Liga Privada Único Serie Nasty Fritas Review
Filed under: Cigar Bands · Field Repairs · CT Broadleaf · Figurados · Burn Time by Size · How to Cut · Filler Types · Nicaragua · The Ash · Retrohale · Ring Gauge · Strength vs Body · The Draw · Which Size, When
Appears in: The Box Buys
Verdict: The Liga Privada Único Serie Nasty Fritas is a Box Buy (4/4) at about $7.50 street... chocolate, leather and sweet cream from the light to the nub, no bitterness, no touch-ups, and close to an hour of heavy smoke out of a 4 inch cigar. It's a weird shape in the hand, and I'll get over that for this flavor.
- Brand
- Drew Estate
- Line
- Liga Privada Único Serie
- Vitola
- Nasty Fritas
- Size
- 4 x 52
- Wrapper
- Connecticut Broadleaf oscuro
- Binder
- Brazilian Mata Fina
- Filler
- Honduran and Nicaraguan (short filler)
- Made in
- Nicaragua
- Factory
- La Gran Fabrica Drew Estate (Estelí)
- Strength
- Just under medium building to just over medium
- Street price
- $7.50
The Nasty Fritas is part of Drew Estate's Liga Privada Único Serie. The filler is short-cut Nicaraguan and Honduran tobacco left over from Liga Privada No. 9 and T52 production, under the same Connecticut Broadleaf oscuro wrapper and Brazilian Mata Fina binder. I'd read that going in and wasn't sure it was true. It is. Both parents have been reviewed here: the No. 9 Toro landed a Five-Pack and the T52 Corona Doble a Hand-Me-One. It's a short, steeply tapered figurado, 4 x 52 by Drew Estate's numbers (one retailer lists it at 4 1/2 x 44), and it gets very narrow at the head.
The Setup
- Cigar: Liga Privada Único Serie Nasty Fritas, 4 x 52 tapered figurado with a closed foot and a pigtail cap. Connecticut Broadleaf oscuro wrapper, Brazilian Mata Fina binder, Honduran and Nicaraguan short filler. Made at La Gran Fabrica Drew Estate in Estelí, Nicaragua.
- Street price: about $7.50 for a single online. A box of 25 runs about $184 online, roughly $7.35 a stick.
- What I paid: $7.75 for a single, $6.43 after a 17% coupon, ordered online in September. My own money.
- Storage: my main Herf-a-Dor at 69% RH, where it's been since it arrived about three and a half weeks ago.
- When/where: lit at 8:11 on a Tuesday night on my back deck. 59°, feels like 55, 57% humidity.
- Smoke time: right about an hour, down to the nub.
- Food beforehand: a chicken potato casserole about two hours before, then water crackers about 15 minutes before I lit it, to clean up my palate.
- First cigar of the day, paired with water. Cut with the Xikar XO, lit with my Guevara single torch.
Light Up and First Half
This one is a very dark brown, with a completely closed foot and a nice little twisted pigtail cap. It's angled so steeply that the band sits right up near the foot, so I took it off before I lit it. It came off perfectly clean.
I cut it with the Xikar XO and got a little crack in the cap. I didn't think it would be a problem, but I had the glue right there, so I put a dab on it. Because the foot is completely closed, I didn't toast it. I went straight to lighting it.
On the light, it was straight milk chocolate for most of the light-up. Once it was going, the chocolate stayed, along with a chili pepper flavor, a good leather, and some nice cream. That's the flavor of chili pepper, not the heat.
The retrohale surprised me. It was very smooth, with no pepper at all. Just chocolate, leather and cream. Very delicious.
The draw was really good, which I wouldn't have expected from such a narrow point, and there was lots of smoke.
On a double draw, I got a hit of milk chocolate that went really quick, then moved into a dark chocolate, bitter in the way dark chocolate is bitter, not in a bad way. Then leather mixed with coffee, and on the long finish a thin sweet cream that coats your palate. It's a thin cream, but it's definitely there.
For the vast majority of the first half, there was no spice at all on the retrohale. At one point I retrohaled the entire draw just to see if any spice would come out, and there was still none. Just chocolate, leather and heavy cream.
Near the end of the first half, it was mostly milk chocolate, sometimes dark chocolate, a little leather, tons of sweet cream and a little coffee. The burn was great. A single draw was chocolate, a touch of minerality, a little leather and a tiny bit of sweet cream. A double draw was dark chocolate with a little more leather, a little more coffee and more sweet cream. On the retrohale, a touch of white pepper showed up for the first time, incredibly mild, with chocolate, a touch of leather and a ton of sweet cream.
Strength through the first half was just under medium.
Second Half
I knocked the ash off to start the second half, and the flavor didn't change at all. That first ash was nice and tight, not flaky at all. It wasn't stacking so much, but the burn was darn near perfect, and it was burning way slower than I expected.
The draw got a touch tighter in the second half, but it was still very good. I had a draw tool sitting there, and it didn't need it. Even if it had, I'm not sure I'd use a draw tool on this one, because the end is so narrow.
That narrow end is the one thing I don't love. Where I'm holding it, it feels smaller than a lancero. It just feels tiny in my hand. My usual is a 50 to 52 ring gauge, I smoke a lot of 56s, and sometimes lanceros, and this is definitely smaller than a lancero where my fingers are. But flavor-wise, this thing is great.
