Mayflower Dusk

Mayflower is a fairly new cigar operation headed by Michael Knowles. A “new” cigar company brings both intrigue and fear to a smoking experience. I’m reminded of contestants on So You Think You Can Dance. So you think you can make a cigar? Mayflower has two initial offerings – a Connecticut Shade called Dawn and a Habano called Dusk. Sounds like someone’s been a student of Asylum’s Serenity Now-Insanity Later. Today I’m smoking the Mayflower Dusk – gifted to me by the immortal Jay Clark, former owner of Tre J Cigars.

Mayflower Dusk is made of Nicaraguan filler, a Sumatra binder and covered in a toothy mottled Ecuador Habano wrapper some veinage showing and hidden seams.

The cigar has flavors of cedar, kitchen cabinet spices, pepper, milk chocolate, honey, and earthiness. By the second third there are background notes of dark roast coffee and vegetal. Oak and an unidentifiable sweetness sneak in at times and offer some balance. I rate the body and strength at medium.

The draw has a little more resistance than I like but a couple of toothpick pokes open it up. The smoke production is fair. Light and dark grey ash stacked up but fall off on occasion – a little flaky. The burn line was perfectly even.

Mayflower Dusk is a very average cigar in my opinion. I smoked most of the stick but got very little from the experience. In all fairness, this cigar may have improved with more humidor time. It was gifted and I lit it a few days later.

BTW: Mayflower owner Michael Knowles claims he can trace back his ancestry to the Pilgrims, hence, the Mayflower. Everyone in the tobacco industry has an interesting story to tell.

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