Smoked: H. Upman Vintage Cameroon

Smoked at: West Chester, Ohio

H. Upman Vintage Cameroon features 3 bands, including one on the foot and a cedar sleeve. The wrapper is like fine sandpaper to the touch with numerous small veins and a couple larger ones. There is no give to a squeeze of the cigar – hard and dry. Could it use more time in the humidor? I feel adventurous. Let’s fire it up.

After the first attempts at a puff, I am already second guessing not putting it back in the humidor. The stick has an extremely tight draw. Even the Perfect Draw couldn’t loosen it up much. This persisted until the final third when it finally opened up enough to produce some smoke and taste any real flavors. Some minor wrapper issues appeared at the end.

Flavors are nut and wood dominant (somewhere between cedar and oak), earth, mild pepper and some floral notes, but the taste is bitter. It never really melded into a balanced flavor profile If I want a wood, nut, earth forward stick I’ll go with the SD Kudzu & Firethorn.

I am probably committing a mortal sin with much of the cigar world not showing a Cameroon some love. But… The Upman Vintage Cameroon is not a bad cigar. It just isn’t a good one. Meh!