Wrapper: Honduran Rosado

Binder: Honduran

Filler: Dominican, Nicaraguan

Size: 6.5 x 54 Box Pressed

Body: Medium/Full

Price: $9.00

Conjura means “conspiracy” in Spanish. This stick originally harkens back to 1962 during the planning of the JFK assassination. This stick was the one that the CIA poisoned for Castro. Except one of his minions smoked one before Fidel could get his hands on it, and croaked.

Castro said, “Bad leaves.”

Matt Booth was a special CIA operative living, incognito, in Havana. He had been placed there to develop exciting new blends to entice Fidel. Sure, the photos of Matt on FB show him to be a young man. Matt is 72.

Jack Ruby visited Matt in Havana. Matt didn’t like Ruby and made him leave post haste. Matt felt he wasn’t trustworthy. Now Matt was a patriot of the highest order and came from a family of royalty harkening back to the island of Matzohballtini. But Matt shunned his royal status to develop the cigar that would kill Castro. He lived a Spartan life.

Now at the age of 72, Matt, or his code name: Beard Fungi, has spent the last few years focusing on his passion: The blending of fine cigars. He started by introducing his Room 101 (which is the room number he stayed in at the Blue Goose Hotel in Havana) back in 2009 at IPCPR. People went nuts over this cigar and all of a sudden, Matt came out of hiding from the small dirt floor house he lived in since 1964…in Maltodextrin…a small island of the coast of Greece.

You were not hip unless you had a box of Room 101 in your humidor back then.

As the years passed, I discovered that Matt and I had lots in common: our jewelry making. I started in junior high school with lapidary then moved on to lost wax and then stone cutting. Of course, my father was guiding me the whole way. This sapphire and diamonds ring was made when I was 23. I did the whole thing by myself and still, today, have my workshop in the basement. If you thing cutting a precious stone is easy, you’re fucking nuts. We bought an encyclopedia of books that had math equations up the wazoo. It was hard!

At 2010 IPCPR, he blew the doors off with the Conjura. This 6.5 x 54 behemoth is the most gorgeous box press I’ve seen. A slight toothiness envelops the wrapper. It has the color of Bambi’s mother, before she was shot.

The cap is almost seam free. The entire cigar is seam free. Some minute veins inhabit the cigar. And it has a nice matte finish. The bands are very elegant.

I sniff the stick and detect cinnamon, cedar, pepper, coffee, a lovely sweetness, earthiness. Just gorgeous.

So I punch and light up.

The flavor is going nuts with earthiness, sweetness, coffee, cinnamon and baking spices. The body is a mild/medium.

I always have trouble lighting a big cigar. It takes up a lot of space and I use a single torch flame. So any discrepancies in the char line are me, not the cigar. Hot spicy pepper quickly ensues.

This has been a rough day..in a capsule: I got a haircut. Then I went to the DMV and had 40 people in front of me with at least 75 people waiting. I have a CCW license in WI and I had my derringer in a holster, attached to my belt in the small of my back. As my number was finally called, the back part of the plastic chair pulled the derringer out of my belt and it went flying. When I got up to the window, I discovered that my gun had followed my skirting across the floor. I bent over and picked it up and then casually put it in my leather jacket pocket without ever turning around to see how many of the 75 people saw me. Completely casual. So while I chatted with the DMV employee as I got my license renewed, I waited for the cops to come in force. They didn’t. No one did, or said, a thing. My nonchalance threw them. Was I an off duty cop? Was I something else? What was I and was I worth fucking with? As I turned on my heels and left, everyone stared at me. I kept my glare straight forward and did not turn my head. This really had to shake them. I got outside and laughed half the way home.

So this seemed like a good time to write this review.

The coffee is very strong and then comes some creaminess. All in the first inch. The char line is perfect. The draw is a bit tight but this is a really big stick and should loosen up soon.

Since this cigar is the size of a stick of dynamite, I will be putting it down now and then as I smoke and write at the same time. At the 2” mark, the burn line goes crazy. I grab my lighter to correct it.

As I move past the first third, I have experienced a very earthy, well balanced cigar. The coffee and spices are very nice.

The second third is chockfull of creaminess and coffee. The spiciness has tamped down a bit. The strength has moved to a strong medium. The draw has improved immensely.

I am on a diet using Atkins Shakes as my meals. One flavor is Café’ Caramel. I grab one to see how it affects the taste of the cigar. Well, of course, it enhances it big time. But since I suck the shake down quickly, that marriage of flavors dissipates a bit.

At the halfway mark, complexity kicks in. The flavors of cinnamon and coffee and now, cocoa are mixing with grace. A new flavor jumps in: orange zest. This cigar is beginning to taste like something from Starbucks. The flavors mingle beautifully. The spiciness ramps up out of nowhere.

The last third kicks in. The creaminess just envelops the other flavors of coffee and cocoa. The sweetness of a light caramel makes this stick lip smacking good. The cap has behaved itself nicely without the added misery of loose tobacco. Everything stayed in place just as it should.

I finish the cigar and it was smooth as silk. The body moved closer to full bodied and the flavor profile was extra full flavored. The creaminess makes you wanting more past the point of giving yourself an ash moustache.

Great cigar. I look forward to my next one.

And now for something completely different:

Something your parents never told you…it you were conceived in the early 80’s, it was a sheer miracle. Because it was at this time that cocaine was extremely chic. Everyone was doing it and adding it to their marijuana fixation.

What nobody told men was that coke kept your pee pee in the limpy position. Now you may have been horny as hell, but the apparatus would not cooperate.

My band was playing at a very prestigious club in Hollywood: Gazzari’s. A movie producer had heard our demo and wanted us to do the music for the film. And the producer sent out his casting agent to see if we might be able to be in the film…if we were good looking enough. And this band was made up of four good looking guys. I was the best looking. LOL.

R, our vocalist and guitarist, was nervous as hell and drank too much and did too much coke. The casting agent came on to him and dragged him into a broom closet. R could not perform and 5 minutes later, the chick came out looking very disgusted.

Then the casting agent dragged me into the same room. She undid my belt and pulled out my woo hoo. What she did to me, no one ever did to the Pope. We both came out with a smile but then the assistant took the agent aside and must have told her story of what was a horrible mishap.

We go on stage, and R is a mess. He is embarrassed. He is a stud and he fucked up. Er..Or didn’t.

He was really unstable on stage and almost fell. The casting agent was up in the balcony in the front row with her entourage of 7-8 people.

On the third song, R slipped, fell backwards into the drums, and splattered the drums everywhere. He kept falling and didn’t stop until the wall behind the stage stopped him…where he fell into a heap. He blacked out.

I looked up to the balcony and saw the agent wave her hand in disgust as she gathered all of her peeps and left the building. I was so fucking angry I could bite nails.

We didn’t finish the set. All was lost. Phone calls were not returned. All because of a failed BJ.

Show biz. Ya’ gotta’ love it.

Categories: CIGAR REVIEWS