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Old 11-03-2021, 04:40 PM   #1
RoomDog
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Join Date: Jan 2003
Location: Little house in the woods
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Confessions of a Cigar Smoker

My Sister has several old pictures, documents and whatnot she kept after my Dad passed, and we were talking about some of them the other day. One was a mystery. A typed document with the same title as this thread. It originated from my grandfather, and was annotated "Gormet [sic] Magazine Dec 1970".

Did he write it? A submission? Was his typing it out simply some method of saving it for posterity or sharing it? We certainly overlook or take for granted the benefits of our digital age...

I searched online and found a copy of the December 1970 issue of Gourmet Magazine, and ordered it. To my sister's disappointment, he did not write it. The author is Donald Aspinwall Allan.

Anyway, the portion my grandfather "saved" is attached in the photos, and essentially reproduced here. His document omitted parts I included from the original article, and I suppose he didn't think them worthwhile.

Although a little pretentious and aficionado-ish, there remains a lot of truth that should ring familiar, and I enjoyed reading the copy and the original. I tried scanning from the magazine, but the formatting was such a pain I just typed it out; in a sort of homage to my grandfather's effort. I'm sure I introduced some typos that the computer didn't catch, but I'll leave them, just as my grandfather's transposition (on typewriter) had some as well...

Quote:
Originally Posted by Donald Aspinwall Allan - in an excerpt from Confessions of a Cigar Smoker
Smoking a cigar is a voluptuous experience involving all the senses. The law of diminishing returns dictates that such experiences be rationed to maintain maximum enjoyment. Four cigars a day I say outside limit. I know that some famous cigar enthusiasts smoke five or six times that many, but I cannot believe that their compulsive habit provides as much pleasure as a single after-dinner cigar gives the connoisseur.

Let us begin at the beginning, with an unopened box of (for nostalgia's sake) Romeo y Julieta. You remove the protective wax paper covering and admire the box. It is a flagrantly gaudy object of art, proclaiming its precious value by heavy use of gold, purple, and red inks. Romeo is clambering up a rope ladder on a balcony of gold bowered in red, pink, and white roses. Juliet, her golden tresses loosed to the breeze, leans over a red tapestry to clasp him by his purple velvet jacket. Overhead streams a pink ribbon with their names in gold. The touching scene is framed in a king's ransom of gold medals commemorating awards won by the cigar in nineteenth-century expositions. Cigar box art is a unique genre, its masters extinct and anonymous.

Having enjoyed the artwork, you carefully open the box, first slitting the paper seal around the lid, then, with a butter knife, gently prying up the single nail in the center holding the lid. Great care must be taken not to penetrate beyond the edge of the box where the blade could damage a cigar.

Now your cigars are unveiled. You sniff their liberated perfume and admire them. They are carefully matched as to shade of wrapper, and tightly packed, thirteen in the top row, twelve underneath. To unpack them, you press gently on the sealed end of a cigar near the middle. This raises the cut end, permitting you to remove the cigar and loosening the others so that they may easily be lifted from the box. Any other method of removal risks damaging one of the beauties.

The next step is to place them together in a humidor, preferably a massive dignified object of polished wood with cedar or leather internal trim and compartments sheathed in porcelain. A glass tube filled with porous material is fitted to one side, and when kept moist with water it will maintain the humidity necessary to keep the cigars in condition. The humidor should not be placed near a source of heat or sunlight. Nothing must be put in the humidor with the cigars, for they "breathe" and quickly absorb even the faintest foreign odors. Nor should the cigars be sheathed in cellophane, and thus suffocated, until you remove one or two to place in a case or pocket.

The humidor will have compartments for cigars of several sizes, for different occasions demand different smokes. The best all-around size, to my taste, is the classic corona. It is round, about five-eights of an inch in diameter and five inches or more in length, with a closed, blunt head and a cut foot. The shorter demi-coronas and the longer, fatter double coronas have their uses, but the popular slim panatelas, regardless of length, can never give the properly dense volume of rich smoke in a draw. The perfecto, tapered at either end, is now found mainly in less expensive cigars, whereas the torpedo, beloved of cartoonists has all but disappeared.

