cuba

$16,000 Box of Pre-Embargo Cuban Cigars at Auction

Filed under: Cigars, Spirits, Wine, Auctions

A rare box of pre-embargo Romeo y Julieta Cuban cigars stars in Christie's Fine and Rare Wines and Vintage Cigars sale in London this Thursday. Expected to fetch up to $16,000, the box of 100 cigars from Winston Churchill's favored brand, labeled "Selección de Luxe", was originally purchased at Saks Fifth Avenue in New York prior to the enactment of the U.S. embargo against Cuba in 1962. The mint condition cigars in a wooden presentation case consist of 25 Petit Coronas, 25 Coronas, and 25 each of two sizes of Perfectos. Also featured in the luxurious sale are several cases of vintage Krug champagne, headed by a couple cases of Vintage 1985 estimated at about $3,000 each.

Tags: Champagne, Christies, Cuba, Cuban cigars, CubanCigars, Krug, Romeo y Julieta, RomeoYJulieta

Matusalem "Gran Reserva" Rum

by Jared Paul Stern (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Spirits

In our post on the new book Havana Before Castro the other day we reminisced about Cuba before the infamous dictator ruined everyone's fun. Among the many moronic moves Castro made was expelling Matusalem from the island in the '60s, a smooth, rich rum that had been distilled there by a family of Spanish settlers since 1872.

Following the expulsion the company languished for several decades, until it was finally re-established in the Dominican Republic (as were several Cuban cigar brands) using the original secret formula brought from Spain. Today, Matusalem is flourishing once again, with its delectable blend of smooth spirit matured in French oak casks bottled as Matusalem Gran Reserva.

The rum is made using the solera system, which was originally developed to produce Spain's famed wine, sherries, brandies, and cognacs, producing a blend that's somewhere between dark and amber.

Tags: Cuba, dominican republic, DominicanRepublic, Fidel Castro, FidelCastro, Havana, Matusalem Rum, MatusalemRum, Rum, Solera, Spain

When Havana Was the "Paris of the Caribbean"

by Jared Paul Stern (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Books

It's now somewhat synonymous with decay of both a socioeconomic and physical nature, but there was a time before the Socialist revolution when Havana was known as the "Paris of the Caribbean," a place where Americans came to hang out in nightclubs, gamble, smoke cigars, hit on showgirls and drink copious quantities of rum. This prelapsarian paradise is celebrated in Peter Moruzzi's brilliant new book, Havana Before Castro: When Cuba Was a Tropical Playground (Gibbs Smith, $30), filled with hundreds of photos, brochures, postcards, artifacts and other ephemera.

From Hemingway hangout La Floridita, where the daiquiris flowed like water, especially during Prohibition, to the Tropicana and other casinos that were cutting edge in the 1950s thanks to the interest of American mobsters, Moruzzi provides a gorgeous and engaging glimpse of an all but forgotten era. See the gallery for a preview.

[via Men.Style]

Gallery: Havana Before Castro

Ernest Hemingway celebrates his Nobel Prize in 1954 with a daiquiri

Tags: Casinos, Cigars, Cuba, Daiquiri, Ernest Hemingway, ErnestHemingway, Fidel Castro, FidelCastro, Havana, Prohibition, Rum

A Great Day in Cocktail History

by Jared Paul Stern (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Spirits

Looking for an excuse to celebrate? July 19 is National Daiquiri Day. The drink many people associate with author Ernest Hemingway was in fact invented in 1898 in the small iron mining town of Daiquiri near Santiago, Cuba by an engineer named Jennings Stockton Cox.

He came up with the drink, a simple blend of lime juice, sugar and local Bacardi rum (est. 1862) over cracked ice as a way to boost the morale of mine workers during the sizzling summer months. It was such a success Cox not only received a generous stipend from the mining company but also a monthly gallon of Bacardi.

Hemingway (above, hoisting a daiquiri) later helped to popularize the drink. Of course in Cox's day there was no question of freezing or blending. See the gallery for a traditional hand-shaken daiquiri recipe and some historical images pertaining to this classic cocktail's origins.

Gallery: National Daiquiri Day

Daiquiri inventor Jennings Stockton Cox.

Tags: Bacardi, Bacardi Rum, BacardiRum, Cuba, Daiquiri, Ernest Hemingway, ErnestHemingway, National Daiquiri Day, NationalDaiquiriDay, Rum

Cigar Roller Working Toward A Record

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Cigars

Record-setting cigar roller Jose Castelar is working on a new champion stogie in Havana, Cuba. Castelar is in the process of rolling a more than 65-foot cigar by Wednesday which could bring him his fourth world record from the Guinness Book. His previous record is 66.9 feet. He has been working on this project eight hours a day since Sunday and plans to finish on Wednesday. This event is timed to coincide with the 28th International Tourism Fairground and the cigar will be displayed there once it is finished.

UPDATE: The IHT reports that Castelar is still working on the cigar which will likely be 98 feet, not long enough to beat the current record. Guinness says Puerto Rican cigar-maker Patricio Pena made a 135 foot cigar last year.

