Wrapper: Connecticut
Binder: Undisclosed
Filler: Undisclosed
Size: 5 x 50 Robusto
Strength: Mild/Medium
Price: $5.00

Today we take a look at the Whipped Cream by Cigar Federation.
At the time of this review, CF still has 72 cigars left.

BACKGROUND:
From Cigar Federation:
“The Factory Direct Boutique releases just keep getting better and better and better!
“I’m just gonna flat-out say it. Whipped Cream should be a $10 cigar. Period!
“The tobacco used in this baby and the Class 7 Cuban rollers that handmade Whipped Cream are some of the best we’ve ever worked with.
“And it shows in the cigar! Like, BIG TIME!

“Whipped Cream is RIDICULOUSLY tasty! It will probably induce you to mutter a little profanity to yourself because of how amazing the flavors are when you first light it up. (You know what I’m talking about. We’ve all done it.)
“Whipped Cream is a medium strength, smooth little number wrapped in a specially fermented Connecticut wrapper. And it’s beautiful. It comes from one of the finest growers of Connecticut tobacco in the industry.

“Flavors are (you guessed it!) VERY creamy, buttery, and sweet. Milk chocolate, cashew, and toffee all make appearance along the way. The candy like flavors are balanced perfectly with hints of cedar wood.
“NOTE: Don’t dismiss this cigar because it’s a Connecticut. Hey…Connecticut is the new Corojo!”

APPEARANCE:
This is a plain looking cigar. Some dough was saved by not providing a fancy cigar band. The Connie is typically light in color with the hue of a camel/Greyhound. Seams are tight. Lots of veins especially down one side…looks like something Dr. Frankenstein would deliver. The cigar is way too hard. No give to the stick whatsoever. I see a ream in its future.

NOSE AND OPEN MAW:
Floral notes, super creamy, milk chocolate, malt, cedar, caramel, vanilla, lemon zest, a touch of white pepper, almonds, and barnyard.
The cold draw presents flavors of white chocolate, creaminess, white pepper, lemon, almonds, vanilla, and malt.

FIRST THIRD:
I cannot get any air through the stick. My trusty PerfecDraw cigar poker tool comes out of its coffin and remedies what might have been a tossed cigar.
Note…this cigar has more than 6 months naked humidor time.
The draw is still very stiff. I ream it once again. This is a really hard cigar.

Immediately, the burn line becomes errant and a quick touch up is required. Not a good sign my brethren.
The cap is so hard that it’s like holding a plastic spatula handle in your mouth.

Not much happening in the flavor arena. Typical miniscule flavors of cream, white pepper, lemon, malt, white chocolate, cedar, and banana.

The burn just won’t behave. I remember getting an email from CF a few weeks ago announcing that this blend was back in stock. Hmmm…

The cigar has plenty of age on it and should be stellar by this point. The Cigar Federation PR description make it sound like this cigar is the second coming. So far, I’m not impressed. It is just another inexpensive tasteless Connie.
Mild in strength. No pizzazz. No punch. This is why I can count on one hand the number of Connecticut wrapped cigars I actually enjoy.

OK, sure, this is an inexpensive cigar. But I’ve reviewed a number of inexpensive cigars lately only to discover they were great cigars. The Southern Draw 300 Hands was roughly the same price and it’s pure night and day. I don’t sense any passion in this blend. Just homework and a laissez-faire approach to blending.

Unless something changes soon, the best I can say about this cigar is newbies might appreciate it but there are other options out there for a good Connie.

Big time hype really annoys me. Everyone writes about their new blend that this is the best blend they’ve ever produced. La dee da. I’s like to see some manufacturer state about a good cigar that it’s pure crap and only put out for sale to make their 2018 tax payment…and have a write off.

Zero complexity. Not a single transition. No finish in this lifetime.

