La Aurora Corojo

It’s been awhile since we had a review up from the good people at La Aurora. They had a stellar year in 2010 with a bunch of good releases that were accepted to much fanfare. This is blend came out closer to the end of the year and seems to have garnered a lot less press than the other blends did during that year. The blend I’m talking about is the La Aurora Corojo.

As you might be able to guess from the name of the cigar, this blend comes with a Corojo wrapper. The leaf is grown in Ecuador, and so is the binder. Now the interesting part of this blend is that the binder is a Sumatra leaf. Typically in the cigar world I see a lot of Corojo cigars packed with Ligero or Habano leaf which typically gives them a spicier appeal. The fact that a Sumatra leaf is used as the binder offers an interesting change of pace since these leaves tend to have sweet or creamy notes. We’ll have to see how that plays out.

The band on the La Aurora Corojo has the classic “La Aurora” Lion logo and text with second band that has “Corojo” text written near the bottom of the band. The second band mimics the exact same ones you can find on the La Aurora 1495 line (See my review of the La Aurora 1495 Connecticut). They seem to have a knack for creating nice clean bands, I seem to like them all.

It seems that there isn’t much history or interesting back stories to tell when it comes to this cigar. It was released during a busy year from La Aurora and around the same time that the Guillermo Leon Signature (Reviewed here) and Miami Cigars Nestor Miranda Art Deco (Reviewed here). That same year also saw the release of the La Aurora 107 which was a huge hit and fan favorite (We have a review of the 107 in Corona and Robusto available). So you can see how this cigar may have gotten missed on a lot of people’s radars. So did it stand up as another good release in the La Aurora line up? I guess you’ll have to read on to find out!

Cigar: La Aurora Corojo
Drink: Unibroue La Fin du Monde
Vitola: Robusto (5 x 50)
Wrapper: Ecuadorian Corojo
Binder: Ecuadorian Sumatra
Filler: Dominican and Nicaraguan
Price: About $6.00
Burn Time: Just over 1 hour

Construction:
• Now this is a fairly rugged looking cigar, the first thing I noticed was all the bumps it had along with a few medium sized veins
• Despite some roughness, there is a nice oily shine coming off the warm golden brown wrapper on the La Aurora Corojo
• The top of the cigar is finished with a neatly applied single cap
• The foot of the cigar is moderately packed with 2 small gaps in the filler
• There is plenty of spring to this cigar wen squeezed, especially near the cap
• My double bladed guillotine cutter made easy work of the cap with a smooth and even cut
• The draw is disappointingly open right now, very hard to get a good mouthful of smoke
• Within the first inch, the draw seemed to tighten up a bit to a comfortable point

Burn:
• Toasting of the foot took a little longer than expected, it just didn’t seem to want to catch
• Took a few more touch-ups near the beginning to get off and running evenly
• Had a wonky burn start after the first ash that required me to touch it up again, was burning only on half the cigar
• It seemed that I needed to re-light or touch up every time after I ashed, luckily it didn’t affect the flavors much

Smoke & Ash:
• The very open draw is making it hard to judge the smoke output here but after taking a few draws it seems to produce a nice thick smoke
• The initial ash is not exactly pretty since I had a few touch-ups here, it’s very dark grey/black and also quite uneven and flaking
• After the draw tightened up I was getting very nice thick mouthfuls of smoke with easy draws
• Since the initial ash was a little messy I decided to tap it off after about 1 inch to avoid it landing in my lap or on the floor
• The smoke seemed to get even thicker in the last half of the cigar, really coating your palate with all the interesting flavors

Tasting Notes:
• The wrapper on the La Aurora Corojo is fairly plain with just a minor cedar aroma and the slightest hint of spice
• The foot tells a much different story bring plenty of cedar and a sweet floral bouquet, very unique for a Corojo cigar
• The pre-light draws brings more cedar flavors along with more of the peppery spices,the sweet floral seems missing here now
• The first few draws seem to be a mostly creamy woodsiness, I’m not picking up any of the floral or spice so far
• The body is right in the low end of medium and the retrohale has a small bite with a smooth cedar finish
• After about an inch, some mild peppery spices started to creep in but they are balancing well and not overpowering anything
• As the La Aurora Corojo progresses, the spices are slowly gaining some prominence but are still balancing well with the smooth creamy woodsiness
• I’m picking up a sort of buttery flavor in there which is really tying everything together nicely
• The tasty mix of buttery, creamy, woodsy and spicy flavors continued right through in the last third
• The interesting mix of flavors and that awesome buttery finish continued into the nub and up until my fingers were burning
• There was very little harshness or bitterness to the nub, a great finish to a tasty cigar

Final Thoughts:
Even with some funky burn issues I found the La Aurora Corojo to be a tasty cigar and an enjoyable experience. The mix of flavors isn’t overly complex but they are balanced, enjoyable and flavorful. The burn issues definitely knocked it down a few points but they didn’t affect the flavor much so I still got to enjoy the cigar. The price on these is fair for the cigar that I got so I will likely be picking these up again in the near future. Perhaps the few I had were a bad batch in the burn department, could have also been the colder weather? The unique flavors on this one is what will bring me back for more!

Pairings:
Yes it’s another Unibroue beer. Why? Because everything they make is super awesome! The brew I picked out today is La Fin du Monde which seems to be their most popular and most widely available. I also paired this with the Arturo Fuente Hemingway Short Story not too long ago. As expected, this triple-fermented ale on lees delivers a TON of flavor. There is some fruitiness, malt, a bit ofa creamy undertone and it’s super smooth. Even at 9%alc./vol. this ale goes down with a perfect balance of flavors. I was a little concerned the Corojo was gonna be a bit spicy for this beer but it actually worked out wonderfully. The La Aurora Corojo blend was equally smooth and flavorful and balanced extremely well with this brew. I think a nice amber or blonde beer pair perfectly here, maybe even a cup of tea. There are a lot of good flavors in the cigar so I wouldn’t pick out anything too strong as a pairing.