Ep. #177: Stoic Cigars Courage (April Fools' Day Blind Review w/ Flor de Caña 18, PCA 2025 Preview, Dunbarton and Davidoff New Releases, Senator's Patio is Open & Lizard Henrito Joins Post-Rating to Reveal the Cigar)

Episode Transcript
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Gizmo (02:47):
Welcome to the Lounge Lizards podcast presented by
Fabric of Five. It's so good tohave you here. It's a leisure
and lifestyle podcast founded onour love of premium cigars as
well as whiskey travel, food,work, and whatever else we feel
like getting into. My name isGizmo. Tonight, I'm joined by
Rooster, Senator, Pagoda, chefRicky, and Bam Bam, and a plan
is to smoke a cigar, drink somerum, talk about life, and, of

(03:08):
course, have some laughs.
So take this as your one hundredand seventy seventh official
invitation to join us and becomea card carrying lounge lizard.
Planet news here once a week.We're gonna spoke at New World
cigar tonight, share ourthoughts on it, and give you our
formal lizard rating. We do ourfirst ever full panel blind
cigar review tonight with ashocking result. Lizard Henrito
joins us to reveal the detailspost rating, and we preview PCA

(03:31):
twenty twenty five in NewOrleans, all among a variety of
other things for the next twohours.
So sit back, get your favoritedrink, light up a cigar, enjoy
as we pair 18 year aged FloridaCana rum with stoic cigars,
courage. What looks to be aRobusto on the pod tonight,
boys? It's our first ever fullpanel blind. Including me, no

(03:52):
one in this room has any ideawhat the cigar is that we have
in our hands. It has no bands onit.
Nothing. It was all removedbefore it was given to us. Our
friend, Lizard Henrito, who wetalk about a lot on the pod,
good friend of ours. He is amember of our lounge, procured
these for us, and made sure thatwe had no indication what these

(04:13):
cigars are other than, I guessthis is Robusto. Something like
Not

Bam Bam (04:19):
only does it look mysterious, but I'm not getting
any aroma on the wrapper or thefoot. Very light.

Pagoda (04:26):
Like a very light milk chocolate or something.

Senator (04:28):
Yeah. Get a light aroma, but

Gizmo (04:29):
it's actually very pleasant. Do you say milk
chocolate if you

Senator (04:31):
go to I agree.

Gizmo (04:33):
It's very oily. It feels like it has a sheen on it in
your hand.

Senator (04:37):
Yeah. And smell the foot, Bam. Yeah. That's where I
get more of the milk chocolate.

Gizmo (04:41):
Yeah. So what ring gauge do you guys think this is? I'm
thinking it's somewhere betweenforty eight and fifty. Looks
like 50. Would say 50.

Pagoda (04:50):
Yeah. What's it like? 49 plus or

Gizmo (04:52):
49 plus. Exactly. Pagoda?

Bam Bam (04:55):
I'd say 48.

Pagoda (04:57):
I'm gonna go 50.

Gizmo (04:58):
Alright. Well, let's cut this thing, boys. See, we're
getting on the cold draw and thewrapper. So some listeners who
are old, you know, old schoollisteners, OGs, let's say of the
podcast would remember that wedid a blind. I think it was like
episode nine or 13 or somethingmany, many moons ago when we
were rookies.
Grinder provided the cigaractually correct, and we haven't

(05:20):
revisited it since. We did thatin our rookie days, so we were
scarred by that experience. Ittook

Senator (05:25):
us a hundred and something episodes to come back
to it.

Bam Bam (05:26):
It's true. I don't I don't remember what that was.

Gizmo (05:28):
A lot

Senator (05:29):
of times. I remember.

Gizmo (05:29):
It's not good. Was in. Wow. Nice job, Ricky.

Bam Bam (05:33):
Right. Look at you. Big fan.

Gizmo (05:36):
So what are you guys getting on the cold draw here on

Bam Bam (05:38):
our Well, I will say I just took the very extreme cap
off. The draw is wide open.

Pagoda (05:43):
Mhmm.

Bam Bam (05:43):
So it's a well made at the moment, well made cigar.
Same.

Gizmo (05:46):
This is an incredibly flavorful cold draw here. I'm
getting fig. I'm gettingsweetness.

Bam Bam (05:53):
Yeah. It's sweeter.

Chef (05:54):
Yeah. It is. I'm not that enthusiastic about the cold draw
on my end.

Gizmo (05:58):
Not yet. Awesome.

Bam Bam (06:00):
Yeah. Faint apple I'm getting maybe.

Gizmo (06:03):
I'm getting more like a Fig Newton, a bready Fig Newton.
Mhmm.

Rooster (06:06):
Yeah. Definitely Fig Newton. Very flavorful.

Pagoda (06:10):
Oh, yeah. Meaning, it's yeah. It's a Fig Newton. Yeah.
No.
No. It's

Bam Bam (06:18):
It's life. It's

Pagoda (06:21):
I'll tell you when Tuck does the By

Gizmo (06:24):
the way, that bam. Let me just reference

Senator (06:26):
a little listener.

Gizmo (06:27):
That's one of my favorite clips Me too. That has ever
existed on this podcast was therating on the Cohiba Siglo six.
Pagoda just sang, life.

Chef (06:38):
It's great.

Gizmo (06:39):
Unbelievable clip.

Pagoda (06:41):
No, I was just saying that, you know, my tongue just
touched the end of the tip, andmy initial thing was, and I know
it's a bit off, but tea,initial. And then it went into
like, I

Bam Bam (06:52):
agree with that.

Pagoda (06:52):
Little black tea. Then it moved into like the
sweetness. Definitely. And it'sactually just left a really,
really pleasant flavor. Like,it's pretty it seems like it
should be a very flavorfulcigar.

Gizmo (07:04):
Alright, boys. Well, let's light this thing. Our
April fools blind cigar tonight.We're gonna see if we're fools
or not. And it looks to be aRobusto

Pagoda (07:13):
Oh, damn. It's a Xeno, isn't it?

Gizmo (07:15):
Ring gauge cigar by five inches long. I would love it if
it was a Xeno for rooster'ssake. And lizard Henrico is
gonna come in after we rate,give his rating on the cigar
because he smoked it prior tous, and he's going to share the
make, the model, and componentsof our blind cigar tonight. The

(07:37):
only thing we know about thiscigar is that it is not Cuban.
It is a new world.
That's all we know tonight.

Bam Bam (07:43):
Yeah. That's obvious.

Pagoda (07:47):
I don't know. It it could it it looks Cubanist. The
wrapper seems very thin.

Gizmo (07:51):
Oh.

Pagoda (07:53):
Doesn't the wrapper feel very thin?

Gizmo (07:55):
Pagoda found his mic.

Pagoda (07:56):
Oh, yeah. Finally.

Gizmo (07:57):
The wrapper does feel thin. This is very pleasant on
the light.

Chef (08:03):
So far so good.

Gizmo (08:04):
Yeah. I would say I'm getting like a coffee thing, a
little salt. Very nice.

Bam Bam (08:12):
Maybe a little butter. That's salty butter.

Chef (08:17):
Getting a little strength. I'm getting a little, some
spice, some pepper on theretrohale there.

Bam Bam (08:22):
It's very toasty. Yeah. There's a toast thing going on
here.

Chef (08:26):
Something that's very similar in flavor to the,
toasted marshmallow you werespeaking of a few weeks back.
Yeah. Getting some of that here.

Bam Bam (08:33):
The burnt part of it. Pretty nice.

Gizmo (08:37):
I like it. Yeah. I actually like this quite a bit.

Chef (08:40):
Yeah. Very milky on me all of a sudden.

Senator (08:44):
Yeah. It's creamy. Yeah. There's like a creaminess
and even a slight viscosity tothe smoke that I just feel like
marries up all the flavorsreally nicely.

Gizmo (08:53):
And as I draw it, I'm getting a sweetness on the front
of my tongue.

Senator (08:58):
That's where I

Gizmo (08:58):
was going. Oh, that's I'm sorry. No. No. No.
As as the smoke takes over yourmouth, your tongue is kinda
highlighted by, like, a sugarcomponent.

Bam Bam (09:07):
Right at the front.

Pagoda (09:07):
Yeah.

Senator (09:08):
Yeah. It leans more sweet than savory.

Gizmo (09:11):
Which I like in a in a new world.

Bam Bam (09:13):
You know, if this takes a roller coaster ride back and
forth, that would be incredible.

Pagoda (09:19):
I like the smoke output. It's really nice.

Gizmo (09:21):
Oh, Smoke output

Pagoda (09:22):
is Open drawer.

Chef (09:24):
Yeah. It's checking off a lot of boxes.

Bam Bam (09:26):
Brewster.

Rooster (09:27):
It's easy to smoke, meaning it's not,

Bam Bam (09:32):
It's not harsh.

Pagoda (09:32):
Yeah, absolutely.

Gizmo (09:33):
You don't

Rooster (09:33):
get that pepper blast in the beginning. You're getting
actually a sweet like there's alot of sweetness right on the
light, which is different thanmost cigars. Feels like it's a
Steve Sakka cigar.

Chef (09:44):
Yeah. Maybe safe to say it's not a Nicaraguan or not
heavy Nicaraguan blend there.

Pagoda (09:49):
There's definitely no Nicaraguan, at least from what I
understand that. It's an info.

Gizmo (09:53):
I'm not I'm not comfortable saying that yet.

Senator (09:56):
I just think though, to the point that a number of the
guys are making, on the light, Idon't get anything
Nicaraguanesque. I get more likeDominican Correct. Maybe a
little Honduran.

Pagoda (10:06):
Honduran, yeah.

Senator (10:08):
Because it's a very approachable, easygoing,
creamier kind of smoke.

Bam Bam (10:13):
Endurance, creamier Honestly, it's like a fab five
experience right now. Thosecigars.

Gizmo (10:18):
Could you imagine if Henrito

Bam Bam (10:21):
I bet. A different flavor.

Gizmo (10:22):
Five in

Pagoda (10:23):
our hands tonight. Exactly what I thought.

Senator (10:25):
The honestly, the thing this tastes the most similar to
to me is the trinity ribuso.

Rooster (10:29):
Yeah. Can you imagine?

Senator (10:31):
Because there's like a sweetness about it and also like
a nuttiness there.

Bam Bam (10:38):
But that has a pigtail, doesn't it?

Senator (10:39):
Yeah. Yeah. Does it really? Did I?

Pagoda (10:41):
It does.

Gizmo (10:42):
It does.

Senator (10:42):
Oh, wow.

Gizmo (10:43):
Yeah. Alright. That's a good point, Bam. Yeah. I cut it
without even looking, but thisdoes not have a pigtail.
So that would

Bam Bam (10:48):
pull up.

Senator (10:48):
Them rolled without pigtails just to

Gizmo (10:50):
throw He called

Senator (10:50):
Rob. That's right.

Chef (10:51):
And I feel like the wrapper on the Trini Robusto is
a little bit darker.

Bam Bam (10:54):
It is maybe a touch, but honestly it's smoking a lot
like the Trinity I feel like thewrapper's a bit more robust, not
too too thin. Definitely not asoccer cigar.

Gizmo (11:08):
I'm not getting

Bam Bam (11:08):
These cigars are pristine.

Senator (11:10):
This is not what

Pagoda (11:11):
this is.

Gizmo (11:11):
I want to eliminate flavors. I'm not getting any
pepper. No. No spice. Otherthings that we often call out.
Are you getting any coffee?

Rooster (11:21):
More like milk chocolate.

Gizmo (11:23):
Milk chocolate. Yeah.

Chef (11:24):
Yep. Milk chocolate, maybe a a latte esque flavor. Like,
there's definitely a very creamycomponent to this where it's not
just straight coffee.

Bam Bam (11:32):
No leather like a Padron.

Chef (11:34):
Yeah. No leather. It's not earthy.

Senator (11:36):
It's not earthy.

Bam Bam (11:37):
No. It's not mint there's no minerality there. All
good things.

Pagoda (11:43):
And and that is why, like, I thought that maybe it's
an acrogan. Maybe we we tend tosmoke maduros, and, you know,
which is earthy, sweet, peppery,leathery. We are getting none of
that. So that's why I wasthinking it could

Bam Bam (11:55):
be easier to eliminate. This is not a Madura wrapper.

Pagoda (11:57):
No, not at all. This is absolutely not.

Senator (12:02):
And there's like a faint fruit note in there. Yeah.
Like going back to your FigNewton comment, like, some kind
of dried fruit in thebackground.

Chef (12:11):
Oh, did you say dried fruit?

Senator (12:14):
Someone's got it. As long as it's not

Bam Bam (12:17):
bad. I'm not allowed to.

Chef (12:19):
Yeah, I don't know if it's because it's been a couple days
for me without a cigar. I'mgetting a little bit of

Pagoda (12:25):
Are you

Senator (12:25):
feeling okay? I'm Well,

Chef (12:27):
everything's Your place on it was the last cigar.

Senator (12:30):
Oh wow. Well we put in plenty of work.

Chef (12:32):
Yeah we did.

Senator (12:32):
That'll last you for a few days. I

Gizmo (12:35):
want to ask you guys about that in a little bit.

Chef (12:36):
Yeah I'm getting a little of a nicotine tingle here.

Bam Bam (12:39):
You

Chef (12:40):
know, not in a bad way. Not that it's overpowering but
it's definitely noticeable forme.

Bam Bam (12:45):
I'm not getting any of that. It's pure pleasure with
this thing right now.

Chef (12:50):
Oh, it's not an unpleasurable thing for me. I
don't mind it.

Bam Bam (12:53):
The aroma is still getting that toastiness, but
there's a slight faint flourtype thing, potpourri mix in
there, which I really like alot.

Senator (13:05):
Smell the burn line. That's where you're getting what
Bam's talking about.

Bam Bam (13:09):
Toast and

Senator (13:09):
I also get some baking spice on there.

Bam Bam (13:11):
Toast, baking spice, and a little bit of a potpourri,
just a touch. This is

Gizmo (13:15):
This is a nice cigar.

Bam Bam (13:16):
It's surprisingly good. Surprisingly good.

Gizmo (13:19):
Doesn't feel one dimensional to me. Like, it
feels dynamic, and it feels likethere's a journey that's going
to be had here. Like, it'sreally piquing my interest.

Bam Bam (13:27):
Yeah.

Gizmo (13:27):
A lot of times we talk about even some of the good New
Worlds we smoke, they're verylinear. They're very one flavor
dominant, straight through allthe way. They give you know,
it's like a race car goingstraight down, you know, a a
track. This this is somethingthat it might be more of a as
Bam was saying, like a littlebit of a journey.

Chef (13:45):
Let me

Senator (13:46):
ask this.

Bam Bam (13:46):
Well, I'm hoping it's a journey.

Chef (13:47):
Yeah. Right. Does this taste like anything any of you
have ever smoked before? Thisseems like a new journey for me.

Senator (13:53):
To me, this is the closest thing I've had to the
Trini Robusto.

Bam Bam (13:56):
I agree with that. Yeah. Hard to compare it to
anything else.

Pagoda (14:03):
It feels very Cuban esque to me. I don't know.

Bam Bam (14:07):
Yeah. Not enough salt for me to say that.

Pagoda (14:09):
Yeah. But I'm

Gizmo (14:09):
I'm getting And it's little more full,

Bam Bam (14:11):
I would say. It's fuller than

Chef (14:12):
the Cuban. It's definitely fuller bodied. I am getting a
very kind of a fresh tea notehere, you know.

Bam Bam (14:20):
Pagoda mentioned that earlier. Think that's a
legitimate

Chef (14:23):
It kind of reminds me of jasmine almost.

