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LGP 73 - Perdomo Legacy
29 Plays1 month ago
This week, we (accidentally) smoke 2 of the 3 different blends in Perdomo's Legacy release!
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction and Cigar Discussion
00:00:00
Speaker
hey everybody welcome back to let's get pairing this is episode number 73 and today we are smoking the perdomo legacy uh i'll tell you all about it we'll have some pairings we'll get into what makes this cigar special but for now grab yourself a drink grab yourself cigar let's get pairing
00:01:09
Speaker
technical difficulties which uh we will talk about because that is one of my points of contention with this cigar welcome back everybody i'm your host trip here in a lgp south studio um in mostly sunny florida been pretty nice um and today we're goingnna smoking the perdomo legacy not the 30th because that's what dennis grabbed it for um but Hopefully he has the right cigar.
00:01:38
Speaker
i do. I do. Okay, good. Good. You're back. ah Welcome back. to the thirtieth but ah um but As you were away, I was, I was saying, I'll get into that. That is a point of contention. I have with this particular cigar.
00:01:50
Speaker
It looks exactly the same. They look almost identical. ah They're very close. It's kind of like a, my father thing going on where it's like, if you have two cigars next to each other, it's not quite as bad as like Fuente.
00:02:04
Speaker
But if you have two cigars next to each other, you can be like, those are the same cigar. And then you get closer and like, oh wait, they're not the same cigar. I thought they were. So yours ah is a Torpedo. Did you mention Torpedo? No, mine is a Toro.
00:02:16
Speaker
Okay, I have a Toro. i and We're good. right, cool. So we'll we'll talk about that. So let's get into, well, first, how you doing? as How's how things been going? Hey, man. We're here. We're getting into the holiday season.
00:02:28
Speaker
um There's a lot of good stuff, and I know everybody's super busy doing holiday things, family things, probably not smoking as much as you would like, potentially, but ramping up to a place where you can get to you know sit down, have a cigar, have a drink, hang out.
00:02:43
Speaker
um Yeah, man. it's It's been good. it's it's It's just been a little bit wacky. And, Tripp, I will say you understand ah my industry and I understand your industry. And so you get you get that grind. At the end of the year, the grind the work that we do tough. Yeah, with the work we do, it's crazy because the last three weeks of December are either balls to the wall or the most relaxing week of the year.
00:03:16
Speaker
There's no in between. It's either everything gets locked down and nothing is happening or everything is falling apart and needs to be done before the end of the year.
00:03:29
Speaker
But, you know, that's the way it goes. It's not that it's not that bad. ah at least At least I and mostly enjoy what I do. So, Perdomo Legacy. This is a special cigar for Perdomo and a special cigar for you if you're if you happen to be smoking one tonight.
00:03:46
Speaker
Um, it does like as much as the bands are very close to being the same band. And I can never remember which color goes with which rapper.
00:03:57
Speaker
Um, this is a great looking band. Like it's, it's very elegant and fancy, especially for a cigar. That's, uh, a, these days, very reasonable 1350. there was time 1350 was lot.
00:04:10
Speaker
there was a time thirteen fifty was a lot um The changing world has changed that. So, Perdomo Legacy was released earlier this year, PCA 2025. This is the first Perdomo blend that has been fully, from head to tail, done by Nicholas Perdomo III without his father's oversight.
00:04:32
Speaker
um He kind of did it as a surprise for for his dad. He was telling Coop and I about it at ah Great Smoke last year.
00:04:43
Speaker
um And just how excited Nicholas was about it, ah that he had, you know, he had worked on this project behind the scenes for a while and then surprised his dad with, you know, this is the cigar I made.
00:04:56
Speaker
of As with pretty much all of their... I don't know if they have a specific name for it, but these... The gold seal of approval kind of line.
00:05:09
Speaker
That means the... a God, I just lost one of the names. But I know that it includes the 20th, the 30th, and there's a couple others that come in the red, blue, gold, signifying sun-grown Maduro Connecticut shade.
00:05:28
Speaker
This one, Nicholas changed it up. So the highlight for the Legacy brand is the Nicaraguan shade-grown tobacco that they've used for the very first time.
00:05:40
Speaker
Uh, it has been a long time coming. I didn't realize what a long time coming it was because I first heard about it, uh, just a year or two ago when Nicholas was talking about working with it.
00:05:51
Speaker
Uh, but so this is a tobacco that is a hybrid ah hybrid seed, non-Nicaraguan, grown in Nicaragua, undershade, which is not usually done typically in Nicaragua. They do sun-grown because it is easier and cheaper.
00:06:08
Speaker
um So this is a hybridized, and this is a as far as I know, this is a proprietary strain that nobody else has used. ah But it is a hybridized Cuban and Cameroon tobacco strain.
00:06:21
Speaker
um So that's that would be Habano and Cameroon which is, of course, like I said, shade-grown in Nicaragua. They ferment this leaf for 18 to 24 months.
00:06:32
Speaker
They then bale-aged it for a minimum of 10 years. um And then finally, to finish them off, they spent a minimum of 10 months in bourbon barrels.
00:06:44
Speaker
um So should be some serious flavor coming out of this wrapper. um We're smoking the Red Label version. which is the Nicaraguan Shade Grown wrapper. um Binder and filler are all Nicaraguan.
00:06:57
Speaker
The other two versions, the ah Nicaraguan Sun Grown Maduro and the Ecuadorian Shade, both use this Nicaraguan Shade Grown tobacco as the binder. So it's in all three blends.
00:07:11
Speaker
um
00:07:18
Speaker
i I just got a little boop in my ears. That sounds good. And it confused the hell out of me. ah So we were smoking these the Nicaraguan Shade Club version. but um I lost my spot in my notes.
00:07:32
Speaker
Oh yeah, I remember what I was going to say. So you had that 30th, which has a very similar label. Um... But it was box-pressed. And for this, there are, i believe, four sizes of each blend.
00:07:47
Speaker
um And the box-pressed, the only one that's box-pressed is the Torpedo, which comes in 10-count boxes. um We are smoking the Epicure, the 6x54. Bro, you're
00:08:01
Speaker
kidding. That's all right. That's all right. We're good. We'll make it work.
00:08:08
Speaker
but I was wondering what your what your message was about. And I was like, oh, God, something's gone wrong. um Then it has, but not too bad. ah you Not awful. It's not awful, but I think we can talk about it. They're going to be similar in some ways. so we can And different in other ways, which is interesting. ways That's great. ah That's right. You may have a red kicking around in that bag somewhere. Jesus.
00:08:31
Speaker
We can we could follow up. It's literally like we're smoking like we're smoking a ah Fuente. where The labels look exactly the same. And we think we're smoking the same cigar and then realize we are. yeah um So for anybody who missed it or anybody who's listening, what just happened is... a
00:08:51
Speaker
ah Dennis accidentally had the blue label, the Maduro version of this. So we are smoking the same Vitola, but a different blend, different wrapper at least. I believe the fillers are the same. His wrapper is my binder, and I think my binder might be his wrapper, but I'm not sure about that. it's just reversed, so the Maduro is just reversed out.
00:09:10
Speaker
Vitola is the same, same obviously the same manufacturer and everything, but goddamn, dude, the label threw me off because ah initially I picked up the 30th the thirtieth And that was not the right cigar. And so still not smoking the right cigar. But it's it's close enough, I think. It's close enough. We'll make it work. You may or may not actually have the sun grown. I don't i don't think I have the sun grown.
00:09:35
Speaker
That's all right. um I have smoked all three blends. Sorry to do this to you, Dennis, but in my opinion, the sun grown is the best one. Um, that like, i don't know, that little bit Cameroon-ness of it.
00:09:48
Speaker
And like, you don't have it in front of you, but this is like real nice looking wrapper. That's a really, yeah, dude, absolutely. like it's kind of reddish. It's really good. Um, but, you know, your binder's the same thing. If you, if you really want to experience it, you could just pop that wrapper right off.
00:10:05
Speaker
but um listen I'll tell you what, a first light, coming off the first light, generally speaking, I'm not someone that goes for Podoma cigars. It's just not my wheelhouse flavor profile wise.
00:10:19
Speaker
You know, for whatever reason, I i don't think they suck. i just It's not for me. And this, so far, this has been really good. Impressively good. To a point where, we're like, oh man, this is Perdomo. This is cool. I want to think about a little bit more. I want to smoke through it a little bit.
00:10:34
Speaker
um There's a really intense spiciness that I'm getting. And, again, because I'm smoking the Maduro, it's going to be a little bit more intense. Potentially less sweet and kind of rounded out as a sun-grown would be, potentially.
00:10:48
Speaker
um But that being said, it's it's really nice. so Pleasantly surprised. i'm I'm in the same wheelhouse as you. Herdomo's, not that I've ever had like one that's just bad, but they never quite hit my palate. I'm like, you know, I smoke, a I don't know, of I used to smoke Lot 23s a lot back in the day, but like the, God, I'm forgetting the name of the main line, the champagne one.
00:11:17
Speaker
whatever that's called. Yeah, very popular. It's a crazy popular cigar. Every time I've ever smoked one, I've been like, it's a good cigar, but it just doesn't doesn't do much for me. um And I kind of felt the same way about the 20...
00:11:28
Speaker
twenty um And I just, you know, every time I smoked a Perdomo, I would be like, this is a good cigar, but it's just not really for me. And this, all three blends in this one are the first time that I'm like, okay, that's for me.
