CAO LX2

I've been meaning to get a review posted of this cigar, and since I find myself at work patiently waiting for UPS to deliver a package that I need to get started today, I figure I'd take a few minutes to offer up my thoughts on a relatively new offering from CAO, the CAO LX2.

A few months ago I found myself at my local cigar bar Stogies participating in their monthly No Limit Hold'em Poker tournament. Since Tennessee is a state that does not allow any gambling, no cash prizes were awarded, rather gift cards and other assorted prizes. For $25 you get to participate in the tournament, you are given 2 cigars to smoke and 2 beers to drink. Normally a preferred vendor is brought in as the host for the evening and he or she gets to talk about the different pairings that you are given, and while I came to play poker, most folks there were there to smoke cigars and as such their play tended to be loose and carefree.

Along with the smokes and brews throughout the evening you were given raffle tickets basically ensuring anyone who came would win at least something. The grand prize that evening however was a CAO LX2 humidor stocked full of CAO LX2 cigars.

If you haven't figured it out yet that I won the grand prize raffle, I hate to be a spoiler here but I did. It felt good to win something, and with pride I carried that humidor home stocked full of cigars that I was excited to try and share with friends.

As a side note here, one of the two cigars given this evening to smoke included the Cigar Aficionado 2008 Cigar of the Year, the Casa Magna Colorado Robusto. I won't be posting tasting notes on this cigar until such time as I get a chance to taste it again when I have a chance to focus on the cigar, and not the cards I am holding such as was the case this evening.

The CAO LX2 is part of the CAO _x2 line of cigars. I have been fortunate enough to taste the CX2, the MX2 and most recently the LX2. The "L" in this case stands for ligero, and the x2 means times 2. For clarification the CX2 is a Cameroon and the MX2 a Maduro. CAO has seen tremendous success and has brought to market quite a few cigars that have consistently gotten high reviews. For me I have to be honest in saying I haven't been a fan of every CAO cigar I have smoked however if ever asked for a great go to cigar in a pinch, especially for a novice, without a doubt I will always suggest a CAO Gold.

The LX2 is a long cigar. Commonly known as a lonsdale, this cigar is the better part of 7 inches with an incredible small ring size. Holding it in your hand felt like holding a pencil. The cigar itself was well constructed and the wrapper perfectly rolled without any signs of stretching or tearing and the veining was almost non-existent, a testament to the attention to detail CAO puts into its cigars.

I had previously smoked an LX2 in a Robusto size, however the humidor it had come out of was not well regulated and as such that particular cigar was dry and brittle - so having not one but in my case a total of 30 or so LX2's, I was anxious to light one up and smoke it.

When time finally presented itself I cut the head and roasted the foot. With such a small ring gauge it didn't take much to get it going, and I took the first draw which was surprisingly difficult. After a couple quick strong draws I was able to get a decent mouthful of smoke, and I noticed at once a charred taste, especially noticeable when the smoke left your mouth. I attributed that taste to the need to draw harder on it thereby causing a hotter burn than what would be normal on a shorter thicker cigar.

As the cigar settled into its burn two things became abundantly clear. Number one was the almost overwhelming black pepper taste that overpowered the cigar and number two was the need to take a lot of draws off the cigar just to keep it lit. I found myself reaching for my lighter over and over again leading to frustration and annoyance.

I wanted to be fair to this cigar, and since I had more than my fair share of them now populating my humidor, so I experimented with them trying a couple different things to give my tasting experience a fair and balanced look. First off I smoked another cigar just like the first hoping that the experience would be better, but sadly it was almost identical. The cigar was difficult to draw on, difficult to keep lit and offered a one dimensional dare I say HARSH black pepper flavor never developing or smoothing itself out.

On try number three I actually cut about 3 inches off the foot of the cigar leaving a 4 inch cigar that resembled a cigarette. I again roasted the new foot and was again surprised how harsh a cigar the LX2 was. To be fair, I packed up a handful of my vast inventory and sent some to my buddy Tony up at Motor City Cigars for him and his brother to taste and again no positive tasting reports came back.

I was so disappointed in the experience I put the humidor up for sale on ebay and sold it. Is the CAO LX2 a bad cigar, or did the size I won simply turn out to be a not so great configuration for what otherwise might be a decent cigar? To be honest, I don't know. In all fairness I don't think I'll ever even try another LX2 in any other size or shape given my experience with the cigars I won. I ended giving my remaining cigars to friends and neighbors who profess to be cigar fiends. I had one friend in particular gush about how great a cigar it was and I promptly gave him more, but his humidor consists of a plastic ziplock bag kept in the freezer so there isn't the passion there that others may share.

And of course that is alright, and in fact even considered good. For even though in my opinion the CAO LX2 sucked, someone else found enjoyment in it and within that enjoyment is the true definition of what makes cigar smoking so great.

So let them have the CAO LX2's out of the humidor and I'll settle for a lowly NUB or Cain or Rocky Patel. The beauty is is that if they are enjoying the cigar, that is all that matters in the end.

Until we smoke again.