Pagoda (14:25):
Mhmm.

Senator (14:27):
The thing I like about the construction of this so
everyone commented how open thedraw was initially, and I feel
like whenever you cut a cigarand you have a really open draw,
half the time or most of thetime when you're smoking it, it
burns pretty quickly. The waythis is packed with tobacco, I
can tell like, you can take yourtime with this. It's not gonna

(14:48):
burn fast.

Gizmo (14:49):
Yeah.

Senator (14:50):
And I I really like that. I think the flavor profile
is so good. It'd be tempting tosmoke this quickly, but I think
it's gonna muddle the flavors. Ifeel like we're gonna get a good
amount of time out of

Rooster (14:59):
this cigar.

Bam Bam (14:59):
I I think it's a great point. There's some density to
this thing.

Gizmo (15:02):
Does feel was gonna say it feels weighty in the hand.

Rooster (15:04):
It's not it's not loosely packed.

Pagoda (15:06):
No. It's a very well made. Very well made.

Bam Bam (15:09):
Very well made.

Senator (15:09):
But to have that weight to it with such a perfect draw
Yep. It's not easy to do.

Gizmo (15:14):
You remember what we experienced with the Mona Cristo
White Edmundo where most of us,I think, finished that in Mhmm.
Forty minutes.

Senator (15:20):
Yeah. Is that the one we all lit up like a second
cigar? Yeah.

Gizmo (15:23):
We lit up a second cigar inside the episode because we'd
only gotten forty minutes out ofit, we had a lot to talk about.
We were having fun too, butthis, to your point, does seem
like a cigar that's of a similarsize, actually maybe a little
smaller, and seems like it couldbe something you get an hour,
hour, hour fifteen out of. Yeah.You know? I'm pretty into this.

Chef (15:43):
So I'm curious because on the pairing, were you given
anything to pick a pairing oryou just want

Senator (15:49):
to say for

Gizmo (15:50):
all that? That's a great question. So I'm going to
answer. I'm going to talk firstabout how I set this up to kind
of, you know, answer yourquestion with that, and then
I'll talk about the pairing. Solet me lay out how I asked
Lizard Henrito to do thisproject for us.
So way back, I was talking toTuxedo Timmy. He said, you guys
need to try a blind again. Isaid, you know what? That's a
great idea. I looked at thecalendar.

(16:11):
I saw for the first time thatTuesday was going to be April 1.
So April fools. So I said, youknow what? Let's try to fool
ourselves and see if we can nailwhat a blind cigar really is.
And that would mean that none ofus have any idea how, you know,
this cigar came into the roomand what it is.
So what I said to Lizard Henrywere three things. Number one,

(16:33):
it needs to be a cigar that is$40 or less. We always get 10,
so I Venmoed him $400. I said,Just get them, and then after we
figure out what the price is,you can send back the balance.

Bam Bam (16:44):
No split wise.

Gizmo (16:46):
I said, Number two, it has to be non Cuban. This week
falls on a New World episode, soI said, I want it to be a New
World cigar. And number three, Isaid that the listener, if we
enjoy the cigar and share it andourselves, you we need to be
able to find this cigar prettyeasily on the Internet at least.
So those were the threeparameters of how it was set up.
Lizard Henry went out.

(17:07):
He bought five or six cigars,tried them. I guess chose this
one as the one out of thatgroup.

Senator (17:12):
There were some duds.

Gizmo (17:13):
There were some duds.

Senator (17:14):
Because I was in the lounge when he was trying some
of these, and I think it was thefirst one that I guess he had
attempted.

Bam Bam (17:21):
Did you

Chef (17:21):
see the bands?

Senator (17:22):
No. No. He had bands on.

Gizmo (17:24):
He was he was very diligent

Bam Bam (17:26):
Oh, good.

Senator (17:26):
Yeah. About this product. He had these shipped to
my house and had whoever he gotthem from removed the bands
prior to shipping.

Gizmo (17:33):
They literally shipped them in those empty bags with no
bands, no receipt, no nothing.

Bam Bam (17:37):
That's amazing.

Gizmo (17:37):
So Henry's gonna talk about the retailer later. We
can, you know, support theretailer who helped us with this
project. But the project showedup to senator's house while Bam,
Henry, and I were in Cuba. We'regonna talk about that in a few
weeks. But these cigars showedup.
No receipt, no bands, noidentifying marks at all. Just a
box with 10 cigars. Wow. Sothat's how we set it up. Know,

(17:59):
the last time we did this, likeI said, we were rookies.
Lizard grinder brought in acigar. He knew what it was. So
it really wasn't a true blind.And we've done so many cigars
now. We've learned so much abouttobacco.
I felt that this was anappropriate time to do it for
April Fools this year. So herewe are tonight, boys.

Pagoda (18:16):
I must say, I love that Henrietta's picked a wonderful
cigar.

Bam Bam (18:18):
That's very good.

Pagoda (18:19):
I'm really enjoying it so far. Like, that's fantastic.

Rooster (18:23):
He's definitely redeemed himself.

Bam Bam (18:25):
He took the words out of my mouth.

Pagoda (18:27):
Though he asked.

Gizmo (18:32):
So to answer your second question, the second part of
your question, Ricky, I with allthat being said, I had no idea
what it was, so I figured I'dbring in a really good spirit
that would be versatile if itwas Honduran, Nicaraguan, you
know, Dominican, whatever it maybe. And that's why I chose the
Florida Cana 18 Years aged rumtonight, which is now the third

(18:57):
Florida Cana we're doing on thepod. We did the 20. If you
remember coming up on a year agoat PCA twenty twenty four with
the folks from Florida Cana, andwe then reviewed the Florida
Cana twelve on the pod. Andtonight, we have the 18 years
age Florida Cana rum.

Senator (19:14):
I can't wait for what we discover at PCA in NOLA this
year.

Pagoda (19:19):
You know where you'll find me. Can't wait for that
one.

Senator (19:22):
Any listener that wants to eat Pagoda, he'll be at

Bam Bam (19:24):
the beer stand. 14 in.

Gizmo (19:29):
Alright, boys, so let's try our pairing. Let's see how
it does with this blind cigartonight. We have the 18 years
aged Flor de Cano rum.

Bam Bam (19:36):
It's outstanding on the nose.

Pagoda (19:37):
Always excited about Flor de Cano.

Gizmo (19:39):
Yeah. It's great rum.

Chef (19:41):
I gotta say, just getting back to the cigar real quick,
this ash is gorgeous. Mhmm.Bright white. Burn line is
beautiful. It's perfect.
I mean, I I'm having a hard timebecause I'm thinking about
Honduran tobacco, and I'm like,alright. Who do you have?
Camacho, Placencia? Like, areany of them worthy?

Pagoda (19:55):
Could be Fab or Capade, one of the new Yeah.

Chef (19:58):
Right. You know, can it be a Fab five cigar that we haven't
had yet?

Gizmo (20:03):
Lizard Henrico knows no bounds. Oh, he doesn't? He was
very diligent with his project.So anything is on

Rooster (20:08):
the table. Is one that was a recommendation by a
listener?

Gizmo (20:13):
Lizard Henrico had no access to our emails. The only
thing I asked him was to not,you know, do a cigar that we've
done in the last few weeks, butI think that was obvious to him
already. You know? So I have noidea who made this cigar.

Bam Bam (20:27):
After taking a sip, you take a draw, and if you can
retrohale, you retrohale. It islike a deep biscuit, toasted
biscuit finish I'm getting withthe cigar. Incredible. Wow.
Incredible.

Chef (20:39):
Shortbread. Oh,

Gizmo (20:40):
yeah. This rum makes the cigar even more dynamic. Great
pairing. Vice versa, the cigaris making the rum Agreed. Very
dynamic.
This is an excellent pairingYeah.

Chef (20:53):
This is bonkers. You know, I thought the rum was gonna be
sweeter, but it leans a littlebit dry and I'm enjoying it.

Gizmo (20:57):
And it's there is a bit of pleasant heat there that I
like on this.

Bam Bam (21:01):
Yes. And what you and senator mentioned about that
capturing that sweet note on thefront of the tongue, that's
still there. And it I think it'sdeveloping for me.

Senator (21:11):
Going back to the rum, what chef just mentioned, it not
being as sweet as you would havethought. That's how we fell in
love with Flor de Cana.

Gizmo (21:18):
Mhmm.

Senator (21:18):
I mean, when Pagoda and I met the brand ambassador
there, we tried, like, everyexpression they make, and that
was like the big thing thatstuck with me was it it's
perfectly balanced. Like so manyrums are mean, brands that add
residual sugar, and they'resweet as can be, and it just
totally for me ruins it. There'sno additives in any FortiCagna

(21:40):
product, and I feel like it'sthe perfect balance of, like,
sweetness with this, like, richflavor that the eighteen year
brings out.

Bam Bam (21:47):
And I

Chef (21:48):
could really tell that there's no additives here
because on the nose, it developsall of that sweetness that you
expect from a rum. But then onthe drink, the palate, it's it's
balanced. It's a little dry.Whereas with, you know, added
additive laden spirits, theytend to wanna match that nose by
adding a lot of sweetener andartificial stuff. So

Gizmo (22:07):
so just for the listener out there, we're referencing
drinking for the first time,Florida Kanye, twenty years aged
on episode 126 for our PCAtwenty twenty four. We actually
recorded that live at PCA, andwe're gonna do the same thing
this year when we go to PCA inNew Orleans. And I just wanna
shout out Luis Baez, who is theglobal ambassador for Florida

(22:29):
Kanye, who actually joined us onthe episode for a few minutes,
talked about the product, thehistory, and the, as as Senator
was saying, the additive freeprocess that they go through.

Bam Bam (22:39):
Great interview.

Gizmo (22:40):
It was a great conversation, and we're really
thankful to them. And obviously,we're still enjoying Fortacania.
We enjoyed the 12 on thepodcast, and tonight we're back
with the 18. And for a $60bottle, boys, this bottle I paid
$60 for a total wine. I don'tknow if an 18 year aged rum at
$60 if there's more value outthere than we're having right
now.

(23:00):
Pretty impressive.

Pagoda (23:02):
It's excellent. So anybody who's looking

Gizmo (23:05):
for Florida Kanye's story or rum, out our PCA twenty
twenty four episode, episode126. And speaking of PCA boys,
might might as well tell thelisteners now, in a couple
weeks, we are heading to NewOrleans for PCA twenty twenty
five. A few of us are gonna bethere. We have some surprises
planned, some good things linedup, and our plan, of course, is

(23:29):
again to record an episode liveon-site like we did last year,
so that should be a lot of fun.

Chef (23:34):
Oh, yeah.

Pagoda (23:34):
What are

Gizmo (23:34):
you guys looking forward to in New Orleans this year?

Bam Bam (23:37):
I'm looking forward to the guided senator tour. Because
I've never been there.

Pagoda (23:42):
Some beignets.

Senator (23:44):
That's right. Mean, Orleans has a special place in
my heart. I first went to NewOrleans, spent a lot of time
there for work, doing a lot ofadvertising down there, but
quickly fell in love with it. Itwas the place I actually did my
bachelor party before I gotmarried, and I've been back many
times since. The food scene isawesome there.

(24:04):
We've got a reservation atCommander's Palace, one of my
favorite spots.

Gizmo (24:07):
You locked down a reservation?

Senator (24:09):
It's locked in.

Bam Bam (24:09):
My man.

Senator (24:10):
It's locked in.

Gizmo (24:11):
He's our tour guide.

Bam Bam (24:12):
That story that he told us about that dinner, I I can't
wait.

Senator (24:16):
Just just the the hospitality in New Orleans, the
restaurant scene is socompetitive. The service is,
like, off the charts. And it'sthat way because if a server if
a server doesn't cut it, theycan so easily find someone to
replace them. Like, it is like aprivilege to be at some of these

(24:36):
restaurants

Bam Bam (24:36):
Wow.

Senator (24:37):
That they really don't mess around. And I love with
Commander's Palace. I there wasmaybe a few year gap between my
last trip to New Orleans, and Iwanted to actually not cook or
host Thanksgiving and doThanksgiving somewhere. And so I
picked New Orleans, took my wifeand and family, and I called
trying to get a reservation,obviously expecting it's gonna

(24:57):
be difficult for Thanksgiving,and told them the party size, is
there any way you canaccommodate us? And the first
thing they say, mister senator,we haven't seen you in a while.
We would be honored to have youfor Thanksgiving.

Bam Bam (25:08):
Wow.

Senator (25:08):
And they said the exact date that I was last there. They
had it in their system. Theykeep meticulous notes on people.

Bam Bam (25:16):
That's good CRM.

Senator (25:17):
It's crazy. Luckily, lot of the They

Gizmo (25:20):
paid for Salesforce. Correct.

Chef (25:22):
That's OpenTable, boys. Oh,

Gizmo (25:25):
that's OpenTable. Okay.

Chef (25:26):
OpenTable does wonderful things for you.

Senator (25:28):
And then the funny thing is, you know, I had eaten
there a number of times, andthey have this room there called
the Garden Room, and that's,like, the premier room to dine
in.

Gizmo (25:35):
I've actually So that's where we're gonna be, ma'am,
because We

Bam Bam (25:37):
can hope. Let's hope

Senator (25:38):
I had never been there prior, and then I show up for
Thanksgiving for a reservation,and they were like, right this
way to the Garden room. I waslike, I finally made it. I
commend you. It's like, I got myown table in the garden room. I
took years for that.

Gizmo (25:50):
Well

Senator (25:51):
So we can hope that we'll be there, but just top to
bottom, I just you know, I mean,chef knows this. Obviously, he
owns restaurants. The foodobviously has to be excellent
anywhere for you to return, butthe service is what really
defines the experience. Becauseyou have great food and shitty
service, you may as well dotakeout. You're not gonna ever
wanna go back and visit.
And every time there, it's beenexcellent.

Bam Bam (26:12):
That's great.

Rooster (26:13):
Pretty big French influence on the food. Right?

Senator (26:15):
For sure. French Creole is really the the New Orleans

Bam Bam (26:18):
Can't wait.

Rooster (26:19):
And I'm sure the service is very, like, old
school where it feels like it.

Senator (26:24):
Oh, it is. They do a lot of table side stuff. Like
Nice. It's a

Rooster (26:27):
it's A lot of flambees and stuff

Senator (26:29):
like that. Exactly.

Chef (26:30):
Nice. You guys get Do

Pagoda (26:31):
they have a dress code?

Senator (26:32):
Yeah. They do, actually. Percent. Yeah. Shit.
Jack jacket is

Bam Bam (26:36):
Bucket shirt. There. Button downs. No hoodies.
Luckily You could wear

Chef (26:40):
a hoodie. Just put a blazer over it.

Gizmo (26:42):
Thank you, Sean.

Senator (26:42):
Not a commander's.

Pagoda (26:45):
Luckily know it's not windy there.

Senator (26:47):
Luckily, we'll be coming from PCA, so even Gizmo
will be at a blazer. That'scorrect.

Bam Bam (26:51):
He did very sharp last year.

Gizmo (26:53):
Thank you very much.

Bam Bam (26:53):
Very, very sharp. So I'm looking forward to us as a
unit, like we did last year,moving through PCA like Lizard
Mafia. We turned heads all overthe place. And you can't deny
it. We made an imprint in thatevent, and I'm looking forward
to that again.
Agreed. Yeah.

Gizmo (27:12):
It'll be nice to be back. And honestly, I'm pretty excited
that it's not in Vegas. Youknow, Vegas is a love hate
relationship I've always hadwith it. I don't gamble. It
seems very overpriced, theexperience seems a little put
on, you know, a little fake,obviously, trying extract as
much money out of your pocket aspossible.
But it lacks culture. It lacksculture.

