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Released every Tuesday, the LOUNGE LIZARDS podcast helps listeners navigate the experience of finding and enjoying premium cigars (both Cuban and non-Cuban) and quality spirits. Episodes are normally around 90 minutes long and feature a variety of different topics including food, travel, life, sports and work.
The podcast features eight members: Rooster, Poobah, Gizmo, Senator, Pagoda, Chef Ricky, Grinder and Bam Bam.
This is not your typical cigar podcast. We’re a group of friends who love sharing cigars, whiskey and a good laugh.
Join us and become a card-carrying lounge lizard yourself! Email us at hello@loungelizardspod.com to join the conversation and be featured on an upcoming episode!
Welcome to the Lounge Lizards Podcast presented by FabricAfi. It's so good to have you here. It's a leisure and lifestyle podcast founded on our love of premium cigars as well as whiskey travel, food, work, and whatever else we feel like getting into. My name is Gizmo. Tonight, I'm joined by Rooster, Senator, Chef Ricky, and Bam Bam.
Gizmo:On our plan is to smoke a cigar, drink some bourbon, talk about life, and, of course, have some laughs. So take this as your two hundred and fifty first official invitation to join us and become a card carrying lounge lizard. Glad to be here once a week. We're gonna smoke a Dominican cigar tonight, share our thoughts on it, and give you our formal lizard break. We discuss a controversial new release from Fuente.
Gizmo:We share the long histories of both the cigar and the bourbon, and we invite in a guest lizard to help recap Senator's big birthday event all among a variety of other things for the next two hours. So sit back, get your favorite drink, light up a cigar, enjoy as we pair Blanton's The Original Single Barrel Bourbon Whiskey with the Cuesta Ray Centrofino Sungrown Pyramid Number Nine. A pyramid on the pod tonight, boys, from The Dominican Republic, and it's kind of a debut. It's the Cuesta Ray Centrofino Sungrown Pyramid number nine. It's a 52 ring gauge cigar by six and one quarter inches long.
Gizmo:And boys, this cigar is made by JC Newman at the Arturo Fuente factory. So we are going back to a pyramid out of the Fuente factory. If you remember a couple of weeks ago, we did the Anejo shark, which also comes out of there. So it'll be interesting to see how this does tonight. The wrapper.
Gizmo:Delicious. Smells so good. So before Senator sent this cigar over as we were trying to figure out cigars to smoke, I had actually never heard of CuestaRey. Has anybody else ever heard of this? No.
Gizmo:I've heard of it. Never had it.
Bam Bam:So where'd you find this?
Senator:Just online. It was on some of the top 25 lists
Gizmo:for Reviews? The past Yeah. I think last year it was number four on CA's list.
Senator:Yeah. I think even another cigar pub had them high as well.
Bam Bam:It is a beautiful cigar.
Gizmo:Looks great.
Bam Bam:Wrapper's gorgeous. Little sheen to it.
Gizmo:Alright, boys. Let's cut this thing. See what we're getting on the cold draw and the wrapper. The wrapper smells a little bit better than the one we had a couple weeks ago out of that factory, you remember. I could never forget.
Gizmo:Draw is great.
Bam Bam:I can't get much.
Gizmo:How much did you guys take off?
Bam Bam:More than I should. You did? I needed to.
Gizmo:Yeah. I did a second cut as well. I did. Yeah.
Bam Bam:Draw is good now. Yeah.
Gizmo:What do you guys get? Anything good?
Senator:Not really.
Gizmo:Getting the typical stuff. Little salt. I mean, maybe a little Little fig. Apple. Little apple maybe.
Gizmo:Yeah.
Chef Ricky:Now I see why you kept the cutter a bit longer.
Bam Bam:That's correct.
Senator:Are you going for a second?
Chef Ricky:Yeah.
Gizmo:I got
Senator:lucky. My first cut was fine, but I I was holding on to it just in case. Coulter was good.
Gizmo:Yeah. Fruit, salt,
Bam Bam:that's about it.
Gizmo:Apple. Honestly, it tastes a little bit like a Millennium Pyramid Coulter.
Bam Bam:Oh, you're not wrong.
Rooster:I can see
Chef Ricky:that.
Bam Bam:With less cedar.
Gizmo:Yeah. Less cedar.
Bam Bam:Good point. Yeah. Millennium has more cedar.
Gizmo:Alright, boys. Let's light this thing. The CuestaRey Centrofino Sungrown Pyramid number nine.
Rooster:The wrapper smells like perfume.
Bam Bam:It's almost like a candied type
Gizmo:And of thing for it's a 52 ring gauge cigar by six and one quarter inches long. Like I said, coming out of the Arturo Fuente factory in The Dominican Republic made for JC Newman. Of course, those two companies have had a long history together. We've talked about that before, but we'll touch on it tonight a little bit. This cigar is very reasonably priced.
Gizmo:We got them under $10.
Bam Bam:It's good value.
Gizmo:Chef just welded his microphone to the door.
Bam Bam:Need to clean that filter, boy.
Gizmo:Oh, that's really nice on the light. Very pleasant. I'm actually getting a ton of flavor there.
Bam Bam:It's different.
Gizmo:There's a mustiness to the tobacco.
Bam Bam:It's also a little potpourri for me.
Chef Ricky:Yeah. I'm getting a lot of perfume, I think Rooster said earlier.
Senator:Smell the burn line? It is insanely perfume
Gizmo:like.
Bam Bam:Yeah. That's absolutely right.
Senator:More than any cigar I've ever smelled with the burn line.
Chef Ricky:Guys ever walk into a botanica?
Bam Bam:That's exactly what this is.
Chef Ricky:A what? Yeah. A botanica. So in in in Latin neighborhoods, there's usually a good place where you could buy candles and all kinds of religious tchotchkes or whatnot. This smells like that store.
Bam Bam:Smells like palm olive.
Rooster:A lot of incense.
Chef Ricky:Plastic incense.
Senator:You said palm olive? Mean, wouldn't describe this as dish soap, but
Bam Bam:That aromas is
Gizmo:It's pretty potent.
Senator:It's like a fruity perfumey. It's not like dish strange. Soap.
Bam Bam:It's almost like a body spray thing happening here for me. A little
Rooster:antiperspirant. You sure you want to go there?
Bam Bam:I live there. Do you like what you're getting?
Gizmo:I do. On the draw, I do.
Chef Ricky:Yeah. I'm not in love with it.
Bam Bam:I'm asking chef.
Chef Ricky:Yeah. But I'm I'm waiting for it to develop. You know, I wish there were more food forward notes like we usually get, you know, This carbohydrates and some sweetness and dried fruit and is very different.
Bam Bam:Definitely different.
Chef Ricky:And we need to talk about the band a bit.
Gizmo:Yeah, what do guys think of it? It's actually very Cubanesque in its presentation, kinda all around. Yeah. Even the top of the box, the bottom of the box.
Bam Bam:That's very true.
Gizmo:Cedar boxes, boxes of 10, and they look like almost like a dress box, like they would be cardboard, but they're fully cedar. Correct. Like the lid is actually pretty heavy. And there's the artwork inside under
Bam Bam:the little door. Nice.
Gizmo:Very ornate and very Cuban, the design of the box. It actually has like a transit seal.
Chef Ricky:The Republica Dominica. Yeah. There's a good sheen on the on the wrapper. It feels a little gaudy for me.
Rooster:What's the makeup of
Bam Bam:this product? What's the blend?
Gizmo:The wrapper is Ecuadorian Sumatra Sungrown. That's where the name comes from. The binder is Dominican and the filler is aged Dominican Lihero.
Bam Bam:So
Gizmo:apparently, the Dominican Lihero is aged for approximately five years. So maybe that's where that mustiness I'm getting is coming from?
Senator:I mean, it's it's kind of potent, the cigar, and I'm not sure if that's just on the light and it's gonna settle down a little bit and some of the flavors will come out a bit more. I feel like it's it's kinda tight to start. Like, I get a little bit of sharpness. There's flavor, but it's not really delivered in like a particularly elegant way. So I'm just hoping that it kind of settles down a little bit.
Rooster:Yeah. Like, it's not a refined
Bam Bam:Well, it's not nice on the palate for me yet. There's no culinary angle here.
Senator:It's also not nice. It's just a very youthful expression. It's not like an aged, refined delivery, at least so far.
Rooster:It's not smooth.
Gizmo:It's all rough. Yeah. Know, little edgy. Yeah.
Bam Bam:Five years is suspect, I think.
Gizmo:Well, that's just that one Lihero leaf. I don't find it to be off putting. It's pleasant for me. I like the cigar right now. I'm not going to write home about it, but
Chef Ricky:I don't hate it. It's starting to get a little bit creamier than where we began. So hopefully that continues to develop.
Rooster:It's hitting the back of your back of my tongue. I don't know if it's that pepper note or something.
Bam Bam:It's I'm getting that too.
Senator:Yeah. Yeah. Cayenne or
Rooster:black pepper. It's a little yeah. A little sharp on the back.
Gizmo:Mhmm. So let's talk about CuestaRey boys. This is an old Cuban marca dating back all the way to the late eighteen hundreds. Of course, these cigars were made with Cuban tobacco. So this brand was once the official cigar of King Alfonso the XIII of Spain.
Gizmo:So the founder Angel Cuesta was reportedly given the title tobacco purveyor for the Spanish king and court. So that's pretty cool. Yeah. I had like I said, I'd honestly never heard of it. I didn't even know.
Gizmo:I actually went to Cuba Cigar website and went through, like, all of the old discontinued stuff that there's, like, hundreds or thousands of them. And it was there. I was surprised that I had never heard of it. JC Newman purchased CuestaRey in 1958 from the Cuesta family. Of course, JC Newman is Tampa's oldest family owned premium cigar company.
Gizmo:We've done a couple of their cigars before. At the time Newman acquired the brand, CuestaRey was reportedly producing roughly four to 5,000,000 cigars per year. So that's quite a bit in 1958. I don't think they're obviously making that many now. So as we know, JC Newman began working with Carlos Fuente Sr, Carlito's dad, and the Fuente business in the mid nineteen eighties.
Gizmo:And following the merger of operations, I guess, factory operations of JC Newman and Arturo Fuente in The Dominican Republic, JC Newman moved the manufacturing of CuestaRey to Tabaclera Arturo Fuente in the Doctor. And as we know, Fuente and Newman have a manufacturing relationship that Fuente kind of handles, and they have a distribution relationship here in The United States that JC Newman handles. So they are responsible for distributing Arturo Fuente cigars here in The United States. So they've been doing business together for well over forty years. JC Newman developed this Centrofino Sungrown line around 2002.
Gizmo:The point was to create something stronger or bolder than what people would expect from Cuesta-Rey, and it was launched in 2003. What I found interesting about this was it kinda came out of nowhere. Like, when Senator mentioned this being in the CA top 25 last year, I went back and looked at some of the other ratings that they've done. 2004 got an 88, 2,006, 87, 2,019, 92,021, 87, 2,025, 93, and then it landed at number four
Senator:What?
Gizmo:On the list. So it's a weird out of nowhere brand. Maybe they were trying to fill a slot for JC Newman, you know, in the top 25. I don't know. Maybe the cigar will blow us away.
Gizmo:MSRP is $11.45, and that's about doubled in the last twenty years. But like I said, you can find them online pretty inexpensively. The core Centrofino Sungrown sizes are the Pyramid number nine we have in our hand, 52 by six and a quarter. The number 60, which is 50 by six, and the number seven, Robusto, 50 by four and a half. They used to have a Bellicoso number 11, but they discontinued that a few years ago.
Gizmo:So Centrofino obviously means the fine center. The wrapper leaves from those Ecuadorian Sumatra seed plants, they come from the middle of the stock. So they're not too dark. They're not too light. So they choose that central area of the plant, and that's where these leaves come from.
Gizmo:So that's where the name is. Of course, they are also Sungrown, which is in the name benefiting from the cloud cover in Ecuador to grow great Connecticut seed wrapper. So that's the story on Centrofino and CuestaRey.
Bam Bam:The only thing I like right now is
Gizmo:the aroma. It's a bit unpleasant.
Bam Bam:I'm not enjoying the traditional draw, but the aroma's great.
Senator:I agree. The traditional draw, it's too bright. I'm now getting lemon, of acidic citrus.
Bam Bam:It is acidic.
Senator:It's too much. It's too sharp.
Chef Ricky:We went from palm olive to pledge.
Bam Bam:Yeah. That soapy thing disappeared for me.
Chef Ricky:I'm starting to get some toasted nuts here but it's not. You said creamy? It's very short. That's just it. It's not lasting the way we've kind of Wow.
Chef Ricky:Grown accustomed to lately. I feel like every cigar we've been smoking, there's these very long creamy fatty notes.
Bam Bam:Mhmm.
Chef Ricky:This one feels like it's trying to come through, but then the white pepper cuts it off.
Rooster:It's a very odd blend.
Bam Bam:Going from acid to cream,
Senator:that's What's very tough is the underlying notes are pretty pleasant. It's just like the sharp acidity that's here is what's like ruining it. So I just feel like I'm not sure what they were trying to do with this blend. Like this could have been something at least to start more enjoyable than it is. It's just way, way too sharp and acidic to start.
Gizmo:I obviously wasn't smoking as I was talking about the brand history and all that. But as soon as I hit it again, I'm definitely getting that that unpleasant citrusy thing. Yeah, there is a harshness there, especially in the front of your mouth. Sharp. Yeah, There is some pleasantness there, but it's overwhelmed, I think, by that.
Bam Bam:Retro. And it's
Gizmo:taken it down.
Bam Bam:Retro is terrible.
Gizmo:I didn't even try the retro. I'll do that now. Oh yeah, no. You know the retro is like? It's like when the cleaning folks clean my school.
Bam Bam:Mhmm. Oh, you're still in soap mode.
Gizmo:And it's like, no, it's like lemon, the lemon smell, and it's like overwhelming when you first come in and it goes through your nose. I'm kinda feeling like
Rooster:Are they using fabuloso?
Gizmo:It might, no, I think it's lemon something.
Bam Bam:Fabuloso is good shit, man.
Chef Ricky:Might be Mr. Clean or something.
Rooster:Lemon pledge.
Bam Bam:I'm not getting actual lemon, but the acidic properties of it is what I'm getting.
Rooster:It's like the sharp acidic spice hitting the back of your tongue.
Bam Bam:Almost ammonia like.
Rooster:That's kind of taking over the cigar.
Bam Bam:It's ammonia like really.
Chef Ricky:Poorly pulled espresso. We may
Bam Bam:not finish the cigar tonight.
Gizmo:We'll see what happens.
Bam Bam:Pull a CA in the room.
Gizmo:You want to rate it now?
Bam Bam:You can edit that. I
Rooster:don't know how they gave this number four.
Gizmo:That's rough. Four cigar. Honestly, I will say in defense of CA, we've been harsh on them over the years. We were very complimentary of their list this year. This year.
Gizmo:Yeah, the twenty twenty five list. We were very complimentary of. So honestly, when you sent the Senator, I didn't bat an eye
Senator:at it. Totally. That's why I even looked at it in any serious way because most of the stuff on there, we've tried and it has been good, but this is a very bizarre blend.
Gizmo:I also have to imagine That I don't know about you guys. Are you having an issue with the draw kind of closing up at the head of the cigar? No. No. I feel like I'm having to massage it a little bit to reopen the.
Gizmo:Airflow. No. And I've cut it. Look, I've cut quite a bit off now with three cuts.
Senator:Now my construction is good, but it's just burning a bit unevenly, which is annoying. My only complaint.
Gizmo:All right, boys, let's talk about some news. Got a lot to get to tonight. Ton of stuff. So first up, we have a new cigar coming from the Kellner factory in The Dominican Republic. Our friend, Klaus Kellner, has partnered up with the LA Cigar Collective for the exclusive Le Flambeau.
Gizmo:So if you remember, we actually went to the LA Cigar Collective right outside New Orleans at PCA. So they are making a cigar with Klas Kellner, and it's apparently supposed to be one of the most full bodied cigars that Klas has ever made. So apparently, according to the press release here, the challenge from the LA Cigar Collective to Klas was to build them a cigar that was full bodied. They wanted him to push beyond the strength profile people expect from a Kellner blend without sacrificing the complexity and balance that defines his work. The result, they're saying, is Le Flambeau.
