Unlit Impressions

Yawn all you want at the bland branding and banding on this blend. We sure did. Montecristo may not be setting the marketing world ablaze with ingenuity, but you cannot deny the fact that the band garners instant recognition and a certain level of respect within a walk-in humidor.

That khaki-colored wrapper sure looks nice too, what with its heavier oils, deeply capped mouthpiece, and crisply fitted seams. Hints of hay and honey, lemon zest, and a lively, peppery finish make sniffing a satisfying sensation. Very few, if any, miscues here, so best turn toward the foot.

Well, isn't that a nice little surprise? There's a dark little swirl of heavily fermented tobacco down there, and dammit if it doesn't smell nice. Spicy cedar, orange juice pulp, cinnamon, brown sugar, buttermilk, and a pleasant pop of white pepper are eager to come out to play. There's a fair deal of depth to be found within those darker filler leaves and that Nicaraguan binder, so take your time and inhale deeply.

Cold pulls will provide you with some of what was just mentioned, plus a few extras. These bonus notes include vanilla bean, toasted points, white cooking wine, some pithy citrus peel, and a creamy taste that is somewhere between melted ice cream and whipped cream.

Initial Impressions

Milder than a milk bath on a spring eve, the start to the Montecristo White Series is as tame as it comes, all the way up until you blow out a retrohale. There's a hefty dose of leather and pepper toward the back. But if you keep the smoke downstairs, it does a damn good job of hiding behind all of those buttermilk biscuit and honey notes on the tongue. 

Throw in some creamy vanilla almond milk flavors, a touch of that tangy tangerine peel, and finish it with some freshly whipped cream, and you have a very pleasant start to a cigar. On their own, these tastes wouldn't be all that engaging. But throw in a touch of retrohale action, and zingo! You've got a party...

1st Half

It doesn't take long for this cigar to shift from moderately memorable to medium-bodied, Nicaraguan-based, and unabashedly vibrant. Those aged internals really do impart some roundness to this blend's mouthfeel and overall presence.

With dried cedar shavings leading the taste buds toward flavors of citrus, vanilla, oak, and almonds, the first half hour of this stick is sure to surprise and impress. Part of the reason why I say this is because of the smoke's unflinching determination to create a creamy mouthfeel and mellower retrohales. Both of which it achieves in plentiful amounts.

While the white pepper keeps the tingles running down the length of the tongue, the start of the second half stays true to those oak and citrus notes, with a wonderful nutty aftertaste forming a medium-length finish. Some may consider this to be a copy of the first third, but when the cigar is this smooth, sometimes it doesn't matter. 

2nd Half

Take it easy, and puff slowly, and you'll be rewarded with some roasty salted nut tastes that are a touch darker than before. It may have started off with almond, but toward the center of the cigar, it begins to go walnut-oriented, and with those milkier retrohales in full swing, I cannot complain.

Medium-bodied and growing stronger in flavor, the blend takes on a more traditional Connecticut shade characteristic, with hay and cornmeal being the first to emerge. Creamy and still favoring pepper tingles on the nose and tongue as well at times, the smoke slowly allows the citrus to fade and warm baking spices to layer themselves atop those walnut notes. Cinnamon and nutmeg jump from the nose to the palate and back again, while an oak stave tannin dryness keeps things crisp and toasty.

Parting Puffs 

The tail-end of this stick provides a nice surprise. As it's very much a medium cigar by this point, tastes tend to skew more toward light leather and sun-grown tobacco spice than mild Connecticut monotony. There's very little char or off-tastes to be detected either, with the addition of buttermilk and latte foam being the only changes to the lineup. Smoke textures may be dry up front, but the finish is sweeter and rounder, with stronger cedar adding some extra zip to close things out.

Ash / Burn / Smoke / Draw

If you are a lover of round, milky cigar smoke, then the Montecristo White Series is likely going to be your sort of stick. In fact, the smoke production and draw on these cigars are so prominent that I find myself punching and V-cutting this blend to control flow.

As for construction, soft spots were notable on three of the five sticks I smoked in the 5-pack that was sent to me. Not to the point where I could consider them to be under-filled, just unevenly bunched in areas. While this looseness could have been attributed to the overly fluid draw, my review stick felt notably tighter than the other, yet it too had a draw that was wide-open. 

But the biggest concerns with this blend are ash flake and heat. Every stick I smoked wanted to burn hot and flaked heavily in the second half, so puff as slowly as humanly possible and keep that shop vac at the ready. However, the general shape of the ash, as well as the cleanliness of the burn line and the cone build, was impeccable on each cigar smoked.

Final Thoughts 

I'm sure that I am not the only one who found themselves liking the Montecristo White Series way more than expected. It's by no means a perfect cigar, for it does run a bit dry and hot for my taste, and revolves heavily around many of the same tasting notes again and again. But these are small potatoes when compared to the big picture, and that is a clean, smooth, mild-medium cigar that has enough complexity to keep you coming back for more. 

So I suppose Montecristo got what it was after, and for the better part of the past two decades we cigar smokers have gotten what we want. It's a clean blend that is both reliable and familiar enough for low-power puffers, and rich and surprising enough to keep us full-flavored fellas content too. I also find the shorter "Rothchilde" vitola to be a nice selling point, especially in summer, when a seemingly harmless cigar-smoking session can result in heat stroke.