Senator (27:32):
What New Orleans has that Vegas doesn't. Correct.

Gizmo (27:34):
Culture. So I'm also looking forward to a new
experience in a city I've onlybeen to in a limited bay you
know, I've been there, but I wasthere for work and really kind
of in one building at a time. Soit'll be nice to actually
experience

Bam Bam (27:46):
Mhmm.

Gizmo (27:46):
You know, New Orleans for real.

Senator (27:48):
And the cool thing, I'll give PCA a lot of credit
what they did this year, theytalked to a number of different
bars, restaurants, lounges,because in New Orleans, there
are cigar bars. Yep. But they'rethey're all smaller. There's not
like a big I mean, everything isreally crammed in in the French
Quarter. So there's not like abig go to place to smoke, but

(28:10):
there are a number of bars andlounges that have outdoor
patios, and some of them arevery friendly about smoking.

Pagoda (28:15):
You can

Senator (28:15):
have a cigar. Others, if there's

Bam Bam (28:16):
a lot

Senator (28:17):
of people, they'd rather you not. PCA in advance
talked to a number of theseplaces, came up with a guide of
kind of the after What? AfterPCA kind of smoking spots.

Bam Bam (28:29):
That's cool.

Senator (28:30):
Every night, there's gonna be all these different
places that everyone from PCAcan go and meet up and smoke,
which should be a lot of funthroughout

Bam Bam (28:36):
New Orleans.

Gizmo (28:37):
I believe they've also gotten city leadership on board
for the time that PCA is thereto kind of, you know, be a
little more lax about cigarsmoking in general. So, you
know, overall, you gotta shoutout to Premium Cigar Association

Bam Bam (28:50):
for Absolutely.

Pagoda (28:50):
I mean

Gizmo (28:50):
you know, the effort.

Senator (28:51):
To your point about getting the city council to be
more lenient. So when I sawJoshua Habrusky, who's the the
CEO there at an event at one ofthe political conventions late
last year, I asked him kinda howNew Orleans came to be, and he
said, the funny thing is theconvention center in New Orleans
smoking has always been bannedin there. You can't smoke in
their convention center like youcan in Vegas. That's why PCA is

(29:13):
always out in Vegas. Him

Chef (29:15):
and

Senator (29:15):
the team lobbied the city council in New Orleans and
got a two year exception writteninto law just for PCA to be
posted in Washington Centerwhere we can smoke throughout
it.

Gizmo (29:27):
That's incredible. Incredible.

Bam Bam (29:29):
You can't have that event without a smoking
experience.

Gizmo (29:34):
So we're very excited about it. I just wanna highlight
the headline sponsors this year,PCA twenty twenty five. You
know, every year they change theheadline sponsors. These are the
folks that are highlighted inthe Friday panels. They each
give talks.
They sponsor different events.I'm just going to go through the
gold sponsors this year.Espinosa, Villager, Orongo Cigar

(29:55):
Company, Dunbarton Tobacco andTrust, Drew Estate, Tatawahi,
Buffalo Trace. I was interestedto

Rooster (30:02):
see that.

Bam Bam (30:03):
That's interesting.

Gizmo (30:03):
Foundation cigars and Placentia. So those are the
folks that are going to beheadlining the events and the
talks on Friday, as well as, I'massuming, releasing some pretty
cool products throughout PCA. SoI'll tell you, I'm pretty
excited about all of this

Bam Bam (30:19):
Me too.

Gizmo (30:20):
You know, in a couple of weeks.

Rooster (30:21):
Isn't Davidoff back in?

Gizmo (30:22):
Davidoff's back. Again, thanks to Josh's leadership over
there. Yes. I mean, Davidoff isback for the first time, I
think, five or six years. Yep.
If not more. So before we getback to the cigar boys, I do
wanna shout out DunbartonTobacco and Trust, one of those
sponsors we just announced.They're adding a Micarita
Gorilla Gordo this year at PCA,sixty ring gauge by six inch

(30:46):
cigar. And it'll be, I guess,one of the biggest cigars in
their portfolio. It's gonnafeature a Connecticut broadleaf
wrapper covering a binder andfiller blend composed of all
Nicaraguan tobacco.
So, Steve Sokka had told thehalf wheel where I'm reading all
this, that the price is stillbeing finalized, but the cigars

(31:08):
are gonna ship in boxes of 20.So I thought that was pretty
cool. We do love Steve Socket.We had a great interview with
him last year at PCA on thefloor and looking forward to
chatting with him again thisyear.

Chef (31:19):
It's gonna be a heavy box of cigars. Absolutely.

Gizmo (31:22):
Boys, we're coming into the second third here now on our
blind cigar tonight.

Chef (31:27):
I'm tell

Pagoda (31:28):
you what

Bam Bam (31:28):
I'm getting here.

Gizmo (31:28):
I'm blown away.

Bam Bam (31:29):
We're all blown away.

Pagoda (31:30):
This is awesome. Absolutely.

Gizmo (31:31):
This is an awesome cigar.

Chef (31:33):
I'm getting that shortbread the shortbread cookie
with the raspberry jam center.That's like that's exactly what
I'm

Bam Bam (31:39):
getting. Yeah. I'm getting everything. Maybe not
raspberry, but the shortbread,the toastiness, the little
butteriness, it's very creamy,and the quality of the cigar.

Gizmo (31:50):
Everybody's ash is holding on brilliant.
Construction is phenomenal.

Bam Bam (31:53):
The structure of this is just off the charts.

Gizmo (31:56):
I love the charts. Smell the burn line, dude.

Rooster (31:59):
And the sweetness is still coming through.

Gizmo (32:01):
Yeah. Awesome.

Bam Bam (32:03):
What is that? That's like a jasmine potpourri type
thing happening.

Gizmo (32:06):
And a little bakery.

Chef (32:07):
I can't wait to find out what the cigar is because

Gizmo (32:09):
I want What the hell?

Senator (32:10):
Look at look at the burn on chef's cigar.

Gizmo (32:12):
What is going on here?

Senator (32:13):
I thought my ash was holding on.

Pagoda (32:14):
Look at that.

Gizmo (32:14):
Razor about an inch and a half Razor sharp. Bright white
perfect burn line ash on hiscigar right Unbelievable. I'm
blown away by this. So am is Aplus. I can't believe it.
I can't believe it.

Pagoda (32:29):
What a redemption. What a redemption.

Bam Bam (32:31):
I don't think we're gonna nail this one because I've
never had a cigar like this.

Senator (32:35):
I don't care if we nail it or not. I think we need to
have Lizard Henrico just pickall of our cigars going forward.
This is damn

Bam Bam (32:40):
New procurement director. That's right.

Gizmo (32:43):
He can have the job. Enough.

Bam Bam (32:46):
I think he'll quit promptly.

Gizmo (32:50):
Wow. This is this is really impressive, and I'm
loving the pairing with thisrum.

Chef (32:54):
Agreed. I'd say he understood the assignment.

Gizmo (32:56):
Yeah, he did a great job.

Rooster (32:58):
And the cigar is barely medium. It's not It's very
flavorful, but it's like mild tomedium.

Bam Bam (33:06):
And that retrohale, honestly, I'm sorry. It's so
toasty and pleasant. It's reallyvery unique.

Pagoda (33:12):
I'll tell you, for me, on the Toparma palette, I'm
getting a little bit of thesaltiness now with the, like,
nuttiness, right?

Bam Bam (33:21):
Oh, yeah.

Pagoda (33:23):
Nuttiness, I think, but a little

Senator (33:24):
bit salty.

Bam Bam (33:25):
I Salted nuts.

Senator (33:26):
This is super nutty, this cigar, and I think there's,
like, a nutty quality about therum on the finish

Bam Bam (33:32):
that Does it enhance that nuttiness? Exactly.

Pagoda (33:36):
Oh, man. Exactly. $10.10 wins.

Bam Bam (33:41):
That's another one to coin. Wow.

Gizmo (33:45):
I and by the way, let's just take a look at the room
here, boys. It is full of smoke.It's like we're driving through
a thick fog on a dark night. Itis very smoky in here.

Bam Bam (33:56):
Yeah. It's beautiful. I think this is gonna hold up
beautifully.

Chef (33:59):
This is great.

Pagoda (33:59):
Very pleasant.

Rooster (34:00):
This is this is not Nicaraguan tomorrow.

Pagoda (34:02):
What are doing here? Mean, no.

Senator (34:04):
There's no way. Yeah. Giz, would you agree at this
point this is not Nicaraguan?

Gizmo (34:07):
I'm thinking that there if anything, there's a touch of
Nicaraguan in the cigar, maybeNo. Maybe a little Nicaraguan.

Senator (34:13):
Mean is it possible? I mean, do you really No. I don't
think flavor wise. That's whatI'm saying.

Gizmo (34:17):
I'm I'm leaning I'll tell you where I'm leaning right now.
I'm leaning Honduran Dominican.That's where I'm

Pagoda (34:22):
kind of Yes. I It's Honduran Dominican.

Gizmo (34:23):
Correct. Honduran Dominican territory right now.
And what kind of

Bam Bam (34:26):
rapper do you think this is? This could be Corojo
rapper?

Pagoda (34:29):
No. This could

Gizmo (34:30):
be a What was again?

Senator (34:30):
How do you pronounce that? Corojo. Crayola.

Gizmo (34:36):
Crayola or I have no idea. It could also be a
broadleaf. It could be anEcuadorian. No. It could be an
Ecuadorian.

Pagoda (34:44):
It could be the shade the Connecticut shade or

Gizmo (34:46):
It could be Ecuadorian Connecticut shade as the
wrapper.

Pagoda (34:49):
Ecuadorian Connecticut.

Gizmo (34:49):
But obviously, I mean, most of the component of this
that we're tasting is beautifulfor everything Of

Bam Bam (34:54):
course. The

Senator (34:54):
sheen on an Ecuadorian Habano wrapper too?

Bam Bam (34:56):
Yeah. Maybe. Or Habano.

Pagoda (34:58):
Yeah. Anything. Because they're lighter. They're

Bam Bam (35:00):
But the sheen

Pagoda (35:01):
That could be it because the Cuban seed through in
Ecuador.

Senator (35:03):
I think

Chef (35:04):
you're onto something with the

Senator (35:05):
My guess on the wrapper is going to be Ecuadorian
Habano.

Rooster (35:07):
Yeah. Okay.

Bam Bam (35:09):
Very, very good.

Gizmo (35:10):
Bam, you're onto something too about the sheen. I
mean, I would assume

Bam Bam (35:13):
That's unbelievable.

Gizmo (35:14):
My assumption too, as we're talking about this, is
this cigar does not have a lotof age on Mhmm. Not that I'm
tasting youth, but I'm No.That's just my assumption coming
from a retailer. You know, I'massuming Don't discount it,

Senator (35:24):
It sat my humidor for a week. That's true.

Bam Bam (35:27):
A lot of age. A

Pagoda (35:28):
of age.

Rooster (35:28):
A week ago does wonders.

Gizmo (35:30):
Lizard Henrico is the new procurer Correct. Lizard Senator
is now the storage master.

Senator (35:35):
Aging master. Exactly. Incorrect.

Gizmo (35:39):
Alright, boys. Let's talk about another new release at
PCA. We just talked aboutDavidoff. They are launching an
Escorio tenth anniversarylimited edition next month,
which is a 56 ring gauge by sixToro extra that has four year
old Ecuadorian wrappers we justtalked about, nine year old

(36:00):
Brazilian binder, and fillermade up of one Brazilian leaf
and four different leaves fromThe Dominican Republic.

Pagoda (36:07):
Is it with an o or an e? Oscuro.

Gizmo (36:10):
O? Escuro, e s e r I o. Okay.

Pagoda (36:14):
Yeah. Yep. Yep.

Chef (36:16):
I actually like their Escuro line. You know, they're a
little bit fuller. Listen.

Rooster (36:22):
We're not this is not the Duolingo podcast band.

Pagoda (36:25):
No. But you know the reason you know the reason I
asked, we I think I think Dude,this is

Gizmo (36:31):
the blind leading the blind with

Pagoda (36:32):
a blind cigar in our hands. No. No. Absolutely.
Kurojo with an o or with an e?

Chef (36:43):
I've seen it spelled both ways

Bam Bam (36:45):
It is.

Chef (36:45):
To your point. Yeah. It's spelled both ways. So you're not
wrong.

Pagoda (36:48):
No. Because we we had a discussion on this, and I
remember very clearly having theDavidoff with an o as well.
Yeah. So there was a e, which Idid not like, and the o l, like
the Oscuro rap. And we were justhaving the discussion, I think,
last week or the week before.

Rooster (37:02):
There was a cigar that Davidoff came out with. It was
the Escorio, e s c o. No. Not au. The black

Pagoda (37:09):
tubal with the c s. I think it was a o.

Bam Bam (37:12):
E I. So Let's But

Pagoda (37:15):
either way

Rooster (37:16):
I love that we're laying out our preferences and
vowels. I didn't like the e. Ilike the o. While the Escurio is
a regular production. Yeah.

Pagoda (37:26):
So that's why I wanted to confirm. I was just laughing.
I was very excited that maybethe o has come back.

Gizmo (37:31):
I'll tell you. We listen. Full disclosure for the
listener. We didn't record lastweek. We haven't seen these guys
in two weeks.

Rooster (37:37):
Bam and I were

Bam Bam (37:37):
in Havana. Missed this, boys.

Gizmo (37:39):
Oh, I missed it. This was great. This is great.

Chef (37:41):
I I just wanna break out old McDonald had a farm. There
was a

Bam Bam (37:45):
farm who had a dog.

Senator (37:46):
80. That's a rock song.

Bam Bam (37:51):
No.

Pagoda (37:56):
Alright. We gotta stop this.

Gizmo (37:59):
We're off the rails. And again, boys, we've talked about
this before. This is whathappens when we have a great
cigar in our hand, and we have agreat cigar in our hand tonight.
This is fantastic. Very true.

Chef (38:09):
So good. So am so It's a Zeno.

Gizmo (38:15):
Oh, man. So lizard senators, so as I just
mentioned, Bam, Henrico, I wereactually in Cuba last week. We
didn't record. While we weregone, senator, it was very
fortunate here. The weather waspretty good, I guess, in the
fifties at night, sixties duringthe day.

Senator (38:30):
Oh, yeah. It's a big And you were able

Gizmo (38:31):
to invite everybody over because your outdoor patio
backyard is finished now. That'sright. You had a big crew over.
So tell us about your yourexperience hanging with the boys
outside.

Senator (38:41):
No. It was a lot of fun. I mean, the the weather was
surprisingly nice, so I had saidto the guys, you know, I was
hoping there was two nights thatlooked promising, so I think it
was Wednesday we decided to doit. I assumed at night it was
gonna get cold, so I wasactually planning on using the
fire pit. And we had startedwhen kinda earlier in the night
when Rooster and Pagoda came byjust under my I have a a kind of

(39:03):
waterproof sealed deckunderneath and, you know, TV
down there, patio furniture,outdoor kitchen, all that, and
there are heaters up there.
And so we were just using theheaters, and they're putting out
so much heat. I mean, even whenchefs showed up and some other
friends, we were there the wholenight under the heaters. We
never even needed the fire pit,and it was toasty as can be
under.

Gizmo (39:23):
That's great. And what did the temperature get down to?

Senator (39:26):
The low was 42 that night. Wow.

Gizmo (39:28):
And you guys were comfortable just with the
heaters. Totally. That'simpressive.