Gizmo:The name draws its inspiration directly from New Orleans and the historic flambeau carriers of Mardi Gras. Before modern street lighting transformed nighttime parades, flambeau carriers walked the routes bearing flaming torches, illuminating the procession for those gathered along the streets, derived from the French word for torch, flambeau, has become an enduring symbol of New Orleans tradition. So the blend here is really interesting. At the heart of it, they say, is a filler composition containing 60% lyjaro, providing strength and intensity that they challenge Klaus Kellner to achieve. As a Mexican San Andres wrapper with an Ecuadorian Habano binder and Dominican filler tobaccos, and like I said, it's produced in the Doctor at the Kellner family cigars.
Gizmo:The Vitola is a 55 by six and a half Gran Toro, and they come in 15 count boxes. So limited to 10,000 cigars. You can get them at smallbatchcigar.com, of course. Check it out there, lacigarcollective.com, and there's also gonna be available in certain brick and mortar stores around the country. They're not named yet, but we'll see how these are when they come out.
Gizmo:I'm interested to try a stronger blend from class.
Bam Bam:I wanna try everything he makes. Yeah. Whatever it
Gizmo:is. Everything's done well so far, so I'd like to try it. Pretty cool photo though. I like this press photo of the cigar. Nice.
Gizmo:Pretty nice.
Bam Bam:The Toro?
Gizmo:It's a Grand Toro. Mhmm. 55, six and a half. Pretty big.
Senator:I like the band too.
Gizmo:Yeah. The band looks great. I'm getting a harshness on the top of my palate right now that I am really not enjoying.
Bam Bam:How much will that cigar be?
Gizmo:So each box of 15 will be $275. Okay. So I'll get my calculator out, rusty trusty. Price on those is $18 a cigar. Nice.
Gizmo:Right in line, I think, with a lot of Colossus stuff. So what are you guys thinking of the cigar right now? Same spot?
Rooster:Dog shit. I don't know. Jesus. Wow. It's horrible.
Bam Bam:How far along are you?
Senator:Don't hold back, rooster.
Gizmo:I can't
Rooster:I can't even smoke it. It's harsh. It's just harsh.
Bam Bam:It is, but honestly, I'm kind of getting a few notes that are keeping me puffing. It's getting a touch better for me.
Rooster:It's so unpleasant. The mouth, like the whole tongue is just dry. It's a very dry cigar. It's very
Bam Bam:spicy. You're gonna pass that moment, and I think it'll improve.
Senator:I agree. Because I'm with Bam. In the background, there are some pleasant notes, but it's just dominated by that acidic And dryness. Sour citrus.
Bam Bam:Sour, acidic, ammonia.
Rooster:But Acidic note is hitting the back of your tongue, and it's There numbing that
Bam Bam:is a little fruit deep in the background, which is kind of keeping me interested.
Rooster:I hope it comes through.
Bam Bam:Yeah. I
Chef Ricky:find that fruit, but that fruit's quickly cut off by some bitter tannic note that's happening at the very end of the finish, and I can't put my finger on it. I stopped puffing for a bit and swallowed the saliva that was in my mouth. And I got some really interesting flavors that was left by the tobacco that I was not crazy about. It was almost like cloves and soap. You're
Bam Bam:still getting the soap? Yeah. So for me that has completely disappeared. What I'm kind of getting, if you've had a yogurt with fruit in a refrigerator a little too long, but you still got to eat it, and I've done that.
Gizmo:It has a little rank on it.
Bam Bam:Just a touch where the cream is about to turn, but there's still the fruit, so it's a little sweet. It's kind of like that. Now, that can go really bad really quick, but that fruit in the background, I don't know. Hopefully it grows.
Chef Ricky:Can't wait for the pairing.
Bam Bam:Oh, yeah. That's gonna save the night.
Gizmo:You wanna go to it now? Alright. We'll get to news in a my next news story in a second. Alright, boys. Let's go to our pairing.
Gizmo:This one has been requested quite a bit from listeners and I know we've been kind of earmarking it to the best of our ability, but it's not available anywhere. And as a gift from Lizard Seagull, we mentioned a lot, he's a longtime listener. We have a bottle of Blanton's single barrel Kentucky straight bourbon whiskey. Extremely generous. Very generous and I'll tell you, it's very hard to find.
Bam Bam:And you don't have your drink?
Gizmo:I don't.
Bam Bam:It's delicious on the nose. The aroma is beautiful.
Gizmo:Cheers, boys. Cheers. Salute. Good to see you all. We haven't had drinks together in a week and a half.
Gizmo:We'll talk about that in a little bit. So Blanton's is a very difficult bourbon to find because it is so beloved, and damn, that is good.
Bam Bam:That's good.
Gizmo:That is gonna save them.
Chef Ricky:That is delicious. It's like a it's almost as if Claes Kellner distilled this. The way it dances on your palate, man. Mhmm. Oh, wow.
Chef Ricky:The finish is still going. It's still jumping around.
Bam Bam:Very long.
Chef Ricky:Yep. It's like cherry, apple, honey, everything just happening at once. It's a very smooth affair.
Bam Bam:It's helping the cigar. Oh, yeah. I'll tell you that. A draw after a sip isn't too too bad.
Gizmo:How's the bourbon for you, Senator?
Senator:It's good. I'm not as enthusiastic as the crew. I think the flavor notes are good.
Bam Bam:I think we're just desperate for anything.
Senator:The delivery, I just wish it were a little
Gizmo:Smoother.
Senator:Smoother, more supple. Like, it's Smooth. It's a
Gizmo:With the load.
Senator:It's a little more abrupt than I would like, but the flavor notes are good.
Gizmo:What's the proof, Cigar? So the proof on this is 93. So 46 and a half ABV.
Senator:Okay. That explains everything. If you would have said this is 80 proof, I would be really complaining. But now knowing this is higher proof, it drinks like a higher proof spirit.
Chef Ricky:I think like anything higher proof, give it a couple sips and
Bam Bam:Curious what this bottle cost.
Gizmo:Honestly, I have no idea what the I mean, retail probably like $50 I would use. Yeah. Mean, but what you're actually gonna find it for outside of
Bam Bam:Probably a 100
Gizmo:Buffalo Trace factory, you're it's you're looking a $100,150.
Bam Bam:100
Gizmo:on the gray market probably, or at a retailer who's price gouging. Yeah. I mean, I would bet the MSRP is probably like Senator's saying, under $50. I just, again, I can't, I know that age is the issue and the barrels and all that. I just can't believe that
Bam Bam:Exclusivity. It's like
Gizmo:we're talking about a pretty basic mash bill, water,
Senator:and time. Well, Total Wine is in on the gouging. It retails there for 99.99.
Gizmo:That's ridiculous. Ridiculous. It's good. But I'm
Bam Bam:surprised you can find it there.
Senator:It says it's in stock in Totowa.
Gizmo:No way.
Bam Bam:Get the heck out.
Senator:I was
Gizmo:there two weeks ago. It was definitely not in stock. Wow. So let's talk about Blanton's Boys. It is produced at the Buffalo Trace Distillery in Frankfort, Kentucky, introduced in 1984 by legendary master distiller, Elmer t Lee.
Gizmo:It was named for colonel Albert Blanton who ran the distillery for decades. Of course, it was originally called the George t Stagg Distillery, then it was changed to Buffalo Trace. Buffalo Trace describes it as the world's first modern commercially marketed single barrel bourbon. The mash bill is the Buffalo Trace mash bill number two. Of course, they don't define what that means.
Gizmo:So according to Elmer T. Lee, colonel Blanton would entertain important guests, politicians, dignitaries, loved celebrating with his friends and family, and he would personally select particularly good honey barrels of bourbon. He favored barrels from the center section of Warehouse H at the George T. Stagg, now Buffalo Trace distillery. Those barrels would be bottled individually rather than mingled with whiskey from numerous other barrels, and then Elmer T.
Gizmo:Lee later remembered this practice when he was asked to develop a premium bourbon, and he launched the Blanton's Single Barrel in 1984 as a tribute to his former boss. What's interesting about this whole celebration that is the first modern commercially marketed single barrel bourbon is that in 1984, when you walked into a liquor store, you didn't see that. Now, obviously, you could walk in and see thirty, forty, 50 single barrel offerings of bourbon wherever you may be, but in 1984, it was pretty crazy that that they were releasing that. Whiskey in America was always marketed around consistency, blending barrels together so that every bottle tasted essentially identical. So they wanted everything to taste unique and individual and allow people to chase different runs, different bottles, etcetera.
Gizmo:So they pretty much helped create the super premium bourbon category. So warehouse h is very famous for specifically Blanton's. It was constructed in 1935. It's Buffalo Trace's only metal clad aging warehouse. Apparently, metal reacts much more quickly to outside temperature.
Gizmo:You might know if does does oxygen oxidize there, Ben?
Bam Bam:Yes.
Gizmo:It reacts much more quickly to outside temperature changes than thick brick warehouse walls. Mhmm. Kentucky's temperature swings cause whiskey to move in and out of the oak. Buffalo Trace argues that warehouse h's metal construction amplifies these fluctuations and produces a distinctive maturation environment. And then, of course, colonel Blanton and Elmer Tealey became particularly fond of barrels from this warehouse, and that's where this came from.
Gizmo:One more note on this. Obviously, the bottle is pretty unique. How would you describe this bottle? It's how would
Rooster:you describe that?
Bam Bam:It's kind of a sphere that has facets and I'm sure everyone's seen this bottle. Nice beige band and is that a horse?
Gizmo:Yeah, so it's a gentleman on a horse on the top and actually each of these
Bam Bam:in dark bronze and they're usually unique to
Gizmo:each bottle. They do. So the horse stoppers debuted in 1999 and each stopper carries one letter of the word Blanton's. And there actually are two separate end stoppers. There's a little mark on the second one to distinguish them.
Gizmo:And the whole idea is that you're collecting, I guess, the entire line of Blanton's. I think there's like display things you can get. People love to collect those things. They say that all eight letters are produced in equal quantities. They're applied randomly.
Gizmo:I don't know if that's true. I've not seen some of the letters before. Not that I've had a ton of these, but I know it's kind of hard to complete the collection. One final note on this is there's handwritten stuff on the actual bottle. So they specifically write what date the whiskey was dumped on.
Gizmo:This one came 04/10/2026 from barrel number 6196 and Rick number 44. And then they also handwrite the proof on it. So I think that's pretty cool. Yeah. So that's Blanton's boys.
Bam Bam:Yeah. Nice presentation.
Gizmo:That's our pairing tonight.
Senator:I also found the actual MSRP is 70 to 75.
Gizmo:That must have gone up over the last
Senator:I'm sure.
Gizmo:Five to ten years.
Bam Bam:How are you feeling about the flavor?
Senator:The Blanton? The cigar?
Bam Bam:Spirit. How many sips have you had?
Senator:Probably three.
Bam Bam:Yeah, I've taken a good amount of it down. It's not your typical bourbon experience. It's a little different.
Chef Ricky:It's unique. Yeah.
Bam Bam:Right?
Gizmo:I got to tell you, I'm having a hell of a time keeping this thing lit.
Bam Bam:Well, you're talking.
Gizmo:I know, but really, every time I talk, I'm relighting
Bam Bam:the damn thing. Well, say what you will, it's a beautifully made cigar. The ash is fantastic. That Senator's about to ash. It's very nice.
Rooster:I don't know. I think the burn is a Which is disgruntled. Mean, burn is a bit wavy, actually. I don't think it's-
Bam Bam:Not mine.
Senator:Bam's is good, but mine was
Gizmo:had to course correct
Senator:a lot to get it to even out.
Bam Bam:Chef's looks good.
Gizmo:Every time I relight, I correct mine.
Bam Bam:This is a different bourbon experience.
Senator:I like the flavor profile.
Gizmo:I like it a lot.
Chef Ricky:I really do. Not overly sweet.
Bam Bam:That's true.
Gizmo:It's smooth like Weller is to me. It's different, obviously. I'm not comparing it so much to that flavor profile, but the smoothness and it's refined, unlike this cigar, it's pretty good.
Senator:I think it's well balanced, and I even now get a little bit of a buttery finish.
Bam Bam:A little salt. I guess oily. I'm getting a touch of salt. The aroma is fantastic. What's that Italian fruitcake that they make?
Gizmo:Panatone.
Bam Bam:That's a specific aroma for me. I'm getting that on the nose. If you keep your nose in there for a while, it's like a fruitcake type thing.
Gizmo:I don't know. I like it, man.
Senator:Yeah. I'm there right now. The first few sips, like I said, I thought the flavor was good, there was a bit of a bite. But my palate's adjusted, I'm able to appreciate the flavor more. And I actually think it's nicely balanced.
Bam Bam:Getting any smoky finish on that? I am. Just a touch of smoke.
Chef Ricky:I'm not.
Bam Bam:No?
Senator:Mm-mm.
Gizmo:How's it pairing with the cigar for you right now? It's fine. I think it's helping the cigar.
Bam Bam:Yeah. Oh,
Gizmo:yeah. How about you, Rooster?
Bam Bam:How's your pairing?
Chef Ricky:Rooster, you want to sue?
Lizard Obaiy:He might.
Rooster:I feel like every time I take a puff, I want to take some water now. Really? Yeah. It's drying. But I'm getting a dark fruit note now, which is rather nice.
Lizard Obaiy:Like a
Bam Bam:prune or date? Those are dark.
Senator:Fig?
Rooster:Almost like a bitter fig, if there is such a thing. Could be a prune.
Senator:To your point, the cigar has picked up a bit in sweetness, which is helping counteract the acidity, That's
Gizmo:better. Which I'm
Chef Ricky:This is somewhat a tangent, but No. I'm I'm growing gooseberries on my deck right now. You don't say. And gooseberries is probably the note that I'm going to replace tomatoes with you guys ever had a gooseberry? No, sounds amazing though.
Chef Ricky:Also call them husk cherries. It's a much sweeter and much smaller variant of a tomato. It's tiny, tiny, tiny like this, and it's covered in a husk, almost looks like a mini tomatillo. But when you bite into it, there's like this mixture of fresh fruit with a tomato finish, like a very short tomato finish at the end. It's almost
Senator:like Like a little funkiness though, almost.
Chef Ricky:Not as much as Tomatillo. Know the funk you're talking about because Tomatillo has them a lot, Has it a lot especially.
Senator:And especially because gooseberry is a very, very prominent note in a number of Sauvignon Blancs from New Zealand.
Chef Ricky:Uh-huh. I could totally see that.
Bam Bam:Yeah. Yeah. What about doodleberries?
Rooster:Are you growing those?
Chef Ricky:Alright, we could go back to the shitty cigar.
Bam Bam:So the potpourri is kind of coming back, which I don't hate. The aroma is still actually okay.
Chef Ricky:I don't mind it on the aroma. Just This like it on my
Gizmo:is really a mediocre affair as far as a cigar goes. I'm finding it to be very frustrating in almost every angle of our review here.
Rooster:Is there is there any cigar that this reminds you of? No. It's so different
Bam Bam:No. No.
Rooster:That I can't think of anything that
Bam Bam:But you can't say that it's improved. It's improved from when we started. You have to admit.
Senator:It's improved. It just still doesn't make sense. Like, there's few cigars that you smoke and you don't really understand what the blender was trying to do or accomplish. You know, when we're frustrated, sometimes we're saying like, okay, the blender was going for something really bold and chocolatey and deep and all those kinds of notes, but the delivery sucked. With this, I just don't understand, like, there was you get all the, like, floral kind of fragrant notes on the burn line.
Senator:You don't get them as much on your palate. Then at some point, you start to get some of that. You have this acidic note that is like the entire first inch of the cigar, like super overpowering. That starts to dissipate. There's some fruit notes, but they're still like not sweet enough.
Senator:Nope. So I just don't really know what, you know, if you think about like the the taste receptors, you know, that Klas Kellner had walked us through, like, I'm not sure in which direction the blender was really trying to go with this. It's like all over place. The
Bam Bam:acid direction.
Rooster:It's hard to pinpoint two distinct notes out of the cigar.
Bam Bam:Are there any tasting notes that they offer? Nothing. I'd love to hear what they have to say.
Gizmo:I could tell you what cigar fish you know has to say
Bam Bam:about it. Oh, let's hear You
Senator:get notes, they're just not notes I like. Like, this reminds me of literally biting into just like a fresh cut lemon that like acidity is so Bitter lemon. Yeah. Like that's the first most prominent note, and then you do get some fruit notes in the back of your palate.
