Every Tuesday night the same guys sit in my garage in Gilbertsville, Pennsylvania and smoke cigars. We’ve done that for years. We just started pointing a camera at it. Nothing else changed. Same chairs, same jokes, same guys giving each other grief. The only difference is now you can pull up a seat.

This week we finally did something we’d been joking about for months. We built our own cigar rating system. And on the very first night we used it, somebody hit a perfect score.

The Plasencia Boxes Showed Up and Eric Won the Night

Before we even got into cigars, two boxes from Plasencia landed on the table. Each one had a lighter and cutter, magnetic lid, the whole thing dressed up nice. I kept one box for myself because it was too good to give away. The other one went to Eric. He’s been carrying our social media all year, and it was time he got something back for it.

Eric nearly dropped the cutter on the concrete about four seconds after opening the box. If you know Eric, that checks out.

We also had some samples from Don Emmanuel that were dispersed amongst the crew.

We Finally Built the Sword Rating System

We joked about this last week and this week we just did it. Five swords, one through five. One sword means the cigar had real problems and you couldn’t finish it. Two means it had issues but you got through it. Three is the baseline, the cigar was fine, maybe you’d smoke it again, maybe not. Four means you genuinely enjoyed it. Five means it’s something special.

No half points. No 2.5s, no 3.5s. You commit to a number.

The idea is simple. Ones and fives should be rare. If you’re handing out fives every week, the rating means nothing.

What Everybody Smoked and How They Scored

Bruce, who showed up a little late, lit up the Room 101 Farce and gave it three swords. I smoked the West Tampa Tobacco Company Devil Crab and gave it three swords. Mark had a ChiMolly and gave it three swords. Eric smoked the Tatuaje Cojonu Tuxtla and gave it four swords.

Jim smoked the Black Label Hawaiian Hornet, one of the Hawaiian regional releases we’ve come to love, and it earned the first five sword rating we’ve ever given out. Perfect burn from start to finish, no touch ups needed, flavor that held all the way through.

I wrapped up the evening with a Crowned Heads Thunderkiss, which I gave three swords. Jim and I have both had good luck with this stick lately.

We also talked through a stack of Crowned Heads in general this episode. The Moonflower is getting a lot of hype right now and it earned it, four swords from the Eric. The JD Howard Reserve is a stick I only reach for when I’m in the right mood, it’s a strange flavor profile that either works or it doesn’t. And an old Crowned Heads Court – fantastic cigar given to us by Eddie a while back.

The Price Increases Nobody’s Happy About

Tatuaje’s Monster Series used to run around $13 a stick. This year’s release, the Creature, launched at $19 MSRP, and some of us paid more than that online. Bruce smoked it and gave it three swords, said the construction was good but the flavor never developed. Six dollars is close to a fifty percent jump, and that’s a hard pill to swallow for a cigar that used to be a lock purchase every year.

Black Label’s Bishop Blends jumped too. What used to run ten or eleven dollars for the smaller vitolas is heading toward fifteen. Nobody in the garage thinks the cigars got worse. We just think the ten dollar cigar is becoming a thing of the past.

Bruce Made the Move to Chartwell

Bruce cancelled his membership at Cigar Mojo and joined Chartwell Cigar Club in Glenmoore, PA in favor of its much closer location. He says the selection is strong, and if they don’t carry something you want, they’ll track it down or find you something close. There’s a two cigar minimum to use the lounge, no price floor on those two sticks.

He’s not walking away from Mojo completely. He still plans to show up there on Saturdays as a regular, because the people there matter to him as much as the cigars do.

One Year Is Coming Up Fast

Next week marks a full year of Smoke and Steel. Fifty six episodes in, and it still feels like we just sat down for the first one. Eric reached out to the Discord crew for their favorite moments and got back actual timestamps, not vague memories. These guys did their homework. That says something about who’s been showing up for us all year.

Something to Sit With

A year ago this was a handful of guys smoking in a garage with nobody watching. It still is. We just added a rating system, a camera, and a few people who show up every week to see what we’re smoking. I don’t know what year two looks like. I know we’ll be here Tuesday night either way.

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If you want to see this crew build out the sword rating system week to week, subscribe to the Stogie Review YouTube channel and never miss an episode. And if you want to talk cigars with us between episodes, argue about sword scores, or just see what Eddie’s up to next, come hang out in the Stogie Review Discord.