Damn. I anticipated this being a good cigar. It isn’t. It’s flavorless and without character. No balance. No subtlety. Like a hooker who takes her teeth out and puts them on the top of her head so she doesn’t lose them.

With all the time this cigar has received resting, it should be exploding on my palate. The only explosion so far is that steam is coming out of my ears because I broke my own rule of not reviewing a cigar in which I had only one sample. Fuck me.

I put a lot into the prep work before writing a review. So once I start, I’m going all the way to the finish line even if the cigar is a stinker. I don’t take responsibility for this. I put it on the phony PR that entices me into false submission.

SECOND THIRD:
Under normal smoking circumstances, at just $6 a stick, I’d have tossed it by now. But I’m stuck because you all look up to me like your own personal Mussolini.

Flavors are so muted that I see no difference between the Whipped Cream and a Gurkha 3rd.

I’m fucking pissed off now. I can tell there will be absolutely no change to this cigar’s flavor profile, character, or influence. It’s a dud.

Class 7 Cuban rollers? LMAO! And of course, no credit is given to the schmuck that blended this. No one wanted to sully their rep by admitting they blended this after birth.

Ahh…Jimi shows up to save the day…or at least this part of my review. “Little Wing.” Classic.

Not only do I not sense any sort of blender’s intent but I am not sure this is a real cigar. If this thing explodes in my face, I’ll finally get it.

The total lack of spiciness is keeping the cigar from having even the smallest amount of punch to it. It is so lackluster that it’s like sucking on the toilet scrubber. At least then, I’d taste peanuts.

At the halfway point, the cigar struggles to exert some authority by upping the ante and providing a decent amount of creaminess. Either that or I’m so desperate to be proven wrong about this 50¢ bowl of porridge.

I go back and take a look at the CF page showing a whopping total of 15 reviews for this cigar. It gets an average of 3.5 stars but there are a lot of 5-star ratings swearing this is the best cigar ever. Uh-huh. I wonder what becoming a professional citizen reviewer pays? I could use the dough and say something better than: “A great cigar!”

The white pepper finally returns giving the cigar the tiniest amount of oomph. Like coming out of the pool and pulling a George Costanza yelling “Shrinkage!”

Let’s see…do I know any jokes? I do. But I have to stand and be animated. I’m a story teller not a Henny Youngman. Although, any time I come home from a doctor appointment, Charlotte asks how it went? I tell her “The doc said I only have 6 months to live. I told him I can’t pay. The doc says, ‘OK. You’ve got a year.”

LAST THIRD:
This is the part of my cigar journey where I either mosh pit myself into finishing the review or just throw it away and try another cigar tomorrow. I’m certainly not doing you any good describing a totally worthless cigar. But at least it’s cheap!
Not the slightest touch of character other than that of a mime performing for blind folks.

Jethro Tull is playing. Ian Anderson…what a prick. Toured supporting them on a few gigs and what a tool. His band were great guys. Anderson was an autocrat. Mussolini would have told him to calm down.

Constant touch ups of the char line. Class 7 rollers my arse. Maybe they meant they are 7th graders? I don’t know. I’m always weary of a cigar that refuses to declare who made it. The blender isn’t stupid. It’s like a certain boutique brand that changed its name two or three times that foisted old crap found in abandoned tobacco warehouses and then gave the cigars kitschy names with campy artwork. Only to hide the fact that the cigars were not only overpriced but total drek as well.

If given the chance, I’d have opted for waterboarding this morning instead of this review. At least you get your face washed.

Naturally, at this point, the ash has decided to man up and hang on for dear life. And no char issues…Sure, just as I’m at the end…perform.

Even the creaminess has disappeared leaving a bit of white pepper on the palate that makes me think I’m eating a Slim Jim I found on the curb.
I can’t remember the last time I smoked a cigar that was totally devoid of all the criteria that is required to legally call itself a delivery system for a rollicking good time.
This is bullshit and I’m done. If I want to torture myself, I can watch an Abba music video.