Gizmo:So here's what Cigar Aficionado said. They said they loved the Pyramid Number Nine for its ability to convey rich, nutty layers with every puff, all accented by notes of honey, nougat, chocolate, and a big buttery cashew
Chef Ricky:finish. Spot on. Spot on. I want that cigar.
Bam Bam:Yeah. Where's that cigar?
Chef Ricky:That's not this one.
Rooster:I don't know. Nougat.
Gizmo:Yeah, they were raving about this, man.
Bam Bam:Unbelievable.
Gizmo:They gave it a 95.
Bam Bam:No palm olive in there.
Gizmo:No notes of palm oil. Okay. All right, boys, let's go to another new story. This one's pretty controversial. We're obviously recording this before this episode is going to come out on September 8.
Gizmo:But we have to talk about the Fuente Fuente Opus X Resilient, which is commemorating the twenty fifth anniversary of September eleventh, which is crazy, by the way. It's twenty five years. Mhmm. So this episode is gonna come out about three days before the twenty fifth anniversary of nine eleven. Arturo Fuente has announced that the Fuente Fuente Opus X Resilient.
Gizmo:And in Resilient, by the way, the s in Resilient is replaced with a big x. So it's phonetically would be pronounced pronounced ReXilient with a big x. It's shipping to retailers now. The cigar was first seen actually, we did see it at the twenty twenty six Premium Cigar Association trade show earlier this year. By the way, shout out to Cigar Cooper.
Gizmo:I'm getting this information. He had the most complete detailing on this new release. He says many cigar companies have been focusing on special releases to celebrate the two hundred fiftieth of the United States. However, Carlito Fuente wanted to honor the memory of the fallen heroes and the individuals who lost their lives during the nine eleven attacks in 2001. Arturo Fuente designed the Opus X Resilient, continuing the theme of never forgetting the impact of that day.
Gizmo:According to Carlito Fuente, he said, this project has been burning inside me since what I experienced on 09/11/2001 with my father while attending a board meeting in Ashton with Ashton in Philadelphia. I was right across the street from City Hall, we had to be evacuated. Our country changed that day. I will never forget. The project's packaging includes many details.
Gizmo:Stars and Stripes, of course. There's two cigars in the center of the package meant to illustrate the Twin Towers surrounded by eight I guess they're double coronas or Churchills. Following nine eleven, the Fuentes did a special version of the iconic father and son ad for American Airlines magazine with the stars and stripes that they're showing here. Each box contains 20 cigars, includes 16 Churchills, 48 by seven, and four fifty four by six and a quarter boxed press Toros. The Toros are wrapped in The US flag and are the first fully boxed pressed cigars Fuente says it has produced.
Gizmo:Each tray contains eight Churchills and two Toros. The two Toros in each tray, of course, representing the Twin Towers. Inside the box, the top sheet pays tribute to the fallen heroes. Pretty nice, actually. Top sheet in the box above the cigars.
Gizmo:So this is where the kind of controversy comes in here. And and the cigar community, after its announcement, was up in arms. So each box has an MSRP of $535, and Arturo Fuente says that $11 per box will be donated to Tunnels to Towers. Very generous. So the Opus X Resilient also appeared at the Freedom two fifty celebration at the US Embassy in The Dominican Republic.
Gizmo:And Carlito Fuente that says here, we'll be doing launch events in New Jersey on September 9, Brooklyn, New York on September 10, and Fort Bragg, North Carolina on September 11. Couple things here. So I think the big thing about the controversy around this cigar is seeing an MSRP of $535. How many come in that box? 20.
Gizmo:So the price on this MSRP is like $26.27 dollars per cigar. Now, couple things. First, MSRP of $5.35 on that box, dollars 11 going to charity. I think that's what a lot of people jumped on. Of course.
Gizmo:And obviously, I'm curious to hear your thoughts on that. But also, the other side of that too, and this is not Fuente's fault per se, but we all know that those cigars are not going to appear at retail for $27. All of the a lot of retailers going to be marking them up, you know, well beyond that like they always do with Opus X. It's a very limited release, hard to get your hands on, etcetera. So my question for you guys is, what do you think of that?
Gizmo:Do you where do you stand as far as the uproar goes with the $11 on $5.35? And if you were a retailer and this box showed up with your Opus X delivery, your Fuente delivery, what would you do as far as the MSRP? Would you sell it at the price determined? Would you mark it up? What would you do?
Bam Bam:I wouldn't mark it up. I mean, if they're commemorating 09/11, I think it'd be egregious and very I don't know. It just doesn't it's not a good look. I'd do it in a
Chef Ricky:way where I'd raffle it off, and those raffle tickets you're probably going to get hundreds of raffle purchases, and then you could donate a lot more than the $11 per box. So if you were to get $2 in raffle ticket purchases, just cover the cost of whatever you paid for the box and the difference you send to the charity. Charity.
Bam Bam:It's a shame that the retailer has to do that and the manufacturer is not contributing more to the charity.
Gizmo:Sure.
Senator:Yeah. I agree. I think it's too little. The tough thing is, I understand the temptation to make the amount donated somehow correspond with, you know, $9.11. But at a minimum, I mean, you could have done like $9 to something, $11 to another charity.
Senator:Like, just the 11 is way too low.
Gizmo:And I think, you know, if if again, you know, so from the economics of the, you know, manufacturer retail relationship, the retailers are probably buying this box for $270, let's say. And, you know, pretty much when you get a box of cigars, you half that and that's what the retailer paid for it. The idea that even a penny of profit could be made on this cigar commemorating nine eleven. I think that's what I have the problem with. I think, you know, I have no problem with business and folks, you know, doing business.
Gizmo:But to put out a nineeleven cigar and to even earn a penny of profit on it, on the manufacturer side or the retail side, I think that is, for me, the issue with it. It's not the $11 For me, it's not a single penny should be profit. That's a good point.
Senator:Pagoda would disagree with
Chef Ricky:this year. I know he would.
Gizmo:I know he would. I mean, I know it's twenty five years, you know, but, and I know that there's been a defense of Fuente online as folks have been teeing off, you can see some of that on the half wheel comments and on Reddit. Reddit's real harsh. But, you know, I've seen defense where it's rooted in Fuentes long history of charity and nobody disputes that, you know? But I just don't appreciate the glazing of Fuentes in general where they kind of get a pass, I think on this, which is a major misstep here, I think.
Gizmo:And from a marketing or branding standpoint, Senator, I think that this could have been presented a thousand different ways that are better than this. Agreed. You know, instead of naming a number, some proceeds, all proceeds, you know, name a flat number that's going to charity on the box.
Rooster:Or do a percentage.
Gizmo:Or something like that.
Rooster:You know, like 11 isn't very I mean, I know they wanted to do something with like nine eleven.
Bam Bam:Was that 0.07%?
Rooster:No, it's Right? Actually like two
Gizmo:But that's still up.
Rooster:I mean, it's it's minuscule
Lizard Obaiy:for Yeah.
Rooster:You know? So they How
Gizmo:many boxes are being made? I don't think there's a number on that. Okay. But we know it's limited. I mean
Bam Bam:Gotta be limited. Yeah.
Gizmo:That's the other problem too is you're you're putting something together that's commemorative that only the elite are going to even be able to access and contribute to.
Senator:How many do we think they'll put out? A few thousand?
Gizmo:I would say 2,500 to 5,000 boxes at the most.
Senator:I would think. I wish they would say like, for every nine eleven boxes sold, we're gonna donate $10,000 or something. That would be cool.
Gizmo:Nobody would do the math on that.
Senator:That would be cool.
Gizmo:Yeah. Yeah. So I don't know. I think it's weird and I don't want to pile on Fuente for the sake of it. This is not a knock on Carlito or the company, whatever.
Gizmo:But I do think that this is a misstep period. This this whole release. Honestly, I don't even know. Don't even touch it. I mean, unless it's gonna go all to Charity, why even brand it related to nine eleven?
Gizmo:I mean, that to me seems like like like you wouldn't put out like a Pearl Harbor cigar for $700 and then say we're gonna donate $7
Bam Bam:Yeah.
Rooster:Or $11. Is this an Opus X?
Gizmo:It's an Opus X. Which again plays into the exclusivity. Like, why not put this on a rare pink or a Hemingway or, you know, something that is accessible? Take a Hemingway series, take the best seller and wrap
Bam Bam:That's the, I think, most salient point. If you were to put it on a rare a pink, you'd sell many more
Gizmo:cigars. Nobody's
Bam Bam:gonna fun raising blink it. Be tremendous.
Gizmo:And nobody's gonna blink their eye at $11 on a box of Hemingway.
Bam Bam:Sales will go through the roof.
Gizmo:Of course. I think the Flint, you know, the Opus X already has a little bit of a branding stink on it from its elite Yeah. Because it's
Bam Bam:so damn expensive. Scarcity.
Gizmo:Yeah. And the price, which is often marked up.
Bam Bam:And the the performance from that.
Gizmo:Well, you do have the Opus Dubajvam.
Bam Bam:I do like that cigar.
Senator:I mean, this is funny. So I just pulled up the rare pink. Fuente donates $13 from the sale of every box. Why would that be more than this?
Gizmo:That's a
Senator:wow. I mean, that's that's
Gizmo:I mean,
Senator:that says it all. Outrageous. That's from Cigar Aficionado. Like, that's
Bam Bam:Must be some obscure department in the company.
Senator:Yeah. That that's a problem.
Gizmo:So to me, what this does is it diminishes Carlito being at Fort Bragg on nineeleven, donating to other charities, being involved in all that. This actually, I think, pulls down that, you know, celebration of their charitable efforts. This is
Rooster:what people are gonna
Bam Bam:talk about. Did you read any of the defense on comments?
Gizmo:I did. It was all Did
Bam Bam:anything specific hit you or no?
Gizmo:The defense on comments or the comments defense
Bam Bam:on the scenario.
Gizmo:The defense was that the internet's in an uproar. You know, it's ridiculous that they're doing math, 11 on $535 You don't understand the economics. Arturo Fuente, the company's very charitable. Charity, you know, Carlito might be one of the most charitable people in the industry. It's a lot of glazing in that way.
Gizmo:Like, almost like because of all that, we can we don't have to address this Yeah. Those are very
Bam Bam:generalized comments.
Senator:Just wanna say, I I do not think there was any bad intentions There's no malice.
Gizmo:Yeah. There's no malice.
Senator:I just wanted It's a misstep. Be very clear there.
Bam Bam:I would agree with that.
Gizmo:It's a misstep.
Senator:I think it was well intentioned. I have every reason to trust that, but I do agree with Giz that, you know, when you look at it on its face, it it it's it could have been done in a much better way.
Gizmo:So I'm curious to hear what the listeners think of that. Like I said, I've seen a lot of folks out there teeing off, some of it reasonable, some of some of it very much not. And, you know, like you're saying, you know, pointing to there being malice or malintent and I don't believe any of that. And honestly, I don't think Carlito sat around saying, how can I make so much more, you know, how can I make some more money on Opus X? Let's put two cigars in the middle representing the Twin Towers and ship it out.
Gizmo:I don't think that's even close to his thinking. I think he really, you know, wanted to do something nice like Senator said, but it's just falling on its face here a little bit. So I'm curious how this will be addressed. And if anything pops up, you know, we'll report on that. And like I said, I'd like to hear from the listeners.
Gizmo:What are your thoughts on this? Obviously, we're in the New York, New Jersey area. This area is especially sensitive to 911. So many folks around here, especially where we are in Bergen County here, Passaic County, you know, everywhere out here in in North Jersey was deeply affected with loss.
Bam Bam:A lot of lives lost.
Gizmo:A lot of lives lost. And again, I'm still stunned that it's twenty five years ago. That's the crazy part to And
Rooster:also, I think it's an odd number to come up with $11 on each box. So let's say you come out with 5,000 boxes, that's still $55,000 that you would be giving to Charity, correct? So instead of saying $11 a box, why not say, I'm going to give X amount, like $50,000 towards Charity, from the proceeds of these boxes?
Gizmo:I think it's a marketing and message issue. I know, Senator, you're an expert in those areas, but that's what I think it is. I just don't understand how this press release and this these numbers and story, I I don't understand how it got approved. So, boys, we've come to the end of the first third now on the Cuesta-Rey Centrofino Sungrown Pyramid number nine paired with this Blanton's, the Original Single Barrel Bourbon Whiskey. What's everybody thinking?
Rooster:Big question mark right now.
Bam Bam:The aroma is still great. Other than that, it's just a strange cigar. It's unusual.
Chef Ricky:I had about a four inch ash on mine, and the flavor was much better prior to letting that ash go.
Gizmo:Really? Yeah. So losing the ash?
Senator:I had the same experience actually. I didn't have a four inch ash, but when there was maybe an inch and a half, at most two inches, the flavor was getting better, as soon as I ashed, it reverted right back to square one.
Chef Ricky:I was starting to really get much sweeter notes, little bit creamier, some bready notes, and then once I ashed, the sort of bitter soap came back.
Bam Bam:So do you think it's maybe the less air going through it is better experience? Possibly.
Rooster:Less is more.
Bam Bam:How are you going, touristy?
Rooster:Not great.
Senator:I'm in the same boat. Honestly, this is a bit painful right now.
Gizmo:Yeah. I'm not enjoying this at all. I'm finding this to be work Yeah. In keeping it lit. I'm finding it to be work in sitting here and talking about it and recording it.
Gizmo:I I am finding it to be a problem across the board.
Rooster:It's unpleasant.
Gizmo:Yeah. It's not great. Correct. What a follow-up to episode 250.
Rooster:Yeah. The dark food note is gone too. Yeah. You know, it's back to, like, the acidic
Senator:Yeah.
Gizmo:Notes are back. So boys, I wanna talk about an event that happened. When was this? Don't even remember. Friday.
Bam Bam:Baller in the room.
Gizmo:Look at this. So our friend Lizard Senator, he's talked about his patio many, many times on the podcast as it was coming together and being developed and all the times that we've gone there and enjoyed ourselves and he's enjoyed himself and entertained friends and family and guests, etcetera. Well, he really put the patio to a test on Friday celebrating your birthday. My birthday. And some other things, but celebrating your birthday.
Gizmo:Correct. And I would say this, The party went so well, and we're gonna get into the detail of it. I don't remember the last four hours of it.
Bam Bam:Rightfully so.
Gizmo:So with that, we are welcoming in our friend here.
Rooster:That's a good thing, by
Gizmo:the Lizard Obey, who we've mentioned a thousand times on the podcast, member of our lounge. He effectively has on this party become the lizard stenographer because he doesn't drink. And Rooster doesn't drink, but I don't trust him.
Bam Bam:But Lizard Obey keeps track of every word said.
Gizmo:There is a he is the mind of an elephant. Well Nothing gets That's good. Lost. And we are gonna go through some detail tonight. Alright.
Gizmo:First up, Obe. Lizard Obe, welcome. Welcome. Thank you, brother. Mhmm.
Gizmo:Welcome in. He's got his headphones on. He's sitting in pagoda seat. He's ready.
Senator:He's big time
Gizmo:now. He's ready. He's ready.
Bam Bam:Got that mic up there.
Chef Ricky:Big old
Gizmo:smile. He's happy. Just don't hand me a Xeno ever.
Lizard Obaiy:We'll get into that.
Gizmo:So Senator, do you wanna kind of set up your thinking on the party, the detail, etcetera?
Senator:So Lizard Obey and Lizard Henrito, who has also been on the pod, very generously volunteered to head the planning committee for this.
Gizmo:God bless the committee.
Senator:The committee. Long live the committee. And Henrito at first had wanted to do this like Brazilian food truck and basically the number of people and some other logistical things, decided to move away from that idea. And the next idea was, well, what if we actually bought a crazy amount of prime New York strip and grilled? I've got a big grill at my place, catered some sides, and then some of the little details in the alcohol I had some very strong thoughts around.
Senator:And so it's not a party at my place unless there's champagne. So the intention was to start with some champagne. I think I sabered five or six bottles that night.
Gizmo:At least. The saber is dull now. The saber is dull.
Bam Bam:It's being sharpened.
Rooster:Yeah. He said it for sharpening.
Gizmo:By monks.
Senator:With champagne, something obviously I love very dearly, had to also pair was some caviar. So we had plenty of caviar.
Bam Bam:That was actually surprising for such a large group to have that caviar there special. Oh yeah.