00:11:43
Speaker
And I think the difference is just that, ah you know, Nicholas's palate just fits ours better. um We just enjoy those same flavors that Nicholas enjoys more than what Nick Jr. enjoys.
00:11:57
Speaker
Absolutely agreed. And you know, the other thing for me with Podomos is a lot of times I'll, whenever I've lit one up, I've sat there and like, all right, um I get it. I'm i'm waiting for this. I, throughout the entire cigar, I'm waiting for it to ramp up to something that I go, yeah, that's it.
00:12:14
Speaker
And it's very close. It's always very close to like, okay, I'm waiting for this thing to ramp up. And then eventually I finish the cigar and go, well, it never hit that point. yeah And it was never bad, but it was never it was never where it never hit that like, okay, this is what I like. I can smoke this. I really enjoy this.
00:12:32
Speaker
It was more of a, you're you're kind of just waiting for the flavors to develop. Yeah, and for me, this one hits right off the bat. like So, again, our tasting notes may be a little different. He's smoking the Madero. I'm smoking the Sun Grown.
00:12:46
Speaker
They're both great cigars. it's um It's a fantastic cigar off the light. This one has a lot of baking spice, some cinnamon. I think what at least one of my parents, maybe two, are going go really well. One's going to be bad, I'm aware of that.
00:12:59
Speaker
I'm just going to say it off the bat. Maybe not bad, but it might be kind of a ah tough pairing. um So baking spice, a ton of black pepper, little bit of sweetness. You actually do get a little bit of that like bourbon-y kind of influence, vanilla, oak, those kind of flavors.
00:13:21
Speaker
it's I think this is just absolutely out of the park blend for Perdomo. I hope it does as well as all of their other cigars do because they're, you know, um As much as they don't, mine and Dennis' palettes don't love Perdomo's, up people love them. They're some of the best-selling stores out there. yeah And there are shops, especially in my old hometown of Portland, Oregon, that 80% of their business is probably Perdomo.
00:13:49
Speaker
like People are crazy for them. Not all of them for me. they you know They sell really well, and I can see from from my experience now compared to every every other Podomo I've ever had, which I've had quite a lot, ah this is it feels like this is it for me.
00:14:07
Speaker
this is That was exactly my feeling the first time I lit this cigar. immediately off the first light and generally off the first light, I'm kind of apprehensive. I'm a little bit unsure of how the cigar is going to go.
00:14:18
Speaker
Even for cigars that I really love, I generally don't think about the, you know, the first third because it's just getting there. It's warming up. It's the the flavors are developing and this thing off the first light, holy shit, it's pretty good.
00:14:33
Speaker
I really like it. Yeah. I'm very curious how it's going to pair. Cause I've, I've smoked these, but I haven't really paired with them other than maybe coffee. ah So I'm going to get right into some pairing here.
Beverages and Their Histories
00:14:45
Speaker
Yeah, man. What do you got I have something you're going a little jealous of, not because you don't have it or can't get it, but because I haven't mailed it to you yet.
00:14:55
Speaker
Oh, you dirty bitch. ah Talk to me. What do you got? So I have Lacto Cooler from Voodoo Brewing Company. I'm sorry to do this to you. I just thought it was it was too funky to not pair tonight. Yeah. ah And I just kind of wanted to see how how it works with this.
00:15:13
Speaker
So this is from Voodoo Brewing Company. Voodoo Brewing Company is a really interesting company. um So they were founded as a brewery by a guy named Matt Allen in Meadville, Pennsylvania in 2005. They started producing beer about a year later.
00:15:28
Speaker
ah for for the next seven-ish years, he was making beer and just kind of not grabbing an audience. um So in 2012, they were nearing bankruptcy. He was really struggling.
00:15:42
Speaker
um And one of his brewers who had been working for him for a fairly short period of time named Kurt Richaki, and his brother Mateo bought into the business.
00:15:53
Speaker
um I've read conflicting information on whether Matt was bought out entirely or if they just invested and helped him to, you know, resurrect the business.
00:16:06
Speaker
um But they went gangbusters from there. So later that year, they actually opened their first tap room, which was really the big turning point. Um, Because up until that point, they were you know they were selling beer and distributing it locally, which is a very tough business no matter where you are.
00:16:24
Speaker
ah In 2016, so that was 2012, they opened their first taproom. In 2016, they opened an additional taproom in Pittsburgh, But 2017 would be the year that would just completely change everything for the company.
00:16:38
Speaker
They opened a production brewing facility so that they could really crank out the beer, and they opened the option to franchise. um And they have a really unique, they call it an unfranchise, I've also seen it called an anti-franchise.
00:16:54
Speaker
Yep, I've seen that as well. Where within just a couple years, I think it was by 2020, they 20 locations. they had twenty locations across the U.S. So basically the way this franchise works is you buy in as a franchisee. they you know They have to do the approval and stuff like that with your business plan and all those kind of things.
00:17:13
Speaker
ah They provide... the name they provide all the branding they provide a bunch of signs for you to put in the bar tap handles stuff like that they have a signature food menu that they ask you to use but i believe that not all locations have the full signature menu i think pizza is kind of the bare minimum um They even give you a customized playlist for every every location that they update throughout the year, which is pretty neat.
00:17:43
Speaker
So every Voodoo Brewing Company you go in around the country, you're going to hear different music, but probably some of the same songs. ah They've said that they like very carefully curate it so Because they won they want one kind of soundtrack for the lunch audience and then for the afternoon people and then for the late night people.
00:18:03
Speaker
um They really carefully think about the the music choices that they put in. um But most importantly, they provide the beer. Which is the, you know, for a company like this, that's that's the lifeblood. They like to call it liquid gold because that's what really makes the difference between this place and another place.
00:18:22
Speaker
um So this allows them to maintain quality of the beer um and get really solid and consistent distribution for the beers that they're making.
00:18:33
Speaker
So they're not going to have a batch of beer that they make and nobody buys it because they have franchises to send it to. um The really unique thing is that... ah They maintain the quality of the beer and kind of oversight of the menu and stuff like that.
00:18:51
Speaker
But they really encourage franchises, owners to ah make it their own. um They want the vibe of the place to be what feels local.
00:19:02
Speaker
um They want regional food items on the menu or local food items. They want you to have like their signature stuff, but then also some local stuff that people are in that town for.
00:19:16
Speaker
Um, they also encourage adding to the cocktail program because they also have a cocktail program. Um, and they even encourage offering guest taps because, you know, more beer helps everybody at a tap house.
00:19:29
Speaker
Um, having it just be all your own product is not necessarily the way you want to do it. Yeah. Um, actually i think to that point, I was really surprised when we visited, there was a, a beer on tap from Pennsylvania.
00:19:43
Speaker
that I'm very familiar with. Well, all of their beer is from Pennsylvania. But umm sorry the fact that, I mean, all of the Voodoo Brewing Company beer, it all comes from Pennsylvania.
00:19:54
Speaker
Why? yeah Really? Meadville. Oh, bullshit. All right, well, that explains a lot, but I saw Rotunda. Rotunda was on their tap list. I'm like, I know Rotunda. It's it's out by Hershey.
00:20:06
Speaker
And it was really cool to be in Florida and then see a beer that I'm familiar with from an area that generally doesn't get a lot of love for their beer. um and And that's a great brewery as well. i really love their beer. It was nice to see that. And I thought, cool, man, that's a fun partnership.
00:20:23
Speaker
Yeah, um this is also, well, I'll get to that in a little bit. um there's ah There's a funny circular connection that I'll talk about in a minute. um So the company is expanding in a very different way than most modern breweries.
00:20:38
Speaker
um If you happen to be near one, ah I think both of us would highly recommend like stop in and check it out. Yes, absolutely. Because it's ah it's a cool little tap room to hang out in. They have good food. They have good beer.
00:20:49
Speaker
Check it out. Right now they have 26 locations, I believe, across the country. was 27, but earlier this year... um my local one there they were about 45 minutes from me uh shut down because they're in fort myers florida if you're unaware they're only open for like 11 and a half months just under a year um but during construction of that place is when hurricane ian hit while they were open hurricane helene hit um
00:21:22
Speaker
Yeah, those were the two hurricanes. So they had to deal with, like, during construction, they were dealing with the road right outside the brewery being closed and stuff. it was It was not good. um And they just had a lot of struggles, so they had to they had to give up the ghost, unfortunately.
00:21:36
Speaker
um There's still a bunch of them all over the place, including, i think there's four in Florida now. it might be down to three with that one closing. um But I am smoking what sort of accident, or smoking, I'm drinking, rather.
00:21:51
Speaker
what became their accidental flagship in lacto-cooler. If this looks a little familiar to you, probably were a child of the late 80s, early 90s like we were.
00:22:03
Speaker
um no It is very inspired, like very obviously inspired by high seas orange and tangerine flavored ecto-cooler that came out in 1989 and was a a staple of children in the the nineties and a little bit of 1989.
00:22:22
Speaker
Um, and you know, that's the, that's the inspiration for this one. So this is a fruited. Well, they don't even call it fruited. It's a flavored sour burrito rice.
00:22:33
Speaker
Um, you can assume the flavors are probably some big fruit flavors, including orange and tangerine. Um, of course you can't have ecto cooler,
00:22:45
Speaker
without making it green. So they added some green to it. I don't know whether it's... They don't say whether it's dye, whether it's some of the ingredients that turn it green or what. But it, ah you know, it's intention grabbing.
