Joya De Nicaragua Cabinetta Serie

Yes, I am at the slacker spot this week once again. I’d like to blame Daniel for this, but alas, he’s been keeping up with his game. Therefore, I will just blame Canada. Today’s review is Joya De Nicaragua Cabinetta Serie.

As many of you may know, I tend to stick on the more Full Bodied end of the cigar strength spectrum. It’s not often that you will catch me smoking mild cigars. Not that I have anything against them, but I just always seem to grab a full-bodied maduro whenever I reach into my humidor. Lately though, especially as summer approaches, I have caught myself for the first time grabbing lighter bodied cigars over the full. No idea why, it has to be a weather thing. That being said, this Joya De Nicaragua Cabinetta is a great go-to that fills that milder cigar need. Daniel actually did a blind review of this cigar if you want to check that out as well. Ok, enough rambling, lets get to the review.

The Good Stuff: As most of you know, Drew Estate is now distributing Joya De Nicaragua. That being said, you know you are getting a quality product. Joya De Nicaragua is known more so for their powerful cigars (The Antano 1979, and Dark Corojo are STRONG!), but this is one of the first ventures into the mild/medium category that this company has taken. The Cabinetta Serie boasts a dual wrapper construction. The combination of the 75% Ecuadorian Shade Grown wrapper and the remaining Nicaraguan Criollo Wrapper are intending to give the cigar a very unique taste and aroma.

The Cabinetta Serie comes in boxes of 24 and are made in 4 different sizes: No. 2 (Belicoso 6×54), No. 4 (Robusto 5×52), No. 7 (Toro 6×50), and the size that I am reviewing now, and my favorite out of the four,  the No. 11 (Corona Gorda 5.25×46).  The cost of the cigars are very reasonable too ranging from $5 to about $6.50.

Size:  5.25 x 46  –  Wrapper: Ecuadorian Shade/Nicaraguan Criollo  –  Binder/Filler: Nicaraguan  –  Body: Medium

Prelight: The Joya De Nicaragua Cabinetta has an obvious twist to it, being “Dos Cappa”, or Dual Wrapper. The cigar starts off with a very light brown and orange wrapper that leads up to a very firm, dark, almost maduro wrapper towards the rounded double cap. Neither the lighter wrapper, nor the darker wrapper really show any veins. The lighter Ecuadorian wrapper seems very thing and delicate though (I always think Ecuadorian tobacco is fragile), as the Criollo wrapper is thick and strong (much like me). There are very slight soft spots towards the foot of the cigar, but nothing concerning.

The lighter Ecuadorian wrapper, and the foot of the cigar give off just a ton of very sweet, cedar white it was near impossible to really get any scent from the Criollo wrap. The cap clipped very easily using my double bladed palio cutter. The sweet, cedar taste carried into the cold draw, and I really hope it carries into the entire experience. I pulled a tiny bit of spice from that cold draw as well.

First Smoke: Now if I would have to classify the first half of this cigar, I would have to compare it to the ideal tastes one would get off of a cinnamon dulce latte. The cigar starts off with this just burst of sweet cinnamon leaving behind some great cedar tastes as well as some cocoa and coffee. The Cabinetta lit up with extreme ease, it was almost ridiculous how fast the foot toasted. The draw is very easy, clean, and really kicks out a tick cloud of smoke. However, I really didn’t get too much in the stationary smoke department. The burnline started out all sorts of crazy, probably due to the easy lighting of the foot, but quickly corrected itself and is now burning dead even leaving behind a nice trail of semi-flaky whitish grey ash. The first ash fell of surprisingly soon (an all over my lap) at only about a third of an inch in. Again, this was probably due to the softness of the tobacco packed into the foot of the cigar.

Halfway There: Again, I don’t smoke Medium or Light bodied cigars awesome, but I am really enjoying the vast amount of flavor the Cabinetta brings to the table. The Flavors haven’t changed up too much except a lot more of the coffee flavor sneaking in, but every little puff is just so flavorful. The burnline is really thick, and tends to have a mind of its own, but is always quickly pulled back to an even burn. The retrohale is awesome. Tons of cedar and cinnamon priming with just a little spice burn. The cigar is medium by far and I am not feeling any nicotine at all from this stick.

Finish: I was expecting a nice little flavor changeup once I entered the Criollo portion of this Joya De Nicaragua Cabinetta, but I just didn’t get it. Maybe the maduro portion is just too deep into the cigar. If any difference was really made, it may have smoothed the cigar out into the finish cause this cigar finished off incredibly smooth. The flavors really matched up with a heavy creamed coffee with milk chocolate and a little natural tobacco mixed in. All in all it took me about an hour to smoke this cigar from start to finish and I felt absolutely no nicotine in the slightest.

Overview: What can I say, I love yet another mild cigar. This cigar’s massive flavor, smooth smoke, decent price, and overall pleasant experience make for just a perfect everyday smoke. This is really a great box purchase if you stumble across them. Ideal for the everyday smoker looking for something that will blend in throughout the day, and perfect for the novice smoker without knocking them on his ass.

Pairing: I decided to pair this Joya De Nicaragua with some Flying Dog, Snake Dog IPA. I’m not one to go for an IPA as they usually overpower the cigar, but the nice warm, summer weather combined with the lighter cigar made for a great pairing. At a little over 7.2% the Snake Dog IPA’s hoppy, citrus flavor meshed in perfectly with the sweet cinnamon of the Cabinetta. Outside of an IPA, or Trippel, I can’t think of a better pairing for this cigar than some black coffee, or sweet tea. Cheers!