um, it just seems like it kind of sits there. Yeah. Before, it's before usually like an after
**Bam Bam:** dinner. Yeah. And Puba said it earlier, it's not in vogue. Right. Unless you know it.
**Senator:** Yeah. And, and honestly for me, Hennessy ruined cognac for me in the sense that when you would just see Hennessy like, become this nightclub drink, You know, you, you would never see someone in a nightclub order like, you know, bottles of single malt Scott like that.
You're, you're not going clubbing to drink like, you know, blind spirits. You
**Bam Bam:** don't associate it with a moment where you're having a [00:35:00] cigar.
**Senator:** Exactly. Yeah. So I just wrote it off. I just said like, this is not a serious spirit anymore and I'm glad we're, we're giving this a shot because I could very easily see myself drinking more.
This dude story. Dude,
**Bam Bam:** it is so drinkable. There's zero bite to it. Yep. It's delicious. It's tasty, it's
**Poobah:** fantastic. You know it. Go it. I agree, Ben. It's ridiculous. A hundred percent. And you know what? It goes great like that little split, you throw that in your locker at the cigar lounge. and it's a really nice thing to have around in a, in, in a certain spot.
Um,
**Bam Bam:** I'm gonna give it to my son before his final exams. . Yeah.
**Poobah:** shit. You should. It's like swing lube, you know, it's like when you're on the golf course, you know, just loosen him up. Swing lube. Swing lube. You know, Hey son, take a couple shots. There you go. Take a couple shots of Remy Goman and knock that final dead.
You didn't kill the nerves.
**Gizmo:** pagoda. What do you think of the cigar?
**Pagoda:** For me, [00:36:00] I was just about, I was just zoning. I was, I was thinking about, but, um, really, really enjoying it. I, I think what I really like about it is, I think, like Pua mentioned it earlier, is, um, that you get this flavor in your mouth, it's somewhat coat to your mouth, and it's, it's kind of lingers and I've really been enjoying that and it's very mild and flavorful.
**Gizmo:** Um, . And as someone who likes a little more oomph, it, it does that. Is that something you appreciate or you don't love? Like No, I Where does it sit for you kind of in, so I've,
**Pagoda:** I've really started enjoying a lot of the Cubans, uh, as, as you guys know, and, you know, um, like even you consider something like RAs, where you have the Cuban twang as per se, I think I've started to just really enjoyed that kind of flavor.
So, um, it's not something I go and pick up every day, but, uh, I can tell you the other day I was smoking Cubans out on my deck when it was not windy, and it was beautiful. Yeah. [00:37:00] I really, really enjoyed it. And it was sunny and, you know, I, I think I'm more likely to put them more in the afternoon. Um, I know this is supposed to be like a medium body.
It doesn't, uh, give me that, you know, like one could say it's really refined for my taste.
**Gizmo:** Right.
**Senator:** Well, well, I think though, you know, when Pagoda says that, I just think about the comparison between the, this ahman at what, 2014? Yeah. And the atmans that we have at 2018. And I think maybe we have a 19 box
**Gizmo:** too.
Yeah. Eighteens or nineteens. I have 20
**Senator:** ones as well. Okay. And I just think the eighteens and nineteens have a bit more Ooph, ooph and strength to them a little. That's exactly right. And I think, you know, maybe for a pagodas palate in particular Yeah. He may actually prefer that. Mm-hmm. , um, I would normally gravitate toward that, but this is like blowing me away that I would
**Gizmo:** never take this.
Yeah. This is, this is superb.
**Poobah:** The rough edges are off or have been Yeah. This, this is a polished stone. Oh, yeah. You know what I mean? As opposed to something with some [00:38:00] rough RAs on it. There are no rough RAs on the cigar that it's, it's really to, so to me, this embodies what I would, I would call, you would say I, I would call it full flavor.
Yep. I would call it full body. Medium cigar. It's medium and strength, but full-bodied in flavor. To me, I think that this is a full body, full flavor, like full bodied. It's got bodi to it. It's got so the coat your mouth, the finishes long and it's comfort.
**Bam Bam:** That combination I get in the youngerman. For me personally, what I'm getting now is a sophisticated, smooth.
And Senator, you said an earlier creaminess that I don't get in the
**Poobah:** early upness. Well, that's what I call body.
**Senator:** Yeah, that's what I call body. I would still say on the body of the cigar, I would say medium full. I would not say full. And I just say that cuz like if I think of like a full bodied cigar that's delivered very smoothly, like we lit up a Padron 50th the other night.
Oh was
**Poobah:** [00:39:00] 50. Well, if we're going there, yeah, it's full box body. That's well, okay, sure. This is medium full. Sure. Yeah. Okay. I'll temper that. That you're right. I mean I'm, I'm thinking really kind of more in the Cuban realm. I've got a question. For a Cuban, I think it's got a lot of body Oh,
**Bam Bam:** oh. Solidly,
**Senator:** medium, full to me.
M very medium holster. Medium. Yeah. Yeah.
**Bam Bam:** I'm, I'm, for me, the saltiness on this is getting is is getting stronger and stronger. I am loving that. What
**Gizmo:** kind of salt
**Bam Bam:** is it for you? It's like that Cuban twang. It is the twang, floral, it's unbelievable floral
**Senator:** salt. I in the second half bams. Exactly right. Yeah.
It's like exploded for me. Like this is very twangy now and I love that. Yep.
