Wrapper: Connecticut Broad Leaf
Binder: Nicaraguan
Filler: Nicaraguan
Size: 6 x 54 “Belicoso”
Body: Medium/Full
Price: $7.50

The cigar came together with the collaboration of Janny Garcia, Patricia Quesada, and Raquel Quesada. Hence, Tres Reynas: “Three Queens.” No sense of shaky self-esteem in that family. I guess they could have named it “Three Gods.” But that would be over the top.

The cigar is made at the My Father factory in Nicaragua.

The construction is on the rustic side very visible seams, lots of veins, a mish mosh of a cap, solid, and very oily and toothy. The delicate white band with even more delicate gold writing on it is going to be a bitch for me to photograph with Fred Flintstone’s camera.

I clip the cap to search for fresh aromas and find dark baker’s chocolate, spiciness, sweet tobacco, hay, some barnyard and rich earthiness.
While this is a big cigar, it’s not a behemoth like the LP UC I reviewed yesterday. The size completely destroyed the flavor profile.

This is a bit smaller and hopefully within the range of holding on to its flavors. The cigar has been resting in a humidor for 12 months. It may mellow out nicely; or too much. We will see.

Time to light up.

As I puff away, there are flavors of earth and red pepper. Almost the Garcia spice bomb, but not quite. There is chocolate and sweet coffee. The sweetness appears and coalesces all the flavors together in one circle. A carousel ride of components. I am impressed that this early in the cigar, the flavor profile is so expressive. I’m not even half an inch in and the cigar is trying to be a flavor bomb.

The draw is good and the char line; a bit wavy. The body hits classic medium right away. This means there will be hell to pay during the last third. And I haven’t had any breakfast. Uh-oh.

Creaminess appears quickly and quietly pulling the flavors even closer together. Clearly, the humidor time did it wonders. And provided me with a cigar that the blender had intended for me to enjoy.

The cocoa moves up front next to the creaminess. The flavors are just blasting away.

I’ve reviewed this cigar for an online cigar store when it came out in 2012. But it was a robusto, I believe, and was then too, very impressed with its flavor bomb qualities.

The damn sun isn’t out today. It’s dreary. The forecast is overcast with a possibility of thunderstorms…and very hot and humid.

I am at the one inch mark and the cigar is sailing on the wind of its flavors. This is a true joy of an experience. I also have a jumbo Gordo, 6 x 60, sitting in the humidor with the same amount of age on it. But I am grateful that I don’t have to review that log. This size turned out just right.

The first third ends with a flourish. The profile (in order of execution): creaminess, cocoa, sweetness, coffee, spice, and earth is just accelerating and defining itself. The more I smoke, the more expansive the flavors become.
This is one of those cigars you never want to end. Good on ya’ Three Queens.

It must be something to grow up with fathers that are master blenders. Can you imagine what you could learn should you have the desire?

The second third is just more of the same. I don’t know where it can go from here. It’s as if it has already reached its zenith. The last third will be the “Determinator!”

I approach the halfway point and the stick is singing to me. Complexity has landed. The flavors intermingle sweetly. The body is still medium. But the spiciness has really been tamed at this point. It lingers in the background.

The last third begins with an emboldening of the flavors. They had been somewhat muted during the second third; which meant it was gearing up for the last part of the cigar.

I highly recommend that if you buy this cigar; and you should, that you get a robusto. More flavors and more intensity. It only comes in three sizes. And this is the smallest of the three.

The draw is not so great now. I use an anti-plugging tool and the draw returns to normal. And then I put my lighter to the foot. Strangely, the ash started out a nice gray and has turned to almost black.

Being a big cigar, it has taken me well over an hour to get to the last third. And here, the strength begins to kick in. I feel the nicotine.

The damn cigar goes out again. I use the tool once more and re-light. The cigar comes to life.
I hate doing this because, initially, I get a charred taste. But it goes away within minutes.