RATING: 60 (I’m feeling generous)

And now for something completely different:

We had finished recording the first studio album I played on. Prior to this, I played on the “Live” album. So we went into seclusion while the violinist and guitarist and vocalist wrote songs. I was left out. So was the drummer. So I spent time at home doing my own writing.

Miles Copeland, the cheapskate, tried to save money by hiring a producer that had never produced before; only engineered. Granted, he had engineered the albums of the most famous rock bands of the time but producing is a totally different animal than engineering.

The band ran all over him and he couldn’t control the giant egos.
At the official playback of the album at the RCA office building, the suits hated the album.
The band was in shock, but not me.

The album was scrapped and Miles brought in a pair of brothers from America that were real hot shots. Not to mention really obnoxious.

We were in Amsterdam; always the start of our European tours.
Miles called and said the brothers were in town to watch us perform and talk to us.
A meeting was set up at their hotel but no one wanted to go but me. So I went.

These sons of bitches lambasted me on my playing, the production, the choice of songs and even my style of playing on stage. WTF?
They held nothing back and even said they hated the band. Hated?

Why were they chosen? Why would you choose producers that hated the band?
I sat and listened for an hour while the two ranted about everything. Nothing positive.

I went back to our hotel totally depressed and traumatized.
Everyone was in the chick’s room bull shitting. I told them I went to the meeting but they didn’t want to hear about it. I finally forced them to listen and told them what happened.
They all laughed. Such egos.

Well the laugh ended up being on me.
A meeting was held with the band excluding me. The brothers said something had to change. So the band picked me. I was the mediator between the two groups: the guitarist and the violinist….and the chick singer and the drummer. So who better to give the heave ho to than the bassist? Yeah, I was totally the problem with the album. I didn’t get anything of mine on the album and was told what to play. So naturally, it was my entire fault.
I got a call from Ian Copeland. He was the booker for Miles. And newly appointed to be Curved Air’s personal manager and his first duty was to fire me.

He told me he was coming out to Edgeware where I lived. About 15 miles outside of downtown London.
This freaked me out. Why was an important man like him coming all the way out to see me?

I called the chick singer. She finally broke down and told me what was up. I pleaded with her. A total mess. It was so humiliating.

Ian arrived and we sat in my living room. He hemmed and hawed and I couldn’t take it. Ian was a very down to earth guy. And it seemed that he was suffering.
“I know why you’re here, Ian. You’re firing me.”

A sigh of relief was on his face and then he dropped his head and agreed.
I told him that was not fair. What was BTM Records going to do for me for dough? Were they just going to cut me loose and send me on my way? Broke and living in a foreign land.

When I spoke to Miles about money, he told me to ask the band. Wow. This guy really knew how to humiliate me. I now had to go beg for money from the same people that fired me to save their own skins.

I went to one of their rehearsals. The violinist would not talk to me. A stand in bassist was playing with them already.
The band basically blew me off. I left the place wondering how I was going to live.

Thank God for the roadies. I was the only one in the band to treat these guys like humans. The others treated them like slaves.

So when they heard what happened, they approached the managing director. Not only would this asshole not budge, but he told them to get my bass back! I bought my bass from Martin Turner of Wishbone Ash. They were Copeland’s first band. And because they fronted me the dough, the bass was theirs.
This infuriated the roadies so they grabbed a huge lorry and went to the storage area of the record company. The loaded the truck with expensive equipment and drove to my home.

They unloaded it in my garage and told me to sell it all.
No one from management did or said a thing about this. Guilt.

So I sold everything and had money in my pocket. I stayed another 6 months but gave up. I bought tickets and got on an airplane with my girlfriend and her little girl.
Big time rock and roll is an ugly business.

Categories: CIGAR REVIEWS

Tags: cigar review, cigar reviews by the katman, cigars, Whipped Cream by Cigar Federation | Cigar Reviews by the Katman