**Bam Bam:** And uh, pagoda just said a hint of Flor. And ramp up in saltiness. It's fantastic. Through the
**Poobah:** nose. It gets whirled, particularly in the beginning. Yeah. It's ridiculous.
**Pagoda:** Yeah, it's, it's very enjoyable. Please don't get me wrong. It's just as you know, ,
**Bam Bam:** but that's why I asked the question chant.
**Gizmo:** Yeah, no, thank you. That's why I asked the question because I'm, I, you know, the other, the re the other five of us, I, I kind of [00:40:00] knew, I kind of know where it kind of falls for us, but I'm, for you, I think you're a little bit of an outlier, which is a, a compliment Yeah. In that your palette's different than ours and I think that's a good thing.
So I'm curious how this hits a palette like
**Pagoda:** yours, you know? No, absolutely. I, I think I'll definitely get a box of these and have it around because, um, I've really, really enjoyed it. There's, it's not that, but it's not one of those things where, You know, it's, uh, blown my mind away, you know, like, uh, uh, for, for some of you,
**Gizmo:** yeah.
Like, I, I want to find a box of these immediately. Can you Venmo? Pba,
**Rooster:** like
**Gizmo:** $1,400 .
**Pagoda:** 1400 rupees. Yes. . That's coming
**Gizmo:** right away. That'll, that'll get you the band. .
**Pagoda:** Hey, listen, we good start. So I'll begin with the band
**Bam Bam:** up and twos of any age are hard to find right now.
**Poobah:** Yeah. They really are. People like 'em, I mean, they're popular for these reasons.
Yeah. Um, you know,
**Senator:** I've started to see, I mean, very [00:41:00] recently, some of the younger ones pop up and I've like mm-hmm. hesitated some, I'm not sure what to expect, but, but giz you said that you've got a 21 box and they're good.
**Gizmo:** I haven't smoked one. Oh, okay. Uh, because I know, you know, based on what, what Puba has said about the cigar, that it definitely needs some time.
I have the eighteens and nineteens, I. , you know, I picked the, the P two s and the Monte twos far more frequently just because of scarcity. You know, I'm just, I don't see them as much. You're right. Um, I have a couple PSP boxes of these coming from, uh, f o h Wow. That I'm gonna just sit on 20 ones. Uh, yeah, they're 20 ones.
They're young. Okay. But I'm just like, I, I've almost code kind of blindly, uh, just because I trust Puma's Palate and, and how he's, what he's taught, you know, uh, turned me onto with up and, uh, especially with the Winston and, and some of the other cigars. But I've kind of blindly just chased that. So when I see them come up, I've just kind of been collecting them.
Yeah. And the eighteens have blown my mind. And this is just, eighteens are awesome. This is superb. Yeah. What's, what's
**Rooster:** the oldest up men Twos out there, like,
**Gizmo:** when was it introduced? It came out, it was in [00:42:00] the fifties. But you can find, you know, they're as old as the Monte twos. They are, yeah. I don't think they've been as, uh, you.
revered or chased, you know, Amani two something. Yeah, I mean, I've
**Rooster:** seen some, like 1970s ma twos, like the guys smoke, but I've never seen an ahman go
**Gizmo:** that far back. So yeah, they've been around a
long
**Poobah:** time. It's a nice representation of the marker, in my view. It is, it's like a nice representation of it. I feel like it's kind of like when you go through and you talk about, like, I like, I like the mag 50.
Not everyone loves it. I like it. Um, the Mag 46, but this is like a departure from that. But to me, the kind of dessert flavors that are reflected in this and the, some of the things we talked about that are adjacent to the Sir Winston and that kind of flavor profile to me is, says, says huppman. It's like, it kind of, I just represents the, represents
**Gizmo:** the marker really well.
I, [00:43:00] but the thing that I, that frustrates me about the fact that they call Sir Winston a regular production cigar. is, it's that, I think that's an unfair thing to say. I know. They make it, everyone, it, it just doesn't come up a lot. It's a very pricey cigar. It's hard to find. Yeah. This, to me, has a regular production cigar that you can get.
This is the, as it sits right now in our hand, this is the, some of the best that Upton has to offer. I It's the best.
**Poobah:** I mean, and when you think about the ahas, the, the 2011 didn't talk abouts. That's a great point. You know, when you think about that cigar and what that delivers, and that's kind of a, it's a, it's a cousin to this mm-hmm.
the smoothness and that creaminess and that delicious delivery to me like. That cigar, this cigar, and how some of these monds with age up create kind of something
**Gizmo:** really nice. Yeah. So let's, let's talk about the ahas for a second that you brought up, because that, uh, I, I can't believe we, none of us, because I mean, that's such a create cigar.
It's an, it's amazing.
**Bam Bam:** It's an incredible, magnificent cigar. It's an [00:44:00] incredible
**Gizmo:** cigar. So we incredible cigar. We got, uh, we, a couple of us, I was late to the party, but a couple of us now ended up with, uh, 2011 boxes of Huppman Royal Ribos, uh, with the ahas label on them, which is a questionable, uh, marketing thing that ha Bonos did.
Um, where they put out age cigars later. So we ended up with, uh, 20 elevens and these cigar. are just unbelievable. They're unbelievable.
**Poobah:** Unbelievable. They're on the same level of this as this. Maybe better. Maybe even better.
**Bam Bam:** I agree with you. I agree
**Poobah:** with pba. They're they're, they're really good. They're close.
**Senator:** Yeah. I got that on Blind Faith. There was a auction that some of us were partaking in and, um, that was on there. And there were a number of other Ana Hato cigars, and I had heard so much about how the Ana Hato line is kind of a bunch of bullshit that they say that they're aged at least four or five years.