00:22:57
Speaker
You drink one of these, green people are going to ask, the hell are you drinking? Damn it. So the interesting... there's There's two interesting kind of footnotes about this. um This is the official beer, or was the official beer, of Halloween Horror Nights.
00:23:13
Speaker
For a few years. Wow, no shit. I heard it actually wasn't there this past year. um But interestingly, it was replaced on almost every menu by Zool's PB&J mixtape.
00:23:27
Speaker
which we drank in the bar where we got this. We drank at Voodoo. yeah. So Zool is another brewery that I'm a huge, huge fan of. And that PB&J mixtape is a beer that I absolutely adore.
00:23:41
Speaker
It is one of my favorite peanut butter and jelly beers of all time. probably Probably number one. I learned about that because I had i was you know doing my research and I found a thread on Reddit saying like,
00:23:53
Speaker
No more lacto cooler on Halloween Horror Nights. And somebody in the comments said, now they have PB&J mixtape. Try that and you won't miss lacto cooler at all. They're very different beers, but they're in the same in the same genre of beer. They're very fruity, sour, and super funky.
00:24:13
Speaker
super weird yeah there's Yeah, absolutely. There's a lot of funk between the two of them. So this is 5.5% ABV. um In some parts of the country, you can get it at at liquor beer stores.
00:24:25
Speaker
um But if you have a voodoo brewing company near you, they will definitely have it on tap and in cans because it is their... is kind of their flagship. It's what they're known for. Yeah.
00:24:39
Speaker
So if you have one near you, check out Voodoo Brewing Company. It's cool cool spot to go grab lunch, grab dinner.
00:24:47
Speaker
Check it out. Dennis, what do you have? Well, I take couple sips. You got to send me them cans, son. I do. I have them half boxed up. but um Thank you. Thank you. I appreciate it. I couldn't bring them back. i should have them out this week.
00:25:01
Speaker
From ah from ah LZP. Unfortunately, as as happens, um ah it's so you went home with too much alcohol from... Always, always. Oh, you know, and and thank you for sending the box.
00:25:14
Speaker
Last time when we talked about on last show, we had this lovely Chainbridge distillery, which is almost all gone because it's so good. ah You know, i gave I gave that one to my neighbor, the the the beet flavored one, or the beet distillate, and he actually didn't know what beets taste like, and I didn't realize this. So he tasted it, and he was like, i I don't know what it tastes like, and I assumed everybody knows what beets taste like. of course And he had never eaten, he's never had beets in his life. And so he's like, I don't know what is it supposed to taste like.
00:25:48
Speaker
that um So it was a really cool experience to see somebody try that for the first time, not knowing what that's supposed to be and not being familiar with that profile. And that's what we talk about on the show a lot, is your palate is distinctly unique to yourself based on your culture, your background, where you live, what you have access to.
00:26:06
Speaker
It's shaped by all these different things. And so sometimes, you'll get something that in a lot of worlds, that's sort of the, you know, it's kind of the norm. We talk about Amaro's, Amari in general, and people go, I don't know, what is that flavor? I don't know what that is. i can't figure it out because they didn't grow up with that.
00:26:25
Speaker
And they're not really, maybe they're not being to spirits. To be fair, even if you're familiar with every flavor in an Amari, an Amaro, it can be almost impossible to pick out flavors because there's always so much going on that you like taste it and you you survive the wave of flavor.
00:26:44
Speaker
And then you're like, ah all right, I got one note from that. I recognized, don't know.
00:26:52
Speaker
Star Anise or something. Sure. And, you know, the more you try it, the more you you kind of really start to understand. And that's a good segue from my first pairing because it's something that is contentious for a lot of us that that went through our college and high school experience.
00:27:08
Speaker
And certainly your age, my age, we're in the same demographic. For us growing up, I went to parties. And I went to parties in high school as a senior, whatever, and, and you know, as a freshman in college.
00:27:20
Speaker
um there was one thing that was at every party and almost always it was mixed with Red Bull. Oh, yeah. You know what I'm talking about? Of course. It is the, it is literally, it's one of the most, it is the most underrated, um arguably we can call this an Amaro, I think a German Amaro.
00:27:39
Speaker
One of the most underrated spirits in the world. um I think either you know it and you have a bad memory or you don't know it and you go, well, that's kind of weird. i don't want to try that. Well, it's it's weird because it's a very old drink.
00:27:57
Speaker
Apertif. No, not Apertif. A digestif. you just um It's a very old digestif. that spent about 20 years as the party drink of choice.
00:28:10
Speaker
And so it gained that reputation. and People just think of it as a party drink. of But I'll let you talk about it. It was the tequila of Europe, essentially, when comes to party drinks. So tonight, my first pairing is something called Jägermeister.
00:28:26
Speaker
Let me show you this bottle. i love i love I love the bottle. You know, listen, I've had my experiences good and bad with this, but this is... see if I can get the lighting. I'm not happy tonight, but... and There's some words on there. it doesn't really matter. I can read it to you.
00:28:43
Speaker
um 56 Botanicals. It is cold macerated essence with different things, and it is refined in oak. When they say refined in oak, it is rested in oak for 12 months.
00:28:55
Speaker
So they mix all this all this stuff together. It's a macerated spirit, which means they make the spirit first, they have the stuff afterward, and then they put it into a barrel to sort of meld the flavors and smooth it out a little bit.
00:29:10
Speaker
um Now, this has been around for a really long time. The bottles say 1878, but really officially, technically we're looking at, let me check my notes, tell We are looking at 1934, when it really hit the market officially as a company, as a brand, as a business.
00:29:30
Speaker
1934 is when they started and it was founded by Kurt Mast. Today, they're still located in the same place as they've always been, which is, do you know this place in Germany? I don't.
00:29:43
Speaker
Wolfenbutel. i mean I'm gonna try, let me get my German, real deep German in there. ah Wolfenbutyl. Wolfenbutyl? Wolfenbutyl, Loto-Saxony, Germany.
00:29:56
Speaker
Lower Saxony of Germany and comes in a solid 35% alcohol, which is, I think, perfect for what it is. Now, the idea here was not to make a party drink by any means.
00:30:08
Speaker
The idea here was that essentially kurt Mast was a producer of vinegar and he was a hunter and he liked botanicals and he liked all of this stuff and he was like, well, I'm doing i'm doing vinegar and mixing these things together.
00:30:21
Speaker
What else can I do? And now this is one of those things that became a really popular digestive herbal tonic rooted in these like classic forest traditions and the hunting culture of Germany back then.
00:30:35
Speaker
And so when you look at the name, Jägermeister, it literally means master of the hunt. And when you look at the bottle, you have this lovely stag with a cross. And now,
00:30:47
Speaker
You know, back then, we you talk about Jägermeister, Jägermeister wasn't just a the name of a thing, it was also the name of a title. It was the title of a senior hunting official in Germany. So somebody who was responsible for managing um the hunts of a region, of an area.
00:31:05
Speaker
These were your early ah kind of public officials that that oversaw all this stuff. That was your Jägermeister. And the Jägermeister would say, it is this day in September, we are gonna go out into the woods, and I experienced this actually in the Czech Republic.
00:31:23
Speaker
I went out in a small town in Czech Republic during the opening of the hunting season, And it was like, we're gonna go to the woods, we're gonna walk, and we're gonna celebrate. And there's a celebration that happens, and all the families bring food to feast on and to celebrate the opening season of the hunt.
00:31:39
Speaker
And there were almost always, in this case, when I was in in the Czech Republic, there was this really cool statue of a stag. It was just a beautiful statue of stag. It was in the middle of the woods, in almost the middle of nowhere, I would say, unless you knew where to find it.
00:31:55
Speaker
But then the people, and the local people, would congregate, and they would all bring food and set up tables, and every member of a community would share something. And so you can walk to different tables and try different foods and celebrate the idea that, hey, this is the opening season of the hunt.
00:32:13
Speaker
um This is a couple of months before it's going to get cold. We are all hoping for a really good hunt so that we can have meat for the wintertime. And it's a beautiful tradition. It's really cool. And so Jäger Meister is really rooted in a lot of that.
00:32:28
Speaker
Now, cool thing is I mentioned 56 different things go into this, which is wild. But classically, like many Amari, we're looking at things like juniper berries, saffron, ginseng, chamomile, star anise, you mentioned that earlier, licorice root, cinnamon bark. It's all these different spices and woods and and stuff that go in, um they get filled, kind of filled over the top with a neutral spirit.
00:32:57
Speaker
And then they go, hey, cool, we're gonna take this, we're gonna rest it for several weeks in the spirit, and then we're gonna dump it into an oak barrel and let it sit for a year.
00:33:09
Speaker
And when it sits for a year, the flavors meld a little bit and they mellow out so you're not getting that heat from from the from the you know from the spirit.
00:33:19
Speaker
But it was it was like, man, it was that step. It was the thing, like when you when you try this for the first time, It has all those qualities of, wow, this is really earthy, this is really spicy, this is really warming.
00:33:32
Speaker
This is really interesting and unique and the tannins come out and then the finish on it is kind of bitter but then you go, oh, that's kind of smooth. It leaves this coating on your palate that's kind of warm and really interesting.
00:33:45
Speaker
And you know, listen man, in the 1970s, it started to become really popular in the US bar scene. And it became so popular that many of you that are old enough to remember, we had chillers at bars. It was a i have little chiller station with a Jager bottle sticking out of the end of it, right? And when you would order Jager, it'd be poured from the chiller and it'd be almost ice cold. It'd be served, well, depending on the bar.
