This past weekend, I was lucky enough to celebrate my birthday. In honor of this solar circuit, I requested to have my friends with dogs bring their puppers over for an ice cream social. I am pleased to report that giving doggo friendly ice cream to sweet canines was just as enjoyable as I had hoped. I did not expect, but was extremely surprised when my friends brought me a plethora of cigars. It is indeed a fabulous first world problem to have a full humidor. The most prevalent present, one of my favorites: Asylum 13. I have written about the corona in the past, I would like to talk about their Ogre version with the really nice Barber pole tobacco effect.
This slender version of the Asylum 13 Ogre doesn’t let anything down in terms of how it smokes. While they made it skinnier, it’s much longer than a corona, so it smokes in about the same amount of time. I feel that the light Candela and dark Habano tobacco in the barber pole wrapper actually meld into a nice middle ground between light and medium bodied cigar. I would definitely classify this as a smoother natural cigar. A bigger ring size is available of this stick, but this size was perfect for me.
Before cutting, the slender Asylum Ogre smells of leather, coffee, chocolate, and the cut-grass-green-aroma of the Candela tobacco. When it’s cut, the darker tobacco filler makes it presence known and starts to take over most of the aroma. After lighting, the first 3rd of the cigar is very leather and tobacco, with a smooth draw. Getting to the mid point of the stick, some of that chocolate and coffee starts to edge in. At this point, the draw got a little uneven, but not necessarily tough. The cigar finishes with a really nice coffee-tobacco-leather melding of all of the previous flavors. For the smoke itself, I get lots of chocolate and coffee nuances tinged with the green aroma from the stripe of Candela, but not a lot of bite and pepper like I usually get in the full corona of the Asylum 13.
In the past, I have paired the Asylum 13 with a dark, dry red wine with much success. The Ogre was also very tasty with a solid Merlot, and I would suspect that it would also pair well with root beer, coffee, or a nice dark beer. I was lucky enough to be gifted a few delicious gluten free Endeavours for my birthday, and cigars always go well with that. The cigar was also delicious after my non-traditional birthday treat: coconut milk ice cream with gf cookie dough bits, a half shot of Jameson, chocolate and caramel sauces, bacon bits, and happy little sprinkles. I consider myself lucky to be able to thank so many people for such a fantastic birthday!