Bam Bam (39:31):
That's awesome.

Senator (39:32):
Totally. I mean, Idiav, Lizard Idiav, who he is and when
our lounge is 70 degrees

Gizmo (39:37):
He's got a coat

Bam Bam (39:37):
on. Exactly.

Senator (39:38):
Yeah. He was sitting in there, and he's like, I actually
am warm. I get he was Wow.

Bam Bam (39:42):
That's cool.

Senator (39:43):
That's awesome. And he was the last one to leave, which
was at, like, 02:30 in themorning.

Bam Bam (39:47):
Oh, that's a pleasure.

Rooster (39:51):
Actually, senator got up. It was I I left at two.
Right? Senator got up, and andthis is like, you know, you
kinda take a hint like he'scleaning up.

Bam Bam (40:00):
Oh, no.

Pagoda (40:01):
Pushing the inks away.

Rooster (40:03):
Putting the bottles away. I'm like, it's time to go.
And EDF sits down. He's like,what else are you gonna have to
drink?

Bam Bam (40:10):
Yeah. He's like, don't drink don't make me drink alone.
Pour some

Senator (40:13):
more tequila. There you go.

Gizmo (40:15):
So what were you guys drinking? What was the what did
you pull out for

Pagoda (40:18):
the party?

Gizmo (40:18):
What did you weigh out? Drinking, think. What's
question?

Senator (40:21):
So Pagoda actually brought over a bottle of
champagne. So we started withsome champagne, then we went to
rum. I think we were having someHavana.

Pagoda (40:30):
Club. Yep.

Senator (40:31):
Nice. Then we went to scotch.

Pagoda (40:32):
We also have Florida County.

Senator (40:34):
Oh, yeah. Seven. We finished the florican in seven,
then we went to some Balvini.Then chef had gifted me the
first time when kinda the preopening of my patio, this
awesome blanco tequila that wehave to do on the pod. The funny
thing is it comes in like thisreally

Chef (40:52):
gaudy bottle.

Senator (40:54):
Yeah. Like, it it's you kinda look at the bottle, you're
like, oh, that's really nice,but it you'd think it's like all
marketing and that, like, thespirit itself is probably not
great.

Gizmo (41:02):
Bam, go ahead. Say it.

Bam Bam (41:04):
Oh, it's marketing. It took me a second. I'm

Rooster (41:10):
gonna call that out every episode,

Senator (41:12):
by the way. And so I hadn't cracked it open all this
time, so with chef there, aperfect reason to get into some
tequila. So we cracked thebottle, and it was fantastic.
Honestly, one of the bestBlancos I've had. I think it's
gonna do extremely well in thepod.
And the best part of it I mean,being out there late, I drank

(41:34):
plenty of it that night. I feltawesome in the

Bam Bam (41:37):
Can you share the name of it? Sierto. Sierto.

Chef (41:41):
Yeah. So it's made by Enrique Fonseca. He's the guy
that does the bottlingsaccording to vintage, single
estate agaves.

Bam Bam (41:49):
You've mentioned him

Chef (41:50):
So when we did the tequila deep dive in Senator's Lounge,
it was the bottle that I kind ofpoured glass, it was in the
wooden box, was a little on thehigher proof side.

Gizmo (41:59):
I remember that. I remember the box. Yeah.

Chef (42:00):
So this is definitely like mean, all of his tequilas are
bangers, but this is somethingthat was made to be a little bit
more elegant and refined.

Senator (42:09):
I mean, bam, this tequila is so smooth. You could
put back half that bottle, nolike, it's so easy to drink and

Bam Bam (42:18):
get so Let's get a bottle, man. A it's a bottle. It
sounds awesome.

Rooster (42:23):
You can tell he's back from Cuba.

Gizmo (42:27):
So what were you guys smoking? What was kind of the
was did everybody have their ownindividual lineups? Did what
what was All individual lamps.We were just smoking

Senator (42:35):
potpourri, little bit of everything, little potpourri.
But we were watching littlecollege basketball. There was
some NBA game NBA on that night.That night worked out because
that

Rooster (42:44):
It's a great night.

Senator (42:46):
Yeah. That that that prompted the purchase of another
a second seventy five inch TVout there. You're gonna have a
double rover. I already my sonhelped me set it up. Can you
believe?
Two and a half years old. I'mnot kidding. This kid loves
building things. He's helped mescrew in bolts because I had to
build another rover for it. Heheld the rover while I'm
mounting on the the 75 inch.

(43:07):
That's impressive.

Bam Bam (43:08):
Future engineer.

Senator (43:09):
That's right. You never know. So it is fully functional.
So now the setup is basicallysince under the deck is
waterproof sealed, there ispermanently a TV out there. And
then the other TV I keep in thegarage, and I just roll out for
the fire pit area, and then that55 inch goes up on the deck.
So we'll have three TVs. I mean,during March Madness, I have the

(43:30):
two seventy five inch screensnext to each other, like
multiple games going. That'sawesome. That's cool. Fantastic
over the past weekend.

Gizmo (43:36):
Nice. Excellent. So you were mentioning that you guys
were drinking a lot, And thenyou're a big stemware guy. I
know you've talked in the pastabout glasses breaking,
etcetera. So as the residentstemware guy, we've had some
folks emailing about stemware.
Obviously, we did the whole deepdive during the wine episode a
few weeks ago about stemwarepreferences and, you know,

(43:57):
drinking in the proper stemware.So what do you do when you're
outside? Solo cups? So no solocups. That's what I do.

Chef (44:04):
Senator in a solo cup?

Bam Bam (44:05):
That doesn't those things don't go. That shit don't
work. No.

Senator (44:09):
But if it's just for, you know, something that's
disposable, like those kindasmaller, like, wine, like,
disposable glasses

Bam Bam (44:17):
They're clear plastic.

Senator (44:18):
They're clear plastic. So, like, you know, they look
clear. They look, you knowElevated. Decent, a little
elevated. They feel good in thehand, but what I've been wanting
is just once everything is setup, some unbreakable proper
stemware.
What I have found so I'veordered from Amazon and even I
went to Crate and Barrel, everykind of lowball scotch glass

(44:44):
that you can find that'sunbreakable. The material you
want is I think it's calledTritan. It's kind of like
acrylic, but feels moresubstantial and looks more like
real glass. Are these made byRiedel? They make with the same
material.
I didn't like their designs, butthey make exactly the same

(45:06):
material I'm talking about. Andyou're talking about Riedel?

Gizmo (45:09):
Yes.

Chef (45:11):
Criollo, Crayola, Riedel, Riedel.

Rooster (45:14):
E I e I o.

Senator (45:21):
But after trying a number of these, and this has
literally been a project for methis this past weekend, I have
found awesome scotch glasses. SoI just ordered a set of 12. I'm
working on wine glasses,stemless. That'll also be good
for like champagne and winebecause it's like I'm not gonna

(45:41):
disposable I shouldn't saydisposable. The reusable the tri
tan like champagne flutes, noneof them are really great.
The coupe glasses they have,none of them are really what I'd
want. So I actually love I mean,there are a lot of places where
you go if you get champagne.They'll actually serve them in,
like, these smaller essentiallywine glasses, and you get more,
you know, surface area in therefor the nose and all that and

(46:03):
for doping up a bit. So shouldhave everything by the end of
this week, but even for theoutside, stemware is really
important. And I'll I'lleventually send around the link
for the the scotch glassesbecause I think anybody who has
a patio I mean, prior to this, Ialways had a deck.
The patio was an addition. Witha deck, you don't have to worry.
You know, glass falls, as longas it's substantial like a rocks

(46:25):
glass, it's not gonna break.Patio, the other hand, as soon
as that glass hits, it's gonnashine.

Gizmo (46:29):
It's cooked.

Senator (46:29):
So it's like, you know, it's just annoying, you know, to
have to deal with that when ithappens, then everybody's
worried about glass. So to havesomething that total peace of
mind still feels great in thehand, I think super important
for anybody with an outdoorsetup like that.

Gizmo (46:42):
Awesome. Well, I'm sorry that we missed it.

Bam Bam (46:44):
Oh, yeah.

Gizmo (46:44):
I wish we were able to attend. Obviously, we were out
of the country, but There'll

Rooster (46:47):
be many more.

Gizmo (46:48):
Oh, I We

Chef (46:50):
had you guys on FaceTime.

Gizmo (46:51):
I know. You're right.

Chef (46:52):
You were there with us.

Pagoda (46:53):
Senator's Lounge is open now.

Bam Bam (46:55):
Yes. Senator

Gizmo (46:56):
Even if he's not there, we can go. Yeah. Senator,

Pagoda (46:58):
curious for

Bam Bam (46:59):
for beer pong. He's there right

Gizmo (47:02):
now. For beer pong.

Chef (47:03):
For beer pong. Do you use solo cups

Gizmo (47:04):
or you have

Pagoda (47:05):
lot of

Senator (47:05):
this is gonna be

Rooster (47:07):
There is beer pong stemware.

Senator (47:08):
No. This is I'm gonna eat a lot of shit for this one.

Gizmo (47:13):
Uh-oh.

Senator (47:13):
So there's a photo. I'd have to find this. This was back
when I was dating my wife. Whenyou go to the masters, you get
these cups. They're like thickplastic cups with the Masters
logo and the year on them, andeveryone collects them.
So like each beer you get there,and you're there like ten hours
basically. So like you're goingthrough like 10 beers a day

(47:35):
basically, And you just collectthese glasses. It's like by the
end of and I went threedifferent years. It's like even
my first year, I probably camehome with like 15 of these
things.

Bam Bam (47:43):
Wow.

Senator (47:44):
So I have a ton of them. And I actually in the
island in my apartment when Ilived in DC, we everybody wanted
to play beer pong and I didn'thave solo cups, so I used
Masters cups for beer pong. So Istill have them, and I still
break them out for thatoccasion.

Gizmo (47:58):
Nice.

Chef (47:58):
I expect nothing less from you.

Pagoda (48:02):
Will it be beer pong or tequila pong? Correct.

Gizmo (48:06):
Well, sounds like it was a great event. I'm looking
forward to when we're in townfor one, hopefully very soon.

Senator (48:12):
Oh, it'll be I'm telling you, we're gonna have so
many nights out there. I alsodiscovered so I got Apple TVs
now for all the TVs, and you canconnect the Sonos audio of the
TV through that, which was agame changer I recently
discovered. So

Gizmo (48:26):
So much better quality than actually using the TV
speakers. Exactly. Because theTV speakers, if you think about
a flat screen TV, most of the TVspeakers shoot out the back.

Pagoda (48:33):
That's right.

Gizmo (48:34):
Yeah. And they're planning on they're not planning
on cigar smokers outside with iton a rover. They're planning on
it being on a wall, so they'reusing the reflective nature of
the wall to shoot it back out atyou, which obviously then also
dampers and changes the tone ofit. But when you have a Sonos
that's dialed in, functioninggreat, and pointed right at you,
even if you have a sub twosomewhere, sub, you know, base

(48:55):
is non directional. But, youknow, highs and mids are
directional.
So if they're focused at you andpointed at you with a great
system, it elevates the wholenight.

Bam Bam (49:03):
I am I am in awe of you right now. I you are the digital
MacGyver. That's what you are. Ihave a whole story about this
guy.

Chef (49:12):
Oh, boy. And I'll say this because this is a problem I was
facing with my TV on my Rover onmy deck. I'm like, man, well,
I'm losing all the sound becauseI don't have it flush against
the wall most of the time. Idiscovered that on Amazon, they
sell reflectors that you couldput on the TVs themselves to
shoot the song forward. Yep.
So or you just get yeah.

Rooster (49:31):
We could also get a soundbar.

Chef (49:34):
Yeah. Yeah.

Senator (49:34):
That's you can.

Chef (49:35):
It's just more shit to bring inside when you're, you
know, done watching or whatever.

Senator (49:38):
The other thing I'll say for lizards with a rover
setup that I discovered. So withmy fire pit area, it's more long
than it is narrow. So theviewing angle on a TV, you kinda
never have to worry. The setupunder my deck is more wide, and
so on any TV, especiallyoutside, the viewing angles from

(50:00):
the side of a TV are never verygood. The only time that they're
gonna be good is with an OLEDTV, but then you're dropping
serious money for an outdoor TV.
I thought I was going to buy anOLED TV to put under the deck
because the viewing angles justsucked with how wide that area
is. Ironically, I had a Roku TVout there, and I really love

(50:23):
Roku's apps because they havelike every app imaginable where
like the built in systems inmost like Samsung, LG, any of
them, they don't have half theapps that Roku does, and it's
super easy and just seamless. Ihad a problem for some reason
getting into the Roku ecosystem,so I had to hook up an Apple TV.
The big discovery for me withthis, Apple TV, if you get like

(50:46):
the newer, like the four k ones,they upscale the image quality.
Yep.
And so when I put the same appthat I was previously watching
with the native app built intothe TV instead on the Apple TV,
it upscaled so great that theviewing angles from every
direction were perfect. So Isaved a ton of money in not

(51:08):
needing to buy an OLED TV forthis anymore because now you buy
an Apple TV for, like, a hundred$20, you're basically set. So
for anyone that has a widerseating area with a rover, the
people that are on the edgesalways get the worst view of the
TV. Get an Apple TV to upscalethe quality, save you a ton of
money, and everybody's gonna behappy.

Bam Bam (51:26):
That's great.

Gizmo (51:27):
And I just find the Apple TV too. You know, most folks
have iPhones. You wanna shootsomething from the phone to the
TV. It's so seamless, and itjust works.

Rooster (51:34):
Plus, the menu is great.

Gizmo (51:38):
A cigar. Cigar is unbelievable.

Bam Bam (51:41):
It's Henriette, I don't know what you did here, but this
is exquisite. And it's onlygetting better and better.

Rooster (51:47):
This is the Steve Saka umagog. No.

Pagoda (51:52):
Umagaga. I don't think so.

Gizmo (51:54):
Aren't you gaga about it?

Bam Bam (51:55):
I'm gaga about it, but It's the umagaga. I don't think
it's a Dunbarton product.

Gizmo (51:59):
It's not. I don't think this is Dunbarton. I think this
is definitely something Honduranor Dominican at this point. I'm
leaning more Honduran, moreprimarily Honduran, but there
may be some Dominican orNicaraguan, but that's where I'm
sitting right now. Where are youguys at?

Bam Bam (52:13):
I agree with you.

Senator (52:14):
Yeah. Yeah. In the

Gizmo (52:15):
same boat.

Bam Bam (52:15):
Hard to that. We all

Pagoda (52:16):
are the same. The only thing with the rapper, probably,
like, one of the either theEcuadorian Habanos or the
Ecuadorian Yeah.

Rooster (52:23):
Don't think I don't think it's it's it's a

Gizmo (52:25):
poor Honduran either. I agree with you on that.

Rooster (52:28):
I it's it's got some Dominican and Honduran

Gizmo (52:31):
Or even Nicaraguan tobacco. Could be.

Chef (52:33):
Yeah. Honduran tends to be a little more floral. I'm not
getting a lot of floral here.

Rooster (52:37):
But there is some floral.

Bam Bam (52:38):
I get a little floral. Yeah. Do too.

Pagoda (52:40):
I do. I do. I get a little bit.

Chef (52:42):
I'm getting tremendous baking spice still and

Pagoda (52:44):
A bit more biscuity now.

Bam Bam (52:46):
The aroma on the cigar is very biscuity for me. It's
not baking spice, but there's atoastiness to it, a biscuity to
it. It's really very pleasant.

Senator (52:57):
The baking spice you just get on the burn line.