The creaminess is just going nuts. The red pepper returns and makes me sneeze. Cocoa is right behind these two elements.
The cigar finishes out in a blaze of glory. It is a whole hearted flavor bomb. And the full body is kicking my ass. My vision is blurred. Really blurred. I expect if I smoked cigarettes, this wouldn’t happen. But I’ve never smoked one cigarette in my life. At age 18, I went straight for cigars like my father and his father. They smoked the cheap cigars like Dutch Masters or Bering. On my 18th birthday, I went to a cigar shop and bought a box of lanceros for $35. No idea what brand they were. And during breaks between classes in college, I would sit on the large grassy knoll (No. Not that one.) And smoke to my heart’s content.

This is a great cigar. My only query is why the Queens stopped here. Why not another blend? Was it just to prove they could do it? To impress Daddy? I have no idea. But they have enormous talent and should think about coming out with more sticks.

And now for something completely different:

Did you ever see that Tom Hanks’ movie, “That Thing You Do?” I loved that movie as much as I love “Spinal Tap.” Only because I began playing bass in the mid 1960’s in rock bands that played out. I was only 15 and had to have my mother drive me to gigs. So getting my driver’s license was a welcome advancement for civilization.

Hanks got the technical portion of the era and the band’s equipment right on the money. The Silvertone guitar made by Sears. The Dan Armstrong bass. I laughed the first time I saw it because my the guitarist in my first band played the Silvertone guitar; which came in a guitar case that also was a 5 watt amplifier. You stand the case up and it has a little 3” speaker in the corner of the case’s interior. Guy actually used it for a while before he earned enough money for a small Fender amp.
I played a Hofner bass like McCartney’s.
I saved up for 7 months for that bass that I bought out of a pawn shop in downtown Long Beach. I then spent another three months practicing without an amp. My mother urged my father to buy me an amp and we went to Palos Verdes one day to a store owned by a family friend…who went on to screw my father and me by selling me a Knox amp. ??? Knox? The damn thing worked maybe half the time and the only way I could get it to start working again was to kick it. That makes for quite a sight when you are on stage.

I liked the theatre and was active in drama classes in high school and also the Long Beach Community Playhouse. One summer, 1966, they did a musical of Taker Her, She’s Mine. And I played bass in one number and banjo in the other. You don’t know how embarrassing it was to be playing a sweet soft folk love song with a guitarist and two good looking chicks; and have to go kick your amp.

I did enough whining after my folks saw me in the show that my dad, reluctantly, took me to Wallach’s Music City and bought me a real Fender Bassman amp. This was pure fucking heaven. I had a pro amp.

My band’s first name was “Renaissance Faire.” It sounded girly so we changed it. We re-named it, and that name I will never forget. This was nearing the height of Hippie Power. We called ourselves the “Southern California Musical Exposition & Protest Aggregation.” And the drummer got it all on his kick drum’s head; thanks to his older brother who was a graphic designer.
We played out almost every weekend. Three players and a lead singer. We did all the cool tunes of the day. People went nuts when we played “Louie, Louie.”

The best memory I have of that group was when Cream’s “Disraeli Gears” album came out in November of 1967. It had been out for only days when Guy came to us and said we had to learn this one song for the gig on Saturday. It was called, “Sunshine of Your Love.” It remains a classic.

This gig was a step up for us. It was a college gig. Prior to this, we played high school dances and the Jewish Community Center. We averaged about $35 for each gig. That was $8.75 per guy. It got us food at Taco Bell. And with what was leftover, we put our money together and bought a “lid” of grass.

Anyway, the gig was at the college and in their auditorium. Not very big, but it had a big stage about four and a half feet high. We were used to playing on the floor or a 6” riser platform.

The first song we played was the Cream song and the place went nuts. The girls clamored at our feet. They were actually trying to grab our legs like we were rock stars. It blew my mind and it was then I decided to make my life’s ambition to be a rock star.

We played that song once every set. Four times to be exact. And each time, it got the same reaction. I was very skinny with shorty nerdy hair. And the beautiful college girls wanted me. I’m sure I had a boner each time we played that song.

Categories: CIGAR REVIEWS