2nd UPDATE: Looks like we have a winner after all. Castelar's cigar measures 148 feet, nine inches.

Source

Tags: cigars, cuba, expire-images2009-5-6

Exile Cigars

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Cigars

The latest company to jump on the Cuban cigar nostalgia bandwagon is Cuban Imports which now produces Exile, a cigar meant to evoke the spirit of pre-embargo Cuban cigars. The cigars are made from an aged blend of Nicaraguan filler and binder tobaccos that are available in either an Ecuadorian sun-grown Sumatra Rosado or a Connecticut Broadleaf Maduro wrapper. There are for shapes ranging from the Robusto (5" x 50) to the Perfection2' (7" x 49 figurado). Each cigar is wrapped in a paper reproduction of the February 4th, 1962 page of the New York Daily Mirror announcing the Cuban embargo. Individual cigars cost from $5.50 to $8.50 per cigar.

Source

Tags: cigars, cuba, tobacco

Havana Club Rum Now On Sale In The United States

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Spirits

Havana Club, a rum that has been not been available in the U.S. because of the trade embargo, is now back on the market. Bacardi has begun shipping cases of Havana Club in the United States. The rum is based on a recipe which was created by a Cuban company in 1935. After Castro's rise to power, the family-owned company plant and the trademark were seized by the government. The Cuban government has continued to produce rum under the Havana Club label since 1960 and it has been sold all over the world.

Bacardi bought the recipe and the Havana Club name from the Arechabala family in 1994. The rum was sold in the U.S. for a few years but a legal battle over who owned the name erupted and the rum was pulled form the shelves. Last week, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office ruled against government-owned Cubaexport saying Bacardi has the right to the name. The patent office says that the timing is not related to current events. Bacardi's version of Havana Club is made in Puerto Rico from black-strap molasses that is fermented and then distilled five times and aged in oak barrels. The rum takes three years to age so Bacardi has been preparing for a relaunch for a while.

[via AP]

Source

Tags: alcohol, cuba, havana club, rum, spirits

The 40th Anniversary Cohiba Announced

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Cigars

The mystery has been revealed! Cigar Aficionado reports on the new Cohiba which was unveiled today in Havana. The new cigar set a record for the price of a young cigar. A limited edition humidor of 40 cigars sells for 15,000 euros. The cigar, which was produced for the 40th anniversary of the brand, is a Behike and all 4,000 cigars for the project were rolled by one person, Norma Fernandez Sastre. The Behike measures 7 1/2 inches long by 52 ring gauge. The cigar will only be available in the humidors which are made of ebony, bone and skate skin. The cigar will need to be aged but with time it will likely become a legendary smoke. The 100 humidors are numbered and each cigar is also individually numbered on a secondary band.

Source

Tags: behike, cigar, cuba, cuban cigar, habanos, havana, tobacco

Joseph Fiennes Attends Cigar Festival To Celebrate New Cigar

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Cigars

We recently mentioned the Fesitval del Habano that is taking place this week. In order to promote the new short Chuchill size from the Romeo y Julieta brand, they brought in Joseph Fiennes, famous for playing the bard in "Shakespeare in Love." It was Fiennes first visit to Cuba and her tossed off a few lines from Romeo and Juliet at the cigar festival. The festival will also bring the announcement of a new mystery cigar to celebrate the 40th birthday of Cohiba.

Source

Tags: cigar festival, cigars, cohiba, cuba, cubans, habanos, havana, romeo y julieta

Tabacos del Cordillera Green Cigar Special

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Cigars

Tabacos del Cordillera is offering a special promotion to get smokers interested in their Cumbres de Puriscal Green line. They are offering a 10% discount on all nine shapes in the new line throughout March as a St. Patrick's Day special. The Cumbres de Puriscal is their flagship line which is available in Green Gold and Silver, each of equal price and quality but with different taste. The Green and Gold lines are mild-to-medium bodied, and the Green’s blend has earthy and sweet overtones.The wrapper is Habano-derived Connecticut shade and the filler and binder are made of proprietary Habano tobaccos, grown on the company's 65-acre farm in Costa Rica. As we've mentioned before the company's director, John Vogel, developed the cigars from Cuban seeds grown in Costa Rica.

[via Top 25 Cigars]

Source

Tags: cigars, costa rica, cuba, smoking, tobacco

Festival del Habano

by Gustad Mody (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Cigars

Make your way down to Havana on February 27th for the VIII Festival del Habano. The 5 day event offers a variety of activities to celebrate and promote cigars. Visits of tobacco plantations and even a tour of the factory which was once home to Davidoff, Cohiba and Trinidad will take place. There will also be special cigar and spirit matching sessions. The whole cigar fest will set you back about 1,260 Cuban Convertible Pesos. Perhaps we should convert to a more useful currency, like US dollars. So if we multiply by the number of US dollars per convertible peso, that comes out to ... 1,260 US dollars.

Source

Tags: churchill, cigar, claro, cohiba, corona, cuba, davidoff, destival, havana, maduro, oscuro, pantela, pesos, robusto, smoke, tobacco, torpedo