When you are in that state of spiritual equanimity and physical well-being when neither more sleep nor work nor play, nor food and wine, nor even love could be added without detracting from the perfection of your contentment, only one pleasure remains to bring it to fulfillment - a rich, fragrant cigar. You lift the lid of your humidor and breathe in slowly as the essences of the sleeping beauties escape their airtight compartment. You select a corona. You hold it firmly between thumb and the first two fingertips. You gaze lovingly upon the satiny wrapper, noting the sheen of the tautly rolled leaf. You press it slightly to establish that it is fresh and resilient, but firm. You observe the cut end to appreciate how closely the cigar maker has rolled his filler, and the tip to admire the neatness of its closing fold. You may put it to your ear, listening for a slight crackle as you rotate it, while gently pinching. (You are not sure that this means anything, but it brings a fish sense into play.). Then you produce your cutter and slice a V-shaped notch in the head. You raise the cigar to your nostrils for a final inhalation of its living scent, lightly moisten your lips, and place it dead center in your mouth.

You flick a kitchen match into flame, let it burn a bit to consume the chemicals, then bring the fire directly under, but not touching, the foot of your corona. As you draw evenly, you rotate the cigar so that the whole cut end will ignite at once. Two more quick, shallow draws and you remove the cigar to see that it is glowing a uniform red. Then you throw the match away and take your first good puff.

The smoke fills your mouth almost as would a draft of wine. You puff your cheeks slightly, working the rich, palpable smoke around in your mouth and on your tongue. You inhale through your nose, still holding the smoke, then let it out in three stages: a quick jet upward past your nostrils; a long, slow blowing over the tip of your tongue; and finally, a last exhalation through your nostrils. Bliss! The first dozen puffs are the best. Between each, you remove the cigar from your mouth, holding it lightly and inspecting it fondly from time to time. Its head remains dry. You do not chew it, for that would bring bitter juices into your mouth.

With succeeding puffs you vary your routine. It may suit your fancy to lean back in your chair and blow smoke rings toward the ceiling. Or you may prolong your pleasure by taking only one puff every few minutes. A good corona should last at least forty-five minutes. Should it go out, you take a matchstick, scrape off the charred leaf, and light up again.

A childish pleasure I indulge in, which used to entertain my children, is seeing how long an ash I can hold. A well made cigar will hold an inch-long ash easily, but it is a myth that the cigar burns more evenly and slowly with the ash that without it. Keeping the ash is a matter of aesthetics and proof of good materials and workmanship.

Of course one does not inhale a cigar, but one toys with inhalation. The chief pleasure is in the taste and smell of the smoke - one almost eats it. But one draws a little of the smoke back onto the palate by inhaling through the nose while drawing on the cigar. Everyone has his own foibles in this regard.

When your cigar is somewhere between the half and three-quarter mark, its life is drawing to a close. Let it expire in dignity. Do not smoke it down to an acrid butt or grind it brutally and messily in an ashtray. It will go out by itself. When it does, throw it into the fireplace or take it out of the room for decent burial. Never leave the remains in view.

For me, the best cigar of the day is smoked in the morning. A half an hour or so before breakfast, after shaving and pottering around a bit, but before dressing completely, I require a period of quiet to read three newspapers and make notes on work in progress. In winter I light a fire and settle down with a full corona. With all my senses keen, each of the cigar's delights seems purest at this hour. On the other hand, what can compare with the ceremonial cigar and brandy culminating a memorable dinner? It is perhaps impossible or inappropriate to weigh the special pleasures of different circumstances. What is essential is a degree of unhurried calm and good tobacco.


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Last edited by RoomDog; 11-03-2021 at 04:43 PM.
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