00:34:15
Speaker
it Technically, it should have been served at at zero degrees Fahrenheit, proper ice cold. um If you got that, that's great. If you didn't, you you still got kind of the concept of it.
00:34:27
Speaker
um But what happened was it sort of re-educated bartenders to what they were doing with these types of spirits because they weren't really that popular. Like Frenette wasn't that popular. i only I believe, you I'm not certain about this, but I think Jägermeister kind of led to the resurgence of Frenette in the U.S.
00:34:45
Speaker
I think did like Fernet is a more aggressive, but more refined character. profile, but still in the same vein as Jaeger Meister.
00:34:59
Speaker
Yes. Yeah, absolutely. And so back then in the 90s, certainly late eighty s but also early 90s, we had stuff like Jaeger old fashions. We had espresso plus Jaeger kind of riffs.
00:35:12
Speaker
Mezcal and Jaeger splits, which was wild, but they were mixing Mezcal and Jaeger together. Jaeger Negronis, stuff like this. So today Jaeger sold in over 140 countries around the world.
00:35:24
Speaker
which is really cool. And it's it's crazy when you think about this because they're really selling it close to 80 million bottles a year around the world.
00:35:36
Speaker
It's still there. It's deep-rooted in the culture. It's deep-rooted within the drinking culture, the bar scene, the things that people are doing. What I wanted to show off is also something that I think doesn't exist anymore and probably I could sell on eBay for a lot of money that I got in the early two thousand Holiday box. you know when you bit We're close to the holiday season now, right?
00:36:02
Speaker
bars ah sorry um Liquor stores would sell like you know box kits. You you get like a glass and in ah a bottle. And it would almost always be the same price as just buying a bottle. So you go, yeah, going buy You get a free glass or two. You get a free shaker. price um It's the same price. I'll just go, going to buy it anyway. So um I'll just buy the box set. That's cool. And you can gift it. But I have something that's really, really unique. And it's made out of pewter.
00:36:28
Speaker
And I don't think it hasn't been sold in a long time. I think I've seen this. it is Yeah. This is, it's a stag. um Little shot, which is what I'm drinking out of. It's a full pewter thing. It sits perfectly. When you put it set it down on the table, it sits perfectly.
00:36:50
Speaker
And it's heavy as all hell. When you pick it up, you go, I'm doing something. You feel that conviction when you pick it up to drink from it. And I think it's the perfect way to remind yourself of the history of of something like a Jaeger and the history of the culture and the and the and the the pride of people that go, we rely, as people that live in a region that's cold, we rely heavily on hunting to survive.
00:37:17
Speaker
And we have to hunt, but because we're hunting, we need to show respect to the land and and show respect to the animals that we're potentially gonna harvest. It goes full circle, man.
00:37:30
Speaker
And so in a sense, that's kind of part of the celebration that happens. So it's not just a party drink. it It is absolutely not just a party drink. Anybody who's who thinks it's a party drink is crazy and hasn't been paying enough attention.
00:37:44
Speaker
a um So Sam wants to know, how do the ABVs compare? What's the ABV on that? I think it's similar to Frenet, like 30 or 35, right? So, yeah. So Frenet, when you're looking at Frenet outside of the U.S., s generally Frenet Bronca is going to be 35%.
00:38:02
Speaker
because of regional laws. So like when we travel to Central and South America, we end up seeing spirits that are 35% on purpose, where in the US generally they're 40.
00:38:13
Speaker
This is the classic German Jaeger, so it's gonna be 35. There are Jaegers where you can buy that are kind of the US blend, which are gonna be 40. But it looks like, based on the bottle, i haven't bought Jaeger in quite a while.
00:38:26
Speaker
And generally I buy Jaeger from, I order it from Europe. Yeah, that's what I've always done too because it has a different, there's a different recipe. It tastes better. It's a slightly different recipe now. So this one I bought in the U.S. and this one is 35%.
00:38:40
Speaker
But it has, it's other than in selected botanicals and, you know, cold macerated essence refined in oak, everything else is in German on this bottle.
00:38:51
Speaker
You'd love to see it. Which is really cool. I really love that. Even on the top, Wolfenbutel, Jägermeister, Germany.
00:39:04
Speaker
It's cool. It's it's just a cool thing. And again, these bottles are really... if I pull this bottle out at a party, some people are going to vomit. Some people are going to gag.
00:39:14
Speaker
And other people are going to go, want that. group Those are the people that you want to hang out with. um So to circle back to Sam, he is ah he' is also smoking the Sun Grown, which it's rare that he gets to pair the same thing as us. That's cool, man. And his first pairing was Glen Morangi.
00:39:31
Speaker
Classic. Classic pairing. Which one did he mention? Just the original. OG. Okay. The OG. That's, ah i think, 12-year. Yeah, I believe so.
00:39:42
Speaker
um All right, so Lacto Cooler. ah bright green. It's delicious. um it It does have like, if you're, if you like me, grew up drinking a lot of ecto cooler, this definitely brings back, you know, it brings back that flash of nostalgia where it tastes familiar.
00:40:03
Speaker
It's interesting that it's a beer because it doesn't really taste like a beer. Tastes almost like a mixed drink. um It's yeah sour and fruity and kind of, uh,
00:40:16
Speaker
almost overly sweet, but it rides that line where it's not like candy sweet, but it's close. um And yeah yeah, it's got that like sour apple, sour orange kind of flavor.
00:40:30
Speaker
It's so good. Man, I forgot how good it is, and it's only been like a month since I've had it. ah Shockingly, I thought this was going to be the bad pairing. It is working really well with this cigar.
00:40:43
Speaker
I can see it, man. Absolutely. The, like, brightness, those citrus flavors kind of bring out some, like, bitter orange peel, citrusy kind of brightness in the cigar.
00:40:54
Speaker
Um... Along with that baking spice, that black pepper spice I was talking about before, still going. um i'm I'm surprised how well this pairing works.
00:41:04
Speaker
What about Jägermeister? How does this work with Jägermeister? I'm curious. I may still have a bottle of Jägermeister inside, but I'm not sure. It's it's so wonderful. And in the cigar, I want to go back to the cigar because I'm blown away by how great this is and how much it blew me away coming into it thinking, well, i've nope I know Perdomo cigars and really not kind of my wheelhouse in that way.
00:41:27
Speaker
And then lighting the cigar and going, oh, okay, hold on. tell me Let me pay attention. I really love this blend. I love what they've done with this particular blend. And I understand that you and I are smoking slightly different cigars, but also we're smoking cigars from the same person.
00:41:43
Speaker
Yeah, and and the fillers are the same. Respect, right? The fillers are the same. smoking the same perspective. um You know, wrappers going to be different, fine. But also... that that essence that we talk about a lot of times with our spirits and our beers and things, the essence is there and there's something there that keeps pulling me back in, in the way that Perdomo's have classically but never really finished. And I think now I'm getting that finish where it's, I'm getting that thing that I want rather than smoking the cigar and sort of seeking it the entire time.
00:42:18
Speaker
Very impressed. And dude, with Jaeger, yes. love work It sounds weird, but it works so well. right, I'm going to have to try that pairing. Jaeger with the the Legacy Maduro. All right, time to move on to second pairings. um Mine, you'll you'll know them from last week. This is from Virginia Distillery Company, but it is not what one that I had last week.
00:42:42
Speaker
um So the short version, they're founded in Lovingston, Virginia in 2011, but the guy who started Targus... um, after he sold Targus, the tech company for, Oh, okay. I was a billion dollars. Targus. Yeah. That Targus.
00:42:56
Speaker
Wow. Ashburn, Virginia. Um, Oh, I know what this is. I know exactly. Yeah. This is the, uh, Virginia distillery company. Yeah. This is a different one that you haven't seen yet.
00:43:07
Speaker
Um, so, uh, the short version again, during construction of the distillery, uh, George Moore passed away of a heart attack. And his son ended up taking over, finishing the building of the distillery and then running the company.
00:43:22
Speaker
um So his son, Gareth, is now the face of the company. They are a distillery that, as his father wished, they only make American single malt in the style of scotch, nothing else.
00:43:37
Speaker
um They have one mash bill that is all Scottish barley, and then they figure out what to do with it after, which is a bunch of very interesting barrel programs, including this is their ah their pinnacle brand called Courage and Conviction.
00:43:56
Speaker
So this is Virginia Distillery Company's premier brand. that They do have a they have four standard whiskeys and then ah much larger number of ah Single cask releases, which are always cask strength.
00:44:14
Speaker
um Courage and Conviction, which is their' their kind of sub-brand, is the most awarded American single malt whiskey company, which is wild. but Seriously? Yeah.
00:44:27
Speaker
They've won more awards around the world than any other single malt company. That's wild. in the In America. Crazy. It's also really great packaging, packaging by the way.
00:44:39
Speaker
I'm going to talk about the packaging because this packaging is chef's kiss packaging. I was going to say chef's kiss. When was the last time you had a barrel tube or a bottle tube rather?
00:44:51
Speaker
You could do this one. how holding it? I'm holding it from the top, baby. What? Look at this. Ready? oh pops oh halfway? No, it stays like this.
00:45:03
Speaker
ah And it twists. Oh, it twists. It twists. That's nice. It's got like a little locking mechanism in there. um You can see here ah the distillery is situated in the Blue Ridge Mountains.
00:45:18
Speaker
That's nice. On kind of the the you know the paper sleeve inside. Another thing that's that's just a really nice touch. Locking cork? Not just that.