Rooster (53:00):
Yeah, Outstanding. It's gonna be hard to tell the brand,
though.

Gizmo (53:04):
Yeah. That's impossible. Know, because

Rooster (53:07):
if you've never had it

Pagoda (53:08):
When you don't know, you call it xeno.

Rooster (53:11):
Even when you do know, you

Bam Bam (53:12):
call Another coined expression. You're on fire.
Another pagoda

Gizmo (53:17):
Another pagoda ism. I mean, the thing with the

Senator (53:19):
brand, for the major manufacturers,

Pagoda (53:23):
I

Senator (53:23):
feel like most of them, we would have a decent guess.

Bam Bam (53:26):
Mhmm.

Senator (53:26):
Right? Like, this doesn't taste like any Fuente
I've ever had.

Gizmo (53:30):
No. I would rule out Fuente.

Senator (53:31):
We've obviously ruled out Padron. None of us think
this is primarily Nicaraguantobacco. This doesn't It's not
Davodoff. Look or taste like aDavodoff.

Bam Bam (53:38):
Definitely not.

Senator (53:39):
So like, whatever brand this is, I think it has to be
something that we don't know,we're not as familiar with.

Bam Bam (53:45):
Could could it be an obscure avo that we don't know
about maybe?

Gizmo (53:49):
I'm thinking my gut way. My gut is telling me this is a
boutique brand we haven't hadbefore that has components of
stuff we have had before. That'smy gut right now.

Rooster (53:58):
Could it be a CAO?

Chef (54:00):
It could be a warped.

Gizmo (54:01):
Oh. It could be a warped.

Senator (54:03):
Oh, Warped is a good That's

Rooster (54:06):
a great call out.

Gizmo (54:07):
Will say though, the construction on this is better
than what I've experiencedrecently on several warped
cigars.

Bam Bam (54:13):
And the ashes on the typical warped are darker from
my The

Chef (54:17):
ash was pristine on this. This is bright white.

Senator (54:20):
Yeah. I'm just saying, his flavor profile

Bam Bam (54:23):
wise It's theirs. Yeah, yeah.

Senator (54:25):
Warped should be in the conversation.

Bam Bam (54:27):
Mhmm.

Senator (54:28):
I think Chef is very smart to point that out.

Pagoda (54:30):
Mhmm. Link to Fab Five and Warped.

Gizmo (54:34):
I mean, if this is Fabrica Five, I'm gonna feel
like a fool.

Bam Bam (54:39):
Tasting panel, global insider.

Gizmo (54:42):
Status that status is gonna be revoked then.

Bam Bam (54:44):
Correct. So on our way out of Cuba, we were delayed in
the airport for at least elevenhours.

Gizmo (54:50):
Yeah. We were stuck in Havana.

Bam Bam (54:51):
Twelve Hours.

Senator (54:52):
It was a disaster. Is after after you broke the bottle
of Havana Club?

Gizmo (54:58):
We're saving listen. We're saving that story

Bam Bam (55:00):
for the

Gizmo (55:00):
Cube episode.

Bam Bam (55:01):
Very heartbreaking moment. I was so you know what
it was? I was so excited I know.To have those three bottles in.

Gizmo (55:09):
He was like a little kid.

Bam Bam (55:10):
I really was.

Gizmo (55:10):
Bottles in his hand.

Bam Bam (55:11):
And it broke, and I was like, my face went blank. I
don't

Chef (55:14):
think the flight was

Rooster (55:15):
in picture of it.

Bam Bam (55:16):
No. No.

Chef (55:17):
I I I think he missed the flight because he was just
staring at

Bam Bam (55:20):
the bottom on the

Pagoda (55:21):
flight. It'll be posted on the Instagram, right?

Bam Bam (55:23):
I It was hours in the airport, and we were thinking,
are we gonna stay in Cubaanother day? It sounded like
there wasn't gonna be anyflights available, so we
probably had to go back, comeback another day, go through
customs, and do the whole thingagain. Sounds terrible to have

Senator (55:39):
to stay another day in Cuba.

Bam Bam (55:40):
Well, no,

Rooster (55:41):
it was at the airport.

Gizmo (55:42):
It was pretty harrowing up here.

Senator (55:43):
No. No. At the airport. I'm saying if you guys had
stayed another night there,obviously, that

Bam Bam (55:47):
would be That's true, but they were gonna put us up at
some hotel that the airline wasgoing to select for

Rooster (55:51):
us. Told them Massimo.

Senator (55:53):
Yeah, well screw that, you guys would've just gone to
one of our places.

Bam Bam (55:56):
Yeah, that's true. So you know, we're sitting there,
everyone's worried, everyone'skind of down, Gizmo stands up,
some kind of switch flipped inthat brain of his. He saved at
least a quarter of the people inthat airport. He literally got
up, systematically went throughour phones. He took my phone,
got me on a flight, got HenryDoe on a flight, got several

(56:20):
people that were surrounded thatwere all panicking because we
didn't know what was gonnahappen.
Got them on a flight. Gizmocharters? No. Dude, this guy's a
digital MacGyver. I'm notkidding.
It was incredible.

Senator (56:32):
I could get him a job at American Airlines.

Bam Bam (56:34):
You probably Let

Gizmo (56:35):
me tell you something. American Airlines is out after
that experience.

Bam Bam (56:37):
Oh, dude.

Pagoda (56:38):
I think they're also looking for some aircraft
controllers.

Bam Bam (56:41):
Yeah. It was just it was incredibly dramatic. And we
finally get to Miami, and weknew prior to there weren't any
rental cars. So we were gonnaget stuck there.

Senator (56:50):
There were no rental cars

Gizmo (56:51):
in No rental cars. So let me explain.

Senator (56:52):
It was awful.

Gizmo (56:53):
We had come back from Havana. American Airlines All
Day had kind of punted thisflight and kind of ruined our
day. They were a littledishonest about what was
happening, and ruined ourability to pick another flight,
fly another airline, gosomewhere else. But we

Bam Bam (57:06):
missed every connecting flight because we were there for
so Yeah.

Gizmo (57:09):
We didn't

Bam Bam (57:09):
know what was gonna happen.

Gizmo (57:10):
So when we got to Miami, and we were realizing this while
we were in Havana, that therewas an issue in Miami. I don't
know if it was spring break orweather or something. But after
we started missing connectingflights, Miami, Palm Beach, and
Fort Lauderdale had zero flightsback to New York for thirty six

(57:30):
hours.

Bam Bam (57:31):
Correct.

Gizmo (57:31):
And we were missing all of our And no cars to rent

Bam Bam (57:34):
at any of these airports.

Gizmo (57:36):
No rentals available.

Rooster (57:37):
Wow. So this

Senator (57:37):
is widespread. This is

Bam Bam (57:38):
a nightmare. So he so they realized this prior to us
getting to Miami. So we get toMiami. Lizard Henry's online
fighting for us to get our moneyback for the connecting flight
that we couldn't possibly make.This guy, I stay with the
luggage because that's what I'mgood at, and he and this guy
goes out into the wild, like,hunting big game.

(57:59):
And what did you get for us?

Rooster (58:01):
You Of some

Bam Bam (58:02):
boss. Miraculously, he found

Gizmo (58:04):
I found a three row

Bam Bam (58:05):
SUV. SUV, GMC Acadia. Perfect. Now they hated the car.
You loved those.
I was very thankful to have acar because from there, we drove
where? So we had

Gizmo (58:13):
to go to we had to drive two and a half hours or two
hours to Fort Myers across theacross the state because that
was the only airline the theairport that could get us back
to New York the next morning. Sowhen we landed it in Miami from
Havana, we missed our connectionbecause when we were in Havana
on the flight, we waited twelvehours to get on. They they sat
us at the gate waiting for twopeople in the terminal Mhmm. To

(58:34):
get on the plane. I don'tunderstand why.
Then we land in Miami, and wemissed our connecting flight.
Correct.

Senator (58:39):
So we

Gizmo (58:39):
had to drive to Fort Myers that night, stay over

Bam Bam (58:42):
Through the swamps of Florida. Drove to the black.

Gizmo (58:45):
Yeah. We drove to the Everglades in the pitch black. I
you know, it was a miracle. Butthe next morning, we woke up at
04:30 and Unreal. Drove to FortMyers ago.

Bam Bam (58:53):
Was it was awesome.

Gizmo (58:54):
Yeah. It was quite a story.

Bam Bam (58:56):
All full at the same time.

Pagoda (58:56):
Yeah. I'm glad you guys are back home safe.

Gizmo (58:58):
Yeah. Me too. So we'll tell more of our Havana story on
an upcoming Cuba episode, butthat was our American Airlines
hell story and our dude. You

Chef (59:08):
are my hero. Did did you smoke in the rental?

Gizmo (59:11):
We did not. No. I actually asked how much the fee
was because if it was a hundred,we would have done it, but it
was 400, so we did it. So so,boys, we're in the last third
here on our blind cigar tonight.We're getting ready to invite
lizard Henry in here in a minuteafter some listener email.
What's everybody thinking rightnow?

Chef (59:27):
Fabulous cigar.

Bam Bam (59:28):
It's a fabulous cigar.

Senator (59:29):
I think the thing I'm happiest with is the flavor
profile has been so awesome. Ihave not wanted it to change.

Bam Bam (59:36):
True.

Senator (59:36):
And it hasn't. All those flavor notes are there.
It's been consistent, butthere's so many, and there's
enough that it's complex andrefined. Super happy with this
cigar.

Rooster (59:46):
Absolutely has picked up in strength

Gizmo (59:47):
a tad. Maybe a touch. A little bit. I would say it's
still medium. Agree.
Call it medium plus right now.

Rooster (59:53):
No. Medium plus.

Gizmo (59:55):
No. That was for chef Ricky.

Bam Bam (59:57):
Are you serious right now? We need to

Senator (59:59):
beat this out of Gizmo's vocabulary. Jesus.

Bam Bam (01:00:03):
No. No. It's a good one. It's a good one. I like it.
Don't know it's by

Pagoda (01:00:06):
the way.

Bam Bam (01:00:08):
But it's still very creamy and velvety.

Gizmo (01:00:11):
I agree. This is a great cigar.

Senator (01:00:13):
I love chef Ricky the other night. We were talking
about this ridiculous Rare Pluscrap that Gizbo says, and Ricky
goes, I have news for people whoorder Rare Plus. There's no Rare
Plus option on any POS system atany steakhouse in America.
They're hitting medium rare.They're bringing it out.
The person's saying, oh, this isa great Rare Plus stink.

Gizmo (01:00:31):
Probably true.

Senator (01:00:32):
It's gotta

Gizmo (01:00:33):
be true. Nobody's putting Foca Rare

Chef (01:00:34):
Plus in their

Senator (01:00:35):
fucking POS system.

Bam Bam (01:00:38):
Fair enough. Serious question though. Yeah. Where's
he gonna sit?

Gizmo (01:00:41):
He's this is all set up for him right here.

Bam Bam (01:00:43):
Oh, he's gonna stand.

Gizmo (01:00:43):
He's gonna stand right there.

Chef (01:00:44):
I love

Gizmo (01:00:45):
it. Headphones and everything.

Bam Bam (01:00:46):
Look at you.

Chef (01:00:47):
You know, the only thing that could make this better, if
there was a monitoring roomwhere he could kinda sit out A
green room.

Bam Bam (01:00:52):
He needs a green room.

Rooster (01:00:53):
He can listen to

Gizmo (01:00:54):
bar. Wizard green room

Bam Bam (01:00:55):
Correct.

Gizmo (01:00:56):
With a live audio feed.

Bam Bam (01:00:58):
Ball of Skittles.

Senator (01:00:58):
Just just put them in the bathroom.

Bam Bam (01:01:00):
A ball of Skittles. Yeah.

Gizmo (01:01:03):
Alright, boys. Let's go to some listener email now. I
really like this one, and thisis gonna be our lizard of the
week. And now this is going tobe a repeat lizard of the week
from our first ever winner,Lizard Craig. And Lizard Craig
sent us an email, and I reallyloved it.
I wanted to share it with youguys. And he's gonna be our

(01:01:24):
lizard of the week this week. Hesays, Lizard Gizmo and my fellow
lizards, I cannot express mysurprise and gratitude at the
gift I received for having beenthe first lizard of the week.
Thank you so much for the cigarsand the kind note. After having
started listening to the pod in2024, I have now finished the
entire catalog and haverevisited about half of the

(01:01:46):
episodes.
So he's listened to the entirecatalog of 175 episodes, one and
a half times. Unbelievable.

Senator (01:01:53):
Guarantee he went back to the Bam Bam accountability
hour.

Gizmo (01:01:55):
Oh, at least three times.

Bam Bam (01:01:56):
I was just thinking that.

Gizmo (01:01:57):
I'll tell you, the numbers on that one just keep
hitting every week.

Bam Bam (01:02:00):
No.

Gizmo (01:02:03):
So he says, as I return to further absorb your comments
on cigars that I have sincesourced in order to smoke along
with you, as, of course, I sayon the the intro where I list
what we're doing, he says, Ihave also studied the pairings,
many of which were new to me. Asmany lizards have commented,
listening to the pod can be anexpensive exercise. Solely as a

(01:02:24):
result of the pod, I now have aSodolo, the case, of course,
that we love, and I bought asecond for a smoking buddy
friend of mine, two ST DuPontlighters, an extensive correct
collection of Padrons andDavidoffs, and a growing seller
of Paul Roger. What? Thanks toBam and I.

Bam Bam (01:02:41):
Yes. Tequila Let's go.

Gizmo (01:02:42):
And other spirits reviewed. Thank you for all the
suggestions which have enhancedmy enjoyment of the cigar
journey.

Bam Bam (01:02:49):
Hold on. Two cigar cases, two ST DuPont lighters?

Gizmo (01:02:53):
Yep. And Padron and Davodoff extensive collections
of both.

Bam Bam (01:02:57):
I mean, he's doing better than most of our members.

Gizmo (01:02:59):
He's killing it.

Pagoda (01:03:00):
On his dime, he must be retired.

Bam Bam (01:03:02):
And I

Senator (01:03:04):
Or he

Gizmo (01:03:04):
works with you.

Bam Bam (01:03:05):
He takes one to know one. Correct. I go to, like, a
fellow retiree.

Senator (01:03:08):
I know one when I see one.

Bam Bam (01:03:10):
And I guarantee he will not walk in his club if he goes
to the one with the plastic

Gizmo (01:03:15):
That's true. He does know the lizard rules

Bam Bam (01:03:17):
Correct.

Gizmo (01:03:18):
As as Bam Bam has laid out.

Senator (01:03:19):
Correct. All of us follow except one.

Bam Bam (01:03:22):
That's also true.

Gizmo (01:03:23):
Only on pod night.

Bam Bam (01:03:24):
Alright.

Gizmo (01:03:24):
Hey, Pagoda. Just lay out for us very briefly. What is
your ideal work week?

Bam Bam (01:03:29):
Jesus.

Pagoda (01:03:31):
It's called twelve to twelve.

Gizmo (01:03:33):
Twelve to okay. Go ahead.

Pagoda (01:03:34):
Life. It starts at 12PM on a Monday morning

Gizmo (01:03:37):
K.

Pagoda (01:03:38):
And ends at 12PM on a Friday afternoon.

Senator (01:03:41):
Alright. And does work take place in between? Or what
happens?

Rooster (01:03:45):
Couple of days off in the middle, though. Right? You

Pagoda (01:03:47):
can't work. You would entertain clients, you go for
lunch on most days.

Rooster (01:03:51):
Liquid lunches.

Senator (01:03:53):
A long

Pagoda (01:03:54):
By the way, I hope my boss doesn't listen to that.

