Tatuaje W Nice Ash 2015 | Cigar Review

Wrapper: Sumatra Rosada
Binder: Nicaraguan
Filler: Nicaraguan
Size: 6 x 52 “Belicoso”
Body: Medium/Full
Price: $11.99

Today we take a look at the Tatuaje W Nice Ash 2015 “The Whore.”
Thanks to Justin Zaharris for the sticks.

BACKGROUND:
Released August, 2015.
A total production of 10,000 cigars.
Factory: My Father Cigars S.A. in Nicaragua.

DESCRIPTION:
Good looking solid stick. But no soft spots.
The wrapper is a slightly mottled sandy brown color with just the tiniest bit of tooth.
Seams are invisible. The triple cap is flawless.
And of course, the cigar band with the naughty lady’s corset behind the big red “W” for Whore. My naughty corsets are in bright sea green and sky blue. A man likes to look pretty once in a while. Gak.

AROMAS AND COLD DRAW NOTES:
From the shaft, I smell a load of aromas: chocolate, spice, cinnamon, nutmeg, lemon citrus, sweetness, oak, nuts, and espresso. Wow!
From the clipped cap and the foot, I smell dark baking cocoa, nutmeg, spice, coffee, cinnamon, and oak.
The cold draw presents flavors of milk chocolate, lemon citrus, spice, pineapple, cinnamon, nutmeg, green tea, cedar, and coffee.

FIRST THIRD:
The draw is good and clear.
First flavors: Red pepper (Yikes! A spice bomb), milk chocolate, malts, creaminess, cinnamon, caramel, cedar, citrus, oak, and espresso.
Nice start. I love following up a less than perfect cigar’s review with a winner. And methinks, this will be a winner.
Starts off with a small bang. The spiciness dissipates quickly.
Strength is classic medium body.

Flavors that started out strong are on the wane.
The Tatuaje W Nice Ash 2015 immediately impressed me and then it went flat. I’m 1-1/4” in and wish the flavors were more potent.
The aromas of the wrapper were actually a better experience than smoking it.

Justin Zaharris told me he had these cigars for months. So no excuses allowed for not enough humidor time. Justin also threw in a couple Las Calaveras 2015. I loved the 2014 blends so this should be a treat.
At the 1-1/2” burned point, flavors perk up.

That very grouping of flavors, that started this experience, comes back to life.
But I’m not as impressed as much as I thought I would. I expected a flavor bomb and there is nothing showing that will lead me to that conclusion.

I fear this will be one more cigar that breaks loose in the last third and voila! You have an inconsistent, overpriced, limited edition blend. I swear that I believe that a lot of limited editions were rejects that had to be used up some way. Just like what Impromptu Cigars…or is it Caldwell, Something & Something…or Lost & Found does. Rummage through other manufacturers warehouses looking to re-market old blends.

And this Tatuaje W Nice Ash 2015 reeks of that. I love Tat cigar blends. But something is wrong. I don’t trust cigar blends made exclusively for one online store. I have reviewed a long list of those cigars and there were quite a few duds in play.

A plug develops and the draw is like sucking through a flat straw. I carefully use my cigar awl to clear it and now I have a terrific clear tunnel. Maybe this will help with tasting what the Tatuaje W Nice Ash 2015 has to offer.
And it does.

Spiciness returns. Creaminess, chocolate, espresso, malts, graham cracker, mint, citrus, caramel, oak, and cedar make a new showing. Finally.

SECOND THIRD:
Smoke time is 35 minutes.
Flavors flatten out once again.

Damnation! What a huge disappointment. Other reviewers gave this cigar high marks. But they are also tied to the hip of Pete Johnson. Don’t rock the boat!

Yet one of the Big Guys doesn’t go all ga ga over this blend. The reviewer describes all three thirds as sort of a redundant flavor profile with little flavor and no transitions and then ends his review by saying what an “Excellent cigar this is.” What horseshit. That reviewer described at total of 3 flavors: cedar, spice, and sweetness. And then described them as minimal. Yet proclaims it an outstanding cigar? WTF??

I can never be like those lemmings. I don’t know how they live with themselves. Speaking of whores. And on top of that, no palates. I don’t get it. This kind of talk may be one reason the entire reviewing community hates me. LOL.

Other reviewers don’t mention half or a quarter the flavors I taste. Maybe that’s why they are not disappointed in this blend. If you can’t taste it, then it has a better chance to be a “great cigar.”
One reviewer’s biggest impression is the longevity of the ash. This is the most excited he gets over the cigar and then gives it a high rating. Sonovabitch.

I should learn how to describe a dog turd using flowery language yet saying nothing informative. And then add a high rating to please Pete Johnson and Pepin Garcia.
The Tatuaje W Nice Ash 2015 is a pleasant cigar; that’s all.

I reach the halfway point. Smoke time is 45 minutes.

Construction has been top notch. And yes, the ash hangs tough. And virtually, no burn line issues. But what about the godamm flavor? It comes and goes like a $2 whore.
Flavors are barely there. And I betcha a dollar that the last third sees what the whole cigar should have tasted like. You know I’m right.

Ooh…The cable TV radio station is playing Deep Purple’s 1972 “Smoke on the Water.” You couldn’t be a cover band in the early 70’s without playing this song. And in fact, Curved Air did several dates with Deep Purple in Europe somewhere. The two bands got along famously and near the end of the dates, they invited us on stage for an encore and the played “Smoke on the Water” once again. And I stood next to bassist, Glenn Hughes, and played the shit out of the song laughing the whole time. We even traded riffs when they allowed us a solo. Now that was cool and I hadn’t thought of this for decades.

