Caldwell Long Live The Queen Maduro Queen's Crest

Caldwell Long Live The Queen Maduro Queen’s Crest is made with Dominican and U.S. filler, an Indonesian binder and a toothy dark brown Mexican San Andres wrapper with plenty of veins. The cigar features two bands. The primary depicts the Caldwell Queen logo on a background of black and gold trim. Each side of the queen has lettering – “Caldwell” and a year date. The secondary band has black letters stating “Long Live The Queen” on a gold backdrop.

The cigar launches with oak, earth, leather, doughy bread and cereal notes, mild pepper spice and an array of nuts – almonds, walnuts & peanuts (and probably more I couldn’t identify). Wood, earth, spice and leather are the dominant flavors, but there is a menagerie of background notes. Cedar joins the oak, creaminess, graham crackers, raisins, vegetal and ever so slight hints of chocolate/cocoa and coffee that develops into espresso are detectable.

Occasional notes of vegetal, mustiness with the earth notes, cinnamon, honey/nutmeg, citrus and fruit – some kind of berry – are some of the transition flavors. This thing is well balanced and complex. The pepper increases a tad during the final third, but still subtle mingling with the other flavors. The retrohale is woodsy and leathery. The pepper is in there, but it’s mild.

Whew! There’s a lot to take in here. Into the final third, I had to just kick back and enjoy the remainder of the smoke. There were some other flavors but I didn’t take notes.

The construction is superb - an A-plus draw, balls on accurate even burn line (to quote Marisa Tomei in My Cousin Vinny), generous smoke output, and light grey ash – delicate but held on to over an inch and never fell off once. This is a slow burning cigar for such a small vitola.

Caldwell Long Live The Queen Maduro Queen’s Crest is medium-full bodied and medium strength. Although it’s heavy on wood, leather and earth, there is a subtlety to the numerous other flavors that balance out the experience quite nicely. This cigar is the definition of balance and complexity. I like the original Long Live The Queen. I like the Maduro even more. Kudos, Mr. Caldwell!

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