Rooster (01:04:03):
The twelve to twelve, I love it. Correct.

Gizmo (01:04:05):
You should run for office somewhere.

Senator (01:04:07):
You should run for mayor of New York.

Pagoda (01:04:09):
No, no, no. I'm gonna be the idea man for senator when he
runs for office.

Bam Bam (01:04:12):
Correct. Perfect. Know what the slogan's gonna be.

Lizard Henrito (01:04:16):
Life. Life.

Senator (01:04:20):
Abundance. Correct, I'll do that. What's your
platform, senator? Pagoda?Abundance.

Chef (01:04:27):
Life is a bliss.

Gizmo (01:04:28):
So I really love this. This really hit me. He says,
Shelley once wrote that, quote,poets are the unacknowledged
legislators of the world. And Isay, quote, the lizards are the
uncompensated influencers of thecigar world. Oh, I like that.
That's pretty cool. I like that.One suggestion, which is

(01:04:48):
probably unlikely, but here itgoes. Years ago, the Fuentes
held a cigar family celebrationin The US and later in The
Dominican Republic that broughttheir fans together. A lizard
nation celebration would be ablast and an opportunity for
fellow lizards to commune aboutthe cigar journey.
We've been talking about it.

Bam Bam (01:05:09):
Well, it would be ideal to do that in Cuba.

Rooster (01:05:13):
Ideal. Okay, man.

Bam Bam (01:05:15):
Restrictions coming down the road, God knows what's
gonna happen with that.

Gizmo (01:05:18):
Yeah. We're gonna definitely do something in The
US. There's no question aboutthat. We've been talking about
it. But we're definitely gonnado an event.

Chef (01:05:24):
I say we sit on a stage with our mics in our AI
costumes, the ones that werecreated by that Bam's gonna love
this one.

Bam Bam (01:05:34):
You know what? I'm going to have an entire body
prosthetic made that I can slipinto. That's great. That's a
great idea. So is it?
It is because he's going tospend

Gizmo (01:05:46):
about $10 on this.

Bam Bam (01:05:48):
I am. So preserve our anonymity. Yeah.

Gizmo (01:05:51):
And he finishes here. Thanks again for all you put
into the pod. I am now going tolight one, boys. Lizard Craig.
What a great email and our firstlizard of the week and this
week's lizard of the week.
Anybody out there, of course,can win lizard of the week. All
you have to do is send us anemail, a comment on Instagram,
even a comment on Spotify. Now Idon't know if you I don't know

(01:06:11):
if you guys know that listenerscan do that and actually write
comments on the episode onSpotify. Pretty cool. Instagram,
wherever you choose, but we loveto hear from our listeners.
Comment, subscribe, and leaveit. Exactly right. One more from
Lizard Seagull here. He says,guys, another informative
podcast. He's referring toepisode 175, the Padron episode

(01:06:32):
we did a couple weeks ago.
He says, what do you guys dowhen not recording the pod while
smoking? I know sitting around,of course, enjoying camaraderie,
maybe golfing, but what otherthings do you guys do while you
smoke?

Pagoda (01:06:44):
Most of us work.

Bam Bam (01:06:45):
Ridicule each other.

Chef (01:06:48):
Yeah. Exactly what we do on the park.

Bam Bam (01:06:51):
Yeah. Throw lit cigars at each other.

Gizmo (01:06:55):
Does anybody work while they smoke? I know some of us
come to the lounge here if wehave a like a laptop day.
Occasionally. You know, you'redoing busy work. I do a lot.
Yeah.

Senator (01:07:03):
Yeah. For me, if I need to be really creative, nothing
puts me in that right frame ofmind like lighting up a cigar. I
could be stuck on something forlike a day. All of sudden, I
come to lounge or I'm at myhouse and I light up a cigar,
and it's like all of a suddeneverything's clear. It's really
bizarre.

Bam Bam (01:07:20):
It's all about that cloud of smoke, man.

Gizmo (01:07:21):
Yeah, that's right.

Chef (01:07:22):
I've had some pretty productive restaurant meetings
here at the lounge while smokinga cigar. So it's, yeah. It's
being able to smoke whileworking helps for sure.

Gizmo (01:07:32):
Obviously golf's an obvious one, right Pagoda?

Pagoda (01:07:35):
Yeah, no, but Pagoda only focuses on work when he
works.

Bam Bam (01:07:38):
Correct.

Pagoda (01:07:39):
No cigars for him. Correct. No cigars.

Senator (01:07:43):
He goes two hours during the week without cigars.

Rooster (01:07:44):
Yeah. Exactly. The other thing

Gizmo (01:07:47):
I do, I drive while I smoke.

Bam Bam (01:07:48):
Mhmm. And you eat Caesar salad.

Gizmo (01:07:50):
Exactly right.

Bam Bam (01:07:51):
Correct.

Chef (01:07:51):
I find it hard to drive and not smoke these days.

Gizmo (01:07:54):
I agree. Yeah. I agree.

Chef (01:07:55):
It's it's

Rooster (01:07:56):
Such a bad habit, though.

Gizmo (01:07:58):
You were you invented it in this group. You were the
first one.

Bam Bam (01:08:01):
You're a rolling ashtray, man.

Gizmo (01:08:03):
Yeah, man.

Pagoda (01:08:05):
I try and develop a clientele who smokes cigars so
that I can just take them out tosit out loud.

Bam Bam (01:08:09):
Smart. Smart.

Gizmo (01:08:12):
Yeah. So I think that's about it. I mean, lizard seagull
continues here. I enjoy working,cleaning my motorcycle. It's
outside, so smoke's not anissue.
I can work on the bike for aboutan hour and a half while I enjoy
a stick. Today, for polishing afront wheel, always a pain in
the ass. Since you are a fullhouse of seven, what happens
when you guys have a full houseof eight? So he's, of course,

(01:08:34):
referring to the beginning ofthe episode. Whenever there's
seven of us here, I say it's afull house of lizards.
So obviously, with chef cominginto the fold, now we have
eight. I still have stuck towhenever we have seven, I say
it's a full house of lizards. SoI guess eight is like a full
house plus?

Bam Bam (01:08:49):
Correct. Oh, here we go. Seven plus. You were waiting
to say that.

Gizmo (01:08:55):
Actually just came up

Bam Bam (01:08:56):
with it

Pagoda (01:08:56):
right now. Chef Ricky loves it.

Bam Bam (01:08:58):
How brilliant.

Gizmo (01:09:01):
Yeah. So that's just something I kept since day one
of recording the intro everyweek. But, yeah, anytime it's
seven or more, I call it a fullhouse of lizards because it's
definitely a full house in herewhen there's seven or more.
There's no question about that.So thanks to lizard seagull for
writing that great email.
And boys, we are coming to theend of our evening here. It's
time first, of course, to do theformal liquor rating on the

(01:09:23):
Florida Kanye eighteen yearsaged rum, and then we're gonna
bring Lizard Henry in and do ourrating on the cigar. But let's
start with the rum first. BamBam, you're up.

Bam Bam (01:09:33):
What's the year statement that we really like? I
don't remember.

Gizmo (01:09:37):
The seven and the '12.

Pagoda (01:09:38):
And the '7 and the '12.

Bam Bam (01:09:39):
It's the '7, correct Yeah. That we drink a lot of. I
happen to love that. And becauseof the price, I think I gave
that a 10. I think maybe we alldid at one time.
I'm gonna give this a nine.

Gizmo (01:09:48):
Okay.

Bam Bam (01:09:49):
I think it's delicious. I think it's an elevated
experience from the seven, but Ican drink the seven pretty
easily. This one requires moreof a measured pace for me. I'll
give it a nine. Think that's agreat rating.
Delicious.

Gizmo (01:10:06):
Chef?

Chef (01:10:07):
Yeah, this is a perfect rum. For me, it's a nine plus.
So that's a 10?

Senator (01:10:11):
There you go. So you're at

Bam Bam (01:10:13):
a 10?

Gizmo (01:10:13):
By the way, in my system over here, there's where for me
to put a plus.

Senator (01:10:17):
So you have to So you'll put the 10 like media.

Chef (01:10:20):
That's okay. Just put a 10.

Bam Bam (01:10:21):
I'm surprised you don't have that in your system.

Chef (01:10:23):
No, it's great. It's, you know, it's not overly sweet.
It's complex. It's a littlecerebral. I really enjoy it, and
I think it's a versatile spirit,and at $60, it's a fucking
steal.

Bam Bam (01:10:36):
So we don't know what your rating is. 10. It's a 10?
Okay. Yeah.
Got it.

Gizmo (01:10:40):
All right, Pagoda.

Pagoda (01:10:41):
It's a 10 for me, meaning hands down. I think I'm
a big Florida Kanye fan. For$60, this is a fantastic spirit.
18 years age. But you know, justoverall, you know, one of the
things I must mention is no icerequired.
You know? And it did enhance thecigar at some points, or it

(01:11:04):
didn't, or it complemented itreally well, I think. It worked
really well. I've really enjoyedthe experience, and I had a
wonderful night. It's a 10 forme.

Gizmo (01:11:13):
It's a 10 for me too. When I took the nose on this,
before I even sipped it, I wasblown away by how smooth it was,
how sweet it was, but it didn'ttaste fake or engineered. It's a
very natural sweetness on thenose. And then when you sip it,

(01:11:33):
it didn't have a lot of heat. Ithad the perfect amount, had the
perfect amount of dryness, andthe sweetness there really
complemented the cigar verywell.
Yeah. I'm I would be very happyto have this at home for a
holiday, but at 60, I feel likethis could be Anytime. A pretty
regular pairing for cigars.

Bam Bam (01:11:52):
You like this better than the seven?

Gizmo (01:11:54):
I like it as much as I do the seven. I would just drink
the seven more, I would say,because

Bam Bam (01:12:00):
k.

Gizmo (01:12:00):
Of the price. Right? The price. So the price of the seven
centered Half the price,

Pagoda (01:12:04):
$30.

Gizmo (01:12:04):
What's it? $30? 20 8 bucks? 30 bucks.

Chef (01:12:06):
And I guess it's easier to find. I'll guess the seven's
easier to find than the 18.

Bam Bam (01:12:11):
Yeah. I don't see the price as a factor because this
is a great deal. I just thinkthe seven's so much more
drinkable and it's similar to

Gizmo (01:12:18):
How could you say there's a drinkability issue It's great.

Bam Bam (01:12:23):
We're splitting hairs between nine and ten, but
whatever. You're both right.

Senator (01:12:29):
But I'll explain why in

Gizmo (01:12:29):
my reading. Yeah, I'm very happy at a 10. I think this
is a perfect rum. I love it, andI can't wait to get more.

Chef (01:12:36):
If I could speak quickly to the construction of the
cigar, I have about an inch ofvascular

Bam Bam (01:12:40):
Look at that.

Chef (01:12:41):
Inch of wrapper left.

Bam Bam (01:12:42):
He's barely holding on with

Senator (01:12:43):
his is ridiculous.

Bam Bam (01:12:44):
He has his fingernails This is hard. Are capturing

Pagoda (01:12:48):
the extreme edge.

Bam Bam (01:12:49):
That's like a Cigar.

Pagoda (01:12:51):
A kung fu kind of a hole. Yeah. He's a

Bam Bam (01:12:55):
what? It's called a fingernail hole. Look at him.

Gizmo (01:12:58):
Incredible. Wow. So for me on the rum tonight, boys,
it's a 10. Senator.

Senator (01:13:04):
So for what this is and what it's trying to do, I'm also
at a 10. You know, why I sayyou're both right, I'm very
sympathetic to what Bam issaying because I wrestled with a
nine and a 10. And the onlyreason I gave it the 10, it's
it's a nine for Bam, and in manyways, it could have been a nine
for me in the sense that, like,I do agree. Like, the seven is

(01:13:25):
more drinkable. And what whatBam, I think, is saying there is
this is a very full bodiedexpression.
This is not something that youfeel like you're gonna drink
four glasses of. You're gonnadrink one or two glasses, you're
gonna be super satisfied withthat. But if you're putting in a
really lengthy session, it'slike the difference between, you

(01:13:47):
know, the Havana Club seven year

Pagoda (01:13:48):
Mhmm.

Senator (01:13:49):
And like the Havana Club Selection de Maestros,
like, that's a full bodied Cubanrum. That's something you're
gonna have more sparingly, andit's the same difference here.
So this isn't trying to be that,like, every day you're gonna
drink copious amounts of this.This is trying to be Elevated

(01:14:12):
and Elevated. Yeah.
Full and rich in the experience,and if you're gonna have one
cigar, or after dinner, youknow, you want a really nice
spirit after that meal, thisslots in perfectly for that.

Bam Bam (01:14:26):
Right.

Senator (01:14:26):
If you're gonna have five cigars, you're gonna pull
for the seven year.

Bam Bam (01:14:29):
I agree.

Senator (01:14:29):
Yeah. And I think that's the difference. So I
agree with, you know, what bothare saying, and I I totally get
where Bam's coming from in hisnine. I just gave it a 10
because for the occasion it'strying to compete for, I think
it does an outstanding job ofdelivering that really full
rich, immersive experience. And,you know, the thing I like best

(01:14:52):
with all these Florida Cana rumsand for something this full
bodied, there's no additives.
There's nothing at all thatfeels out of place or off
putting, and you can enjoy moreof it as a result.

Bam Bam (01:15:06):
Sure.

Senator (01:15:06):
Right? With these rums that are super sweet, it's like
you have more than two of those

Bam Bam (01:15:10):
You're done.

Senator (01:15:11):
You feel like crap the next morning.

Bam Bam (01:15:12):
Yeah. All.

Senator (01:15:12):
Yeah. That's never the case with Florida Cana. Correct.
So I think they've done a reallynice job, and $60, even if this
were 70, even if this were 80.

Gizmo (01:15:20):
I think it'd be the same. Yeah.

Senator (01:15:22):
Yeah. I mean, it's that good.

Pagoda (01:15:23):
Yeah. It's very flavorful. I think with the
seven, thinner, if you agree, Ithink that's a little more
versatile in the sense that youcould have it in the summer.
This is probably a three seasonthing, like a spring, fall,
winter thing. I agree.
Maybe like in the summer after,like if it was a nice night at
the end of a dinner, like youmentioned. But it's still, for

(01:15:45):
the experience today, and forthe price level and for the
flavor profile, it's fantastic.

Gizmo (01:15:51):
Agree. Alright, boys. So the formal liquor rating tonight
on the 18 years aged FortiCagnarum to 9.8.

Bam Bam (01:15:58):
Excellent score.

Gizmo (01:15:59):
What an excellent score. Let's compare that to the other
Fortecanya rum we've done on thepod. We'll start first. We did
the Fortecanya 20, as I said, onepisode 126. We did not rate
that as we were at PCA with themanufacturer.
On episode 135, we did the 12years age, scored a 9.7. And on
episode 145, we did the sevenyears age that you guys were

(01:16:21):
just talking about Mhmm. Scoredidentical to this at a 9.8.

Bam Bam (01:16:25):
Interesting. What an excellent product.

Gizmo (01:16:28):
Excellent product. Excellent.

Pagoda (01:16:29):
That might be We love brand.

Gizmo (01:16:30):
Be one of the best scoring products overall. Oh,
yeah. Pairing, you know, cigar,spirit, wine, tequila, anything
that we've ever done. We've donefour of them now. We've rated
three.

Bam Bam (01:16:40):
Mhmm.

Gizmo (01:16:41):
I mean, it's just excellent.