But you have some of these smokes and they really don't taste it. And some disappoint. Some disappoint, [00:45:00] yeah. And so I was just quickly trying to find if there was any of, in the Ana Hato line that were worthwhile and all the markets have, you know, there's, uh, RGUs, there's upk, there's, you know, Monty. Monty.
A ton of them make Romeo. Romeo. Yep. And what I was seeing consistently on forums was that guys were saying that their favorite one. was the Up ado. So on Blind Faith, I said, okay, I'll just bid on, you know, five of these. And I had gotten them and um, I was shocked how much I liked the cigar despite all the hate that's out there for the Ana ADOS line.
And, um, I had ordered a box that popped up on, I have that I had no idea what year. Yeah. And I happen to get this box and it's got the crazy health sticker on the back and I ripped that off. And it's 2011 underneath there, the same as I had bought in that auction. And I remember we were at one of our lounges and I think I gave one to GIZ and Puba.
Right.
**Gizmo:** And Puba, the three of us were there. The, the North
**Senator:** Lounge. Yeah. Yeah. And I mean, I think right on the spot, you like ordered a bot. I mean, I ordered it
**Gizmo:** immediately.
**Poobah:** Incredible. Well, yeah, I [00:46:00] wanna say, I can't say for sure, but almost like we had ordered. At the same time. And I paid my second box, my second, was that the second box?
But the first one we had was with you, I think. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And those were really, can I, I, I, I, I mean I tho those were sourced from the same place by who I got it from anyway. But it, and then you were able to find that which was, and, and grabbed that box, which is
**Gizmo:** great. So, and if you remember, I smoked it without ashing it.
That's right. Once
**Senator:** we have a photo that, remember
**Gizmo:** that was, that was at the North, north lounge, smoked id the whole thing down without ashing it until it went out. Like
**Poobah:** that's ridiculous. Smoked all the way. Yeah. Very good. So, and it has the similar characteristics, right? You can, you can, you can taste it, you can Another groovy great
**Gizmo:** representation.
I gotta say though, that this cigar that we have in our hand, you said it, the R Robusto may be better than. I think this to me, beats the rub robusto. For me
**Poobah:** it's a bigger story in it. It does,
**Gizmo:** yeah. We'll have to revisit the uh, yeah, we could do, we should do that on the [00:47:00] pod. At some point. We should. You know, also what's really good is the probio.
Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Props that. So talking El, yeah. Yes. Yeah.
**Senator:** So Roosters had good scar. I've had that cigar. I've had the cigar. Okay. Yes. When Puba said full body before, that's full body. That's full body. Yeah. That's smokes like a new world cigar. I couldn't believe how much flavor it,
**Poobah:** but it was great.
It was great. Oh yeah, he gave
**Gizmo:** me
**Rooster:** one because I got a box of those and the ahas at the same time. Uhhuh, . I know the ELs, the props were a little bit more, but still, you know, nothing compared to like the prices.
**Gizmo:** Right. By the way, for the listener, when we say el, we're saying Addition Liata limited edition, uh, from Havanas.
So that's what we mean when we, we say what year were those?
**Senator:** Like 2018. 2018.
**Gizmo:** 2018. 2018. That's right.
**Poobah:** Those will get better. Yeah.
**Gizmo:** I have a couple of those sitting. I haven't touched them since the first time we smoked them. It was very good though. Yeah. And then, you know, we talked about, I, uh, one of our favorite cigars collectively.
I know a lot of us smoke it at the end of an, uh, a smoking session is the half Corona. Oh dude. I mean, oh, love those. Those, [00:48:00] I mean all of us and, and all, everybody, we can never get enough of those. I
**Senator:** will never forget when we never goes up together. This was, we were at pub's house. We, let's just say enjoyed ourselves.
quite a bit. ,
**Gizmo:** one of those summer nights .
**Senator:** That is the very end of the night. This was a late, it was a ridiculous, it was a three o'clock in the morning.
**Gizmo:** Yeah, it
**Poobah:** was like two, it was 2 48
**Senator:** actually to this point. It's like two something in the morning. I
**Bam Bam:** think there were only three of us left that night. There was, it was
**Senator:** me, bam.
And PBA I think at that point. That's right. And uh, I think Pagoda had left.
**Bam Bam:** GIZ got mad at us that day. He did. He was there bastard. Well, for many
**Gizmo:** other reasons, , I must have gone to
**Rooster:** bed because I'm exo
**Gizmo:** extra old. .
**Senator:** You were taking a nap. I'm taking a nap. But I needed just like a small little stick. And in that same auction that I had bought the up and on a hato, I had gotten these little half Coronas.
Never had, none of us had had it at that point. Cause I had asked if anyone knew if they were good. No one had ever tried them. So I, and so I just from,
**Bam Bam:** from our guy down south, I bought because, go ahead. After your story [00:49:00] because of your
**Senator:** story. Oh yeah. And oh my God, and I have a bone to pick. So let's get there.
Dude. , let's get there. I couldn't help myself. So, so we, I like to stick up and I'm sitting there gushing about how good this cigar, I mean, this thing is so small. I couldn't believe the flavor out of this little Cuban cigar. And I'm just sitting there. The only thing you can question at that point is like, I've had plenty to drink.
Either it's the alcohol that I think this cigar is that good, or it's really that good. and maybe I had one extra with me and I think I gave it to Bam that night. Yes you did. Yes you did. And Bam had the exact same reaction. Holy shit. This is one of the best short smokes I've ever had. Now the problem with me sharing that cigar with bam was that he went to the same source I bought them from and he cleared about and it was sold out.
