I did another Fonseca for the Cigar Magazine reviews. This time the Vintage Robusto.
It was absolutely terrible. Does Fonseca (Dominican) make a cigar worth smoking?
Yes, The Fonseca Cubana Limitado - very underrated cigar but a good cigar - you should give them a try.
Here's my review of the robusto in that line:
This cigar looked very promising. The first look revealed good construction and a nice firm, but lightweight cigar. The pre-cut flavor was a little spicy, with some decent tobacco flavors thrown in. The score and lift method was employed for removal of the cap. This is where things turned for the worse.
This cigar had the loosest draw of any cigar I have ever smoked. It was like sucking air through a soda straw with zero resistance. This was likely the reason for the cigar weighing so little for its size.
The lighting of the cigar was without incident. The burn was very straight for the first inch or so, but there was no flavor coming through at all. There was a ton of smoke, but the flavor was absent.
The ash of this cigar was very flaky. It would not hold at all and the slightest breeze was blowing bits of ash all over the place. It was quite messy. I was 2 inches into this cigar and still no flavor.
At this point the burn went haywire. It was all over the place crooked and really hot in one place. I don’t know what the deal was, but it was uncontrollable. There was a slight bit of cedar coming through at this point, but the smoke still mostly tasted of only ash.
After wrestling with the burn for another several minutes the cedar left the party and introduced a cigarette like flavor. This was at a little over the half way point. I gave up on it there.
I can tolerate a little burn problem if there is flavor present. I can even tolerate a loose draw if there is some other redeeming quality about the cigar. This cigar had nothing going for it outside of appearance. Ashy smoke, cigarette finish; if I wanted that I would just buy a pack of Camel straights. The worst cigar I have ever smoked.