Strength reaches medium/full.
Here are the limp flavors: Chocolate, coffee, malts, graham cracker, caramel, creaminess, cinnamon, and spice.
Without the spiciness, there is no zip or oomph. D.O.A.

How many were made? 10,000. And they probably sold out quickly. And there are hundreds of cigar smokers, at least the experienced ones, who thought to themselves, “WTF? This ain’t no Tat.”
That’s how I feel. I was so looking forward to fawning over this cigar instead of trashing it.

LAST THIRD:
Smoke time is one hour.
I keep reading the laughable word “Leather” in describing this blend. Fuck me.

I guess my prediction was wrong. No surge of flavors. Just lying there like a haddock.
I agree with one reviewer who basically said the best part of the Tatuaje W Nice Ash 2015 is that the ash really hangs on.

Now the price point. The Tatuaje W Nice Ash 2015 doesn’t even qualify as a $6 cigar.
With 10,000 cigars made, it was just greed to sell the cigars at $12 each. If this was a good cigar, I would say something in the $9 range would be more appropriate.
But the PR always takes precedent.

Waiting. Waiting. Waiting.
Finally. 1-3/4” to go. Flavors kick in. LOL
Wonderful, big, bold flavors: Spice, chocolate, creaminess, caramel, mint, malts, cinnamon, cedar, espresso, and citrus.

Now if the Tatuaje W Nice Ash 2015 had started this way and kept transitioning, I would have rated this with a high score.
But no complexity. A so so balance. And a short finish kept this cigar from being anything more than a yard ‘gar.

I’m sorry Justin. You were so kind to care package me these cigars and then I trash the shit out of it.
Strength is now full bodied. And a touch of nicotine swoops in.

But at least it is now a live, breathing, thing.
Now this cigar had plenty of humidor time. But maybe it needs more than a few months. I find that hard to believe because most cigar blends by Johnson and Garcia are good to go in no longer than a month.
If you missed out on purchasing the Tatuaje W Nice Ash 2015, I don’t believe you missed out on much.

RATING: 84

Now for something relevant:
In my recent HVC Black Friday review (12-5-2015), I discussed my new relationship with a cigar forum I joined.
I’ve told you, dear readers, that in the past I’ve had nothing but bad luck with cigar forums. Hence, I’ve stayed away from them for the last 5 years and STILL there are assholes that remember what happened and still persecute me for my stupid mistakes.

Back in 2010, I was goaded into asking for cigars by the fellas at Famous. (I was writing for Famous Smoke). Since I was recently shit canned due to the 2008-2009 recession, the folks at Famous told me that it was a really good way to snag cigars because all of the members are very generous. I was also asked to be a shill and promote their house blends I reviewed.
HA! They had no clue and were merely guessing. None had any experience when it came to asking for cigars.

So, I was immediately labeled a mooch; and worse. They came at me from all sides; digging into my past to unearth little lies. Like how I lied about my college years on the resumes posted online (Would have given away my age. I was 59 and looking for work.) No one was hiring old men for project managers. They found all sorts of inconsistencies. They should have been private detectives. They found it exhilarating to tear me down.

So in spite of good sense telling me otherwise, 5 years later, I went ahead and joined a cigar forum.
A couple creeps attacked me immediately without even knowing me; showing me they were the Alpha Dog in our relationship. But other than those couple assholes, I found that everyone was quite nice and very kind to me.

Well, folks, I guess the people at this cigar forum didn’t like what I wrote about the cigar forum culture. And they especially did not like the comments YOU left at the bottom of my review about your negative experiences in cigar forums.

Your comments were sincere. There was no trashing of cigar forums just for fun or for the sake of running them down. They all explained with great clarity the way things work in a lot of forums. Others wrote they had nothing but positive experiences.

So without ceremony, they kicked me out. I got no warning. The HVC review was written on Dec. 5. And then I forgot all about the cigar forum. Part of my Alzheimer’s I guess. And then it dawned on me I hadn’t returned in days.

I tried to sign in on the 10th, for the first time since the 5th, and it would not allow me to enter. I even tried saying I lost my password but it said there was no such email address within the system.
It seems that my comments, and readers’ comments, hit a nerve with these fellas. I can hear them muttering to themselves: “How fucking dare you say anything negative about a cigar forum? Who do you think you are? US? Only we have the right to be obnoxious and two faced.”

Now…I’m finally convinced they are all alike. Ahhh…The Politics of Dancing.

Know your place or suffer the consequences. I saw one comment where a member asked why Tommy Z-Man was no longer commenting? LMAO!

I hadn’t mentioned the name of the cigar forum in my initial comments but since they ditched me like an old tampon, it’s on. A real mensch administrator would have contacted me personally.

All forums love to dish it out. But they can’t take a little free speech. They recoil like frightened snakes.

And not a single reader even mentioned a forum directly. Everyone was keeping their issues with specific forums to themselves as far as the forum names.

But on the cigar forum I joined, administrators felt that….”You fuckers don’t talk bad about our culture. And we mean it. Because we have solved the cure for cancer. We have a plan for world peace. We have a plan to decimate ISIS. WE ARE THE COOLEST!!!!

BTW- They have a mission statement with rules and regs. But nowhere within this Magna Carta is there anything about free speech. Welcome to 1935 Germany.

Oooh….I wish I could be a pig on the wall when they go bat shit over this. I will be slammed, bad mouthed, vilified, and so on and so on. Who gives a rat’s ass? I’m too old for this shit. And I have more important things to deal with in my life.

In the end, I’m sorry this had to happen…because there were some truly nice fellas but I guess you get eaten by piranha when you rage against the machine. So be it…Herfers Paradise.

Comments please…..