So when I messaged the guy, he said someone just bought all of 'em. And I wonder who that was.
**Poobah:** That's correct. Pretty fair. And by the way, by the way, it's inappropriate and not all What? Not all, not all of us. Fair in love and cigars .
**Bam Bam:** Well,
**Pagoda:** so no, but to be fair,
**Poobah:** to be very not, he did [00:50:00] share them. That's not He did, of course he shared them.
But still,
**Pagoda:** you know, that's kind of rare. Rare to share. But
**Poobah:** he did share that. Yeah. The, you know, the, the sniper stop sniping or whatever the, the, the little cartoon character is I've learned my lesson. I've learned my lesson.
**Pagoda:** do I remember? No, thank you, bam. For introducing me to that. I remember that night we were once again at the bar up north and um, it was just fantastic and it's.
Actually become one of my favorite. Yeah, you smoke a lot of those. Yeah. Like end of night smokes. There's nothing better. Maybe, you know, there are a couple of others which are, you know, you know, a few percentages below, but that is fantastic. That's a great steak.
**Rooster:** I've been smoking a lot of these short smokes lately, like Coronas and stuff.
Well, like I had a D six this morning. Phenomenal steak. Great stick. Got it. Driving, driving to work, whatever. D six, short to punch D five. Uh, the Portus, um, short bonus. And then the, uh, [00:51:00] Portus short, I mean, and then the uh, uh, LPCs. Yeah. Poor Laga that we, yeah, we just did that. Yeah. Great. I mean, so much flavor.
Yeah. We only have about half an hour to. ,
**Gizmo:** they're
**Poobah:** awesome. Yeah, I'm into, I'm into the, I'm very into the D six and I'm very, I love the D six. I'm very into the D six cuz it's like the size of a half Corona, but a little bit larger ring gauge. Yep. Let me tell you something, man, I like snuck one of those in real quick, and I was super like sa I mean you're like, I wish it was a D four and I'd wanna smoke more of it, but it's super happy I got an H Box or good, can
**Senator:** I make a request?
Yeah. So I've, I've had a D six many years ago that I just didn't fall in love with and I've had the D five and it's just don't love the D five and the D four. Obviously I'm obsessed with. I, we need to do the D six. I
**Gizmo:** think we
**Poobah:** should do I have the
**Gizmo:** D six. Yeah. I think we should do the short smoke special when we, when we get, when we start coming into the, you know, the, the winter.
Winter. All right. [00:52:00] We'll do the D six and the half Corona.
**Senator:** I need to try
**Poobah:** Onex is are old as fuck. I think they're like maybe 20, 16, 15. They're a little
**Senator:** old. I wanna try a younger one only because as inventory obviously is so limited right now. Yeah. The one thing I consistently see on a lot of sites is the D six and I'm nervous to order it cause I'm not sure that I'm gonna like it do it.
I would love to try and
**Gizmo:** the
**Poobah:** presentation, so cool. Dude, it's like two, it's a 20 bucks count box and it's like, but it's the, it's the size of a, the height of a tent count box. I see. And it's just 10 and 10 and you can slide it in your. That's so cool. I love it. Real sneaky. Like , you know, jigsaw puzzle lies, you know what I mean?
Do. Cause if I'm outta a room, sos everybody else.
**Gizmo:** You,
**Rooster:** you guys are, what else is good? The, uh, the Monty Petite Munos. Oh yeah.
**Gizmo:** I also have one of those, those are
**Poobah:** great. And Senator Schitz on those like a the moon and, and it's fucking crazy there. It's a [00:53:00] good cigar. Like just buy one box and have a box. That good ladies, right?
I
**Bam Bam:** only sits on him. He poopy poops. Someone's holding court tonight. . .
**Poobah:** But he does, he sits on him. Ah, that cigar socks. I have one
**Senator:** with me. I've had several mediocre. Petite Munos. I was at Giza place once and he gave me one, and that was the best one I had had. But the problem for me, this is the same problem I have with the D five and, and I hope I'm not gonna have with the D six, the, the D five is just not as good as a D four.
And for me, like a petite muno is not nearly as flavor, like the, the flavor's not as satisfying as like a Monty two. So when, or even like a Monty, any of like the, the three, the four that like have more flavors. So I, I they're not, it just has to hold up flavor-wise to the rest of
**Poobah:** the market. I hear you bro.
But they're like, they're utilitarian to a certain degree to me. Like I gives me a D five or a D six gives me like that D four, like that kind of D four [00:54:00] flavor that you'd want and just like a small package, like a c the, I don't think that those little cigars can really, they don't have time to develop and like, they're so small.
They're over when they're, they're over you. You're smoking a D six dude, you. In like 22 minutes, bro. The thing's fucking gone for real. 23, 4, 5 minutes. That thing's over. Yeah, the D six
**Rooster:** is good. It's
**Senator:** good. I'm try this, I trust, I like it. I trust that that's gotta be better because the D five, I'm not, I'm not
**Rooster:** so, so I prefer the D six over the, uh, the Monty Petite de muno.
Okay. That's
**Poobah:** good to you. Yes. So I would
**Gizmo:** say that too. Yeah. So, and
**Rooster:** then the short dip punch, of course. I mean
**Gizmo:** that's, that's a great, but that's a real cigar though, speaking of peanut butter bomb. Yeah. It's also short though, right? I mean, it's a, it's a little shorter's, a short rib boost. It's a little longer
**Senator:** than a D, but
**Bam Bam:** extremely, extremely flavorful.
Yeah. Very. That is a
**Gizmo:** peanut punch bomb. That's a peanut butter bomb. Absolutely.
**Poobah:** That's a good cigar. Oh, it's an excellent cigar. It's the 10 count, the short. It's delicious. The punch talking about, yeah. Delicious. But that's closer to a rib robusto in my opinion. Kind of. That's [00:55:00] a her
**Gizmo:** a Hermosa. It's a short ribo.
It's a Hermosa, I believe. Flu's, right? Yeah, we did, we did a part on that, right? Yeah. Yeah, we did. Yeah, I think we did.
