moki
el Presidente
- Joined
- Dec 16, 2003
- Messages
- 9,418
It's time for another round of "Can you tell if a cigar is Cuban or not?"
Summary
Fyodor has agreed to undertake an experiment in blind cigar taste testing, put together by yours truly, the evil Dr. Moki. 10 individually bagged & numbered unbanded cigars have been spirited away from my torture chamber, carefully selected to make this an interesting blind taste test experiment. The cigars have also had their heads clipped off, to mitigate any empirical information that might be gleaned from the cap, or the vitola.
As soon as they arrive, he will smoke them at his leisure, in any order he chooses, and post the results here in this thread. This is a great challenge to the subjectivity of taste!
I am merely waiting on Fyodor's address information to ship the cigars to him; I will post the DC# once he PM's me that information, and I have dropped the cigars off at the post office.
The Details
Fyodor has agreed to not attempt to determine the specifics of any of the cigars by any means other than simply smoking them and tasting them (ie, no examining them, looking them up in references, etc.). This is about taste, not research! For each cigar, he will post:
1) The cigar number he smoked
2) Any tasting notes he chooses to share on the cigar as he smokes it
3) Whether he enjoyed the cigar or not, in the form a rating of the cigar from 1-10 (10 being the best)
4) His guess as to the country of origin of the cigar in terms of being Cuban or non-Cuban
5) Optionally, if he'd like to take a guess at the specific cigar he smoked, that's always a welcome addition
The Mission
The mission, should Fyodor choose to accept it... well, actually, he already did! -- is to be able to get the country of origin correct on 7 out of 10 of the cigars. After all, if you claim to love the taste of cigars from a particular country, you should be able to pick out that taste easily, right?
Remember that the baseline score of 5/10 correct is a coin-flop, the results you could expect to get if you just randomly guessed the origins in terms of Cuban/non-Cuban for each cigar. So our bar is set a tad higher than this (though arguably, one might insist on a perfect 10/10 score to make the aforementioned claims, we're a bit more lenient)!
For Observers
For people who are observing this blind taste testing, feel free to chime in, but please be respectful. Fyodor has accepted my challenge with class & gusto, and I can tell you from experience that what he is undertaking is far, far more difficult than you might imagine.
Considering the fact that studies have shown that price affects real pleasure in terms of wine, it shouldn't be too surprising that we might actually get more pleasure from a cigar if we know what it is. But what if we don't? That's what we're going to find out...
That's it -- let's have some fun with this! Blind taste tests are all about seeing if your taste buds are in line with your preconceptions. Blind taste tests are challenging, but always rewarding.
Some Notes
Taste is a very, very slippery thing. Time and time again, experts have been confounded when it comes to blind taste testing of anything... water, wine, beer, cigars... so there's no reason to feel bad at all. We all think we're better at it than we really are, myself included. Check some of these links out: The Subjectivity of Wine
"Expert" wine tasting: Round #1 -- Round #2 -- Round #3
"Expert" water tasting: Round #1 -- Round #2 -- Round #3
Tap water from municipal water supplies keeps winning in blind taste tests, yet people are paying $3 a bottle for Evian... there's definitely a logical disconnect there. People are buying by brand or label, not their taste buds. I like the statement from the last "water" article: In the final analysis, the price is all that separates them
When it comes to taste, the most important organ in your body is your brain, and the preconceptions it carries along with it. Your tongue and nose are mere appendages.
Summary
Fyodor has agreed to undertake an experiment in blind cigar taste testing, put together by yours truly, the evil Dr. Moki. 10 individually bagged & numbered unbanded cigars have been spirited away from my torture chamber, carefully selected to make this an interesting blind taste test experiment. The cigars have also had their heads clipped off, to mitigate any empirical information that might be gleaned from the cap, or the vitola.
As soon as they arrive, he will smoke them at his leisure, in any order he chooses, and post the results here in this thread. This is a great challenge to the subjectivity of taste!
I am merely waiting on Fyodor's address information to ship the cigars to him; I will post the DC# once he PM's me that information, and I have dropped the cigars off at the post office.
The Details
Fyodor has agreed to not attempt to determine the specifics of any of the cigars by any means other than simply smoking them and tasting them (ie, no examining them, looking them up in references, etc.). This is about taste, not research! For each cigar, he will post:
1) The cigar number he smoked
2) Any tasting notes he chooses to share on the cigar as he smokes it
3) Whether he enjoyed the cigar or not, in the form a rating of the cigar from 1-10 (10 being the best)
4) His guess as to the country of origin of the cigar in terms of being Cuban or non-Cuban
5) Optionally, if he'd like to take a guess at the specific cigar he smoked, that's always a welcome addition
The Mission
The mission, should Fyodor choose to accept it... well, actually, he already did! -- is to be able to get the country of origin correct on 7 out of 10 of the cigars. After all, if you claim to love the taste of cigars from a particular country, you should be able to pick out that taste easily, right?
Remember that the baseline score of 5/10 correct is a coin-flop, the results you could expect to get if you just randomly guessed the origins in terms of Cuban/non-Cuban for each cigar. So our bar is set a tad higher than this (though arguably, one might insist on a perfect 10/10 score to make the aforementioned claims, we're a bit more lenient)!
For Observers
For people who are observing this blind taste testing, feel free to chime in, but please be respectful. Fyodor has accepted my challenge with class & gusto, and I can tell you from experience that what he is undertaking is far, far more difficult than you might imagine.
Considering the fact that studies have shown that price affects real pleasure in terms of wine, it shouldn't be too surprising that we might actually get more pleasure from a cigar if we know what it is. But what if we don't? That's what we're going to find out...
That's it -- let's have some fun with this! Blind taste tests are all about seeing if your taste buds are in line with your preconceptions. Blind taste tests are challenging, but always rewarding.
Some Notes
Taste is a very, very slippery thing. Time and time again, experts have been confounded when it comes to blind taste testing of anything... water, wine, beer, cigars... so there's no reason to feel bad at all. We all think we're better at it than we really are, myself included. Check some of these links out: The Subjectivity of Wine
"Expert" wine tasting: Round #1 -- Round #2 -- Round #3
"Expert" water tasting: Round #1 -- Round #2 -- Round #3
Tap water from municipal water supplies keeps winning in blind taste tests, yet people are paying $3 a bottle for Evian... there's definitely a logical disconnect there. People are buying by brand or label, not their taste buds. I like the statement from the last "water" article: In the final analysis, the price is all that separates them
When it comes to taste, the most important organ in your body is your brain, and the preconceptions it carries along with it. Your tongue and nose are mere appendages.
