Quote Originally Posted by webmost View Post
I found this old thread here. It's about a subject which has fascinated me for some time now. Especially where a poister opines: "...a unique taste is what an American puro would need to succeed". I think there is such a unique flavor. It's a little bit of leather, black bread toast, and tea.

Take, for example, the John Hay. They have a store in Intercourse PA. John Hay do offer a number of cigars rolled in Latin American sweatshops for seven or eight bucks a pop. But they also offer one buck cigars rolled by FX Smiths Sons in McSherrystown PA from Amish broadleaf. Toasty leather. FX Smiths Sons used to roll all of Muniemaker's cigars until Muniemaker moved to Central America. FX still makes all of FD Graves cigars. I haven't tried any of those. Mostly homogenized, I think. Sold in New England.

All these cigars are rolled by machine, of course, because here in this country, hey, we started making everything by machine a hundred years ago. Labor saving devices. Efficient. I just don't understand the objection to machines one bit. Hey, this computer keyboard is made by machine. The jeans I'm wearing were machine made. The beer here in my hand was bottled by machine. Why cigars have to be hand rolled is a mystery to me. Doesn't make them smoke any better.

Listen: FX Smiths Sons has been around for a century and a half. Five generations. Switched to machinery in the second generation. The story goes that twenty years ago Cigar Aficionado held a competition. Someone talked old man Smith into entering his best. He sent CA one of his Smithdale Perfecto Oscuros. Didn't tell them anything about how it was made. Out of six hundred some entries, that humble cigar rolled in Pennsyltucky by machine from Amish tobacco came in fifth! It wasn't until a couple months later that CA discovered the Smithdale was machine made. And they were righteously pissed. Called up old man Smith dropping F bombs. Irate. But why? A good smoke is a good smoke. Why does quality need to be made by hand in a foreign sweatshop?

Panacea takes that route, and it costs more. A company named Flat Bed Cigars has all their Panacea cigars rolled by hand in the Dominican. Panacea Green Label is PA Broadleaf, very leathery, very toasty. Ship it all the way down, all the way back. They run eight or nine bucks a pop. Light one of them in one hand and light an FX Smith Tuscorora in the other, and tell me if there's a difference.

There's also Avanti cigar factory in Wilkes-Barre. Somebody who likes those rumpled up Italian type infused cigars has to tell you whether they are any good at all. I can't. Anisette! Ick! I can't stand them. All Avanti tobacco comes from Tennessee and Kentucky.

I just smoked my first Marsh Wheeling a couple weeks back. Reminded me of the old Lucky Strike cigarettes, from back when LSMFT. Darn mild flavor for a cigar. Where the FX Smithdale Maduro would be black bread toast, this March Stogie would be white bread toast.

Both of these are the kind of cigars that you could easily chain smoke all day, 20 a day, like old Mark Twain or Sigmund Freud. Cheap, tasty, and with a clean finish.

Try an American cigar. There's a heck of a selection and they are good smokes.
Do you work for these guys?

I prefer the luxury of a hand rolled cigar. Often machine rolled cigars are made of leftover tobacco from hand rolling, i.e. more inferior.