**Rooster:** We did. Yeah. The
**Senator:** short to punch. Yeah. No, for short. I thought we did the
**Gizmo:** punch. Punch.
**Poobah:** No. Punch. Punch. We did, we didn't do short. We didn't do short. We didn't. I sworn punched to punch. That is absolutely a lot of people fucking love that cigar.
I'm telling you.
**Bam Bam:** It's pot. I think it's pot
**Senator:** worthy. Yes. We didn't do the back to
**Gizmo:** punch. Am I being a dummy?
**Senator:** Yeah. I don't think we did it. We did the punch,
**Gizmo:** punch. I think you're right. I know we did the punch punch. I thought we, we did not do the short to punch. Absolutely.
**Poobah:** You're correct. Okay. We should do that one.
Everyone's got those too. Yeah. Yeah. I have some. Oh yeah. Not a lot, but of a handful. Yeah.
**Rooster:** That's a great stick. I've, I've been smoking a lot of
**Gizmo:** those lately. Fucking great. Have
**Poobah:** you? Yeah. Are they out there? Um, not now. Yeah. You can get the D six I think. No, I thought you meant the, I thought you meant the short to punch.
Oh, short.
**Senator:** Haven't they were for a while and now Not
**Gizmo:** so much. I haven't seen them in a while. Nope. Yeah. Nope, I haven't seen 'em in a while. The
**Rooster:** problem now is like, you know when your tower, like you have so many [00:56:00] boxes, like back and forth, you don't know where. Where the box says, like, you kind of forget what you have.
You
**Gizmo:** know, it's like, you just makes me
**Poobah:** wanna ask. I know. , I knew that was
**Bam Bam:** gonna happen. Ba are you
**Poobah:** having this problem ? Not yet. Senator doesn't have it cuz he like organizes. Oh,
**Gizmo:** I'm sure. I'm sure he is guy. He's got Excel spreads
**Poobah:** really organized and like a, a fucking robot comes out is like that box of cigar was, is gone now when I, and he's like, all of a sudden the computes in this brain.
Like me, I just shovel the fucking boxes
**Bam Bam:** when I, when I get to stocking
**Gizmo:** my tower. Have you pulled, have you, is it in your house yet? No. .
**Bam Bam:** Um, I've been too busy. I've really been busy. But here's the thing. I plan on creating a. So I'll know what's on each shelf and I'll know where to go. You have to have a manifest.
So lu, see the whole
**Senator:** thing's. I love, I love this is guy who doesn't have a tower yet. Jesus. Can we just set this up? I love when Bam says, I plan on having a manifest. That means he's gonna say, Hey Siri, where are my up and dues? . [00:57:00] That's exactly what that means. .
**Bam Bam:** That's
**Poobah:** right. Fucking
**Gizmo:** manifest, dude. But you
**Rooster:** end up like moving boxes around, you know, something's on the bottom.
You wanna bring it
**Poobah:** up? What's on the top? I can't, right? Exactly. My thing's like a thing I can't organize by brand. I'm gonna impress you. I have to organize
**Bam Bam:** by box size. I'll
**Poobah:** impress you with my organization.
**Gizmo:** Okay. I hear
**Senator:** Siri. Someone. Siri I think went off when I said, Hey, Siri, .
**Gizmo:** So I just, uh, I had the Remy neat, by the way.
I, I, I very much preferred it. The, with the, uh, without the ice cube. It's really nice. Neat. It's, it's insane how good it is. Really good. It's pairing perfectly with the cigar. I'm curious how this is gonna rate, it's gonna, for me. It's gonna be very high. Awesome. Yeah. You guys ready to do it? Do the formal liquor rating?
Yeah. All right. Bam. You're up.
**Bam Bam:** I'm on my third glass. Okay, I'll at that. And I'll be honest, it has, like I said earlier, there's no bite. It's delicious, it's tasty, it's so easy to drink. I can go through that bottle alone. No problem. I'm giving it a nine. Excellent.
**Poobah:** Pagoda.
**Pagoda:** [00:58:00] Um, yeah, I'm just having a need right now.
I, I think, uh, for me it's, um, yeah, a seven. Okay.
**Bam Bam:** Ooh, wow, Senator.
**Senator:** All right. Well, that, that makes my decision easy. I'm, I'm just going between an eight and a nine. I gotta balance this out. There's no way. I believe this is deserving of a seven. Um, I'm gonna, because of its price point that I have to factor in, cuz I'm between an eight or a nine, right?
Because I think what it delivers for its price point is really, really enjoyable. Like, I have not one major complaint with this spirit at all. So I'm gonna give it a nine. My
**Poobah:** man.
**Gizmo:** Excellent. I'm also gonna give it a nine. I'm really enjoying it.
**Poobah:** Puba, I'm gonna give it an eight only because, and I'm, I'm just tempering it cause I just don't have an, I don't have enough of a, of a foundational level of knowledge or experience with this, so it was very, very good.