Gizmo:By the way Yeah, because there
Senator:was about 20 guys.
Gizmo:The caviar divvy, the portions Substantial. Very substantial. Yes. Alright. If you see, like, if you look online at like caviar, whatever you think, it's double or
Bam Bam:triple. A little
Gizmo:little dot. Like this was like a the size of like a like a little Hershey bar. It's like
Bam Bam:two ounces on a chip.
Lizard Obaiy:Yeah. Correct. It
Bam Bam:was awesome.
Senator:Yeah. And then for drinks for the evening, we have mentioned on the pod our favorite cocktail spot, Madison Rose right in town in Ridgewood, New Jersey. And the head bartender there, Josh, very graciously bartended for the whole evening. So I picked three cocktails, a Manhattan, an old fashioned and a paper plane, three of my favorite whiskey based cocktails. So those were flowing.
Senator:I bought like 70 something coupe glasses so that we could just keep going
Gizmo:fresh glasses on. Just kept coming.
Senator:They kept coming.
Gizmo:Nobody was washing them.
Senator:No. There was no waiting. There was no waiting. It was like restaurant service, just they kept bringing one out after another. And then also to make sure that no one had to get out of their seat, wait for a cocktail, We hired a couple of servers who graciously
Bam Bam:I served didn't move.
Gizmo:You were there all night.
Bam Bam:I stayed in that chair. Yeah.
Gizmo:It was beautiful.
Bam Bam:Correct.
Senator:So we had a couple servers bringing drinks around the whole evening, and the food. The dinner was the star of the show. I mean, Obay had Lizard Obay had some strong thoughts on his preparation for for the New York Strip, and he knew it was going to be great. I hadn't had steak that he's prepared.
Gizmo:He was extremely confident. Very confident. Very confident.
Senator:As confident as it gets. More confident than I've ever been.
Gizmo:And in this setting, that could be dangerous. That's true.
Chef Ricky:Yeah.
Gizmo:The confidence could be dangerous, Obe.
Senator:Correct. Because there were there were some skeptics among some guests who had heard that Lizard Obe was cooking and
Bam Bam:None in this room.
Gizmo:None in this room. None in this room. We were very supportive.
Senator:So to ensure As as
Gizmo:much as I remember.
Lizard Obaiy:God bless the committee. That's right.
Senator:To ensure that this was gonna be very successful, we did a test run at my place a few nights before. Lizard Obey came by, grilled, and chef actually was there for that. So he got to taste and we were all blown away.
Gizmo:That's news to me. I didn't know he was there. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. This was a whole production.
Gizmo:Wow. This was a whole production.
Senator:So I'll let Lizard Obey detail kind of the the menu and the preparation and
Gizmo:all that. Because that's the part at which you don't remember anything after.
Senator:Well, I I know it because we tested it beforehand, but that evening, can I tell you very much about it? Absolutely not.
Lizard Obaiy:So, yeah, the Saturday before, there was a UFC fight. So we went over to watch at Senator's, and I grabbed a couple of steaks. Lizard, Henrito came. Chef was there. Even chef's partner was Oh, partner
Senator:was there.
Gizmo:Yeah. Okay. Cool. Nice group.
Lizard Obaiy:And so as you said, a lot of confidence.
Gizmo:I admire it, man. I'm telling you, do.
Lizard Obaiy:But I had to prove prove the concept for Senator, obviously. Trust but verifies. And Henrito.
Gizmo:And Henrito. Trust but verifies.
Lizard Obaiy:So one of the things was Henrito actually originally offered to grill. And very quickly, I knew that he didn't want to. So I said, don't worry. I'll take care of it. And Henrico was very skeptical.
Lizard Obaiy:Wait. He offered and then it withdrew? He didn't withdraw. But I based off of the way that he was talking, knew he didn't want to do it. He just volunteered.
Lizard Obaiy:So I told him, don't worry. I'll take care of it. And he was very skeptical of my process, which is just reverse searing. It's nothing special.
Bam Bam:Which is?
Lizard Obaiy:Which is you cook it at a low temperature. It doesn't matter what usually, the most traditional way is an oven, and then you finish it in a pan at a high heat.
Gizmo:Mhmm.
Lizard Obaiy:As opposed to, like, a traditional way steak would be made like, a thick steak would be made in a restaurant is sear it on both sides, then throw it in the oven. This is the opposite, and usually, cook it at a low temperature for
Bam Bam:a longer time. But on a grill, how do you reverse sear?
Lizard Obaiy:So you have two options. One, you can, like, turn the flame on on one side of the grill and then put the steaks on the other side or at the cold side of it, and then the low temperature will bring it up slowly, which is usually what I would do at home. Or chef and I have talked about this a couple of times. What I like to do the most is put it on my smoker at a low temperature. And then sear it.
Lizard Obaiy:And then sear
Gizmo:it. That's what I do. I like that. I put it on my Traeger, and then I finish it in a cast iron pan. I think that's five or 600 degrees with avocado oil.
Lizard Obaiy:So when I'm feeling super extra, I'll lay it on.
Gizmo:It's a high smoke point. Tell
Chef Ricky:him. No.
Gizmo:He's laughing at
Bam Bam:I'm just
Chef Ricky:saying. He doesn't know how much milk costs.
Lizard Obaiy:Correct. Yeah.
Bam Bam:That's true.
Gizmo:He's never been to a he's never been to a grocery store.
Rooster:Nor do
Bam Bam:I wanna
Senator:know. He's like, how
Rooster:do you get oil out of avocados?
Bam Bam:Do you squeeze it?
Lizard Obaiy:Next, we're gonna teach you about olive oil. We tried it at Senator's house. He enjoyed it. Chef gave his thumbs up of approval, so we were ready to go.
Gizmo:By the way, can I just pause you
Lizard Obaiy:there? Yeah.
Gizmo:If I were to to point out two harsher critics in my life around food, I don't think I could find two harsher critics than these two.
Bam Bam:That's correct.
Gizmo:So the fact that you got, like, Roger and Ebert, like, two thumbs up, that's honestly, it's impressive. It's honestly impressive.
Lizard Obaiy:I appreciate it. And Lizard Henrico said that we would get the sides for Market Basket, which there was some discussion around that. The birthday boy didn't want mac and cheese, and Lizards Henrito said, absolutely not. We should get mac and cheese. Which then
Senator:For the record, the problem is most mac and cheese sucks. That's true. Few places make great mac and cheese, and so that was my skepticism. I don't wanna have mac and cheese for mac and cheese's sake at my birthday party if people are gonna eat it and say, well, that was pretty mediocre or shitty.
Gizmo:Agreed.
Senator:But to Lizard Henrico's credit, at this place, their mac and cheese is actually very good.
Lizard Obaiy:It was very good. Even Lizard j was telling me skeptic. Yeah. Oh, yeah. I won't repeat exactly what he said.
Lizard Obaiy:Yeah. Don't worry.
Gizmo:He said We can't say that here.
Lizard Obaiy:He said he said, listen. That mac and cheese is gonna suck. Nobody wants to eat that crap. And then even he, during the birthday party, looked at me and said, that mac and cheese is very good.
Gizmo:Yeah. Shout out to Market Basket. That's a place around here. Kind of a, I would say, specialist grocery store. They prepare food.
Rooster:They do a
Gizmo:lot of catering. Lot of catering.
Rooster:They have, like, 57 catering trucks.
Gizmo:Yeah. They do
Chef Ricky:a lot
Gizmo:of work. Yeah.
Lizard Obaiy:So I showed up to Senator's house a couple hours before the party started just to get the steaks in the oven. And Quick question.
Senator:Yeah. Of set the scene for everyone visually. Just imagine, like, 20 pounds of prime New York strip.
Gizmo:Where'd you get it from? I just
Senator:wanna point that out. Yeah. Please. Costco. Costco.
Rooster:Thank you.
Gizmo:Wow. Share price just went up.
Lizard Obaiy:That's correct. Rooster's happy.
Senator:So just imagine this on like sheet pans with those wire racks, and I've got double ovens in my kitchen. So he's got them at low temperature in each oven coming to the right internal temperature.
Lizard Obaiy:Yeah.
Gizmo:Like, what? Two hundred? Two fifty?
Lizard Obaiy:The oven was at two twenty five, and we're aiming for one twenty five on the steaks. Yeah. Steaks are in the oven. Senator's running around. He's verbalizing everything that he needs to get.
Chef Ricky:Obi, can you walk us through the preparation of the steak prior to hitting the oven? Was there a dry curing process?
Lizard Obaiy:So the day before, heavily salted the steaks on all sides with kosher salt. Honestly, like, if you wanna get technical about it, it's 2% salt, like, of the weight. I don't do any of that. I just eyeball it. Don't really need to weigh it out.
Chef Ricky:Especially when they're that
Lizard Obaiy:thick. When they're that thick, it's very hard to over over season them. So just salt. Senator specifically requested salt and pepper on the steaks. I just salted them.
Lizard Obaiy:Pepper was on the side for anybody who wanted. My personal rub for a steak like that is a bit of a coffee rub, but for Senator's birthday, I Yeah. Not a coffee guy. Did not argue.
Senator:Lizard Henricho and I had very strong reactions to that part. Yeah. We're purist when it comes to beef.
Gizmo:I get it.
Lizard Obaiy:They'll be converted eventually. But regardless of that. By
Senator:the way, that means he's cooking in in next month.
Chef Ricky:Yes. Correct.
Senator:We're gonna do part two.
Lizard Obaiy:Beautiful. Excellent. So Senator is verbalizing everything that needs to get done, and he's doing it. He's talking himself through what needs to get done. And
Bam Bam:That must have been fun.
Gizmo:Senator, this is Senator. Correct.
Senator:Justice. In
Lizard Obaiy:order to accommodate all the guests, I asked Rooster, who doesn't eat meat, what he wanted. And we don't need
Gizmo:to go through this.
Rooster:We said The most important part.
Lizard Obaiy:It was the most important part because Senator is running through his list, and then I remember, holy shit. I forgot the the Soyball. The soyball. I forgot the Beyond Meat. So I had to quickly order more Beyond steak and then anyways, so
Rooster:Actually, he called me a couple of days before, and he said, we're gonna get the Beyond Meat fillet. It's a fairly new product, kinda hard to find. Yeah. So I actually drove down to Wegmans to get it, I I assume. And he actually called me up.
Rooster:He goes, you know, maybe we should cook that before everybody else's steak because, you know, MSW
Bam Bam:wanna see it.
Rooster:It was very night it was very nice when he's a
Gizmo:little older, early bird special. Right.
Lizard Obaiy:We try to be considerate at Senator's house.
Rooster:Thank you.
Lizard Obaiy:Appreciate that.
Gizmo:Can you do
Bam Bam:me a favor? Yes. Can you say, oh, boy?
Senator:Oh, boy.
Chef Ricky:It sounds like, oh, boy.
Bam Bam:Actually, that's very good.
Lizard Obaiy:I've been listening to the pod
Gizmo:a lot.
Lizard Obaiy:Anyway, so senator is tasked me with finding 40 potato chips that are
Gizmo:Of the proper size.
Lizard Obaiy:The proper size and proper shape and
Rooster:Pringles.
Lizard Obaiy:Pringles, precisely. Jesus.
Chef Ricky:Fucking Michelin star dinner over there.
Lizard Obaiy:And so I start setting these chips up, and I realize I need to pray. So I go into his family room to pray, and all of a sudden, Senator is downstairs I was outside on the patio. Outside on
Gizmo:his patio.
Chef Ricky:Senator's like, what the fuck are you doing?
Senator:Come on. We gotta
Chef Ricky:go. Let's go.
Senator:I run a tight ship here.
Lizard Obaiy:Here we go. And You got time
Chef Ricky:to lean?
Lizard Obaiy:You got time
Chef Ricky:to clean,
Senator:baby. That's
Lizard Obaiy:What is it? Bistro hoodie in here? And so so Josh comes walking in. I hear the door open, and my thought is, oh my god. There's an intruder in the house.
Lizard Obaiy:But I'm praying. So Well,
Bam Bam:he kind of looks like an intruder.
Lizard Obaiy:But I can't see him. So because I'm facing I'm facing away from the door. And then I just hear him out loud say, God damn it, how do I get outside? And so he I hear him rustling around trying to figure out how to get outside. He finds Senator.
Lizard Obaiy:And so Senator comes back up, and Josh hands him a cocktail. And so this is the first drink I see Senator have a sip of. He has one sip, and then we put the creme fraiche on the potato chips. And then I know that Senator's very particular, and, also, I didn't buy the caviar. So I tell him, I'm gonna let you put the caviar on because I don't wanna mess this up.
Lizard Obaiy:And he's like, no. No. You're fine. Just watch me. So he puts on a dollop of caviar onto the chips, and then I quadruple that amount for every single chip.
Lizard Obaiy:And so by the time I'm I'm done with Smart man.
Bam Bam:Thank you.
Lizard Obaiy:So so senator looks over at me and he goes, oh, you want ham?
Chef Ricky:That explains why I didn't get any.
Lizard Obaiy:So we quickly finish this. And at this point in time, guests are arriving, and they're already receiving their drinks downstairs. Senator and I come out with the caviar. And as we come out, senator is still on his first drink. We put the caviar down.
Lizard Obaiy:Somewhere between when we put the caviar down and five minutes that I had turned my head away, Senator may have had three more drinks. I On Yes. On top of the one that I saw in his hand.
Gizmo:Yes. I was gonna say one sounded a little light because when I first saw him
Lizard Obaiy:Yes.
Gizmo:The first moment I saw him
Lizard Obaiy:Yes.
Gizmo:It seemed like four.
Lizard Obaiy:And I'm telling you, he was Did he stop
Senator:reciting record, his For I was over served. Did
Bam Bam:he stop reciting his tasks to himself?
Lizard Obaiy:Well, no. Not at that point. No. No. I mean, this is the point in time we were done.
Lizard Obaiy:Everything was set.
Senator:My work was mostly
Rooster:done at that point. Okay.
Lizard Obaiy:His work was the remarkable thing, though, is that he remembered important key tasks even in his drunken stupor later in the night. So so I look back at Senator about five minutes later, and I'm like, oh, shit. He's drunk. Like, he's not I I don't know what the hell happened. I'm I'm very confused.
Lizard Obaiy:So the night starts flowing. People are drinking. People are coming in. It's it's a good time.
Senator:The problem also, right, like, before you got to my house Yeah. I went for a long run, so I was super dehydrated. Also what
Bam Bam:that is. Combo.
Gizmo:Big dog.
Senator:So I was like, I'm gonna eat, like, terribly today. Like, I'm gonna, like, run a little more. Like, I'm gonna feel better for it in the morning, but the timing of it, it was too close to when I was gonna start drinking.
Bam Bam:Rehydrating with alcohol. Correct.
Lizard Obaiy:So one thing that I think is important to set the scene, at least from my perspective, is I've known the lizards for under a year at this point. It has not been a full year.
Gizmo:Is that true?
Lizard Obaiy:Yeah. It's not been a year.
Gizmo:You said it was two years, I believe you.
Lizard Obaiy:It's not been a full year yet. So I've seen Senator Tipsy, maybe a little drunk, but I've never seen him wasted. I've never seen him really drunk before. And so I've seen other members of
Senator:Which also for the record, this was like a topic of conversation at the lounge, like, in the weeks leading up to this. A bunch of the guys are like, I've never really seen Senator. Like, he's always drinking like everybody else, but I've never really seen him, like, drunk or anything like that. So in my head, I was like, this is at my home. I don't have to drive.
Senator:I don't have to worry about anything else. I'm like, if there's one day I'm just gonna let it loose, it's gonna be that night.
Chef Ricky:Oh, you did.
Gizmo:Mission accomplished.
Senator:I just sat there and said, what would Gizmo do? Hey.
Bam Bam:And he did.
Chef Ricky:Oh, Gizmo Gizmo was keeping pace. Oh, he was.
Gizmo:That's why Obay's here. Yeah.
Lizard Obaiy:And and to be honest, that was little I didn't really see Giz wasted because he was sitting in a chair for most of the night. So I didn't notice up until a story which we'll tell a
Senator:little And with the servers, you never even had to leave the seat.
Gizmo:Yeah. Just kept coming out for most of the That's correct.
Senator:The problem was I had to keep walking around making sure everything was happening like him. So you saw I was drunk.
