Condega Serie F Mini Titan
A Spanish favorite
The Cigar
Agnarosa
Nicaragua
Mini Titan 4"1/2 X 60
Medium
According to their website, it's a Corojo 99 wrapper and binder with Corojo 99 and Criollo 98 filler. I'm assuming it's all Nicaraguan tobacco, but I can't be sure.
9.50€ at Cigar Corner Monte
~130mins
3.2/5
The Experience
Today I bring you a weird one.
The cigar market is heavily segmented. Most cigar brands we hear about on online communities and magazines, are the ones that are popular in the United States - the largest cigar market in the world. Those among them with enough production and distribution capacity might reach other markets like the European or Middle Easterner, but a lot of stuff that is available in the US is not necessarily available everywhere else.
Conversely, some brands might be pretty big and yet not have the US as their primary market. Most cigars I've reviewed here were usually quite mainstream, but some examples, like the Flor de Copan, are harder to find mentions to.
The reason why some of these cigars might be unfamiliar to you is that I'm writing from Portugal, a small European country, where cigar culture is non-existent, and the availability of cigars is limited and... unusual. We have a few cigar brands available here that aren't necessarily super common in countries like the US, where most cigar reviewers hail from.
I like to talk about these cigars. It's hard to find reliable information on them online. It keeps things interesting. I might not be the hundredth person to review them.
Introducing Condega. Take what I'm saying here with a grain of salt... there's scarce information about this brand online and I have no way to confirm some of the stuff I was told. Apparently this Nicaraguan brand, manufactured by Agnarosa, is the number one Nicaraguan cigar smoked in Spain.
It was a relatively cheap cigar, in one of the weirdest vitolas I've had so far. The funnily named Mini Titan. A super thick 60 ring gauge vitola, not boxed pressed, on a four inch long cigar. Short and thick. I'm sure there's an immature joke in there somewhere.
The Corojo wrapper doesn't look super elegant, but doesn't look terrible either. The spartan band suggests more Cuban than Nicaraguan. In fact, it looks a lot like a Partagas - suspiciously so. Also exactly like Partagas they name their cigars as Serie Letter. A little too much coincidence if you ask me. I unfortunately never had a Partagas, so my comparisons will have to be limited to appearance and branding.
Uncharacteristically, I haven't mentioned anything about what I'm actually doing for the night, besides smoking this unusual cigar.
Today it happens to be Friday, and my wife went with her young brother to the cinema to watch Kung Fu Panda 4. And as the ancient traditions dictate, when the wife is out, daddy gets to indulge. So I poured a generous glass of Tomatin and sat watching Jujutsu Kaisen and having this cigar.
What is Jujutsu Kaisen, you ask? Well... it's an anime show, a very popular one. I haven't been watching anything anime for a few years, but my recent visit to an anime themed restaurant made me nostalgic about watching Japanese cartoons. I don't really know how much the cigar and anime watching communities intersect, but I'm an eclectic guy.
For those of you who care, I am enjoying Jujutsu Kaisen a lot. It's your typical Shojen, but it's well made, original enough not to be boring and has it's share of laughs. I'm sure than anyone who is into that sort of show has watched it already.
As for the Condega, the dry pull had a decent air flow and didn't taste like much. Lighting up brought up a lot of spice, which calmed down after a while.
Generally, it's a nice flavored cigar. It's what I think of when I think sun grown wrappers, spicy earthy flavors, with cocoa but not a lot of it.
It's not a super dynamic cigar, except for the spice that is a lot more pronounced at the beginning and towards the end.
The weird vitola wasn't really my thing. I'm neither a huge fan of shorter cigars or super thick ring gauges, especially not being box pressed.
It lasted a really long time for a four inch cigar - 130 minutes. I did receive a longish phone call from my parents, where I only really puffed to keep it lit. That probably significantly extended the smoke duration.
Since I was a bit more indulgent on the whiskey than I usually am, I had a bit of trouble evaluating the strength of the cigar. It's hard to separate the effects of the whiskey from those of the cigar. From what I can tell, it seemed quite strong.
Overall, it was a strange but pleasant experience. Watching an unusual show in unusual circumstances, smoking an unusual cigar. I was interrupted and distracted. The Condega rose to the occasion. It didn't feel like the most luxurious smoke, but if it's true that Spain looks at it as their Nicaraguan workhorse, I can perfectly understand why.
I might even get another one day, assuming I find one in a more reasonable vitola.