A single draw was chocolate, a touch of minerality and a little leather, with no cream this time. A double draw had a touch of baking spice, then more leather and coffee. The sweet cream was gone there. The retrohale was still delicious: very, very light white pepper, chocolate, a touch of leather and a lot of cream.
The smoke production on this is well above average. Maybe average for the Liga Privada lines I've smoked, but well above average.
A little more than halfway through the second half, a single draw was just straight milk chocolate. The burn wasn't razor sharp, but it was pretty sharp, and the ash stacked really well and tight for this entire half. I know it's small, but the construction is fantastic. I never even thought about rotating it to keep it burning even.
The minerality was still there, but very light. If I wasn't focusing on each draw, I didn't notice it. It only showed up when I was hunting for the nuance.
Then a double draw gave me a really nice rich fruitiness. I couldn't tell you what fruit it was. It popped back in once after that, and it was really nice.
I hadn't retrohaled in a while, and when I did, it built very quickly to a medium-plus white pepper. Very smooth and clean. You get a good amount of pepper sensation through your nose, and as soon as that dies down, it's chocolate and cream all over your palate, with a tiny bit of leather. At that point I was 45 to 50 minutes in, which is way longer than I expected. I figured this was a 30 minute or less smoke.
One draw after that brought a good hit of breadiness with the cream and chocolate. It was super thin at this point, and the smoke production was still phenomenal.
I hadn't ashed it, and the ash let go on its own. It bounced off my shirt, got ash on my phone, hit the deck, and stayed together. I was still able to pick it up afterward. It just got smooshed a little, which is why it looks a little weird in the ashtray.
I smoked it down to the nub. The smoke production at that size was hard to believe, and the flavor was still phenomenal: a touch more leather than before, still coffee and leather, and a little chocolate. There was no bitterness at all, not once in the whole cigar. Super smooth.
With about half an inch of cigar left, I wasn't getting any heat on my lips. By then I was holding it right behind the burn line, and it was very comfortable to hold. Strength at the finish was just over medium.
It went out on me at the very end, which isn't a bad thing, because there was really nothing left to hold. There was nothing to hang onto to touch it back up and draw on it.
Construction
- Wrapper: very dark brown, completely closed foot, twisted pigtail cap. The cap cracked a little when I cut it. I put a dab of glue on it and it gave me no trouble after that. I've used this cutter for a while without any issues, so I'm putting that one on the cigar.
- Draw: really good, which surprised me with such a narrow point. Maybe a touch snug in the second half, but just a touch. Never needed the draw tool.
- Burn: excellent. Darn near perfect, slow, and I never rotated it. No touch-ups, no relights. It went out at the very end with nothing left to hold.
- Ash: tight and not flaky in the first half, stacking really well and tight through the second. The second ash bounced off my shirt, hit the deck, and stayed together.
- Smoke output: well above average from the start, and still phenomenal down at the nub.
- Band: sits right up near the foot. Came off perfectly clean before I lit it.
Bottom Line
This thing is delicious. It opens on milk chocolate, picks up leather, coffee, a chili pepper flavor and a thin sweet cream that coats your palate, and the retrohale stays completely free of spice for most of the first half. In the second half it goes darker, with baking spice, a light minerality you only find if you look for it, a rich fruitiness that popped in twice, and a little breadiness near the end. The retrohale finally builds to a clean medium-plus white pepper, with chocolate and cream right behind it. Not one bitter draw from light to nub.
The construction matched the flavor. A good draw out of a tiny tapered head, a slow burn that never needed a touch-up, a tight ash that survived a fall to the deck and smoke production well above average the whole way. The only ding is a small crack in the cap at the cut. The shape is the other thing. It's a weird vitola, it gets super narrow, and it feels funny in my hand. It also gave me close to an hour when I expected 30 minutes.
Would I smoke it again? Box Buy (4/4). This is an easy box buy. I don't smoke a lot of short cigars, because most of the time I'm setting aside an hour and a half or more. But this one deserves a box in the humidor for when I want something shorter, and it's not even that short. At my pace, you're going to need an hour, or close to it. I usually price cigars against toros, which run about a third longer than this, so by length alone it's closer to an $11 cigar. That's not really how it works, but it shows what you get for about $7.50. If they ever made this blend, the No. 9 and T52 mix, as a full toro, I'd be buying one to try.
Best for: a weeknight when you have an hour instead of an hour and a half, and anyone who wants chocolate, leather and cream with almost no pepper until the very end.
My scale, one question only... would I spend my own money on this again? 4 Box Buy (box on hand, always) / 3 Five-Pack (yes, a few live in the humidor) / 2 Hand-Me-One (wouldn't buy it, wouldn't turn one down) / 1 Not Even Free (I'd rather smoke nothing).
More reviews
Casa Magna Colorado Robusto Review
The Casa Magna Colorado Robusto is a Five-Pack (3/4) at about $9 to $10 street... the flavor start to finish is a box buy for me, cinnamon, leather and...
Stinky Cigar Car Ashtray Review
The Stinky Cigar Car Ashtray is a Wouldn't Buy at about $38 street... it's built like a tank and seals tight, but the lid outweighs a base that's...
Liga Undercrown Maduro Gran Toro Review
The Liga Undercrown Maduro Gran Toro is a Five-Pack (3/4) at about $11 street... leather, coffee and a sweet cream finish that gets you a lot of what...