Lizard Obaiy:Yeah. Exactly. So in the five minutes that I left Senator at the bar, I walked over to this section of his backyard that are Adirondack chairs, and Giz was sitting there with Pumba. And Pumba was wasted before he showed up, definitely. Like it was
Rooster:Pumba. Pumba is
Bam Bam:I like Pumba better.
Gizmo:Not Takota Pumba. Pumba. Pumba.
Bam Bam:No. No.
Chef Ricky:Pumba. Like
Senator:grand Pumba.
Chef Ricky:Say what
Bam Bam:it be. It's better.
Rooster:Pumba's good.
Lizard Obaiy:Hakuna matata. Hakuna matata. Pooba was wasted already and very loud and funny.
Bam Bam:Oh, yeah.
Lizard Obaiy:And Giz was not drunk yet because he was looking at him with judgment judgmental eyes. How the table's dirty? And Bam was sitting on one side of the Adirondack chairs for half the night, and the other half of the night was the other side of the chairs. He did not I think he stood up once.
Bam Bam:Champagne was spilled on me.
Lizard Obaiy:Multiple times.
Senator:I wonder who that was.
Gizmo:Bam rises in the East and sets in
Lizard Obaiy:the West.
Bam Bam:That's correct.
Lizard Obaiy:So mind you, Senator's wasted not wasted wasted, but drunk. Eddie pulls out the saber to saber some champagne.
Gizmo:That was a little scary.
Lizard Obaiy:And he sabers the first bottle. Everybody gets some. Perfect. Clean break.
Gizmo:Yes. It was nice.
Senator:Every single bottle, even at 2AM when I was still sabering.
Lizard Obaiy:That is true. Right. So Senator's having a great time, which is all that this night is supposed to be about, him having a great time. And so I come over to him at one point in time, and we had agreed that around 08:00, I'd start firing up the grill. And I ask him, do you want me to light up the grill?
Lizard Obaiy:No response. And so I leave him alone for a few minutes, and then I come back to him a little bit later. And I'm like, should we
Senator:That, by the way, was actually conscious and intentional because I was looking around to just see kind of the vibe. And praying. Know because prior to you asking me that, like, I wasn't focused. Like, I was like, what needs to happen here? And then when you said it, I just wanted to see where people were.
Lizard Obaiy:Gotcha. Gotcha.
Chef Ricky:No. No. Senator was like, motherfucker, we already said 08:00 like the girl. What are you asking? Who are you again?
Senator:Are we praying again? What are we doing here?
Lizard Obaiy:So when I asked him the second time, he he looks at his watch, and he says, oh, yes. Yes. So it lights up the grill. We start throwing the steaks on, at which point in time every male on the planet decided to migrate towards the grill to see, oh, fire. What's happening?
Lizard Obaiy:So that's the point That's how we're programmed,
Bam Bam:though.
Gizmo:Don't be judged by.
Lizard Obaiy:I'm not being judged by. I say every man. That's It's what we do. Questions left and right.
Senator:To me, he was like, these guys keep breathing down my fucking neck the whole time.
Gizmo:I'm trying to cook.
Lizard Obaiy:Steaks go on. Well, first, Beyond Meat goes on.
Gizmo:What a waste of cash.
Rooster:Perfect. Perfectly cooked.
Lizard Obaiy:Perfectly cooked. By the way, the instructions on that thing are crazy. It's like
Chef Ricky:Perfectly warmed. There's no cooking involved.
Senator:That was a true, like, meatless cooking process because his stuff went on before the steaks, and I completely cleaned that grill. Yeah. So that was No contamination? No contamination at Thank you.
Bam Bam:So did anyone else try that?
Rooster:I don't
Bam Bam:think rooster?
Lizard Obaiy:I don't know. Interesting. There were just two. They're two small pieces.
Bam Bam:Was it good?
Rooster:Yeah. It was pretty good. Internal temperature, one sixty five.
Bam Bam:Five. Do you get any notes of like soy or something?
Senator:Rubber, leather.
Lizard Obaiy:One thing you need to know about how meticulous Senator is is that next to the grill, there was an ashtray and a lighter
Gizmo:for me.
Lizard Obaiy:For me. Wow. And I turned to him at one point
Gizmo:of That's hospitality. 100.
Lizard Obaiy:I turned to him, and I thanked him, and he thought I was making fun of him. And I was like, no. No. Genuinely thank you. This is the greatest this is this is next level planning.
Chef Ricky:I can't tell you how many girls I've banned at people's homes.
Gizmo:Yeah.
Chef Ricky:And it's like you're you're a worker. Exactly. Hey. Can I get a drink? Can I get a fucking ass treat?
Chef Ricky:You know? So that's that's
Senator:key, man. The only thing that was funny is, like, since nobody got there early when the servers arrived, like, he was in my kitchen helping me prep some shrimp. And so one of the servers at one point says to me, she goes, is he your
Lizard Obaiy:cook? Yes. When he told me that
Senator:just tonight.
Lizard Obaiy:When he told me that later, told him, you should have said yes. I would have played it up the whole way. Oh, yeah.
Gizmo:Of course.
Lizard Obaiy:Sure, Senator.
Gizmo:Can you
Lizard Obaiy:give me anything else? The other the other nice thing was that when we came downstairs with the caviar, Senator sent over one of the servers with a mocktail for me. And she came straight to me, handed it to me. She said, this is for you.
Gizmo:Nice.
Lizard Obaiy:I say, even in his drunken stupor, he takes care of
Rooster:his voice.
Lizard Obaiy:Love it. So when I really noticed Senator was
Gizmo:A little tuned up.
Lizard Obaiy:A little tuned up, I obviously, there's no video, so I can't act out every part of it. But he was his eyes were closed, and the the the bartender needed more ice. And so Senator was trying to describe to me where in his home I I need to go to to receive to get the ice. So his eyes are closed, and he's looking at me. Looking at my direction, he's like,
Gizmo:so. He was pretending he was on the podcast, describing it for the listener.
Lizard Obaiy:But I could tell he closed his eyes because he really needed to focus on where where
Senator:Try to visualize how to explain. Because it's not an obvious door. And as you map. Saw Yeah. So he because he's down in my basement.
Lizard Obaiy:Yeah. He looks at me, he's his garage is right next to the patio, and he says, you're gonna go to the garage. And mind you, the bartender's standing right there, and he is hopped up. He's jumping up and down, maybe five cans of Monster or something like that. He wants to move.
Lizard Obaiy:And and I'm standing sitting there trying to be patient so that Senator can get through his full thought process. You're gonna go to the garage. And then there are long pauses between every word and every thought. The garage is gonna open, and then there's a door. There's only one door.
Lizard Obaiy:This Mhmm. Go through the door right immediately. Immediately right. When you go in, right. Immediately.
Gizmo:This sounds like you, by
Lizard Obaiy:the way. It's brilliant. And then there's another door. Make a right there too. And then the freezer is on the left side.
Chef Ricky:It has a door.
Lizard Obaiy:You want to open it.
Gizmo:Open the door.
Lizard Obaiy:It's a chest freezer. There should be enough ice. So I said, okay. So he's on his phone. So I thought, you know, he's Senator.
Lizard Obaiy:He could open his garage from his phone. So Josh and I are standing at the garage.
Senator:The funny part is one of my garages does open on my phone, but I was in another state where I didn't realize that the garage I needed to open was not the one that opens up my phone.
Lizard Obaiy:And I'm I'm standing at the garage, and I turn and I'm looking at him, and he's furiously scrolling on his phone. So I said, man, this app's gotta be very deep. So he is looking. He's look and Josh looks at me. He goes, do you know the garage code?
Lizard Obaiy:I go back towards Senator. I'm like, the garage? And he he says, okay. Okay. He starts walking sideways.
Lizard Obaiy:I'm straight in front of him. He is walking sideways, and I'm I'm, oh, We're screwed here. And then he gathers By
Gizmo:the way, this is 08:00.
Lizard Obaiy:It's 08:00.
Gizmo:We have an evening. Yes.
Chef Ricky:No. No. No.
Senator:This is like 10:00.
Lizard Obaiy:No. No.
Gizmo:This is
Lizard Obaiy:this is around 09:30 time.
Gizmo:Oh, this is after
Bam Bam:we eat.
Rooster:It's like 10:00.
Gizmo:I'm sorry. Okay. So
Lizard Obaiy:this is the first like, because I knew that he had but this is
Gizmo:the first time I witnessed a real indication.
Lizard Obaiy:Really how messed up he was. He is walking sideways. He's pausing. Then he beelines for the code. He puts the code in, and then we check the rig camera the next day.
Lizard Obaiy:The funniest part is he walks sideways to to the keypad, but then on the way back from the keypad, perfect straight line.
Senator:Perfect straight line. Like, someone, like, just came or was like, someone's there. You see me, like, high five. Like, it was like I was perfectly sober. I just had, like, these moments of, like Lateral movement.
Senator:Exactly.
Lizard Obaiy:Lateral movement. Exactly. Perfectly described. We retrieve the ice for Josh, come back, close the garage. And, senator, every what we started to witness were that there were a lot of cigars that were cut, briefly lit, and just left all over the place.
Lizard Obaiy:So first How many cigars did
Gizmo:you have that night? The I mean, just the first third.
Senator:So the the the one cigar I finished in its entirety was my first cigar, which was a Partagas d four. That I smoked. Then I lit the Monte Cristo, like, doble diamante at, like,
Rooster:$150 one
Gizmo:in a minute.
Senator:That Monte Cristo put out this year, and that was a lot
Rooster:that cigar on a I think it was on the broccoli rabe tray.
Senator:Yes. Yes. I guess it was.
Rooster:Because I look over, I'm like, all of you guys were smoking that cigar. Well, like, four of you guys was and you all lit it about the same time. Mhmm. But senator is already on his third cigar. He's smoking an aging room concerto.
Bam Bam:He rallied hold on. He rallied the four of us to light that sundae. Yeah.
Gizmo:At the same time. Yeah.
Lizard Obaiy:Because And
Senator:then a mysterious left hand cigar.
Bam Bam:Three minutes
Gizmo:later. So for the listener, let let me just remind everybody that we got that so that's the $150 Monte Cristo Doble Diamante that we got at PCA, at the Monte Cristo event. We all saved that cigar, didn't know when we were gonna smoke it. And I think a week or so prior, Senator said, Hey, let's smoke that cigar at my party. So we all brought So it's Bam, Pagoda, Senator and I all had that cigar, all brought that to the party to smoke.
Gizmo:So that's I had some of that. I know.
Chef Ricky:We're going
Lizard Obaiy:to talk about that. We'll get to that.
Chef Ricky:So Obi, you're saying the Senator was seeing cigars all night?
Lizard Obaiy:What?
Gizmo:Cigar Faganado.
Chef Ricky:Smoking only the first third.
Gizmo:Not even the first Very apropos, by way, for this cigar.
Lizard Obaiy:By the way, not even first third. We're talking about the first quarter inch and that it was put that. So first, there was a Bon Roberts next to the grill. Mhmm. And I I looked at I
Chef Ricky:remember that one.
Lizard Obaiy:I looked at Senator, and I said, hey. Did you like this? And and one thing about Senator is that, you know, usually, he's quite defiant, but in in his drunken state, he is 10 times more defiant. So he looked at me, he said, no. No.
Lizard Obaiy:I didn't like that. And I said I said, okay. And then I found another cigar cigar. So I asked him, he said, senator, do you like this one? He was like, he's like, no.
Lizard Obaiy:I'm smoking this one. There was nothing in his hand. So
Gizmo:oh, this is great. By the way, let me just say, it's very rare on this podcast that you get roasted. I'm loving this. I I'd be in
Lizard Obaiy:a good sport. I knew he was gonna be here. Just for context, though, Senator and I, the next night, we sat down and I ran him through everything that
Gizmo:A little debrief.
Chef Ricky:A little debrief.
Senator:And I pulled my, like, camera footage to, like, replay and live it. It was great.
Gizmo:So, boys, let's pause right there. We have come to the end of the second third on the Cuesta-Rey, Centrofino Sungrown Pyramid Number Nine paired with his Blanton's. And lucky for you, Lizard Obi, you're not smoking this cigar right now.
Bam Bam:But you're gonna get one.
Gizmo:You can have it's right there. I put
Bam Bam:it for him.
Lizard Obaiy:I'm so excited.
Gizmo:What's everybody thinking of the cigar right now?
Chef Ricky:I'm thankful for Lizard O'Brien in the
Gizmo:room. Correct. Thank God for this story because this is definitely uplifting.
Senator:Mean, I'll say one positive thing. The nuttiness that was described has entered in the second third of the cigar for sure.
Chef Ricky:That is true.
Gizmo:I'm getting a little saltiness too, which is good.
Chef Ricky:I just wasn't sure if it was coming from the Blanton's or the cigar at
Gizmo:this point. I think it's the cigar because honestly I've been
Chef Ricky:You've been awful. Yeah,
Bam Bam:no nuttiness for me. It's a little salt and just a little unusual acidity that's continuing for me.
Rooster:Yeah, that dark fruit is gone, the saltiness is there. I'm not getting quite that nuttiness either.
Bam Bam:I wish I would.
Gizmo:I don't think I'm getting a nuttiness.
Chef Ricky:I'm getting a sweet nuttiness.
Gizmo:I wish I don't have that.
Chef Ricky:Especially on the retro.
Bam Bam:Yeah, I'm not even retro on this thing.
Chef Ricky:I try to do a slow retro because that's when I could really almost get rid of the acid. It's a bit punishing.
Gizmo:Yeah. Yeah, is not a top 25 cigar. No. At any level, at any publication, this is just not this is not great.
Chef Ricky:Not even the first quarter inch.
Gizmo:I mean So, I was really hoping for something because it was praised. Obviously, it's a low budget cigar. It's under $10 at most retail. I don't even I can't comprehend what happened here. But when you ended up on
Rooster:the pedestal. When we picked this cigar, the perfume that was coming off of the wrapper.
Bam Bam:Yeah, it was great.
Rooster:It looked promising. I was like, wow, this could be good.
Bam Bam:And the aroma actually is still pretty good. Yeah. But beyond that, it's an awful cigar.
Gizmo:Very unpleasant. Yeah. Great. Alright. Back to the party.
Gizmo:Alright.
Lizard Obaiy:I don't
Senator:know why I
Gizmo:said What professionals? Lizard, Obey.
Lizard Obaiy:You guys are the best. So senator lit multiple cigars, didn't smoke any of them. And then the biggest problem is that he lit the the Monte Cristo.
Gizmo:Double idea Monte.
Lizard Obaiy:And Rooster ended up finding it and giving it to him.
Senator:Yes. It was At that point, it was half smoked when Rooster handed it to me.
Gizmo:That's not true.
Senator:I I have photographic evidence of me holding my birthday cake completely sideways Yes. Somehow defying gravity. And if you look at it in my mouth, half that cigar is smoked at that point. So I didn't take two puffs of it. I I smoked more than half
Chef Ricky:of The server almost dived to catch to
Rooster:catch the cake
Gizmo:because she goes, you're gonna go.
Lizard Obaiy:Yeah. That was its own saga. I I I I sent her to go get the cake and the candles, and I told her, when you come out, I'll I'll have my lighter ran up to you so that you can light the candles. You come down with the lit cake. That all happens flawlessly.
Lizard Obaiy:As she comes down, we start singing happy birthday to Senator. And then for whatever reason, she hands him the cake.
Gizmo:That was not a good move.
Lizard Obaiy:It was not a good move.
Senator:Which, for the record, even in the video that I saw this, I'm confused why I have the cake. Like, I'm I'm you see me going like, why am I why are giving this
Bam Bam:to me? Yeah. That should not have happened.
Lizard Obaiy:But we did get an amazing picture of cigar in mouth, fist bumping in the air, at the cake sideways. Yes.
Gizmo:Defying gravity. Honestly, senator, from the photo, how close was the cake
Senator:to being lost? I mean, it's literally defying gravity in the photo. I have no idea how it didn't fall.
Lizard Obaiy:It is at a 45 degree angle. It made no sense how it stand.
Gizmo:Did you did was the cut was the cake cut and handed out? I don't even remember tasting it.
Lizard Obaiy:Yes. And you
Rooster:ate it?
Gizmo:Did I
Lizard Obaiy:like it? I don't remember. Okay. Was I
Gizmo:liked it. Was actually
Bam Bam:It was delicious.