I'm just not [00:59:00] sure. Um, as we explore more of these, I just wanna give myself a little bit of room so I'm hedging a little bit. That's fair. That's fair. So I'm j I'm gonna give it an eight only because I'm assuming I feel like that's, I I really liked it. I really thought it was great. I think I'll buy some, um, but I'm sure there's a nine out there that'll gimme some upward, you know, there's the place to go.
Sure. That's even more refined. So I, I I would give it, I would give it an eight.
**Gizmo:** So boys, the composite lizard score on the Remy Martin vs. O p is an 8.4. Nice score. Perfect score. Great score for that. Very nice score. Perfect. That's a perfect score for that. , it's an
**Poobah:** elite score. Perfect. Yeah. I mean, it could be a nine for me later.
**Gizmo:** Yeah, sure. But I think an 8.4 is very fair for what that is. Mm-hmm. .
**Senator:** Absolutely. Yep. Yeah. And I, I would even let you know, to, to use a cigar analogy, you know, I think the, the Patron X placebo, that's obviously like our favorite everyday stick. Um, and that's a cigar. I think a lot of us have given a nine, two.
Yeah. And it's not to say, well, for me it's one of the greatest of all [01:00:00] time, but it's not safe for everyone that that's one of the greatest cigars of all time. Uh, but for its price point, what that delivers, it's very hard to be, and I almost view this in a similar vein. It's not to say that this is this, you know, one of the greatest, um, cognacs out there, but at its price point, this is like what it delivers is just so tremendous that I, that's I think, where it's being rewarded.
Yep, totally agree.
**Poobah:** Yeah. Yeah. Really nice. Mm-hmm. .
**Gizmo:** So unfortunately boys, we're coming to the end of this delicious cigar. Number two, I have really. Really enjoyed this cigar tonight. I mean, I don't want this to end. I know. I mean, it's so good, right? It's unbelievable. What's
**Bam Bam:** funny is now I'm getting, I'm still getting the salty twang and I'm getting a little coffee
**Poobah:** now.
Yeah. Like all those rough edges. I mean, I'm not selling it. I haven't had a rough, rough edge. There's no, there's fucking rough edge. There's no rough edges down the stretch. Right? You smoke it to the end and it's just beautiful. I want to see you smoke it to
**Bam Bam:** the end. It is. I mean, it's done. You my man. Look at that now that, when do I
**Senator:** [01:01:00] finish?
Whenever, who not
**Poobah:** finishing first? Never. Because this is my jam. All
**Bam Bam:** right. I'd like to see
**Gizmo:** that really good steak. And thank you for bringing it.
**Poobah:** Thank you for you, you know, really appreciate it. You know, rooster. Thank you everybody. All the wizards, uh, your generosity, everyone comes into boxes. Everyone has great sticks in this room.
And, uh, when this stick came up, I, I said, you know what, should I ? How can you hold these back? And, and I think part of, uh, , uh, part of cigar smoking that I think is important. And there's more r I would just say to the listener out there, there's more ROI in sharing, um, cigars, particularly special cigars.
It's celebratory. If you, if you, if you smoke them in a vacuum, yeah, you'll enjoy it, then it'll be nice. But you get much more ROI when you share special cigars with special people. I recommend everybody do that, and I think most people do. Who, who are in this hobby. Absolutely. Absolutely. Well, so it's, [01:02:00] it's just, it makes it that much better.
**Gizmo:** So you guys ready to do the, uh, the formal lizard rating on this thing? Yeah. Rooster, you're up.
**Senator:** I, I saw two eyebrow raises for Brewster before he could
**Gizmo:** even utter a word .
**Rooster:** I mean, it's hard because I, you know, I mean, this is one of, this is the best ahman I've had. I mean, this is better than the younger, the young, uh, sir Winston that we had.
Yeah. But this, I mean, it's phenomenal stickup. I'm gonna give
**Gizmo:** it a 10. Awesome. Wow.
**Bam Bam:** Whoa. Wow. I love it. Wow.
**Gizmo:** I love this like puba. Really? Yeah. I mean, I
**Poobah:** love it. I, it's a 10 for me. Woo. I knew it delivers there and everything that it's supposed to deliver on and I can't balance, knock it
**Gizmo:** on anything. It's incredible balance, complex, smooth.
I knew an inch in that this was a 10 for me and it's, I if I could give it 11, I would, I love this cigar Senator. He's a nine. . This is tough. . This is
**Senator:** tough. This is tough. And these are, [01:03:00] this is a good decision to make cuz it's a nine or a 10 there. There's, you're right. It's thought in my mind that it's anything lower.
Exactly right. Yeah. Um, and what's, what's where I'm leaning closer to 10 when Puba said it delivers on everything it's supposed to deliver on. I can't find a flaw in this cigar. The only reason I hold back a little bit on the 10 is because there are still other sticks that the flavor profile, right. So it, this delivers what it's intended to deliver.
Gets me more where like I have to have it like all the time. I want these, there's no doubt about that. I have two boxes of these. I just don't know that I, I, I want it every single day in the way that I'm like obsessed with like, you know, certain D four s or even other, other sticks. So I am, oh wait, give this before
**Gizmo:** you give that rating.
I just wanna say . He's advocating. Oh
**Rooster:** boy. I mean, I just, I'm just making a point. No, no. Help me out. This is good. I'm just, I'm just making a point that this mond [01:04:00] mistake with this box code rated, just based upon this take not the boxes that you have. This is a 2014 L u B
**Gizmo:** box code. We have salesmanship going on here.
Very, very elite box. And, uh,
**Rooster:** you should be a lobbyist. You know, I mean, not ,
**Poobah:** they're
**Gizmo:** unicorns.
**Bam Bam:** Senator can school you on
**Gizmo:** that, but, uh, absolutely .
**Rooster:** I I can learn a lot from some of
**Senator:** them. So, , I, no, I act, that's all I have to say. No, no. Rooster's commentary there was actually very helpful because he, he's right. And, uh, I'm gonna have to round up.
