Noob review – Fuente Curly Head Deluxe

[gerbilmcbeevey]

I mentioned this cigar in a previous review, but hadn’t had time to jot down my thoughts until now.

Let me preface by saying that I’ve had the Curly Head Deluxe before, many years ago, and my memory of that experience was a pleasant one. At that particular time, however, I believe I was much more interested in the beer I was drinking than in the cigar I was smoking. So I figured I should try and do this cigar justice and smoke one when it wasn’t an afterthought or just a way to get the taste of cheap beer out of my mouth (Natural Lite and a cigar…what wonderful breath I must have had. No wonder girls never wanted to kiss me!).

On to the review. This cigar is a 6 1/2" by 43 size. Seemed a little “thin” at first, but I noticed that my jaw wasn’t aching trying to hold this sucker for long periods of time, which I ended up doing a lot of due to some major draw issues. First impressions were of a smooth tobacco leaf, not very veiny. It smelled a little like an old cigar box, pleasant, “cedar-ey.” I also noticed that this cigar seemed a little hard. Not dried out and crispy, just maybe really rolled together tightly.

Anyway, I clipped it and toasted the foot and was greeted with a delicious aroma that almost made my mouth water. Have you ever been out somewhere and you catch just the faintest hint of cigar smoke on the wind. And while sometimes it can be a little stinky, other times you just want to track down the guy who’s smoking it and stand next to him and kind of vicariously enjoy his second hand smoke? That’s the first thing that popped into my head. A pleasing aroma to say the least.

Unfortunately, this is approximately where my enjoyment of this cigar ended. It was so hard to draw on this cigar after I got it lit. I would puff and puff and just a tiny bit of smoke would make it to me. I rolled the cigar back and forth between my fingers and the draw seemed to loosen up a bit, but not by much. I finally took a length of heavy galvanized wire and eased that into the cigar a few times but it was to little avail. I was getting tired from all the puffing! Have you ever been the one tasked with blowing up all the kids rafts at the beach or swimming pool? You start out thinking, “this isn’t so bad,” but by the time you get to the third set of swimmies you are seeing spots and you feel like you need to lay down for a few minutes. That’s what I felt like trying to smoke this cigar. I finally gave up at the half-way mark and it became something to mask the scent of kitty litter in my garbage can this week.

Overall, I think I just got a bum cigar. I will definitely try another one (if I can find one that isn’t quite so rock-like) just because the aroma was so enjoyable. For what it's worth, it burned very straight and held the ash to nearly two inches.

G

[PUFFNMO]

It sounds to me as if the real thing you didn't enjoy was the draw - understandably. But you said the aroma was delicious. That is enough for me to want to try one. Cheers, Larry