Senator (01:16:42):
That sounds great. Is, like, we discovered this by
chance, by meeting their brandambassador at PCA. Yeah. I mean,
if if anyone at Florida Conyerslistening, Luis does a hell of a
job. We would not have foundthis spirit without meeting him.

Bam Bam (01:16:53):
That's correct. Right.

Pagoda (01:16:54):
And I hope to meet him soon. We all hope

Bam Bam (01:16:55):
to meet Oh, I'm sure he'll

Gizmo (01:16:56):
be back.

Bam Bam (01:16:57):
Oh, yeah. Yeah.

Gizmo (01:16:58):
Alright, boys. It's time now to go into the formal lizard
rating tonight on our absoluteblind cigar, the first time
we've ever done this on thepodcast. Thanks to our friend
Lizard Henrito Henrito. Whowe're gonna invite in in a
minute. It's time now to do ourrating on this cigar.
Rooster, you're up. So muchpressure on me.

Pagoda (01:17:17):
Jeez. Oh, there's no pressure. You know what the
rating is. I know what you'rerating

Rooster (01:17:22):
So this cigar, I mean, right from the light, I think
Henry just hit a home run withthis, picking this cigar. It's a
phenomenal cigar. Just on thelight, I mean, sweetness that
you got from the cigar, and thenthroughout the construction, the
burn, the aroma on the foot, andthis room was full of smoke. I

(01:17:43):
mean, what a cigar. It's anexcellent cigar.
I don't think there's any Ligeroin this, or at least I don't
think there is any. I think thisis a blend of Honduran with some
Dominican, possibly Nicaraguan,but I think it's mostly Honduran
and Dominican blend with maybesome kind of an Ecuadorian

Bam Bam (01:18:04):
Filler of

Senator (01:18:04):
some Wrapper.

Rooster (01:18:05):
Wrapper. Wrapper.

Pagoda (01:18:06):
Yeah, yeah, Ecuadorian wrapper,

Rooster (01:18:07):
I think. I don't know what brand it is. I mean,
somebody did mention Warped.Maybe it's a Warp that I haven't
had. I mean, have had the WarpReboosta, but it tastes
different than that.
It's not like a Fuente. It'sdefinitely not a Padron. It's
not a Davidoff. It could be aboutique brand. I don't know

(01:18:29):
what the price point of this.
But this is a fantastic smoke. Imean, it's a great cigar. I'm
gonna

Chef (01:18:39):
Go for

Pagoda (01:18:40):
it. Yes, we know it.

Senator (01:18:41):
Do it. Just do it. Don't know how

Bam Bam (01:18:43):
much this thing is either.

Pagoda (01:18:44):
You know

Gizmo (01:18:44):
how much it is,

Rooster (01:18:45):
but I I know that it's not over $40.

Senator (01:18:47):
Yeah. You know

Bam Bam (01:18:47):
it's under 40. You know it's under $40.

Pagoda (01:18:49):
A lot of money.

Rooster (01:18:51):
Well, I I don't think it's well, I have no idea.

Gizmo (01:18:53):
On the last the last few weeks on the pod, we did the
Linea Maestro, which is ahundred and 15. We did the
Padron, and we did the Siglassix. So this is a bargain,

Chef (01:19:00):
according So long story short, we need a $15 stick.

Gizmo (01:19:02):
This is

Rooster (01:19:05):
So I'm gonna give this a 10. All right. Boo. It
absolutely satisfies everysingle you know, whatever I look
for in a cigar, it's there.

Gizmo (01:19:14):
Alright.

Rooster (01:19:14):
So I'm at I'm at a 10.

Gizmo (01:19:16):
Very nice. Senator. I can't

Senator (01:19:18):
believe I'm saying this. I'm in lockstep with
Rooster. This has been anoutstanding experience from
start to finish. Before evengetting into the flavor, the
construction on this all the waythrough is flawless. There is
not one thing that I think anyof us has had to complain about
with this cigar.

(01:19:39):
The burn was perfectly even, theash held on, even Pagoda's pants
are relatively clean.Relatively. I mean, chef had
inches of I mean, probably thefirst half of the cigar, he
didn't even need to ash,

Rooster (01:19:52):
which is bright, bright, white ash.

Bam Bam (01:19:55):
Chef had to use a kung fu move to hold on to the to the
very end of it.

Senator (01:19:59):
Just a a beautiful, handsome cigar. The flavor
profile, I think for for myself,and and all of us, if not almost
all of us, exactly the kind ofnotes that we chase in cigars.
Exactly. Yeah. I think it waslike the perfect balance between
like sweet and savory, but moresweet, which if I had to pick

(01:20:19):
one way I would hope it wouldlean, it would be a little
sweeter.
I think you got a complexity offlavors from dried fruit. Even
when chef had called out theraspberry at one point, I got
that in the middle of the cigar,and then shockingly, and that's
why I'm firmly at a 10. Rightnow. I mean, I've got you know

Bam Bam (01:20:39):
Right now.

Senator (01:20:40):
Less than an inch. Yeah. Yeah. And I'm getting
berry. It's happening now.
Exactly.

Bam Bam (01:20:44):
Like a deep like a deep berry.

Senator (01:20:46):
For sure. Getting currant, my

Bam Bam (01:20:48):
dear. Exactly. Currant.

Senator (01:20:49):
I'm getting no rough edges in this cigar at all
despite yeah. I I can't imaginethis is aged with any
significant, you know, number ofyears, but not one rough edge,
nothing indicating really itsyouth that I'm sure has to be
present. There's a creaminessabout this cigar for most of the
way through. The smoke outputwas excellent. I mean, we

(01:21:13):
commented how the room wasfilled with smoke.
We've recently done some like 54ring gauge cigars where you
wouldn't even know that wesmoked a cigar in this room.
This is what you want whenyou're having a cigar and you
wanna just relax and reallyunwind. I'm just blown away, and
the nuttiness in this cigar,which also, you know, I love the
nuttiness in Upmann. Obviously,it's not a Cuban cigar. Very

(01:21:36):
present, paired really well withthe rum.
I would absolutely recommendthis. I'd buy it.

Bam Bam (01:21:43):
If we knew what it was. Mean, there's so many things

Senator (01:21:45):
to like. And I think as far as the the blend, you know,
similar to what we've beentalking about most of the way
through, I think there's gottabe more Honduran tobacco than
there is Dominican tobacco inthis, but there's definitely
gotta be both present in thesense that, like, this ends
firmly medium. You know, I thinkif this were all Honduran
tobacco, this would be milderthan the experience you get in

(01:22:08):
the last third of the cigar. Youknow, we talked about the
wrapper, you know, likely beingEcuadorian, maybe an Ecuadorian
Habana. We've talked about someother types.
Oral Connecticut shade. Yeah.Could be. I I don't I don't
believe that to be the case, butwe'll see. There's just man, I
am truly blown away.
So Henrito has absolutely hitwith the same whimsie.

Bam Bam (01:22:32):
Redemption. Redemption. Out of the park.

Rooster (01:22:35):
Out the park.

Senator (01:22:36):
Mean, there's no other way to say it. I can't wait to
light another one of these.

Pagoda (01:22:40):
I hope it's a $5 cigar, then I love you. I'll come and
out.

Gizmo (01:22:47):
So it's a 10. It's a 10.

Bam Bam (01:22:48):
Alright.

Gizmo (01:22:48):
And I am with you both on that. This is a 10. This cigar,
from the moment we took the colddraw, was relaxing. It was
enjoyable. We didn't have tothink about it.
The construction was all there.It was perfectly burning the
entire way through. I think Itouched it up once because I was
talking a lot. It it just burnedthe whole way through, and it

(01:23:11):
took us on a real journey thatdidn't change a lot but changed
just enough in the right ways tokeep your interest there. The
flavors were there the wholetime.
And like I said, from the colddraw, the flavor was just
amazing. I mean, I was getting,like, Fig Newton I noted on

Bam Bam (01:23:26):
on the

Gizmo (01:23:27):
cold draw. Yeah. And then as we lit it, it just really
took us to another level. Imean, I I'm completely blown
away by this. This cigar creditto Lizard Henrico, as you guys
have said, this cigar is rightin my wheelhouse.
Like, I'm absolutely gonna ordera box or a bundle or whatever,
you know, quantity these thingscome in when we find out what
the cigar is.

Senator (01:23:47):
Bundle a 50. Luckily, Henrico is our new procurement.
Correct. So he'll

Pagoda (01:23:51):
take care

Gizmo (01:23:51):
of it

Senator (01:23:51):
for us.

Bam Bam (01:23:51):
Exactly. No salary, but a lot of work.

Gizmo (01:23:56):
There are benefits. Yes. You know, I love the chocolatey
baking flavors, the fruit notes,little bit of coffee we talked
about or I talked about. Ithought it was great. And I just
honestly, I think the last thirdmight have been the best of the
entire cigar.
It's shocking to

Rooster (01:24:13):
say that.

Bam Bam (01:24:14):
I have a lot to talk about

Gizmo (01:24:14):
that final It's to say that. I'm completely blown away.
Yeah. I do agree. I think thisis a Honduran constructed cigar
with mostly Honduran tobacco andeither a touch of Dominican or
Nicaraguan tobacco in it.
That is my gut feeling on this.But all in all, what an
excellent experience tonight.I'm so glad we did this. It's a
10 for me. Pagoda.

Pagoda (01:24:35):
Ten ten wins. Little Henri Toe. Redemption all the
way through.

Bam Bam (01:24:42):
All the way through.

Pagoda (01:24:45):
No. But this has been a fantastic experience. You can
see that we all are giddy uphere. This has been a cigar
which has been fantastic fromthe very beginning. It didn't
even need to develop.
I think Roussard mentioned thateven on the light, there was no,
you know, blast of spice. So youknow how even Lilith Poohba's
here, he mentions, you know, thefirst quarter. There's nothing

(01:25:07):
like that. It was pleasant fromthe start. You know, for me, I
think as soon as I touched,even, you know, my tongue
touched the end of the cutportion of the cigar, I felt a
little bit of tea.
It was very complex. Obviouslymilk chocolate on the smell of
the wrapper, a little of theflavor, the creaminess, the
nuttiness. Oh man, this has beena fantastic, fantastic

(01:25:30):
experience, leaving a verypleasant flavor profile in the
palate. It's been wonderful. Andyou know, to echo everyone, this
has been one of the morepleasant experiences, you know,
while smoking cigars, especiallynot knowing what it is, also
leads to some excitement.
The pairing's been fantastic,and you know, lockstep with

(01:25:52):
everybody. I think Hondurandefinitely has a lot to play in
this. You know, I think we werediscussing the Ecuadorian
rapper. You know, it could beone of the, either the
Ecuadorian Connecticut or theEcuadorian Havana. And yeah,
meaning maybe a little bit ofDominican.

(01:26:12):
I'm not sure. Fantastic for me.Ten, ten wins. It's a 10.

Gizmo (01:26:17):
Alright. Well done. Chef.

Chef (01:26:20):
Is it Henrietta, you, Aaron, judged the shit out of
this cigar. Right off the bat,you know, the aroma, milk
chocolate. And then there wasfor me, just the smallest,
slightest hint of pepper, whichI enjoyed because it wasn't
overpowering. Then it went intobaking spice and I got a little
shortbread cookie with raspberryjam, some coffee notes there,

(01:26:43):
just very light with cream,creamy cigars, sweet, delicious
all the way through the burnline offered a potpourri of
aromas. You know, it was just itwas a mind blowing cigar.
And I don't know what it costs.I don't know what it is. Maybe
it's a warped. Maybe because ofthis Henrizo sourced it, I'm
kind of leaning Dominican. But,you know, I am feeling it's a

(01:27:06):
boutique cigar.
As I said earlier, I know someof prominent Honduran markers
are Placencia and Camacho, andobviously I don't think this was
any of those. It could be afabric of five cigar, but it was
whatever it was. It wasdelicious. It was a 10 for me. I
enjoyed it.
I mean, the burn line was one ofthe most perfect burn lines I've

(01:27:27):
had, if not the most perfectburn line I've had on this pod.
Just even towards the end,they're holding an inch of ash
with a quarter inch of wrapper.It was ridiculous. I mean, just
absolutely amazing experiencethrough and through. It's a 10.

Bam Bam (01:27:41):
Very nice. Alright. Bam. So I I'm not going to talk
about where it's from, who madethe cigar. I can only talk about
the experience.
And for me, right off the bat,it was biscuity. It was toasty.
There was that sweet, doughytype thing for me that really
took me all the way down to thefinal third. But Rooster
mentioned that it got fullerbodied in the final third. I

(01:28:04):
don't agree with thatcompletely.
For me, it became savory. So ittransitioned from that sweet
dough experience to thatsavoriness, and now, about a
half inch down from the bottom,they married beautifully
together.

Rooster (01:28:22):
I just said it got a tad fuller.

Bam Bam (01:28:24):
Yeah, you're wrong.

Pagoda (01:28:25):
That's all. But

Bam Bam (01:28:27):
Wow. I don't see it being full. I feel it got
savory.

Senator (01:28:34):
He's not saying full.

Gizmo (01:28:36):
Fuller strength, but fuller. Medium plus. Let's go
back to medium plus. Let's agreeto disagree.

Bam Bam (01:28:41):
He'll get some reduced

Rooster (01:28:42):
Everybody's wrong. This

Bam Bam (01:28:46):
is really quite a unique cigar. I don't think I've
ever had anything like this. Thetoastiness was so unique for me.
So I'm

Gizmo (01:28:52):
at a 10. Alright, boys. That puts the formal lizard
rating tonight on our first everfull panel blind cigar at an
unbelievable 10 would like to

Rooster (01:29:04):
guess Henry's score.

Gizmo (01:29:06):
Oh, okay. What do you think that is? As we invite
lizard Henry into the room?

Bam Bam (01:29:10):
Well, he's

Gizmo (01:29:11):
I mean, can I see Henry? Henry, where are you?

Bam Bam (01:29:13):
Oh, Henrico's in the room. He's got a game face he's
got his game face on tonight,boys. Oh, yeah.

Gizmo (01:29:17):
He's ready.

Bam Bam (01:29:18):
There he is.

Rooster (01:29:18):
I think he gave it a nine.

Bam Bam (01:29:20):
Okay. That's what I'm thinking.

Senator (01:29:21):
That's right.

Gizmo (01:29:21):
I think so too. Alright. So let's welcome in our good
friend.

Bam Bam (01:29:24):
He's a tough critic.

Gizmo (01:29:25):
He is. And our colleague and the man who provided this
great evening for us tonight,completely blown away. Think,
you know, the rating here speaksfor our in you know, the entire
panel's feeling on this. Welldone, Lizard Henri. So I'm gonna
give you a round of

Senator (01:29:39):
applause. Yeah.

Gizmo (01:29:40):
First ever round of applause on the podcast for
Lizard Henrito, our close friendand confidant. And you took this
whole thing very, veryseriously. And I gotta tell you,
man.

Bam Bam (01:29:50):
Great job. I'm impressed. Great job.

Excellent. Yeah. I had a great time doing it.

Gizmo (01:29:55):
Well done.

I'm kind of blown away. I really am. I I did
think it was gonna do well, butperfect 10 across the board.

Gizmo (01:30:02):
Yeah.

It's mean, that's that's Dude.

Gizmo (01:30:04):
It's mind

Bam Bam (01:30:04):
blowing, dude. For a blind cigar, it's definitely
worthy. In this group,

Pagoda (01:30:09):
we're gonna need to get him a hoodie.

Bam Bam (01:30:11):
We are very hard to please. This is this is
outstanding. So, Lizard Henry,

Gizmo (01:30:15):
tell us first, what is your rating on the cigar? And
I'll verify this with the hiddennote in my phone. What was your
rating

on this cigar? It was a nine. Oh.

