Email this feature to a friend

Part Two: Las Vegas Big Smoke Saturday Seminars

The Blind Tasting

Posted: Wednesday, November 14, 2007

By Gregory Mottola  

Gordon Mott (left) with David Savona at the start of The Blind Tasting seminar.

Ever wonder what it's like to be a Cigar Aficionado taster? This past weekend more than 500 Big Smoke attendees got to do just that. With a little guidance from some of the members of Cigar Aficionado's official tasting panel, everyone at the Blind Tasting Seminar evaluated two cigars that they had been given to smoke, both of which had their labels removed and replaced with a numbered band.

It was a fairly simple operation, and one that was actually an extension of my job as tasting coordinator for the magazine, which basically means that I go to retail shops, primarily in the New York City area, and purchase cigars to be reviewed. Then I remove the bands, replace them with numbered bands and pass them out to the tasters. But this time, rather than orchestrating a tasting for five or six smokers, I did a tasting for 500, and even participated myself, something I don't do as part of Cigar Aficionado or Cigar Insider tastings, as I'm the guardian of each cigar's true identity. It didn't matter in this case because I tried to put the prior knowledge of the cigars out of my mind and decided to have some fun.

An audience member smokes one of the blind tasting cigars with a numbered white band.

Two of the regular panel tasters, Gordon Mott, the executive editor of the magazine, and senior editor David Savona, explained to the audience the process by which a taster studies, analyzes and deconstructs a cigar.

"When you're smoking a cigar, pay attention to what's happening on your palate," advised Mott. "If you think about it, you will come up with associations, and there are taste categories in cigars that are pretty specific to tobacco."

Appearance and combustion are graded, flavors are identified (coffee, leather, cocoa, etc.), and ultimately the smoker determines how harmoniously and balanced the flavors work together on the palate. Is there an overwhelming amount of one flavor? Are there layers of flavors? Do they remain static or is there a change throughout the smoking experience? All these factors are considered when giving a cigar its final rating. The 100-point system that we use is fairly straightforward and everyone knows what it means when a cigar scores 92 points. It's like getting an A on a term paper in school.

About halfway through the seminar, the panel was taken by surprise when Marvin R. Shanken, editor and publisher of Cigar Aficionado, decided to emerge from the audience along with James Suckling, the magazine's European editor, and join the panel onstage.

Marvin R. Shanken and James Suckling join in the tasting.

"As founders, we thought that perhaps you might need some supervision," said Shanken, jokingly. He brought a jovial air to the stage, but one can't always tell when Shanken is joking or when he is being completely serious.

"It's the suits versus the nonsuits," said Suckling, adding that the tasting panel gives extra points to a cigar if they can blow smoke rings with it.

As they were smoking and discussing the different aspects of the cigars, Mott addressed a point that has been very controversial: the relationship between advertisers and the ratings and whether advertising could potentially affect scores.

"We have had over the life of the magazine some very consistent advertisers," said Mott, "and at one point it was literally 10 years into the history of the magazine and I went out and asked our tasting coordinator to do an average score for every brand that we had ever tasted. He came back and handed me the list, and the lowest rating for a cigar brand was owned by one of our largest advertisers. So if in fact what people suspect to be true that you can buy a rating, then those people weren't buying very much."

Tasting is serious business, but it's not without its laughs as James Suckling comments during the event.

As I mentioned earlier, I orchestrated the test for this seminar, which meant that none of the tasters on the panel knew precisely what they were smoking. (Savona had seen some of the cigars as they came into the office; Mott, Shanken and Suckling had no idea what the cigars were.) I took this tasting very seriously as far as keeping the identities of the cigars secret so that other tasters were as much in the dark as the entire audience.

Time started to run out and Mott asked for a show of hands as to who liked cigar number one better, and then cigar number two. Mott asked the panelists to share their opinions with the audience. Savona preferred number one, citing its good construction, draw and flavors. Mott and Suckling, however, preferred number two. They felt that it was a better made cigar and preferred the overall flavor profile.

After some audience feedback about the cigars, I brought up the envelope -- as though it were Cigar Emmy Awards -- so the identities of the cigars could be disclosed. But before they could be announced, something happened. Mott had forgotten to ask Shanken -- his employer -- what he thought about the cigars.

"Gordon?" Shanken interrupted. "Although you didn't ask…" The audience began to chuckle at the tone of indignation and annoyance. Mott looked at the crowd and asked, "Anybody out there got a job? 'Cause I may be looking for one."

Savona suddenly interjected, "Marvin, what did you think of the cigars?" and the audience laughed harder.

"Obviously," Shanken continued, "Gordon didn't ask because he didn't care. David, although, is very attentive and career-minded. David has a great future with Cigar Aficionado." Shanken then shared his thoughts on the cigars, preferring the draw and earthy flavors of cigar number two, scoring it 93 points. Savona jumped in again: "I'd like to change my score to cigar number two." This show of sycophancy got a huge laugh from the crowd.

"Either change your score or change your underwear," answered Shanken, hopefully in jest.

Cigar number one was revealed as the C.A.O. Cameroon Toro, a cigar that has previously rated 90 points in the magazine. I had thought it would be a good choice for the test because of the complexities and distinct flavors that the Cameroon wrapper could impart. The second cigar was the Hoyo de Monterrey Excalibur Prensado, one of the few box-pressed cigars made by Swedish Match AB's General Cigar Co. subsidiary. It's a dark cigar with a very rich flavor profile that is profoundly different from Cameroon cigars, and I had thought that it would be a great way to challenge the palates of the Big Smokers. It also rated 90 points in the magazine.

In the end, everyone was able to better identify flavors and make associations between smells (olfactory images, if you want to be fancy) and the flavors they get from a cigar. I always have an advantage over the Cigar Aficionado tasters, though. They smoke the cigar and rate it blind. When they turn in their 90-plus scores at the magazine, only I know what they have smoked, and than I get to light up something that Savona gave a 93 or Mott gave a 95. Someone at the end of the seminar asked me, "So how do I get your job?" I answered, "You'd have to kill me." The guy took a very pensive puff of his cigar, looked over at his friends, and the three of them exchanged a knowing look I hope to never see again.

CLICK HERE TO SEE OUR LAS VEGAS BIG SMOKE PHOTO GALLERY.

 Cigar Aficionado RSS Feed
Copyright ©2008 CigarAficionado.com

All Rights Reserved.
If you're concerned about privacy, click here.