El Original Toro Maduro vs Nat

[spiridon]

Okay, lit up one of the El Original maduros yesterday that I recently ordered. It was my first cigar of the day, I wanted to get a "true" taste of this cigar. A well constructed cigar, oily maduro wrapper. It smoked very well, a smooth taste which kept switching back & forth from medium to med/full in strength. The amount of smoke produced was good, though not what I would call a LARGE amount. The burn was nice and even with the ash being even and white. I enjoyed this cigar, but I think I like the natural wrapper version of these better......while I considered this maduro "good", I have always considered the Natural version "excellent". One more thing to add, I also ended up smoking one of the Sharks (a bundle cigar) as my fourth cigar of the day, and I was QUITE impressed at how well this cigar held up! Usually by the fourth cigar it takes something with a good bit of power or flavor to shine thru my tired taste buds.......this Shark did just that. I'm not saying I consider the Shark a "premium" cigar by any means, it has the usual appearance of a bundle cigar and while smoking, usually needs a "touchup" here or there, and the ash can be a bit flaky. BUT for a good straightforward smoke with a bit of ooomph to it, I think these are hard to beat at $2 a stick! I think I will go ahead and order a box of the El Originals in natural wrapper and include another bundle of the sharks.