Gizmo (01:30:27):
Well done.

Rooster (01:30:28):
Wow. I'm

Bam Bam (01:30:29):
like, I tough critic.

Gizmo (01:30:31):
Okay. So first, before you tell us what it is, tell us
where you got it. Who helpedthis project? You know, he you
know, whoever it was deliveredthese cigars with no bands on
them, nothing. How did you pullthis off?

How it started was I I really started reaching
out to all my resources,Facebook groups, cigar chats
that I have. The one group thatI belong to, he's our resident
in house retail shop, mom andpop. His name is Matt Morris.
He's based out of Akron, Ohio,Summit Cigar Company.

Gizmo (01:31:06):
Lizard Matt at Summit Cigar Company. I am impressed.

Bam Bam (01:31:09):
In Ohio.

Amazing. Yeah. Was all in on this project. He
was very excited about it, hewanted to participate, and he he
executed.

Gizmo (01:31:17):
Yeah. So he sent those cigars. You, Bam, and I were in
Havana. We actually had thesecigars sent to senator's house,
and he sent them with no bandson them, took the bands off, no
receipt, no information in thepackage of what these cigars
were. So shout out to Matt atSummit Cigars for doing this for
us.
That's huge. Huge. I also haveto say,

Senator (01:31:38):
it's nice to see a true tobacconist in the sense that
you know, we've all been todifferent cigar shops in our
area where you ask someone for arecommendation, you tell them
the flavor profile that youlike, and you don't get a whole
lot out of them. For Henri to tobe able to go to this guy and
explain the project and whatwe're looking for and deliver

(01:31:58):
something this outrageouslysatisfying, this guy knows what
he's doing. He deserves

Chef (01:32:03):
a world

Gizmo (01:32:03):
of very pod

Rooster (01:32:04):
or has he? He has not.

Bam Bam (01:32:06):
No. Well, he will now.

He will now. Yes.

Gizmo (01:32:09):
Alright. So tell us the price of the cigar.

Shipped, $10 and 99. No way. Oh

Bam Bam (01:32:17):
my god.

Senator (01:32:19):
It's an 11. I wanna change my score.

Bam Bam (01:32:23):
That includes shipping. Yeah. Wow.

Gizmo (01:32:25):
To the door under $11.

Might be slightly cheaper. That was
shipped to two locations. Sentme. I didn't tell you guys. I
bought 30 of them.

Senator (01:32:35):
You got

Bam Bam (01:32:36):
10. So you'll be distributing tonight. I I could
definitely

supply the group for Wow.

Gizmo (01:32:41):
Okay. So now it's time for the big reveal. So we rated
our blind cigar tonight a 10,boys.

Bam Bam (01:32:49):
Hold on. I need a sip before this.

Rooster (01:32:50):
Yeah. Can you tell us the blend?

So the blend is not a % disclosed, but I do have
this information. There's sevendifferent tobaccos from four
different countries. Wow. What?So this really stuck true to the
April fools theme because youguys, everyone guessed at least
one of the countries,

Rooster (01:33:11):
which is

Dominican, Ecuadorian, United States, and a
South American, but he did notwanna disclose the country.

Rooster (01:33:19):
Brazil.

He said it's probably one that you wouldn't
guess, but if you pick up on abright citrus note, that's it.

Rooster (01:33:27):
Oh, we didn't really get a

Gizmo (01:33:28):
bright citrus. I

Chef (01:33:30):
think there's citrus present in raspberry. There's an
inherent citrus present

Pagoda (01:33:34):
in raspberry.

Bam Bam (01:33:35):
Acidity. I didn't get

Senator (01:33:36):
any There's tartness in raspberry. Yeah. Like a like a
citrus smell. What means? Noneof us called out true citrus.

Gizmo (01:33:42):
So the big omission on what Lizard Henry just said was
Honduras. It was not explicitlystated that it was I am blown
away that that is not theprimary component of this cigar.
Where was the cigarmanufactured? Do you know that?

Santiago Dominican Republic. Dominican.

Gizmo (01:33:58):
It's a Dominican cigar. Wow.

Senator (01:34:00):
Okay. So So wait. There's no Nicaraguan tobacco?
Tobacco?

Bam Bam (01:34:03):
No. No. Alright.

Senator (01:34:04):
Wow. That checks.

Chef (01:34:05):
I think we all knew that one. Yeah.

Gizmo (01:34:07):
What is the manufacturer? What is the name of the maker of
this cigar?

Stoic Cigars. Stoic

Gizmo (01:34:15):
Cigars. That is absolutely petite. Correct?

Very brand new brand, about a year old. This is
his first blend. Wow.

Bam Bam (01:34:23):
This is his first cigar? I certainly hope they're
ramping up production becausethey're about to explode.
Correct.

Chef (01:34:28):
This guy's a savant. The creator

of this this cigar, actually, his name is
Vance Taylor. I know himpersonally. And he was part of a
project years ago under anotherbrand. This is his first project
under his own name.

Bam Bam (01:34:43):
Unbelievable.

It's one blend, four different sizes, and he's
working on other things.

Chef (01:34:48):
Wow. Dude. Wow.

Gizmo (01:34:49):
What is his first blend, dude?

Pagoda (01:34:51):
That's crazy.

Senator (01:34:52):
It's insane. I'm blown away. He's hired.

Bam Bam (01:34:55):
Oh, yeah.

Senator (01:34:56):
Lizard master blender.

Chef (01:34:57):
You need get that guy in the pod.

Gizmo (01:34:58):
So what is the name of the cigar? Does he have a name
for this?

The Courage.

Gizmo (01:35:03):
The Courage. Five

Rooster (01:35:05):
by 50 Robusta. The Stoe 50. Courage.

Gizmo (01:35:07):
It was 50. It 50. It felt a little smaller than fifty
fifty.

Bam Bam (01:35:11):
Please observe, Benavito. A quarter of an inch
left. I'm burning my fingers. Idon't want to put it down. Which
means I need to have anotherone.

Senator (01:35:20):
Correct. Tonight. Yes.

Rooster (01:35:22):
So I'm curious, Henry, why did you give it a nine?

To give it a 10, I'm not allowed to because that
would be the absolute best cigarI've ever smoked, in my opinion.

Gizmo (01:35:33):
Okay. Fair enough.

Fair And there's other things that I think I
would put as a perfect 10. If Iwas allowed to do fractions or
decimals, I would havedefinitely gone like nine five.
So part of the process, I smokedfive other cigars before this
one. The moment this thingtouched my hand, it felt
premium. The weight, the feel ofthe wrapper, it did not feel

(01:35:59):
like a cheap cigar by any meansin my hand.

Bam Bam (01:36:02):
We mentioned that earlier that it did have some
weight to it, but the draw wasso beautifully smooth and
elegant.

And and when I smoked those five other blends,
the moment this touched my hand,I I was like, I didn't even
light it, and I knew it wasgonna be special. I I really
enjoyed it, and it was the onlycigar, not only in this this
little trial. It was the onlycigar that I smoked back to
back.

Gizmo (01:36:28):
Yeah. You were saying I I remember you saying something
that you had for the first timetwo cigars back to back, like
you were craving another one.And it was this one that we're
doing tonight in the pub. Then Icame

Chef (01:36:37):
here the

next day,

Bam Bam (01:36:39):
and I saw Two. We're all there right now. I can do
another one right now.

Gizmo (01:36:42):
This is impressive.

Senator (01:36:43):
I could do four of

Gizmo (01:36:44):
these.

Bam Bam (01:36:44):
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, you.

Rooster (01:36:47):
I've already smoked

six. Wow. Yeah.

Bam Bam (01:36:50):
In one sitting. Not in one sitting. No. But

Gizmo (01:36:53):
So are are is Stoic cigars, is that a brand that's
available on the Internet? Is itonly available at select
retailers? Like, where can thelisteners find this sub 11
dollar Robusto?

I I know for sure Summit cigars.

Gizmo (01:37:07):
Yeah. Mhmm.

If you reach out to Matt Wors, he's all over
Facebook, and, you know, he'she's easy to contact. A lot of
people do know him. But Ibelieve Small Batch might carry
them. I didn't do the researchon who actually has it.

Pagoda (01:37:21):
Okay.

But, it should be easily accessible. If you go
onto stoiccigars.com, there'stons of details on the project.
And also, I think he lists whocarries them. Unbelievable.

Rooster (01:37:37):
So these are handcrafted at the Kellner
cigars factory in Santiago.Really? There you go. Is that
Henrik Kellner?

Bam Bam (01:37:44):
Yeah. Yeah.

Gizmo (01:37:44):
Yeah. I am completely blown away. Absolutely. I never
expected to come in here tonight

Bam Bam (01:37:51):
With a 10?

Gizmo (01:37:51):
And rate the cigar a 10. Just Impressive. You know,
because you don't know. There'sno know, like, we love brand
stories, interesting histories,etcetera. Like, to come in here,
we didn't talk about any ofthat.
No. And to smoke a cigar likethis that completely blew us
away. We knew it was somethingwe hadn't had before. Yeah.
Obviously, with differentcomponents that Lizard Henry
just laid out.

(01:38:11):
Like, obviously it's somethingthat's unique, but I never
thought it would be like this.

Senator (01:38:17):
You wanna know where this is rolled in Santiago?
Kellner Cigar Factory.

Bam Bam (01:38:22):
Yeah. Mention it.

Senator (01:38:23):
Oh, I missed that.

Bam Bam (01:38:24):
You were doing your I was. I wasn't listening.

Chef (01:38:28):
Hey, guys. Limited it's limited to 750 boxes.

Bam Bam (01:38:32):
Uh-oh. So

Chef (01:38:33):
we should get on this.

Bam Bam (01:38:34):
Henri, get on that. You're the procurement guy. Sure
thing.

Gizmo (01:38:38):
Well, Lizard Henry, I'm gonna give you one more round of
applause. Excellent job. Many,many thanks. Yeah.

I actually wanted to add one more thing
about this project that makes itreally, really cool.

Pagoda (01:38:49):
Okay.

So every single band has a QR code, and you scan
it. When you get to the website,you can create a little bit of a
login, but every single cigarcomes with a specific code for
you to enter, and you're goingto rate the appearance, the
draw, the aroma, the burn, theflavor, and overall satisfaction

(01:39:14):
with the Wow. If you're thinkingabout someone who cares about
their cigar and is looking atconsistency, and it is
fantastic. I've never heard ofanything like this.

Pagoda (01:39:26):
Nothing like when you

do that, you're earning points that you can
trade in for swag, and I'm surehe's gonna do other projects.
Wow.

Gizmo (01:39:34):
I like this story, I

Bam Bam (01:39:35):
do too.

So it's really cool here. Look, I

Bam Bam (01:39:37):
brought you a smart for I from Senator's point of view,
the whole market testing thingthat he's doing

Senator (01:39:42):
here is fantastic. Brilliant market research.
Absolutely brilliant. And thefunny thing is, like, are other
brands that do QR codes. Think,like, Foundation, I think, has
on the back.
But I've yet to see where youactually rate, you can get that
feedback in real time.Brilliant, brilliant move.

Smart. Includes where you're smoking it, length
of time that you took to you tosmoke Wow, dude.

Gizmo (01:40:05):
I'm pretty impressed, man.

Yeah. If you're looking at something that is and
you're looking for consistency,I'm sure he's looking at those
numbers. I think he cares. Wow.

Gizmo (01:40:15):
So Lizard Henry just handed me the actual band of
stoic cigars. What's the design?Pass that around? Yeah. Yeah.
It's awesome. It's an embossed,kinda lifted, very classy
looking, but simple band that wetalk about all the time that we
really, really like. Mhmm. And Iactually love the color. It's
like

Senator (01:40:31):
a steel blue on black. What are you holding now?

Gizmo (01:40:35):
So Lizard Henry handed me one of the cigars with the
custom code on it, which is on asecond white band

Bam Bam (01:40:41):
So this is

Gizmo (01:40:42):
has a six digit code on

Bam Bam (01:40:43):
it. So the cigar comes with two bands?

Gizmo (01:40:45):
The cigar comes with two bands. Okay. Got it. Is the
white band under the main band?Yes.
Okay. So this second band withthe code is hidden under the
band that I just passed around

Bam Bam (01:40:53):
Oh, really?

Gizmo (01:40:54):
The actual main band. So you don't see this until you
take that off.

Bam Bam (01:40:57):
Oh, that's cool.

Gizmo (01:40:58):
Pretty cool.

Yeah. And every cigar has an individual code.

Rooster (01:41:01):
So that's the same size, right? The one we

Gizmo (01:41:02):
small Yeah. Is the exact same cigar.

Chef (01:41:04):
The box is currently out of stock on small batch.

Bam Bam (01:41:06):
Dude, every single cigar has its own code.

Senator (01:41:09):
It's pretty amazing. That's incredible. Every single
box. Cigar.

Gizmo (01:41:13):
Every cigar.

Bam Bam (01:41:14):
Every cigar. It's quite the coordination.

Pagoda (01:41:17):
I'm pretty blown Very nice guy. Yeah.

Bam Bam (01:41:20):
Love it.

Rooster (01:41:21):
Great job, Henry.

Pagoda (01:41:22):
Thank

Gizmo (01:41:22):
you. Well done, Lizard Henry.

Pagoda (01:41:24):
No. Excellent. Thank you

Gizmo (01:41:25):
for doing this project for us, man. Is obviously the
first of I'm assuming many nowwith this Listen.

Pagoda (01:41:30):
You know, I'm sure it took a lot of courage to do
this.

Gizmo (01:41:33):
Yeah. It did.

Pagoda (01:41:34):
Absolutely right to God. That's fantastic.

Gizmo (01:41:36):
Absolutely. This is huge.

Bam Bam (01:41:37):
In this room, it does take a lot of courage. Well
done.

Gizmo (01:41:40):
Yeah. Well, thank you, man. We really appreciate you,
and that's awesome. And boys,that's it for tonight. What a
great evening.
Thanks to Lizard Henry andLizard Matt over at Summit
Cigars with this amazing 10blind panel cigar tonight for
our April fools episode. Let'sgo through everything one more
time.

Rooster (01:41:58):
I think lizard Henry should be the lizard of the
week.

Bam Bam (01:42:01):
Henrito.

Gizmo (01:42:02):
He's the lizard of every weekend for us here. Alright,
boys. So on the 18 years age,FortiCagna rum, we had a 9.8.
And on the stoic cigars, thecourage, our blind cigar tonight
scored a 10. Of course, we haveto thank all the lizards who
write us each week, including asecond time winner, Lizard

(01:42:23):
Craig, who won lizard of theweek.
Anybody out there, of course,can win lizard of the week. As I
said, just write us. Tell itwhat you're smoking. Stay in
touch with us. Thanks, ofcourse, to Fabrica five, our
amazing sponsor.
They're a great partner to us.Try some of their cigars as
well. And, happy April fools,everybody. Thank you again to
our man, lizard Henrito, and,we'll see everybody next week.

(01:42:47):
Hope you enjoyed this episode.
Thanks for joining us. You couldfind our merch store and ratings
archive at our brand newwebsite, loungelizardspod.com.
That's loungelizardsp0d.com.Don't forget to leave us a
rating and subscribe on yourfavorite podcast platform. If
you have any comments,questions, if you wanna reach
out, say hello, tell us whatyou're smoking, email us.

(01:43:07):
Hello at LoungeLizardsPod.com.You can also find us on
Instagram at Lounge Lizards Pod.We really appreciate your time,
and we'll, we'll see you nextweek.

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