Cohiba Spectre (7 1/4 x 54)

Video review HERE.

(Description taken from Cigar-Coop.com website)

In 2017, General Cigar’s Cohiba brand introduced the Cohiba Blue – a cigar meant to be an affordable Cohiba offering. Now General goes to the other end of the spectrum introducing the Cohiba Spectre, a cigar that is the most expensive Cohiba branded cigar by General to date.

According to General Cigar, the Cohiba Spectre incorporates eight varietals of tobacco from five different countries. At the forefront is a rare Ecuadorian Sumatra wrapper. During the curing process of this wrapper, a small percentage of upper priming leaves developed a reddish hue and were set aside for further aging. The tobacco underwent an additional six months aging. In the end, General had eight barrels of wrapper tobacco that it felt was pristine and could be used for a special release.

The blend also incorporates Dominican Piloto Cubano tobacco that has been aging in tercios since being harvested in 1995. These leaves are placed at the center of the bunch where it is surrounded by Nicaraguan Estelí leaves from harvests in 2011 and 2014. These Nicaraguan leaves were aged in Spanish Sherry barrels. The blend is rounded off by three Honduran leaves (Olancho San Agustin/2002 crop, Jamastran/2011 crop and La Entrade/2011 crop).

The Spectre is available in one size – a 7 1/4 x 54 Double Corona. It is packaged in a circular red and silver box containing ten cigars housed in tubes. Each box has a price tag of $900.00 or $90.00 per individual cigar.

The cigar has a nice, dense feel in the hand.

The test draw after cutting the cap was a bit firm but workable. The initial flavors at light up were on the par of the candy-like orange citrus but at a low level amount. You also have some brown sugar and a touch of cinnamon but they also are quite light. There was a large amount of an earthy black coffee and an above average amount of black pepper, which I would rate at a 7 1/2. The cigar is very earthy and not very sweet at the outset.

At the first third (32 minutes) the flavors are still about like they were at light up, which is a little surprising. Equally surprising is the strength of the cigar is mild to medium. The light candy-like orange citrus has a light effervescence to it, which is nice. There is still quite a bit of the earthy black coffee. There are now nutmeg notes sprinkled into the mix. There are still light amounts of brown sugar and a light sprinkling of cinnamon. The finish has nutmeg, earthiness, and some very light hints of the candy-like orange citrus. There is a low amount of lingering black pepper. I would rate the black pepper at this point a 7. The cigar is not grabbing me at this point. It's ok but nothing spectacular. For the first third I rated the cigar 86.

At the second third (1 hour 13 minutes) the flavor notes have not change but there are now some bitter notes in the cigar. The bitterness rolls over to the finish also. The nutmeg notes are up. The sweetness has dropped a little. There are still a lot of earthy notes. The cigar is medium bodied, at best. I lost any sweetness on the finish leaving you with the earthy nutmeg with some bitterness. The lingering black pepper is up. I rated the second third score at 84.

The cigar lasted 1 hour 46 minutes, which is a great burn time. The bitterness which I experienced in the second third went away in the final third. The other flavor notes were unchanged. The sweetness was not quite up to par for me. The finish also lost the bitterness. So, to sum up the cigar could have been sweeter to counteract the earthy black coffee and it could have used more power. For a cigar of this price I expected much more. But, if you can afford them try it for yourself. For me the cigar was a miss. I rated the final third at 84 also.

Overall Score: 85 (84.67)