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The Retrohale

Updated 2026-08-15 · by Eric

A retrohale is pushing cigar smoke out through your nose... not inhaling it... and it's where most of a cigar's aroma detail actually lives.

What's happening

Cigar smoke never goes to the lungs. It comes into the mouth, sits there, and leaves. In a normal puff it leaves back out the mouth. In a retrohale, you push it out through the nose instead.

Why bother: the tongue only reads the basics... sweet, bitter, salty, sour, savory. The specific notes people write down, the cedar, cocoa, and black pepper, are aroma, and aroma is read by receptors in the nose. Smoke that exits through the mouth mostly slips past them. Smoke that exits through the nose runs straight across them. Same cigar, a lot more information. You already know this effect from food: pinch your nose shut during a meal and everything goes flat, because the aroma never reaches those receptors. A retrohale is choosing to un-pinch.

How to do it

Most instructions stop at "blow some smoke out your nose," which is why so many people try it once, sting themselves, and quit. Here is the full sequence. The tongue does all the work.

1. Take a full draw into your mouth. Single draw or double draw, either works. Keep your tongue against the back of your throat the whole time... the same seal you already use to keep smoke out of your lungs, like you're sipping water.
2. Blow about three-quarters of the draw back out of your mouth, then stop. What stays behind is the working amount. On your first attempts, or on anything strong or spicy, keep even less... the nose takes a while to build tolerance.
3. With the smoke parked in your mouth, take a full breath in through your nose. Mouth stays closed. The smoke and the breath aren't mixing yet.
4. Start breathing out slowly through your nose. As you do, take your tongue off the back of your throat and touch just the tip to the roof of your mouth, up front behind your teeth.
5. Roll your tongue front to back: press it up against the roof of your mouth progressively... tip first, then the middle, then the back... so the smoke gets pushed toward the back of your mouth and into the exhale. Twice through is usually enough. The smoke rides out through your nose on its own. There is nothing to force.
6. Open your mouth and blow out whatever's left.

Written out, it sounds mechanical. In practice it takes a few tries to sequence and then becomes automatic. There is nothing difficult in it... the common failure is skipping the tongue roll and trying to shove the smoke through with air pressure, which is exactly what makes eyes water.

Expect pepper to jump out first... the nose reads spice much louder than the mouth does. If it stings, use less smoke or a milder cigar, not more willpower. The sting fades with practice as you learn how much your nose can handle.

When to use it: as a spot-check, once or twice per third, not on every puff. The nose fatigues fast and pepper accumulates. A few well-placed retrohales tell you more than a constant stream ever will.

What it does and doesn't tell you

A retrohale isn't a toughness test. Blasting a full mouthful of strong smoke through your nose proves nothing except that eyes can water. Small and controlled reads better than big and heroic.

It also isn't mandatory. A large share of cigar smokers never retrohale at all, happily, for years... they're just reading the cigar with one sense partly switched off. And don't confuse the nose-sting of pepper with strength... a cigar can be peppery on the retrohale and still mild in nicotine. If you're working on tasting in general, this is the tool that speeds everything else up.

Keep reading

• How to taste a cigar
• Flavor and aroma vocabulary
• Strength vs body vs flavor

Reviewed at WSA since this page was written

More in Taste and burn: Taste & Burn hub · The Draw · The Nub · Bitter Cigar? · Ash Management · Burn Issues · Cigar Bands · Tight Draw · Flavor Vocabulary · all taste and burn pages →