Smoked: Southern Draw Firethorn

Smoked at: Sharonville, Ohio

Southern Draw Firethorn is cloaked in a dark Habano Rosado wrapper. It opens with oak and pepper and those wood flavors dominate much like the Kudzu. Other more subtle flavors include caramel, toast (with butter), roasted coffee and nuts, cream and spice. The wood profile becomes more like charred wood by the second third. There were a few puffs of raisins and dark tea along with floral and leather notes that were more pronounced on the retrohale.

The construction is fine – cold draw throughout, nice burn line that required only a couple of short touch ups. The ash didn’t hold as firmly as I like, but it did not detract from enjoying the smoke.

I’m usually not a big fan of peppery cigars, but the wood and pepper balanced well and did not impede the other more subtle flavors from emerging throughout the smoke. The cigar was enjoyable but lacked any Oh Wow moments. This is a good cigar and I would smoke it again. I’m just more impressed with the Kudzu, Jacob’s Ladder and especially the Rose of Sharon. There’s a Cedrus aging in the humidor.