00:45:30
Speaker
ah the barrel doesn't move, or the bottle rather. So it is the square bottle that is square cut out. Wow. like all right The packaging on this is ah incredible.
00:45:41
Speaker
um So this is the bottle, Courage and Conviction. i have the Kuvi Cask Strength. Here's one more little little ah just just little touch that they do that's really cool. So you can see there, the single cask.
00:45:57
Speaker
This is cask number 1251. Yeah.
00:46:04
Speaker
That medallion is a magnet. oh Oh, cool. like that's There's layers to this bottle, man, that are so cool. ah the The tap or the cork is like kind of a, mean, I assume it's just cheap metal, but it's like a bronzy brass color.
00:46:22
Speaker
That's very heavy, solid metal. This is the kind of thing you want to keep after you get rid of the bottle. And you can also keep that little medallion, which is just such a cool touch. That's cool, man. All right.
00:46:33
Speaker
So, the single barrel or single cask versions that they offer, let
00:46:41
Speaker
me take a deep breath here. They have a bourbon cask, and they also have PX Oloroso or Fino Sherry cask. Wow. Okay. each That's those wide variety. Yeah. Each of those comes, and and this version, the Cuvie.
00:46:59
Speaker
um Each of those is comes in the blend. so I mentioned they have the standard line and the single-cask line. Single-cask line, you can pick which share you want. The standard line is all three blended together, which is, i think, an interesting way to do it. you know That's like wrapper, binder, filler kind of thing where you get to smoke those little burritos. Yeah, man.
00:47:20
Speaker
um So this is the Cuvie cask. So the Cuvie cask is aged for at least four years, um and this isn't a but this isn't a barrel finish. This is straight up from the still into barrels for four years in ah European red wine casks that are shaved and charred.
00:47:39
Speaker
So that's where they they shave off all of the wood on the inside until it's kind of raw wood that still has wine soaked into it from the aging, but then they rechar it.
00:47:51
Speaker
So you're getting kind of those fresh char notes along with those barrel finish kind of notes. Um, Of course, as with any fine whiskey, this is uncolored and non-chill filtered.
00:48:03
Speaker
You can see that incredibly deep color from those wine casks. um And as with anything single cask, um well, single cask strength, ah the ABV berries, this one is 59.2% ABV.
00:48:21
Speaker
um But I can tell you already, it does not drink like it. This is not that blow-your-head-off kind of 60% ABV. This is that flavor bomb.
00:48:33
Speaker
So I'm going to take couple sips of this. ah which I'm glad you enjoyed the packaging as much as me, because I was really impressed. like From the locking top, the design, to just the that little medallion coming off, it's top-notch, man.
00:48:50
Speaker
I'm a sucker for for packaging. And ah another shocking thing about this is that the price point on this is, in my opinion at least, very reasonable at about $90.
00:49:02
Speaker
Somewhere between $75 and $100 is where most of these single cask offerings fall, um which for something that's single cask strength is pretty reasonable.
00:49:15
Speaker
Yeah, it's it's absolutely on par for for the market. um And, you know, certainly for... but Excuse me
00:49:25
Speaker
me. I'm choking on my cigar. um Something like that is between the packaging, the presentation, the what you're getting.
00:49:36
Speaker
It's not just a, hey, we shed out some spirit, put in barrel, and here you go. it's a lot more. And I think the value is shown through what they're doing beyond the marketing, the branding of it. It's the kind of the essence of the company and the culture of the company.
00:49:53
Speaker
Yeah. it's It's really nice to have something like this that I think is a, a balance of, you know, it's, it's a premium product. It's not cheap, but they're balancing the packaging with the actual quality of the, of what's in there.
00:50:08
Speaker
um You know, a lot of times it's a, eight-year-old blended bourbon that comes in packaging that's really nice yeah like this. um But this is a single cask, single cask strength.
00:50:21
Speaker
So you're getting your, you know, this is whiskey geek kind of kind of stuff. but And it's great. It is great. I have to tell you, man, i'm I am wildly surprised and impressed by this cigar.
00:50:38
Speaker
I'm enjoying it so much more than I even thought I would. I think because in my brain, my brain has kind of shut off Perdomo and I go like, yeah, it's fine. I yeah i could smoke it, but I'm not going to go for a Perdomo.
00:50:51
Speaker
Now, smoking this cigar, I'm thinking, I want to see this at a shop. And if I do, I'm going to buy it. If there's any Perdomo shops near you you will see it. It's definitely there.
00:51:02
Speaker
Oh, yeah. i have a couple of shops near nearby that I think I haven't visited anyway. I try to visit as much as I can. But goddamn. And now talking about packaging, my next pairing, um as I choke and die on my on my cigar, my next my next pairing is all about packaging.
00:51:22
Speaker
Because the packaging is what got me. But then the product is what kept me. It kept me buying more. I buy so much of this stuff that it is...
00:51:35
Speaker
Man, I'm a card-carrying member of this this company, this brand. I have harassed them so hard. know what it is. Yeah, I've harassed them so hard for them to be studio sponsor for our show.
00:51:52
Speaker
I'm still working on it. well you know Maybe it'll happen one day. But if it doesn't, I'm still going to be a super fan.
Unique Collaborations and Branding
00:51:59
Speaker
Of this company. I love them so much. This company is called Liquid Death.
00:52:04
Speaker
And what I'm drinking for my second pairing is non-alcoholic. Beyond that, what I'm drinking is really unique and really cool and really special and kind of weird. Weird in the sense that there's a nostalgia there. If you're old enough to remember this nostalgia, going to appreciate it.
00:52:21
Speaker
What do you think, Tripp? Do you know I'm wrong I don't know where you're going with this, but i'm very curious. All right. So what I have is liquid death seltzer, but this one is the Fruity Pebbles collaboration that they did.
00:52:36
Speaker
You see that there?
00:52:39
Speaker
So this is just water. It's seltzer water. um but it is a Fruity Pebbles collaboration, so it tastes like Fruity Pebbles. When I tell you it tastes like Fruity Pebbles, I mean literally it tastes like Fruity Pebbles with milk.
00:52:54
Speaker
That's exactly how it tastes. Have you had this one yet? Yes, I have some inside. Okay, so you're familiar how how amazing this is. It's really good. It's uncanny. It's that good, it's it's uncanny.
00:53:06
Speaker
um Now, what the ingredients I i really... Can't see because the can lighting is not great. Carbonated water, agave, natural flavor. So essentially there's not a lot in this. It's just natural flavor, agave, carbonated water.
00:53:26
Speaker
It's awesome and it tastes exactly like Fruity Pebbles with with ah milk as I mentioned. Now, these cats started from a really interesting place.
00:53:39
Speaker
back in 2017, founded by Mike Cesario, who came from Netflix. i don't know if you know this, but he was a creative director at Netflix for a while and started this thing. And when he started, it was literally him and his wife. And they came out and they were pitching the idea of this thing. They sold cans of of just, back then it was just water. It was nothing else. It was like, we have a still option and we have a sparkling option. and that's it. Originally, they didn't even have sparkling. It was still only.
00:54:10
Speaker
So yeah. It was just water in a can. Just spring water in a can. they They had no product. And they were they made so many sales even before they had a product itself to sell, which is amazing because the marketing, the branding, the design thing, it was like, well, what if water didn't look boring?
00:54:30
Speaker
How do we how we change that that whole thing? When you to store, you add bottled water, it looks kind of boring, right? Well, let's call it liquid death. but Murder your thirst, right? That that kind of thing.
00:54:43
Speaker
The heavy metal branding, the absurd humor, the all this stuff ended up kind of really becoming viral in a lot of ways. And they they had that original promotion that was sell your soul to us.
00:54:57
Speaker
ah for a free case. And it was, I mean, it was, it was literally just sign up for our email list. with yeah You know, which I did. did I. And you, its it makes it buy one, get one free.
00:55:09
Speaker
Yeah. But the, the marketing of that, the messaging was so good and interesting and controversial that it really got their name out there fast. Yeah.
00:55:21
Speaker
So fast forward a little bit now, Liquid Death is fairly well established. they have They've worked with different major artists through the the metal industry to produce a series of you know albums based on comments that they've gotten.
00:55:39
Speaker
I have several of them on vinyl. And it's literally, they took the the shitty comments they got, people complaining about the company. they They leveraged artists and said, hey, you're Scott Ian from Anthrax, right? You're gonna come in.
00:55:51
Speaker
These are the words, go make a song. And they made a song um from the words. And it's stuff like that. And at one point they did... um I think they did they did skateboards with the blood from Tony Hawk.
00:56:05
Speaker
yeah They did right before Ozzy passed. They sent a case to Ozzy, and every can that he drank, they kept, and they put in a like glass case that he signed.
00:56:20
Speaker
Yeah. Because it's Ozzy's DNA in a case, right? They did a thing with Steve-O from Jackass, which was, they mean I think they made a voodoo doll from his pubic hair. I believe that's correct. Which I tried to buy, and he was sold out.
00:56:33
Speaker
Of course you did. But they do a really great job of this sort of branding thing where it's not just the seltzer and the water. That's great, but they leverage this this fun aspect that, like, kind of absurdity of humor where they sell stuff.
00:56:51
Speaker
I have a ton of things from them. I have, like, a neon sign. I've got candles. I've got... i mean, and I think most importantly... the the end result, the product itself is good.