Chef Ricky:I don't remember it. Yeah. Which Well, let's
Lizard Obaiy:Giz, as Rooster and I are about to tell you, it didn't matter what you said about the flavor of that. You you could not be your palate could not be trusted at that point point in time. So Lizard and Head.
Senator:I love this. Now Giz is about to get roasted. Keep going.
Lizard Obaiy:Lizard and Henri- are sitting on on a couch separate from the Adirondack chairs that, bam, Rooster and Giz are sitting at. And so Lizard and Henri- looks at me, and he goes, the weirdest thing just happened. I said, what happened? He said, Giz handed me the Monte Cristo and told me to try it. He said which is very weird for him, and it's very weird for me.
Lizard Obaiy:But I thought, screw it. And I took a puff, and I said, wow. That's excellent. And I gave it back to him.
Senator:Oh, he was perfectly sober, rooster. So I
Rooster:don't remember any of
Gizmo:this.
Lizard Obaiy:So then he says a few minutes later, you're describing the cigar to him. And he said, yeah, gives you you gave me the cigar. I I tried it, and you vehemently denied ever happening. And he said, what are you talking about? I literally took it from you.
Lizard Obaiy:You offered it to me, and you said, I would never do that. I would never offer somebody my cigar. So then
Bam Bam:you were passing your cigars around.
Gizmo:That might I don't I don't know. I had to try your cigar. By the way, Bam, that's called Brotherhood.
Bam Bam:I liked it too.
Lizard Obaiy:Yeah. Mhmm. Rooster, would you like to take it from here?
Rooster:I go, hey. I think you're doing a
Gizmo:good job.
Lizard Obaiy:So So maybe ten minutes passes, and Rooster comes over to Lizards, Henrico, and I, and he says, so I asked Giz to try
Rooster:No. No. No. Go back a minute. Gizmo was very he said you he insisted.
Rooster:He said, you have to try this cigar. Yes.
Senator:I said, you He would never do that.
Rooster:You pass this to Henry first, then bam, tried it. Then you tried it again, and now you want me to try it. It's like, no, you have to try it. I'm like, wow, he's so pushy. I have to do it.
Rooster:I had not had that cigar before. I said, Okay, it's $150 cigar. I mean, how many times you get an opportunity to try that cigar?
Bam Bam:Yeah. Well, you?
Rooster:So he gave me that cigar. And it was past the halfway point, I think, at that. And I had it in my hand. And I was like, wow, this is actually pretty good. I don't know if it's worth the $150 that they want for the cigar, but it's good.
Rooster:It's a good cigar. So at that point, I had an Exclusivo, which was it was probably in the last third. So I say, you know what, I kind of like this Monte Cristo Doble Dia Monte. I'm gonna keep this. I'm gonna give Guiz the Yes.
Rooster:Just return the flavor. So maybe he's never had the exclusive. Return return
Gizmo:the flavor. Return the flavor. Right?
Rooster:Return the so he held it in his hand. And from that point on, he had no idea what he was smoking. And we kept asking, Giz, how's that cigar? It's good. It's good, but it's not a $150 worth.
Senator:And he kept
Chef Ricky:on saying, am
Gizmo:I wrong?
Bam Bam:I mean enjoying yourself.
Rooster:He was enjoying that cigar, I was enjoying the cigar that he gave me.
Gizmo:Let me just say, the last thing I remember of the evening Yes. Was That was at 8PM. That's a lie. That's a lie. It was about eleven, 10:30.
Gizmo:I remember getting the cigar back from Rooster. And in my stupidity, I remember it feeling like the head of the cigar was very wet. And I remember looking at him going, What did you do to the cigar? And I remember wiping it off on my shirt. After I told him to tell.
Rooster:After I
Gizmo:told to tell.
Rooster:I did that. Before that, you never mentioned it. You didn't even mention it once.
Gizmo:I don't remember that. It's true. I don't remember that. That's why you're here. I don't trust him, but I trust you.
Gizmo:The truth.
Rooster:But after I told you that you're smoking an exclusive, you completely turned. You were like, you.
Gizmo:How could you do that to me? I feel the same way right now. How could you? You took advantage
Chef Ricky:of no clue.
Gizmo:You took advantage of The best
Senator:part that I heard was, like, when you were down to the very end of it.
Lizard Obaiy:Need to understand Gizmo was over about He would forget things that happened twenty seconds before. So at one point in time, he was making fun of bam.
Rooster:Gizmo got loud. Yes. He got very loud.
Gizmo:You're out
Senator:of here. You're out
Gizmo:of here.
Lizard Obaiy:Gizmo, have you seen that video yet?
Rooster:Yeah. And I remember Pooba saying, Gizmo, you're like a gremlin. You just got like water got put on and you're completely changed. Do you remember that? No.
Lizard Obaiy:So Giz at one point in time is making fun of Bam, and Lizards and Henrico and I look at Giz and say, hey. Nobody makes fun of Bam. And then he quickly says, I've never made fun of Bam.
Bam Bam:Oh, yeah?
Gizmo:What was I've never made fun of you.
Chef Ricky:What was I saying?
Bam Bam:Yeah.
Lizard Obaiy:Choose of any list any one of your top 10 lists of things you say to Bam. I love you, Bam.
Bam Bam:I don't remember.
Gizmo:I would never do that.
Lizard Obaiy:Alright. Rooster comes over to tell Henrico and I about what just happened. So we're laughing very hard, and we walk over. And that's at which point in time you put out the exclusive. So I look at you and I say, Giz, I have to let you know something.
Lizard Obaiy:The pod is dead. All credibility is lost officially. Yeah. But 250 episodes is an amazing run, which is actually what you said to me. You said 250 episodes isn't bad.
Lizard Obaiy:I
Gizmo:mean, it's true.
Rooster:I mean, I kinda felt a little bit of a redemption from the xeno day.
Gizmo:But you were sober when that happened. That was nice to take advantage. You took advantage. He did. Bam?
Gizmo:Correct.
Lizard Obaiy:Some other highlights. Pagoda, multiple times, would have a drink in his hand, smoking a cigar, look at me, biggest smile you've ever seen and say, I'm fucked up.
Gizmo:By the way, Pagoda is so fun, man. He's the best. He's the best, man. I wish he was here tonight,
Bam Bam:but Yeah.
Lizard Obaiy:Yeah. Pagoda's the best. The other thing is that in my head, this party was not gonna last past 2AM. Everybody's gonna be too wasted. We're gonna be it is 2AM.
Lizard Obaiy:The bartender, gone. Long gone.
Gizmo:Yeah. So he left at 11:30. I remember that.
Lizard Obaiy:Yeah. 11:30 midnight. Yeah. Servers, long gone. There have been somebody, Lizard Johnny, entered the scene around 01:30 in the morning when
Rooster:Yeah, baby. Yeah.
Lizard Obaiy:When when he enters, Senator sees him, and I'm not exaggerating. He runs to the fridge to grab Paul Roger, runs to the saber box, which at this point in time
Gizmo:Oh gosh.
Lizard Obaiy:Senator's childhood friends are afraid because he's saber in hand, walking sideways, but pinpoint accuracy. He grabs he grabs it, runs to the side of the patio, and says, Johnny, Johnny, look. And sabers another bottle of Paul Roger.
Gizmo:I'm shocked you didn't hurt yourself.
Senator:I'm a professional, giz.
Lizard Obaiy:This this is the point in time where I took the saber out of his hands. I said, hey. Let me take care of that for you. I took the saber. I put it in the box.
Lizard Obaiy:I pushed the box back a little bit so hopefully you can find it. And so from from this point on, there's no bartender. There's no servers. And Pagoda asked for a mixed drink. He wants a
Gizmo:man a Manhattan Yeah.
Senator:A cocktail.
Lizard Obaiy:He wants a cocktail. So senator says, one second. And he goes running up the stairs to grab a shaker.
Rooster:Bidders and shaker.
Lizard Obaiy:Yes. Bitters and shaker.
Chef Ricky:And when senator is tuned, he skips, like, four steps. You see, he takes the step of a gazelle.
Senator:This man
Gizmo:Well, that's all that working out that he's doing before the party. He's stretching out
Chef Ricky:He does it going up and coming down backwards.
Senator:It's like that.
Gizmo:He came down backwards?
Bam Bam:It's like ballet.
Rooster:Oh my goodness. Point where you were on your phone, and it almost felt like you were looking at the recipe for something. I don't know if it was somebody asked for a paper plate. Like in the middle of making a drink, right after you brought the bitters or maybe before you went and got the shaker, then you got the bitters. But then at one point, right before you made the drink, you were looking at your phone and you were searching for something.
Senator:I think there was one ingredient that I was missing and couldn't find, and I was trying to figure out a substitute. But then I said, I'm just gonna make Manhattans because I had everything there to make a Manhattan, so that's the route I went.
Lizard Obaiy:So I'm watching Senator make the Manhattan. He shakes it up very violently. And then
Gizmo:He is a violent person. Very violent.
Lizard Obaiy:So he pours out a little bit into a plastic cup, takes a sip, and the look of absolute confidence on his face, he was like, yeah. Yeah. I know what I'm doing.
Senator:I was like, obey with the steaks.
Gizmo:Yeah.
Lizard Obaiy:Precisely. But 12 drinks in. So he he pours out the drink.
Bam Bam:He made us all in hands at
Lizard Obaiy:that point.
Bam Bam:This is like 2AM.
Gizmo:I left at, like, 01:15, I think.
Bam Bam:Yeah. Were
Senator:at You had to make a return to Lowe's. Do and do payroll.
Rooster:And do payroll. You left about this you left after me then. I left at
Gizmo:one I left at 01:15. I I saw the Uber cause I Ubered home. For all the listeners, I did Uber. Let me let me just say. I left at 01:18 or something.
Bam Bam:Rooster was first man down and then you.
Rooster:Yep. About the same time.
Lizard Obaiy:You first. No.
Rooster:I mean, about the same time.
Lizard Obaiy:Alright. So one thing that happened maybe like an hour before Senator started making drinks was he decided that there was something that he'd forgotten. He needs to run upstairs and get it.
Senator:What was the shrimp?
Bam Bam:I didn't have any shrimp.
Lizard Obaiy:Well, was No.
Senator:No one did.
Lizard Obaiy:There was
Senator:a reason I burned them all.
Gizmo:You really? Yes. Didn't know this.
Lizard Obaiy:So Senator's plan was after I finish the steaks, he's gonna throw the shrimp on.
Senator:Because it's two minutes on each side. It's very fast. The steaks would just rest.
Lizard Obaiy:So steaks finish, obviously, that's the only thing on my mind. So the steaks are done. Everybody's satisfied.
Senator:Everybody's By the way, I blame Obay. He didn't remind me.
Lizard Obaiy:Yeah. Yeah. It it really is my fault at the end of the day.
Gizmo:Correct. Were you drinking again?
Lizard Obaiy:He was So
Rooster:He was praying. He went back.
Gizmo:You're a problem.
Lizard Obaiy:Somebody had to pray for all these people. Correct. Gotta find a way to get these people home safely. So Accurately said.
Rooster:Yeah.
Lizard Obaiy:So senator runs up to get the shrimp. Now as he's running up the stairs, he slips, and he starts falling backwards at which point in time I freeze. He grabs himself, steadies himself, and then continues to running up running up the stairs.
Chef Ricky:Yeah. So he did four steps back, four steps forward.
Lizard Obaiy:So Stayed on my feet.
Gizmo:Yep. Feel like I should hit the pagoda life statement.
Lizard Obaiy:I'm standing, and Giz comes to me, and he says, I've never seen Senator this fucked up before. And that was my thought, but I figured I'd everybody's seen him.
Chef Ricky:That was very rich of Giz. That state he was. I was gonna say, well, I don't remember doing that. And
Lizard Obaiy:then many others came to me and said similar comments, but his childhood friends were nearby. They And looked at me and they're like, you've never seen him like this before? Like like, confused. And I said I said, no. And they're like, we've seen like
Senator:this They know me from my college days. College days. Yeah.
Lizard Obaiy:Senator comes back with the shrimp. Now the shrimp are in two containers. They've been marinating in in the fridge. The grill is still on. It's still very hot.
Lizard Obaiy:Senator opens up the grill, and I tell him softly, senator, do want me to take care of that for you? No. No. No. I got it.
Lizard Obaiy:He dumps both containers straight onto the grill. And now he's very slowly moving each shrimp into a position so that they're not on top of each other. So I again say, Senator, let me take care of that for you. I think they need you over there. No.
Lizard Obaiy:No. I got it. I got it. And so he correctly places all the shrimp all around the grill and closes the lid. And I told myself, okay.
Lizard Obaiy:I am going to watch Senator watch the shrimp so that, you know, people will be able to eat this. Then Lizard Henri To start talking about
Senator:records and Obey failed me a second time.
Lizard Obaiy:Yes. Lizard Henri to start talking to me.
Gizmo:Coming up on a third. We know what that means. He's going on a pip.
Lizard Obaiy:God damn it.
Bam Bam:Sam, we like pips.
Rooster:We like pips.
Lizard Obaiy:Big pip guys. Big pip guys. So I turn away. And about twenty minutes later, I think to myself, oh, shit. I've not seen any shrimps.
Lizard Obaiy:And Senator's still standing at the grill. He's not left to grill.
Rooster:On his fifteenth cigar.
Chef Ricky:He's reverse searing the shrimp at 500
Lizard Obaiy:degrees. So I walk over to him, and he looks at me, and he's like, do you smell that? And I say, did you take the shrimp off? And then he's he he looks at me, eyes wide open, jaw dropped.
Gizmo:Just pan.
Lizard Obaiy:No. No. No. Not panic. Calm.
Lizard Obaiy:But he's looking at me, and then he's like, I never took them off. And then we opened the grill. Now
Rooster:Blackened shrimp.
Lizard Obaiy:On a normal grill, you know, the shrimp would be overcooked. One side of Senator's grill gets to 900 degrees. So there was shrimp charcoal on Yeah. Half of the shrimp. Wow.
Lizard Obaiy:The other half were shrimp jerky. And so I told senator, hey. Don't worry. I got this. I'll take care of this for you.
Lizard Obaiy:So senator leaves. I I take off the the shrimp that is shrimp jerky. Now one of his friends ate, like, half of the shrimp jerky. He was just popping them in one by one, which was remarkable, which credit to you, even your shrimp jerky, I guess, tastes good. Are shaking your head for?
Gizmo:I'm shocked at
Lizard Obaiy:this. He's he's
Senator:hearing all this for the first time in
Gizmo:the is all new to me. This is all new to me.
Lizard Obaiy:We're getting towards the end of the night. Senator has now made maybe six extra cocktails for for the guests who had remained. We're sitting out at the Adirondack chairs, and he looks at me, and he says, Obe, I paid the servers. I don't remember paying them.
Senator:What's crazy is, like, I vividly remember paying the bartender. I have zero recollection whatsoever paying the
Gizmo:two servers.
Chef Ricky:Remember seeing
Rooster:what you have left. No.
Gizmo:But I remember about
Rooster:the truth.
Gizmo:I remember seeing you I walked over.
Rooster:He was on his
Gizmo:QR codes on your phone for Venmo. No. No.
Senator:So I I used Venmo for the bartender. Oh, he used dropped cash for the service.
Gizmo:Got Got it. It.
Bam Bam:He gave him a grand each.
Rooster:Take the leftover shrimp.
Lizard Obaiy:They actually did take leftovers with them. So I tell him, I said, Senator, you almost broke your skull running up the stairs. And he looks at me and goes, I did not fall. I said I said, no. I didn't say that you fell.
Lizard Obaiy:I I said, you almost. And then he looks at and goes, Obey, I did not fall. Stop being so accusatory. I said, yes, Senator.
Gizmo:My bad.
Chef Ricky:That's all that matters.
Senator:Yeah. He forgot twice to remind
Gizmo:me about the strip.
Senator:So how can I believe this guy?
Gizmo:He's almost on a pip. This guy.
Lizard Obaiy:And I was brought in as the expert witness. I was so it is now 02:30 in the morning.
Rooster:So I woke up Who is who's still there?
Lizard Obaiy:It's me, senator, Lizard Henrico. I believe Bam was still
Gizmo:Bam was still there. Johnny.
Lizard Obaiy:Johnny Pagoda. I think that's
Gizmo:Lizard Eric was still there.
Lizard Obaiy:Yeah. Oh, yeah. I'm aware.