I'm give it a 10. Yeah. Yes.
**Gizmo:** Wow. Very nice. Pagoda, you're up. Oh
**Poobah:** my
**Pagoda:** Lord. Now this puts a lot of pressure
**Bam Bam:** on me, . Be honest, be
**Pagoda:** honest. Pressure. No pressure. But being very honest, uh, thank honest Cooper for introducing me to the Chapman two. This is my first, uh, up two. Uh, really, really enjoyed it, really enjoyed the second half more than, you know, how it gradually just grew into something I really, [01:05:00] really enjoyed.
Um, the way I look at it is, um, um, is it, it's a nine for me. Yeah. Okay. Yeah.
**Gizmo:** Bam, bam.
**Bam Bam:** So, yeah, I don't give into peer pressure ever. and I don't like to always go with the crowd. None of that has any meaning for me. So when I really love something, I, I'm very brutally honest for the good or for the bad, regardless of what people think.
I am gonna give this a 10. All right. This is a 10 for me.
**Gizmo:** Well, boys, it's
**Bam Bam:** a high fucking score.
**Gizmo:** The composite lizard score 9.7 on PBAs. . It's gotta, it's gotta be the highest rated cigar. 14 up and twos PBAs, a great roller. 9.8 . That's, that's fucking crazy. I think that's the highest score yet. Yeah.
**Senator:** Just quickly on this Brewster's commentary was really helpful for me because agreed, if, if I were to review the 2018 up in two, I'd give it a nine.
Yeah. And I think Rooster's Point was really helpful [01:06:00] in me figuring out where this really. and it's the age and what that brings, that Puba described. And I think like that creaminess and how it just married all those flavors together, regardless of if I'm gonna be so obsessed with this cigar, I'm gonna need to have it every day, every week.
It, it's a 10. It really, like you said, it delivers on everything it's supposed to. I can't take
**Bam Bam:** picture. So here, here's a, just a general question. Early on in our recordings, episode five, six, or whenever it was, Senator, uh, rooster also made that point. Judge it for the cigar for this moment right now. Yeah.
But we argued against that at the time. I don't think we did. We don't think so. Well, we countered that by saying it's impossible to kind of rate this without rating, keeping in mind other cigars. I remember if you go back, you'll hear that. I don't remember what episode it was, but I kind of like this, the idea of rating it for what this cigar
**Poobah:** is right now for what it is, because it's the example.
It, it epitomizes. It's like it's delivering on what it's designed to deliver on. Yeah. And that delivery is a very, very good thing. And I think that you [01:07:00] just gotta rate it on its merit. That's what it is. The. So well, the other,
**Senator:** the, the, the, the debate I've had many times here has been about factoring in price points.
Price. And I will, I will beat this drum until I'm dead. I'm sorry. Like, you have to, in my opinion, factor that in and why I feel even stronger that this is a 10 is because this is a regular production Cuban that forget now if you tried to source this box. Yeah. So that's a question, but let's just be real.
Yeah. If you, in 2014, sourced a 2014 lu box of, of these, uh, they're probably 10 bucks a piece.
**Gizmo:** They're $10
**Senator:** a st. A cigar. Yeah. What the same way that like, you know, if we get a 21 box right now, you're not gonna pay, like, it's not gonna be cheap, but you're not gonna pay a crazy amount of money. It's not some bullshit, you know, liata that doesn't deliver.
So that holds a lot of weight for me in that this is not an outrageously priced cigar to deliver such an incredible experie. and it makes, it encourages me to just let the 18 bucks I have in the 19 box just sit [01:08:00] and I can only imagine with, you know, five plus years of age what that would be like. So, so here's a question that does it for
**Bam Bam:** me.
So this is a 2014. Yeah. What is this? What does this 2014 up two go for right now? Oh,
**Poobah:** it's gone up. It's, it's now 30 bucks if I, no, it's more, way more, they go $50 of cigar. So now if you
**Senator:** factor that in, but I, the reason I don't, let's just be clear here. Every Cuban, it doesn't matter what the cigar is, if it's any respected Mark, right?
We're talking Parus, upk, Monty Boulevard. If you're gonna buy a 2014 of any of those marks, you're gonna pay a huge premium. Yep. So like we can do nothing about that. That's why I'm not gonna knock this cigar. But the M s MSRP P essentially, right? Like what this starts at, if this were in 2014 and we were buying these, it's not some crazy amount where we talk about some Davidoff that the year they come out, the s r P is 50 40 a stick.
And they don't deliver nearly a satisfying experience. So that's where I don't care that now there's a crazy premium [01:09:00] that's any Cuban that's respectable with this amount of age on it. Yeah. And I
**Poobah:** think it bumps something up like this against like what Cohi Young Cohibas retail for now. Right. Forget it.
Knocks their Dicken, caught it, knocks
**Gizmo:** their Dicken. It's not even close. Think
**Rooster:** about a Vegas Classico 2011 $52 for that. Right. I know, but what? You know when they came out, when they came out, they were
**Gizmo:** probably 10 bucks. 10 bucks. Right.
**Rooster:** And that stick is, it's, you know, if you, you know, if you ever rated it, I'm sure it's gonna
**Gizmo:** get a very high rating.
Oh, well, yeah.