00:57:03
Speaker
Like their water is very good, their seltzers are very good, their sodas are very good, the teas are fantastic. The tea is awesome. And now, so what I'm drinking tonight is this like kind of crazy collaboration with with the the original makers of Fruity Pebbles.
00:57:20
Speaker
It's an official thing, but what they did was they wanted to do something that was as natural as possible. And they wanted to recreate these flavors. So they used esters from citrus. They used aldehydes from berries. They used vanillin, vanillin, yeah, vanillin, right? Yeah, vanillin compounds.
00:57:43
Speaker
I hate that Yeah, it's weird word. um So the vanillin compounds are what give it that sort of like, wow, it's got milk in it, but it doesn't have milk. Which is crazy. It just gives you that like, it reminds you of creamy. Yeah.
00:57:57
Speaker
Yeah. And so when you smile, you go, holy shit, this is Fruity Pebbles with milk. It's wild. And everything else that they do is super cool. I love their teas and stuff. I have them on subscription. So I get seltzers, the teas. I'm not as keen on the soda stuff that they do.
00:58:16
Speaker
I don't really order those, and the energy stuff that they're doing they're doing now, I'm not asking as well. I love the flavor of the energy stuff, but it is not even close to enough caffeine. So I usually have one of those, and then I have another, like a real energy drink after. Yeah.
00:58:33
Speaker
Yeah, so you know it's one of those things. Now, they're valued at over a billion dollars, which is wild, for a company that essentially sells water. Now, obviously, they sell merchandise. They sell tea. They're in the tea business now. and The teas are awesome because you're looking at really low sugar, like two grams of sugar with agave and different types of teas, which I love.
00:58:57
Speaker
And that's, in my in the mornings, that's my thing. I had a can of tea, 12 ounces in two seconds, just down it. It's so easy to drink and so good. And I don't feel bad about it because it's not a lot of sugar, it's not a lot of extra shit. It's just agave and some tea and some water and whatever else, you know natural flavor, whatever they put in.
00:59:19
Speaker
Now, seltzer and cigars, we talked about this, or we have talked about this in the past. is really important because it opens up your palate, the bubbles scrub your palate and give you a chance to go back and taste the cigar. And I understand the hypocrisy in a sense of me going through something like a Fruity Pebbles, very intense flavored seltzer.
00:59:43
Speaker
Generally with cigars, what you want is something like a mineral water that's gonna be neutral and it's going to kind of reset your palate. In this case, I'm familiar with this so I'm sort of more comfortable pairing this with with the cigar because I know kind of how far I can push it. I mean, we're ah hard pushing the boundaries pairing.
01:00:02
Speaker
so don't know We're getting there. I don't think anything's off the table. no
01:00:07
Speaker
But goddamn, it's so good and so lovely. And then I go back to the cigar and I go, it tastes like I'm smoking a stick of chocolate. In my case, that's what that's what the cigar tastes like to me.
01:00:20
Speaker
It tastes like a stick of chocolate. really dark, nice European chocolate, that really dark, heavy, and I say nice European meaning just dark and heavy, less of that milk, American chocolate, which is also great and has its place and I'm a big fan of.
01:00:35
Speaker
But the bitterness is what really kind of stands out for me and you know I love bitter. I know you love bitter. yeah The little bit of bitterness, and I wanna make it clear that when we talk about cigars, sometimes you say bitter, it's a negative thing.
01:00:49
Speaker
In this case, I don't mean it negatively. I think the bitterness is really nice. It's that deep like cacao, bitter richness. It's bitter, but it's also rich. So it's got that almost umami thing going on. yeah um I really like this cigar and I almost feel guilty for saying it because for years I have, not that I've shat on Perdomo, but it's been like, ah oh, Perdomo, I don't want that. It's fine. If i you somebody tries to give me a Perdomo from their humidor, I go, no, it's cool, man. I'll i'll have a cigarette instead.
01:01:20
Speaker
but um But now, this changed changed my perspective completely on Perdomo Cigars. And I think if they keep rolling with this, they have something awesome that can speak to the the newer demographic of smoker. like you Yeah, this blend in particular has me really excited to see what else Nicholas is working on Yes.
01:01:40
Speaker
Because I think, ah for me, I'm going to keep an eye on what he's working on.
01:01:47
Speaker
right. How was your second pairing? Oh, it's fantastic. ah I've had some of it. it's It's so rich. um And it's not super hot on the palate. Like I said, this is 59.2% ABV. That is And a second.
01:02:06
Speaker
twenty proof no yeah hundred and twenty proof right um and i had to do math there for a second ah it doesn't taste like it.
01:02:19
Speaker
This drinks like something closer to a hundred proof ish. Uh, you know, your bottled in bond kind of stuff. Um, but it's got like that richness of cask strength, um, where it starts off.
01:02:34
Speaker
It starts off in the palate, very Scotchy, um, reminds me of a Highlands kind of scotch, kind of sweet, just a little bit of not heat smoke, but barrel smoke, you know, like a little bit of barrel char to it.
01:02:50
Speaker
um And then you get like that intense kind of red fruit sweetness and richness of red wine. um And then it finishes back with the barrel char and kind of the
01:03:08
Speaker
the tannins of wine, you know, that kind of ah not sweet, almost bitter, but not quite, but really rich, intense fruity flavor.
01:03:20
Speaker
Yeah, oh yeah. But with no sweetness. And that's that's what the tannins are bringing to the party. and ah Man, it's just, it's fantastic. It's working really well with the cigar.
01:03:31
Speaker
Not overpowering the cigar, which a lot of times cask strength whiskeys can absolutely they overpower a cigar. um This is fantastic with a cigar.
01:03:44
Speaker
um And particular the particularly this cigar. It's working really well with. Before you get to yours, Sam's second pairing is Glenlivet Triple Cask, class another classic.
01:03:58
Speaker
Fantastic whiskey that I can see really working well with the Sun Grown. I think the Sun Grown in particular is going work really well with Scotch. This is not technically Scotch, but it's made in the in the fashion of Scotch.
01:04:13
Speaker
um but So it's got some of the same flavors going on. How about that ah Liquid Death? has it work with the cigar? um I guess you already kind of told us.
01:04:26
Speaker
You know what? Surprisingly really well. you You would think something as intense and unique as as the Fruity Pebbles thing um could be too much. I think it it works fine. It doesn't take away from the cigar.
01:04:40
Speaker
I like it. Nice. All right, let's move on to our final pairings of the evening. um Mine is going to be from a brewery that I've talked about many times before called Freem.
01:04:52
Speaker
Yes. um The short version is that Josh Freem founded it in 2012. ah He always loved Pilsners and Belgian lagers specifically and Belgian beers.
01:05:05
Speaker
Um, and kind of had made a name for himself in the beer business, working for a couple of other breweries, um, and helping them to strengthen their lager offerings, uh, started his own brewery in Oregon, uh, ended up with kind of, you know,
01:05:23
Speaker
the The IPA was what was selling, so that's what they worked on. After a few years, they released their first Pilsner, and that was like the road to success for them. Pilsner is where they really made their name, um being becoming known as one of the best lager breweries in the Northwest.
01:05:41
Speaker
Since then, they have it's really interesting because they are their IPAs and their are good. but their loggers are incredible and their barrel aging program is incredible because they, they just have a really extensive barrel aging program that, uh, they have an entire series of, uh, year round, not year round of seasonal releases that come out all year.
01:06:15
Speaker
uh, laughing at Sam's comment. I'll get to that in second. So they have ah a series of barrel age stuff that comes out all year, ranging from barrel aged lagers, the barrel aged sours, the barrel aged stouts, the barrel aged brown ales and, and Flemish reds and just doing everything under the sun.
01:06:36
Speaker
ah Since earlier this year, I've been in their Freemsters Union program, which is their their beer club for barrel aging. and they give you a couple of their regular releases, a couple of their limited editions, and a couple of Freemsters Union exclusives.
01:06:56
Speaker
You can only get if you're part of the club. um Somehow... ah Kavor, the company that I used to buy that through, got a hold of some old Framesters Union stuff.
01:07:10
Speaker
And I managed to get a couple of those. So this is a Framesters Union release from 2023. Somebody at Fram has had this sitting and sitting in the back room for a couple of years now.
01:07:25
Speaker
um And this is, ah it's kind of their you know their their classic Imperial Stout Coming in at 11.5% ABV. But this is aged for 10 months in bourbon barrels with Brazilian Ambarana chips.
01:07:41
Speaker
Oh, love Ambarana. I know you're very familiar with Ambarana. So much. I love it so much. um And so after you had talked about it, I had never tasted it before. But after you talked about it, this popped up, and I immediately was like, got to have two bottles of that.
01:07:55
Speaker
it. um So this is their Ambarana-aged Imperial Stout. you can tell that bottle's been bouncing around a little bit. No, I haven't.
01:08:06
Speaker
First time. So this 40 IBUs, 11.5% ABV. I did a little bit of reading on Ambarana. It is a South American tree that basically is coveted for the bizarre flavor that it imparts into anything you soak in it. Vanilla? ah Yeah, it's like... um cinnamon, vanilla, clove kind of vibe. um And you had a Ambarana aged whiskey yeah in Miami that I was blown away by. It's it's like apple pie almost. like takes It tastes wild.
01:08:42
Speaker
It's crazy. So I'm expecting this to be pretty similar. Interestingly, Ambarana is it's a short tree. So they're not tall, big, thick trees. They're short trees.