Bam Bam:He was there. Oh, he was
Lizard Obaiy:Oh, he was there. So there's a couple couple last touches to this story. So number one, Senator had set down his lighter and cutter next to the grill, next to the ashtray that he had left for me. So at one point in time
Senator:Which was very intentional because I knew I was gonna drink a ton, so I had told myself, I'm gonna leave my cutter and lighter in one place the entire evening so that it's impossible to lose them. Continue.
Lizard Obaiy:So senator loudly says Continue. Loudly says, where is my lighter? Somebody stole my lighter. So I come over to see see
Gizmo:what The
Chef Ricky:whole party got serious at that point.
Lizard Obaiy:The whole party got serious. Lizard Lizard e looked at me and said, he's really mad. Yes, Lizard e. I could tell by his yelling. So so somebody had just gone up to use the bathroom, and they said, I think I saw your lighter on on the island.
Lizard Obaiy:At which point, Senator decided that he needed to run up the stairs
Chef Ricky:Four steps at a time.
Lizard Obaiy:Four steps at a time, retrieve his lighter, come back down, and then he looks at me and he's like, who put my lighter upstairs? I said I said, I don't know. Many people have been to the bathroom. He's he said, but nobody's cooking. So I said, yes.
Lizard Obaiy:Nobody is cooking. He was very adamant that that somebody Moved
Gizmo:his lighter.
Lizard Obaiy:Moved his lighter. He was unaccepted. I was correct.
Gizmo:Someone did move my lighter. We had a little bit of a conspiracy going. Let's move his lighter.
Senator:Let's just No. I'm not saying it with this group, but the bartender was using my lighter the whole
Lizard Obaiy:fucking night
Senator:and not putting it back where I actually had it. Correct. Which caused, like, 10 times in the night. I, like, put my lighter down. I go somewhere.
Senator:I come back.
Gizmo:Light a new cigar.
Senator:This happened, like, 10 fucking times.
Lizard Obaiy:It's it's now about 02:30 in the morning. Senator's on the Adirondack chairs, and Lizard Henry took kinda looks at me and says, we should probably get wrapped up.
Gizmo:Is he napping at this point?
Lizard Obaiy:So he's not quite napping yet, but he looks at me and he says, I need a drink.
Bam Bam:Oh, no. He he took a nap.
Lizard Obaiy:No. It's a I
Senator:saw a photo.
Lizard Obaiy:The This is the This is at the very, very end of the night that he so I start directing people like, let's put these things away. Let's get this set up. Let's throw this out. So I Senator is now we've left Senator on the Adirondack Chairs, which is at which point, he falls asleep. And he has one of those deathbed moments where he is his head is tilted back.
Gizmo:He looks like a civil war soldier.
Lizard Obaiy:He is And I and I go to him and I I say, senator, we put the leftovers in your fridge. And and before I could finish my statement, he goes, correct.
Senator:That's the
Lizard Obaiy:best part of the story.
Gizmo:I love it. That is amazing. That is amazing. I love it.
Lizard Obaiy:I pause because I start laughing. I'm like
Rooster:That's hilarious.
Lizard Obaiy:Like, senator, listen to what I'm saying. Correct.
Gizmo:Hey. God bless the pod. God bless the pod.
Lizard Obaiy:And the committee. Correct. Senator got up in the probably around ten or 11PM to make a speech thanking Lizards, Henrietta, and I for putting it together and thanking all of his friends for coming. And so he made the speech once, and it was very impactful. And then maybe six minutes later
Chef Ricky:He did it again.
Lizard Obaiy:He got up to give the speech again. To give the speech. At which point in time, it was clear Giz was sick of hearing the speech because Giz, at the top of his lungs multiple times, just cut him off the yell. God bless the committee. And at which point in time, senator would pause his speech to turn to Gizzard, say, correct, and then resume his speech.
Lizard Obaiy:Then there was a third time that he got up to give the speech, but he interrupted himself halfway through to go get cigars for everybody, which was very
Gizmo:That was nice.
Lizard Obaiy:Senator was giving out cigars on
Gizmo:his birthday. I don't remember it, but I I two days later, I We have evidence. Where does this magnum 46 come
Bam Bam:from? Yeah.
Rooster:I don't know if he remembers it.
Senator:No. I do. That was all part of the plan. So I brought out two boxes. One was QD Kronos Claros.
Senator:The other was up mid mag 46. And I went around, I had everybody pick a cigar. For the guys in the host committee, they got both of them. That all went according to plan. The fact that I even remembered at that hour That's remarkable.
Senator:That I intended to do that, I was shocked.
Lizard Obaiy:Which those two cigars are two of Lizard Henrico's favorite cigars of all time, so he was over the moon.
Senator:And I told Lizard Oba even before anyone got there, I was like, I have some cigars I want you to have later. And I said, Lizard Henrico is gonna absolutely lose his mind because the Cutie Cronos Clarus
Gizmo:is his favorite cigar of all time period. And he loves the magnum 46.
Lizard Obaiy:He said that's number three. So he
Rooster:was Yeah.
Lizard Obaiy:He was very happy. So now after Senator has said, correct as softly as possible, I then try to wake him up a little bit. We're gonna get going. The leftovers are in the fridge, but I just wanna make sure that he gets inside. And Lizard e was very concerned.
Lizard Obaiy:He said, who's gonna carry Senator up to bed?
Gizmo:And whoever does has to do it like a gazelle skipping four steps.
Chef Ricky:Exactly. And tuck them in.
Lizard Obaiy:And tuck them in. Also read them a bedtime story, pour a glass of milk.
Gizmo:Smoke a cigar for him.
Senator:Pour a glass of porridge. Which
Lizard Obaiy:poor Echo, I mean.
Gizmo:Yeah. Echo the cat. By the way, let's just say, for any listener who's not heard this before, Senator probably has one of the most eccentric, incredible cats I've ever met.
Senator:The most dog like cats
Gizmo:in I his mean, this cat is a dog. This cat might be a human. That's
Bam Bam:how AKA Walter.
Gizmo:Exactly. He is one of the coolest cats I've ever met. Just an awesome, awesome cat. And I I went inside. I remember one point going inside looking for him, and I couldn't find him.
Senator:He was No. I had to court him. He was in his bedroom because
Bam Bam:But he put the dishes away too. He does that.
Gizmo:You know, he should have been looking out for the shrimp. Correct.
Chef Ricky:Yeah. He should have made shrimp.
Senator:The problem is the two things that he will go ape shit over, steak and shrimp. Yeah. If I kept him out, none of you would have eaten at night.
Rooster:He likes surf and turf.
Lizard Obaiy:He does.
Gizmo:But, yeah, that's Listen, I gotta tell you, I'm so glad that you came in tonight because number one, you have the memory of an elephant. And number two, I don't trust anything the other sober guy says about what happened that night because he took advantage of me. Bam?
Rooster:Yeah. I can't believe you don't like an exclusive,
Gizmo:dude. As we learned,
Rooster:that's the most disturbing part of the whole story.
Gizmo:I had like 10 old fascisms at that point. Doesn't matter.
Senator:But that's where the truth comes out. I told all you guys how much I love you that night.
Rooster:The truth came out,
Senator:and you told us how much you hate the ex lesbian.
Gizmo:Oh, man. Well, listen. I have to say, senator, it was, as much as I remember, a phenomenal party. And Obey and Henry, the food component, it was phenomenal. Like, I you guys were taking the steaks off the grill, slicing them out, putting them in a tray.
Gizmo:Like, everybody was just grab it. First off, there was no shortage of steaks. No. Mean So much left over. The quantity was unbelievable.
Gizmo:But two, you were able to choose how much, like, fat you wanted in a slice. You know? It was just so well done. The broccoli rabe was great, the mashed potatoes, mac and cheese. Of course, the, you know, hors d'oeuvres, you know, the
Bam Bam:I had three servings of steak was fantastic.
Gizmo:I couldn't stop. It was so it was so good, dude.
Bam Bam:I also got to watch some porn. What? Somebody was watching porn. What? Yeah.
Bam Bam:They handed me their phone. I was like, okay.
Gizmo:That wasn't anybody in this room, correct? No. Okay.
Bam Bam:I won't say who.
Gizmo:Jesus. It happened. Wow.
Chef Ricky:Wow.
Rooster:No wonder you were quiet.
Chef Ricky:That's why he never got up. You were very quiet.
Bam Bam:Wasn't me, but somebody Seriously
Gizmo:though, what a great night, and thank you for coming in
Rooster:Of course.
Gizmo:To Lejuez Obey.
Bam Bam:Of
Gizmo:course. I mean, it was a phenomenal party. So what is your, you know, kind of a couple days later, what, five, six days later, whatever, what what's kind of your takeaway after all of this now? Actually, I should go back to
Rooster:the morning after. How was was everything cleaned up? I mean, did you have to
Chef Ricky:do a No. There was a
Senator:lot of cleaning up.
Rooster:How many corks did
Senator:you find
Rooster:on the lawn?
Senator:I never actually looked for them, but my landscapers actually came today, so I'm sure they found them.
Bam Bam:Did you have to power wash their patio?
Senator:Oh my god. Yeah. He must this is what happened. So when everyone left, that's when I kinda look around like, wow. This is a war zone here.
Senator:It's bad.
Chef Ricky:I tried to clean up a bit before I left.
Senator:Now I knew I'm like, in my state, like I mean, there's a zillion coupe glasses, just shit everywhere. So I'm like, I'm not gonna attempt to deal with that now. I'm not in good form to do that. But I'm looking at the patio, I'm like, oh my god. I mean, there is spilled champagne everywhere.
Senator:There's cigar ash everywhere. There's mac and cheese smeared into the patio everywhere. It was a disaster. So I, at 3AM, take out the hose, and I'm at least trying to hose down some parts of the patio. So I did that.
Gizmo:This is after everybody left.
Senator:Oh, yeah. After everyone left.
Gizmo:You're outside hosing your patio door.
Senator:I found myself on camera from three to 03:30 in the morning, hosing down the patio shirtless. Shirtless. Shirtless.
Gizmo:I then With his boat shoes on.
Senator:I then ended up in my family room, completely passed out on the couch. I wake up at, like, 9AM because I'm freezing cold. I'm, like, right over this AC vent, and I grab a blanket, pass out. And at noon, I finally woke up the next day. But that next day, my god, it was such a process.
Senator:So, like, it was just multiple rounds of the dishwasher, all the glassware and stuff like that. The countertops were disaster outside, and then the last part was the patio desperately needed to be power washed, and thank god for that thing. I have what's called actually, this may be helpful to some listeners, You know, a regular power washer just using the wand. I mean, you could spend a day power washing because
Gizmo:It's like a toothbrush. It cover exactly.
Senator:It covers such a small area. Yeah. There's a thing called a surface cleaner that you can get for patios.
Gizmo:It's like a wheel almost. Right?
Senator:Well, it has like four or six wheels on it, it hooks into the wand, and you just use that like a mop across the patio, and it has all these different sprayers underneath that just get all the grime up. It is so much faster. So like, instead of what would have probably taken like literally six plus hours, I was probably done in an hour, but it desperately needed a power wash. It was when I say the patio was a disaster, it was bad.
Bam Bam:Oh, yeah.
Gizmo:So, you know, listen. Wanting to recap this tonight. This was a real memorable party. Mean, since we've been together as Lizards, even before the podcast, the Sync story everybody's heard a thousand times. I mean, this one was-
Rooster:I don't remember it. What happened?
Gizmo:This one was really one for the books. I mean, a phenomenal party. The food was another element. Of course, the crew that was there, we had 20 guys there almost. I think it was some of your childhood college friends and all the lounge guys and the Lizards.
Gizmo:I mean, it was really one for the ages. I mean, it was a phenomenal event, and the food was great. So kudos to you, man. Kudos to the committee, Obay and Henry. I mean, it was really well done.
Gizmo:So cheers to you guys, man. I mean, just a phenomenal night.
Senator:It was fun for me. I mean, I normally don't celebrate birthdays in any big way. Normally, I take a trip somewhere and just have a very low key, you know, relaxed birthday. So to do that and to have most of my closest friends there for it was special. Was really cool.
Gizmo:Yeah, it was a great night.
Rooster:Can we expect this every year or
Gizmo:every month? Possibly. Possibly.
Senator:We're gonna need new servers every year, but possibly.
Gizmo:All right, boys. That was a lot of fun. Lizard Obey, thank you again for coming in, man. We really appreciate you. Of course, brother.
Gizmo:Lizard Obey is a very dedicated friend of ours who actually listens. And prays.
Lizard Obaiy:And pray
Gizmo:for us. He's probably praying for us.
Bam Bam:He actually analyzes the episodes. He does. And breaks it down.
Gizmo:Absolutely. You're the best, man. Thanks for coming in. A of fun tonight. Very unique episode in this recap of this party.
Gizmo:But like I said, it was once in a lifetime. I mean, really awesome event. So I look forward to the next one, man. Oh, there'll be more. I know that.
Gizmo:I know that. And now, boys, it's time to go to our Lizard of the Week presented by our friends at Bon Roberts. And we have a very simple one tonight, almost to two hours. We've enjoyed our evening. The Blanton's was incredible, so we are gonna give our lizard of the week this week to Lizard Seagull who sent this bottle of Blanton's unsolicited out of nowhere.
Gizmo:I just went to the mailbox, and it was there. So he's gonna win a 10 count box of cigars from our friends at Bond Roberts.
Senator:He didn't know this when he sent it, but he saved the night.
Gizmo:He did save the night. And that's why he's the lizard of the week because thank God for Blanton's tonight, boys. So cheers to him. He's gonna win a 10 count box of anything he wants from Bond Roberts. Thanks to those guys for supporting us and providing our Lizards of the Week each week with a 10 count box of cigars.
Gizmo:And boys, we have come to the end of our evening with the Cuesta-Rey. Centrofino Sungrown Pyramid nine and the Blanton Single Barrel Original Kentucky straight bourbon whiskey. Please send me your ratings. Any final thoughts on the pairing or either before we get to our ratings? I'll say this.
Gizmo:Thank God for the Blanton's. The cigar really, really had. One or two good moments. For me, it was dog shit.
Bam Bam:Very uneven evening.
Gizmo:Yeah, it was very up and down. Thank God, honestly, for this party recap, because as far as the energy in this room That
Rooster:was the highlight.
Gizmo:Yeah. I mean, this you know, a bad cigar, as a listener will know, if you've ever heard us talk about a bad cigar, listeners love it because we get miserable. But in the room, it gets real tough. Mhmm. Because the energy it's like a vacuum.
Gizmo:It's like an energy vacuum. That was tonight in this cigar. Thank God we had some other stuff planned, but man, what a rough evening.
Rooster:You know, sometimes the cigar kind of starts off halfway decent, and then it kind of just goes downhill. This cigar went downhill from the very first light. I mean, it smelled nice. The wrapper was nice. The band was nice.
Rooster:It looked promising like it would deliver.
Gizmo:Are you giving a rating? But I'm ready to
Rooster:I was ready to wait on the first part.
Gizmo:Alright, boys. It's time now to go into the formal liquor rating on the Blanton's Original Single Barrel Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey. Bam bam, you're up.
Bam Bam:Yeah. I didn't like it too much initially. It didn't drink like a typical bourbon for me. But over time, everything adjusted and I was getting a good deal of a nice salted butter with a touch of sweetness, but I didn't get vanilla or butterscotch, which I typically get in most bourbons. That was not existent for me.
Chef Ricky:Me either, yeah,
Rooster:that tracks.
Bam Bam:Yeah, but the butteriness, the saltiness, and the sweetness, if it was anything, it was a touch of honey for me. Honey, butter, and a little salt. So I'm going to give this a nine. I actually enjoyed it as I was drinking more and more of it. Solid nine.
Gizmo:All right, chef.
Chef Ricky:For me, this reminded me of a salted apple pie. The nose had great apple notes, some cherry. There was a good amount of salinity there. But what I really love the most about this at first sip because of the the high proof, it just danced. It was almost like taking a pop rock.
Chef Ricky:When you're a kid and you have that pop rock candy, it just kind of danced and jumped all over your palate.
Bam Bam:I kind of liked the little bit of the heat we were getting.
Chef Ricky:Yeah. I love it. I love it. And over time it started to dissipate as your palate adjust and some of those sweeter notes come through, but it was never overly sweet. I think like what we've all come to expect from a bourbon.
Chef Ricky:But I actually like that. I like the drier finish. I like the more balanced finish, although it was on the other side of the spectrum. So for that, I'm giving it a nine.