**Poobah:** That's the wonderful cigar
**Gizmo:** special stick.
**Bam Bam:** But this is also an, this is an unattainable cigar right now at this age. Yeah. It's a unicorn. You
**Gizmo:** can't get this ci. Well, pub said
**Senator:** it a unicorn in this, but, but I think, again, my point, you don't have to get it at this age. Like what, what? Well, I take away from this.
Yeah. Having had this at 14, at 18, at 19, right. They're all excellent. The 18, the flavor profile. Fucking delicious. Fantastic, delicious. All that this does, which obviously benefits tremendously, is it brings those flavors together in a way that [01:10:00] becomes a bit more refined with age. and you get that creaminess.
And so all that tells me is load up on young, up twos and hold them, be patient with them and that that's worth it. Like this is proof that it's worth
**Poobah:** letting proof. It is worth it. And I will say this as being a guy who's probably bought more up and twos and has more boxes, fucking twos than anyone in this room, nobody's gonna argue that maybe combined.
Yeah. So I will say I have had some that are better than others and um, that's what I'll say at different ages and different c. . The thing about this particular box code, this box code this l u b 14, and that's for a lot of up men. That's not just for this, but ka that's for the Kanye. Yep. I mean, we can smoke some Kanye's.
I have some Kanye that are above fourteens that will, that will, that will blow your hair back and you'll be like, okay, now I see why you can maybe
**Bam Bam:** cheese not my, no, I love the Kanye . I do love the Kanye. I, I,
**Poobah:** I've got some Conny [01:11:00] I that, that are really, that are aged, that are really wonderful. So maybe one takeaway from this is that I, I, you know, um, some monds set up for aging really well, and I think that it's, it's, you could say with confidence that aging like larger ring gauge monds, you can really get a lot out of 'em.
So if you seek 'em out, put 'em down for a while, and I know that some people say that's, that's bullshit. You shouldn't have to wait. But I think it's exemplified by what the experience tonight sometimes. You know, the time is precious and that's what it takes. And that's what these require and that's, this is a little connoisseur corner kind of episode maybe.
And, and that's okay. Yeah. Like I, I, I think that it, you know, to talk about it is a good thing, but I, but
**Gizmo:** I think that, that, for me, what I hear in all of this conversation is that someone who goes out and buys a box of reasonably pri priced young up twos with an investment of time is gonna have an experience that is [01:12:00] maybe unmatch.
By spending any high dollar amount on a cigar that you can buy. That's a good point. At that exact moment. So it's simply an investment in 10. When
**Bam Bam:** you think about it that way, then the rating of 10 makes sense. It does. That's the whole
**Poobah:** point. It is a 10 cause it's smoked like a 10 count, you know, I mean, you can't deny, it's
**Bam Bam:** hard to deny.
Now you're down to a half inch and there is zero ammonia. It's, there's no bitterness at all. Yeah, it's
**Gizmo:** totally perfect. It's, it's, it's ridiculous. And, you know, the, the shark was a 9.7. This edged that out, dude. That's crazy. Now that's, this is now the highest rated cigar that we've ever
**Senator:** done. Yeah. And, and the last thing I'll say, we've talked about obviously the Sir Winston, a very pricey, coveted cigar at this price point and what this delivered.
And the Winston gets even cra way, way crazier in price than this does. Oh, sure, sure. I would take this. Now this is why I'm factoring in price right. I would take this over a a Winston. Thank you. Thank you. When you factor in price point, any day the week, it punches over,
**Poobah:** above its
**Senator:** weight class. Absolutely.
We're like, I gave this a 10. Now who knows if someone is able to source a [01:13:00] 14 bucks of Winston's that is gonna smoke as good or better, maybe I'll feel differently without, without leveraging your mortgage experience that yet. And so for me, you know, if we rate a Winston, I, I very well may give it a nine because for what you have to pay for that experience and what it delivers and what you pay for this and that experience, I think this is a much better value.
**Poobah:** Yeah, that's absolutely, that's a fair point. It it, it delivers, it exemplifies the marker. Well, it really, uh,
**Gizmo:** it, I, I, I hesitate to say that it was shocking to me, but it really was an amazing experience tonight, this cigar. Yeah. Yeah. I'm, I'm very grateful. Thank you, Puba. No doubt. A plus. No doubt. AA plus, and again, to the listener, buy these cigar.
get them at a reasonable price and forget about them and start drinking some cognac and start drinking some cog, drinking some cognac. Man, thank you for the cognac and thank I'm, I'm, thank you. Thank you. It seems like we're just dipping our toe into the pool, like I feel like. In a couple weeks or a couple months, we're gonna be deep into cognac.
Yeah, we'll have Louis the 14th next week.
**Senator:** the
**Pagoda:** 13th. [01:14:00] 14th. 14th, 14th.
**Gizmo:** Isn't that alright? Right. I'm in. Awesome boys. All right, so a 9.8 for the amazing Love 14, uh, Ahman. Two. And, uh, awesome guys. Great night and we'll see you all next week. Keep smoking. Thanks so much for joining us tonight. Hope you enjoyed it.
Don't forget to leave us a rating and subscribe on your favorite podcast platform. If you have any comments, questions, if you wanna reach out, say hello, tell us what you're smoking, email us Lounge Lizards Pod, p o d, that's a lounge, lizards pod@gmail.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.