01:08:52
Speaker
You can make a barrel out of it. But from what I've read, they're about six times the price of an American oak barrel, ah which is already crazy expensive. Like, I think most people don't realize how expensive barrels are. A lot of times a barrel, just the barrel itself, before you char it, before you do anything to it, can anywhere from $1,500 to $3,000. Yeah, they're super expensive. So we're talking like 10 grand.
01:09:22
Speaker
For a barrel made out of Ambarana. Which is why they use chips. Exactly. So just about everybody... be one of the reasons why. Just about everybody uses chopped up Ambarana chips.
01:09:33
Speaker
You toss it in the barrel. That way you're getting some of that bourbon barrel influence. You're getting a whole lot of that Ambarana influence. Like, you can smell it on this beer. I don't know that I would want a spirit made from... from ah ah ah Aged in a full Ambarana barrel.
01:09:49
Speaker
I'm sure it exists, but it seems like it would be too intense because just the chips are like, like ah at least in that whiskey that we had, like it really kind of takes over the classic oh yeah ah the classic bourbon flavors in there.
01:10:07
Speaker
um ah But Ambarano seems to be on the rise. Cool. I want to make a sour, so next brew day batch, probably in January, February, I think I'm going to do a sour with albarana chips.
01:10:22
Speaker
Wow. A simple sour, but I want i want the albarana to kind of be the the the focal point. So we'll see what happens. And also, Tripp, exciting news.
01:10:34
Speaker
On the beer front, I have a Flemish Red that has been literally sitting next to my bed for the last year, over just over a year now, in a keg, in secondary, with French limousine oak spirals, mid-char.
01:10:52
Speaker
So I figured, like, number two, number three. um and it's she's she's ready, and we're going bottle half of it. We're going bottle half of it, bottle in cork, like and in bombers, and then the other half is going to go on tap.
01:11:07
Speaker
So it's going to wild. I'll keep you posted. When it's ready, you have a bottle. I can't wait to try that. um I just took a sip of this, and it is crazy-tasting.
01:11:18
Speaker
So how is the Oberon coming out of that? is it Do you get that like essence of that vanilla, that little apple thing going on? Yeah, it's like...
01:11:32
Speaker
It's the strangest apple pie I've ever had. ah It's overspiced. It's like apple pie, but you accidentally doubled or maybe tripled the amount of cinnamon, nutmeg, clove, kind of those spices. Yeah.
01:11:48
Speaker
And there's like, I'm trying to figure out what else it is. There's definitely vanilla.
01:11:57
Speaker
There's one flavor that I can't put my finger on, but yeah it might be because it's actually a flavor that doesn't exist outside of Ambarana. It's the Ambarana flavor, yeah. Yeah, it's that one flavor. it's It's mind-boggling that you can get this much flavor from just a piece of wood.
01:12:17
Speaker
It's crazy. Like, it makes me wonder. i want to go to Brazil and find some Ambarana and burn it, taste it, and smoke it, and just, like, experience all that Ambarana has to offer. Because I'm very curious now.
01:12:32
Speaker
So I would love to do a a piece of pork with Ambarana on the smoker. I feel like that could be crazy. Ambarana smoked food or Ambarana aged food, like you know how you do a ah a cedar plank with salmon sometimes. like yeah yeah yeah Doing something like that with Ambarana could work really well.
01:12:53
Speaker
um Man. It's crazy. It's a great wood. I hope that we see more of this. It's certainly becoming more popular, certainly because Freem is using it. Other people are using it. It's coming it's coming into this normalized culture of spirits and things.
01:13:13
Speaker
Yeah. Finally.
01:13:16
Speaker
um Yeah, I'm going to take a couple more sips of this and try to figure it out a little bit because it is really like no beer I've ever tasted, especially a beer that has zero adjunct.
01:13:28
Speaker
This is just stout in a barrel with wood chips in it. but Some chips. Yep.
01:13:36
Speaker
Yeah, man. i Let me get into my my my last pairing. It's Kind of maybe contentious for some folks, but it's something that I never really Ginger. Ginger is the other flavor that's in here. Oh, yeah. So ginger is a big thing. Very big.
01:13:52
Speaker
It's the clove plus the ginger plus that overbearing vanilla apple thing, you know, whatever, like applewood. When I say apple, I mean applewood, less so actual apple.
01:14:04
Speaker
Yeah, it it reminds you of apple pie, but it's more about the spices than the apple.
01:14:14
Speaker
my My last pairing is something that I really, I've seen in the stores for a long time and I've really never purchased it, never tried it, never really considered it. Just walk past it most of the time. Like, all right, that's cool packaging. I like the packaging. It's nice, but that's about it, right?
01:14:32
Speaker
I had something that's kind of cool and interesting and apparently was born out of the reality TV show world. I don't watch reality TV. Not really.
01:14:45
Speaker
But Bravo had a show called Summer House. Are you familiar with this? I don't think so. Is that is that a Korean show? No. so and No, it's some American show. I vaguely remember somebody on a podcast talking about a show that was something house that was a Korean reality show. It may have been a Summer House and this could be the American. it's's It's some kind of thing. I mean, inevitably with really good looking people that have different personalities and complain about shit and whatever.
01:15:19
Speaker
Classically American MTV style sort of reality show. um But From that show, Kyle Cook came in. This guy named Kyle Cook and Amanda Batool came in and founded this company in 2018.
01:15:35
Speaker
So they've been around for, at this point, you know quite a while. you know In this business, quite a while. That that is essentially ah long time to still be around, still be relevant, still be alive.
01:15:48
Speaker
And it's a company called Loverboy. Have you seen this stuff before? This is what the can looks like. Never. You're speaking an alien language to me right now. All right.
01:15:59
Speaker
These are ready to drink cocktails. And the interesting thing is they are wine based. So wrap that in your brain for a second as I tell you a little bit more about this.
01:16:12
Speaker
What I'm having tonight is the Loverboy Classic Cosmopolitan. Comes in at 12% ABV. And it's it's a small can. It's about 8.4 ounces.
01:16:25
Speaker
So 250 mil for you Canadians out there. I know someone's going ask about it. 250 mil. It's really interesting because it's a wine-based cocktail, but it is a Classic Cosmo. and Classic Cosmo has simply vodka. it's got You've got your orange liqueur, depending on what you like, Cointreau or whatever else, a little cranberry, and some lime.
01:16:53
Speaker
pretty Pretty easy, pretty simple, pretty you know quick to drink. The only thing is I'd say when I poured it from the can, hot damn, there's some sediment that is disconcerting on the bottom. But other than the sediment, it tastes pretty good.
01:17:11
Speaker
And um it's just interesting to see a brand like this to to come out and and and go, hey we're going to do a wine-based cocktail line.
01:17:24
Speaker
or And with lower alcohol, technically lower... um Again, going back to the can, the can is so small that I'd say, okay, I'd argue, yeah, I guess that's fine. 12% for a small can, okay.
01:17:40
Speaker
It's reasonable.
01:17:44
Speaker
Now, this is not very sugary. It's got only 4 grams of sugar for a can, which is... You know, it's not nothing, but it's not a whole lot to blow you out. Right.
01:17:57
Speaker
um And it's all simple ingredients. It's all just really, really basic stuff. And this company exploded. They're doing something like 40 million annual revenue. Wow.
01:18:11
Speaker
Yeah. and And by revenue, I mean, this is like take home money. it's not It's like after overhead and everything else, staff, raw material, shipping, all this stuff. So take home money by 40 mil is great for a very young brand, for a very kind of specific brand.
01:18:32
Speaker
And um I'm really impressed. It tastes awesome. It tastes really good. I feel guilty saying, much like this Perdomo, I feel guilty saying that I like this, but it's actually really good.
01:18:44
Speaker
I'm pleasantly surprised.
01:18:50
Speaker
I'm still trying to figure this beer out. like
01:18:57
Speaker
As crazy as Ambarana tasted... in that whiskey, it's crazier in a Imperial stout. So it's more pronounced. You're saying, I definitely think so. Okay.
01:19:10
Speaker
Um, man, it's, it's just so interesting. So complex, so much going on. Um,
01:19:24
Speaker
sorry, I had a burp stuck. Um, It's... Man, it's just funky. Like... I think the complexity of it actually kind of takes away from the cigar only because it distracts me.
01:19:41
Speaker
Like, I take a puff of the cigar and I'm still thinking about the beer and, like, how how strange it tastes compared to... Because, again, no no adjuncts. This is just barrel aging yeah that did this.
01:19:56
Speaker
Um... Other than that, it's just an Imperial Stout. But it has so, so, so much going on. I'm very curious to see this used more because I feel like adding some adjuncts in there with less wood could balance it out and make it even more interesting, but I don't know.
01:20:13
Speaker
um
01:20:16
Speaker
It has my attention, man. like Ambarana has got my attention. It's super cool. I can't believe this is what a wood tastes like. I'm going have to order like a small bag of chips just so I can check them out.
01:20:28
Speaker
And i think I think something like Ambarana would work really well with, going back to beer, I think it would work really well with the sour. Yeah. Because you have the sourness to to really drive the flavor forward.
01:20:40
Speaker
That's the top end of the flavor, and the bottom end is going to be the Ambarana. That's the finish. That could be really interesting. Getting that Ambarana, but you're also getting something like the sour citrus, whatever you want to call it.
01:20:54
Speaker
And so, I don't know, maybe an Ambarana...
01:20:58
Speaker
don't to say apple pie, but maybe an apple pie sour. Yeah, like an apple apple sour could work really well. or Or like a... um like that ah I just shared with you that that blend of cider and and sour ale. Something like that barrel-aged with Amarada could be crazy.