Gizmo:So I'm also at a nine. I actually thought this was really great. It's one step below like a weller, like that perfect bourbon for me. It's one
Rooster:step below
Gizmo:that. I really enjoyed this. Honestly, it elevated the evening tonight. I hate that it's unavailable. I hate the MSRP.
Senator:I
Gizmo:hate the markup at secondary or gray market. I think it's crazy, this whole thing with Bourbon. I've said it a thousand times, but this one is really, really good. And I think for the hype, it lives up to it. You know, a lot of people talk about Blanton's.
Gizmo:It's hard to find. It's got these unique qualities like I detailed earlier in the history and what they do with the bottle and where it's stored and everything else. But I thought it was really good, so it was a nine for me. Senator. Oh, look at us.
Senator:This is easy. I'm also at a nine. I thought it was a great bourbon. Obviously. Very cooperative tonight.
Senator:Yeah. Obviously, there's a ton of hype around Blanton's, but like you said, you can see why. You know, thought Bam's point, it's not a traditional bourbon. I agree. I mean, it has still many bourbon characteristics, but I like that it wasn't overly sweet.
Senator:Me too. Like that it was super balanced. It was drier, but never too dry. There wasn't like an oakiness or a woodiness that, like, made it too dry. I thought it was perfectly balanced.
Senator:It has viscosity to it. There's body. The kinda buttery, oily finish is really nice. I don't think there's a single cigar that this wouldn't pair well with. Correct.
Senator:Which at a higher proof is a huge testament to what they've done. So I think blends definitely deserves a lot of credit. My only, you know, real criticism is the price point. I think the fact that this is a $100 a bottle at Total Wine It's crazy. You don't have to spend a $100 to find a bourbon as good or better than Bullet.
Gizmo:Go get
Bam Bam:Bullet. You're paying for the name. Mean, I
Senator:I wouldn't go that far, but I was gonna say That's a bit more I was gonna say, like, Weller Special Reserve, like I must still be drunk. That's like, you know, half the price, and I think as good or better. So I I just think the price is really the only thing that's off here, but I would absolutely drink this again. I think it pairs perfectly with most cigars, and I'm just thrilled to see a higher proof bourbon so approachable for what we would typically smoke. Obey.
Gizmo:So, boys, the formal liquor rating tonight on the Blanton's, the Original Single Barrel Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey is very easy. 9.0. And now let's go to the formal lizard rating on the Cuesta-Rey Centrofino Sungrown Pyramid number nine. Rooster, I know you've been waiting. You're up.
Bam Bam:It's gonna get ugly.
Rooster:Here it comes. So I'm not sure who the target audience is for this cigar. Like, when you are blending a cigar, you must, I mean, have like a target audience that you want
Bam Bam:I that are shipwrecked
Rooster:mean, the cigar just absolutely well, first of all, the wrapper is nice. It has a nice sheen on it. The bands are nice. It smelled decent. It had a perfumey scent.
Rooster:It looked promising. And the price was, you know, for $10 we thought it could be another home run. We have had so many decent cigars, like at the $10 range, that we have scored nines and tens.
Bam Bam:Incredible cigars.
Rooster:Yeah, incredible smokes. But this cigar, I mean, just started off, it was very unpleasant. On your tongue, there was a very bitter note that kind of lasted throughout the cigar. It was dry. It kept wanting you to drink water or something else or coffee or whatever was in your glass.
Rooster:The cigar was a little earthy, and it got a little salty towards the end. Those were really the two distinct notes that you could kind of get out of it. I didn't really get anything else out of it. All of us, I think we smoked it fairly, almost to the last third. But the cigar was absolutely it's not blended well.
Rooster:I don't know who it's blended for. It's dry. It's unpleasant. It's just I mean, I'm at a loss of words for the cigar. Mean,
Senator:I'm anti at a cigar.
Rooster:Yeah, it's odd. It smells so good, but yet it doesn't deliver. It's not refined. It's got a harsh edge. So I'm at a six.
Rooster:All right, Senator?
Senator:So I'm also at a six. It was definitely a big disappointment. The frustrating part is that in the background throughout, there were notes that we would typically enjoy, but they were just completely dominated by that sharp, acidic, like, unripe lemon tartness that just completely detracted from any of the nice flavor notes that would have been present otherwise. I think Rooster's point is spot on in terms of the target audience. I mean, was saying before, like, just thinking about the flavor profile, you couldn't figure out which direction this was trying to take.
Senator:Like, is this for someone who likes more dessert notes? Is this for someone who likes, you know, brighter flavor profile? Is this for someone who likes a medium full cigar, a lighter cigar? I have no idea what they were
Rooster:It's very confusing.
Senator:Yeah. It was just unclear what they were trying to accomplish with this cigar. The reason I gave it a six and not a four or five, the final third for me was the best part. The cigar got nuttier in the final third. The aggressive sharp citrus note had dissipated a ton in the final third.
Senator:If most of the cigar could have been that way, it wouldn't have been as painful an experience to get through it. But the first third for me was the absolute worst part. The second third got a bit better, and the final third was actually very smokable. So that's why I I landed at a six. I can't recommend this in good faith to any listener to go out and buy and try.
Senator:This is something if you, you know, had nothing else and someone handed to you, I'd almost cut the the cigar in half and just smoke half the second half of the cigar because that's tolerable. The first half is just pain. A huge disappointment. We obviously aren't familiar with this brand. This doesn't make me want to try really anything else in this line.
Senator:I just don't get it. I It defies all reason or expectation.
Rooster:And when you say the, you know, it had a tart note, it's not a citrus note. It is citrus, but it's a very, very acidic, unpleasant, It's
Chef Ricky:citrus pith. It's like literally an
Senator:unripe lemon if you were to just cut and just bite into it. It's so aggressively- After bad
Gizmo:to cure.
Senator:Well that's usually lime.
Bam Bam:Well done, Rooster.
Gizmo:It's honestly like they took the lemon off the tree like five days early.
Senator:Yeah. Honestly. And the other thing, also I just wanna mention, you know, they claim that I guess the Lihero is aged five years. This tastes like a youthful cigar all the way through. Yeah.
Senator:It is in no way do you sense age, refinement, any of those things. So I also think that in addition to probably retooling the entire blend, whatever tobacco they're using desperately needs more age.
Gizmo:So for me, it's also a six. I mean, everything you guys have said is spot on. I'll start with I I don't understand how this lands at number four on a top 25 list. I mean, you think about how many amazing cigars we smoke at every single price point from every single origin. How many of those cigars dwarf the performance of this cigar?
Senator:Absolutely.
Gizmo:I mean, honestly, it's kind of laughable and it brings me back to my frustration with Cigar Aficionado that we kind of looked to them as we were deciding on cigars and chose this one because of that. And and look at this letdown tonight. I I think this is absolutely abhorrent.
Bam Bam:How long have you had those cigars?
Gizmo:Forty five days. Wow. It wouldn't help if even if you had it for a year. Yeah. So I I agree with senator.
Gizmo:I think the youth thing is really interesting. It's a real interesting point because there was a mustiness I was getting early on that was like, okay. Maybe you're tasting the That's why
Rooster:I called it the earthy note that we were getting.
Gizmo:Are you tasting aged tobacco? No. Clearly. Not all. Clearly in the blend, whatever's going on here is wrong.
Gizmo:If there is aged tobacco in here, whatever they put alongside it pulled it down to such a level that it's not even performing at a level that's acceptable. I I think that this cigar is is not even deserving of a $10 price point. This is a $5 cigar at most. Yeah. This is a cigar you smoke when you're cutting the lawn and you're not even thinking about it.
Gizmo:You're just looking for smoke. A real disappointment. Why did I give it the 6, not the 5? There were some pleasant moments. No doubt about it.
Gizmo:I had some pleasantry at the front. There was a couple moments in the middle. And even in the last third, there were a few moments of of redemption, let's call it. But overall, I think that this is a really poor blend. I think they need to revisit this.
Gizmo:And honestly, I'm not surprised that none of us have heard of this cigar before. There's a reason for that, and it's because the cigar is not good. I can't imagine they're selling a lot of these. Certainly after this, the Lizard Nation out there, and and we will not be buying it. It performed okay.
Gizmo:It was an okay cigar, but I agree with Senator, I cannot recommend this. Do not go out and buy this cigar. For me, it's a six. Chef?
Chef Ricky:Yeah, I'm right alongside you guys. You know, I had So the first third wasn't my favorite. The second third thing started to get interesting, But that's also when I developed Smash. And that is probably where I felt the youthful edges just kind of got mellowed out and and came, you know, to to a roundness rather than to a point. And I I started to enjoy it there.
Chef Ricky:But that enjoyment made me smoke the final third all the way down to the nub. And at the nub, I got ammonia. So now we're talking about the aged tobacco claim and to your point is about whatever is put alongside this aged tobacco. If there's nine
Gizmo:or 10 leaves in here and one of them is aged five years, it makes it irrelevant.
Chef Ricky:It's the opposite of the davidol formula. Correct. Yeah, started at a seven because I thought the ash gave it some life and made some of those sweeter notes. You know, think you mentioned nougat was called out in the in the sea flavor notes. I did start to get some of that when there was ash on
Rooster:the cigar. After the gooseberry or before?
Chef Ricky:No, no. This cigar had no gooseberry.
Bam Bam:It was the doodleberry.
Chef Ricky:This was a Doodle Berry for sure. But, you know, with that said, I went from a 7 down to a six, you know, and I don't think that the $10 price point is an excuse because we've had many, many great cigars at that price point and lower. Yeah. You know, so Many. Yeah.
Chef Ricky:This isn't this didn't perform well and I think the 6 is spot on for it.
Rooster:Alright, man. Bam, you're up.
Gizmo:Thanks, Rooster. So,
Bam Bam:you know, I wish I got the nutty note that you got, Senator. I didn't ever get that. I don't know if anyone else did. Got plenty of the ammonia though from beginning to end. I think your sixes are very generous.
Bam Bam:This is an unsmokable cigar, and what's really frustrating about it, we all got glimpses of good flavor, but it was also immediately taken away, which is what is really frustrating about this. You get it and it's taken away,
Rooster:you get
Bam Bam:it Disruptive. Taken It's very disruptive. It's stressful.
Chef Ricky:Yeah, exactly. It's the opposite of what doing Solid this
Bam Bam:five. There's no way this cigar, in my opinion, deserves anything higher than that. Five.
Senator:This may be the first time Bam has the lowest score.
Bam Bam:Yeah. That's not true.
Gizmo:But you know what though? I think it's interesting because from the beginning, he easily was the least happy with the cigar. From the light.
Bam Bam:And Well, no, I love the aroma. The aroma was the best
Gizmo:part No, of when you lit it, like you were looking for others in the room. Mhmm.
Bam Bam:Well, was curious what you're
Gizmo:all thinking. Obviously, think
Bam Bam:you had the strange cigar.
Gizmo:The poorest performing cigar.
Chef Ricky:No, but there's a look. You know, there's a look you give. When you're enjoying it and you do the bob and you're looking around and
Gizmo:There was a negative
Bam Bam:bob tonight. Yeah.
Chef Ricky:Wasn't good.
Rooster:Like a yeah. Snow bob. It's just No.
Bam Bam:No handshake.
Gizmo:So, boys, the former lizard rating tonight on the CuestaRey, Centrofino Sungrown Pyramid number nine is a 5.8. You know, I just wanna say something. So a couple weeks ago, we rated the Arturo Fuente Extra Viejo Limited Shark Annejo.
Bam Bam:Delicious cigar.
Gizmo:We rated that, what, a 97 maybe? 96?
Chef Ricky:I don't
Gizmo:know what it was.
Bam Bam:It's great.
Gizmo:The idea that that cigar comes out of the same factory as this cigar is mind blowing to me.
Chef Ricky:You're talking a- like their factory second or something.
Gizmo:You're talking a 40 delta on these two cigars.
Senator:Yeah. It's crazy. It's all about the blend.
Gizmo:I don't know what's going on, but the Cuesta Ray tonight did not perform. And, of course, was a debut. We've done other JC Newman. I'm not gonna go through those tonight, but at a 5.8, what a disappointment. And again, thank God for the story of Senator's birthday party because Thank God for the backup cigar.
Gizmo:Yeah. I have a great backup cigar. I'm doing an aging room right now. It's amazing. So boys, what a great night tonight.
Gizmo:Sorry to the listeners. We didn't get to any listener email or voice memos. Lot to get to next week, so we're gonna hold on those. Keep them coming. Of course, we do a lot of episodes where that's all we do aside from news, so we will get to all of them.
Gizmo:Thanks again to our friend Lizard Obey. Look at what a performance tonight. Your first appearance on the pod. You killed it.
Chef Ricky:Very well.
Rooster:Oh, boy.
Gizmo:Keep, you know, holding Senator to task. Holding Gizmo
Senator:to task.
Gizmo:A little bit to me, but mostly Senator.
Senator:But I also wanna thank you, Gizmo, from the bottom of my heart that my sink made it through
Lizard Obaiy:my unscathed
Gizmo:You know, I was very conscious not to disrupt your plumbing that night.
Rooster:He was using the other bathroom.
Gizmo:I just wanna say, by
Senator:the way.
Gizmo:He was using Echo's bathroom. So they've referenced a few times tonight me disrupting Senator's sink with a really bad night on what was it called? What was the alcohol? Oh, shivas. Shivas.
Gizmo:Yes. Shivas. I can't believe
Senator:disrupt my sink the shivas night. You disrupted your car.
Gizmo:Oh, the McAllen. Yeah. That's right. The McAllen night.
Senator:He forgets how many times he
Gizmo:is
Rooster:Did you say his car?
Senator:Oh, sorry. His car and Rooster's car.
Gizmo:Yes. I wanted to say
Senator:night, my cig.
Gizmo:What I wanted to say, though, is we're starting to reflect on five years, coming up on five years in nine weeks. I can't believe that's even before the podcast started, those stories. That's right. Unbelievable how time flies. Of course, we have to thank Lizard Cigar, our lizard of the week who sent us this amazing bottle of Blanton.
Gizmo:Saved the evening, the pairing tonight with this great bottle of bourbon. We really appreciate you, Lizard Cigar. He writes us every week with his thoughts on the the episode. You know, he's he shares stories and comments, so we really, really appreciate Lizards Siegel. And, of course, thanks to our friends at Bond Roberts.
Gizmo:We're gonna send Lizards Siegel a 10 count box of cigars of his choice, and you can find all of the Bon Robert cigars at fabrica005.com. Great offerings. The Robusto is coming soon, so stay tuned for that. And, of course, boys, the exclusive retail partner of the Lounge Blizzard podcast, smallbatchcigar.com. Use our code lizard 15 for 15% off your entire order.
Gizmo:5% back in rewards, free shipping. It's like 20% off plus free shipping. Great customer service, curation. They have it all there. Smallbatchcigar.com.
Gizmo:And finally, our presenting sponsor, Fabrica five. I mean, how great would it have been to have a Fabrica five in our hand tonight versus this CuestaRey that we had? I was dreaming about getting a Lonsdale in my hand. I don't even have one with me, but I I really wish that we had one of those in our hand tonight. But check those guys out.
Gizmo:Fabrica005.com. Use our code lizard pod for 10% off your entire order. Once you get in their system, they keep sending deals and, you know, bundles and samplers. You can it's unbelievable what they send out. I get emails all the time.
Gizmo:I can't believe I got, you know, Robusto Trinity for 20% off. I can't believe the deals they're offering. It happens all the time. So check them out. Fabrica zero zero five dot com.
Gizmo:And boys, what a great night tonight. Oh, yeah. Aside from the cigar, everything else was very good. Yeah. It was good to be back in the room.
Gizmo:A humble coming down from the stars off of 02:50 into 251.
Bam Bam:Obey in the house.
Gizmo:Obey in the house. Thanks again, man. Of course, brother. And, we'll see everybody next week. Hope you enjoyed this episode.
Gizmo:Thanks for joining us. You can find our merch store and ratings archive at our brand new website, loungelizardspod.com. That's Lounge Lizards p o d dot com. Don't forget to leave us a rating and subscribe on your favorite podcast platform. If you have any comments, questions, if you wanna reach out, say hello, tell us what you're smoking, email us.
Gizmo:Hello at lounge lizards pod dot com. You can also find us on Instagram at Lounge Lizards Pod. We really appreciate your time, and we'll, we'll see you next week.