01:21:21
Speaker
Yeah, that stuff was really good. And my mind goes to like, we're smoking barrel-aged tobacco here. What if you put some Ambarana in there? How crazy would that be? Like, ah my mind is racing with the possibilities that this wood can open up.
01:21:35
Speaker
I really like this cigar. I'm going to say this. It's so good. I really, really like this cigar. Holy shit. I don't go for this brand. Again, I mentioned ad nauseum I'm mentioning this, but I really like this cigar. smell It smells great. It smokes great.
01:21:51
Speaker
It tastes great. And holy shit, good for them because this is what we needed. Yeah, um it's i'm I'm so impressed with this cigar. That's why once we both had them, I was like, we gotta smoke this. Because i had I had bought like three of these in this size, in in the sun-grown blend, or sorry, shade-grown blend.
01:22:15
Speaker
And accidentally smoked them all. I was going to send you one, but ah you know I smoked them all. ah Because it was like, I smoked and I was like,
01:22:28
Speaker
I can't like this cigar this much. I got to try it again. So a couple days later, I smoked another one. I was like, wow, this is really good. And then I was just, I only had one left. So i was just in the mood to smoke it.
01:22:39
Speaker
Smoke the last one. Um, I'm really impressed with this cigar. I'm glad you're enjoying it as well. Uh, Sam's last pairing is the Balvenie Caribbean cask, which again, oh yeah man I think that's a really good choice for this cigar.
01:22:54
Speaker
um I think he's on to something with the scotch pairings. Like I said about the the courage and conviction, the, well, I'll talk about that when we, when we go back through for now, um, any other, i mean, we've talked about it over and over again. Any other thoughts on the cigar before we circle back through our pairings?
01:23:12
Speaker
Go buy it. that's I'm going to say go get it. i I don't disagree with that. Yeah, absolutely it. You're going to dig it. You're going absolutely dig it. And regardless of what kind of smoker you are, if you're into mild, medium stuff, you're still going to love this cigar. If you're into really intense cigars, like a lot of us are, I know Trip is as well as as I am, you're going to have a good time.
01:23:33
Speaker
And it's going to satisfying. I mean, I think generally the logic with... ah with blends like this from Perdomo, is if you like mild to medium, get the Connecticut.
01:23:46
Speaker
If you like stronger, get the Maduro. If you like in the middle, get the the its sun-grown, or in this case, shade-grown. Yeah. The red label. ah Like, I don't think you can go wrong with this cigar.
01:24:01
Speaker
um It's great. I've been buying them every chance I can. Every time I see it in a shop, I'm like, all right, I guess I'll get one All right. I've been going back through my parents little bit here.
01:24:13
Speaker
While we do this. Yeah. I wanted to talk about an experience I had this week that I talked to you a little bit about.
Theme Park Adventures
01:24:21
Speaker
I spent. Oh, yeah. Twelve grueling hours at Universal's Epic Universe in Orlando.
01:24:29
Speaker
And i have become. i i think i I already enjoyed theme parks. A lot. ah Since moving to Florida, my family has become, ah particularly my wife and son and myself, have become aficionados of theme parks.
01:24:46
Speaker
Where, like, we we geek out a little bit. Like, you know, we're dissecting.
01:24:55
Speaker
We don't review it for anybody, but we review it for ourselves. And like we're dissecting like what they could do better and what we're really impressed by. And just about everything at Epic Universe impressed them. Like the evolution of the theme park.
01:25:11
Speaker
has for now reached its peak with Epic Universe. Like everything about that park is really impressive. The theming of the areas, there's a horror area that fucking rules where you get to go through this big portal and then you got, uh, you got Dracula in this building. The invisible man's walking around over there. Like, no, I'm i'm not kidding. Like the invisible man, I have a picture of the fucking visible man talking to some lady.
01:25:35
Speaker
ah You can go back and see the Wolfman's Tavern. That's cool, man. They literally have, like, the Castle of Dr. Frankenstein, and you get to go in it and go on this ride that has, like, just the most impressive animatronics I've ever seen.
01:25:51
Speaker
Like, people... they move like people. Like, it's no longer like, you know, the classic animatronics that talk like this, that their mouth does goes up and down, and they kind of move a little bit, but they they look like a robot wearing a costume. And, like, they had ones that were almost indistinguishable from from human actors.
01:26:13
Speaker
Like, it is really impressive how far it's come. um But then the the Mario world was super cool. All of the food we had was, like, really good.
01:26:24
Speaker
They got beer, which, you know, is the the weight of my heart. And when you have themed beer that is only available there, I'm a sucker for that. I'll pay 15 bucks for that beer. I'm not paying 15 bucks for a Miller Lite.
01:26:40
Speaker
But for the, what did they call it? I went to the Burning Blade Tavern. So this is back in the Wolfman area. And it's like, you go into this, like this ramp that kind of goes down under, not quite underground, but it is kind of underground.
01:26:56
Speaker
And on top of it, there's a a windmill. Also, this is the horror area. Everything is just painted black in this place. Like every building is black. it is It rules. It's my kind of place too. Every building is black. Everybody's costume, except the invisible man's is black.
01:27:12
Speaker
Um, But the Burning Blade Tavern has this windmill on top, and like every 10 minutes or 15 minutes, the windmill sets on fire. It's so cool. like official Fully actually on fire. Real fire? Oh, shit. Real fire. The blades of the windmill are spinning on fire.
01:27:33
Speaker
That's so cool. But they had a beer called Reaper's Reserve there, which was a brown ale with cinnamon, nutmeg, and clove. That was, you know, ah if i'm I'm hanging out, it's chilly. I'm being warmed by the fire of a windmill.
01:27:50
Speaker
ah it was It was the right kind of beer for that. That's super cool, man. I love this kind of stuff, man. We need more spooky stuff. Exactly. At the Harry Potter land they have ah ah like four or five different beers that you can get that are all Harry Potter themed. I went for the Wizards Brew yet again because last time we were at ah one of the other parks that has a Harry Potter area.
01:28:14
Speaker
I tried all the different beers and they were all pretty good. They have like a brewery that is making all these beers for them. They're not just beers that they changed the name of. Um, but they have one called wizards brew. That's like uh,
01:28:31
Speaker
it's close to an Irish stout. It might be more close to a Porter. Um, it's definitely inspired by Guinness, but it's, it's really good. But had a couple of those,
01:28:42
Speaker
Uh, we had some, I had a, a one pound meatball with, with Bowser's head on it. It was awesome. ah That's cool. Like everything about this place was cool. So if you're, if you're going to central Florida and doing the theme park thing, um, don't pass up Epic universe, man. It is very cool.
01:29:04
Speaker
And, uh, if you were into thrill rides, It had one that pushed my wife over the edge. she Within 30 seconds on this ride, she wanted to get off of and she did not have fun.
01:29:17
Speaker
what What was this ride? All right, so it's called Stardust Racers. It is the... Mario? No, so they have like they have Mario, they have How Train Your Dragon, they have...
01:29:29
Speaker
Universal Monsters, and then they have ah Harry Potter. And in the middle, they have Celestion, I think they call it. It's like a vaguely non... not no copyright, vaguely space-themed area.
01:29:47
Speaker
Okay. Like, they had a... they had ah ah One of the restaurants was called the Astro Pub. which I think is a great name. Like a gastropub, astropub, space, you know. Space bar.
01:30:01
Speaker
They had a lot of, they didn't have that. That would have been good. They had a bunch of like constellation kind of stuff. The hot dog place was called Cosmodog. like well ah right Like, it's just vaguely space themed, but this roller coaster rules.
01:30:15
Speaker
My son and I had a blast. So you get on this roller coaster. I mean, so does my wife, but this one was just a little full too much for her. um You get on and it's two roller coasters.
01:30:27
Speaker
So you get on either the yellow or the green roller coaster and they race. But Was like dueling dragons? yeah Yeah, it's that kind of thing. like They start off right next to each other and then they they zip off to the side away from each other and then you go up and down and up and down. And then like there's a part where like you come straight towards each other and then twist past each other. There's another part know where you both go over a hill and as you're hitting the top, you flip and spin like and do a barrel roll as you're going down the hill going 80 miles an hour.
01:31:02
Speaker
pass. but That's kind of what my wife thought. i my dad Not my jam. The thing that really made my wife crazy about this one is that like you would go, it would launch you. You're going really fast. You go up over a hill and down. So like you get that at the top of the hill, you fly it out of your seat.
01:31:18
Speaker
yep kind of feeling and then you're going down the hill and you're slowing down as you go straight at the bottom and then you go through like a tunnel and halfway through the tunnel it lights up and your speed doubles back to max speed before you hit the next hill like it is no it is very very intense hard pass baby um and yeah she was she was not willing to consider doing that one again my son wanted to but I was a little it definitely got your heart going I was afraid my heart might pop if I did it twice in a row.
01:31:49
Speaker
Yeah, i you know, these days I get my heart going by looking at my bills. ah That's, and at my age, now, I look at my mortgage go, don't know. I don't know how feel about this. in In contrast to that, I go to the grocery store.
01:32:03
Speaker
I see that grocery bill, that gets my heart going. Hell yeah, hell yeah, homie. um But yeah, the Epic Universe was super cool. um If you can, this is my this is my professional recommendation.
01:32:18
Speaker
As somebody who lives only a couple hours from the parks, um this is what I recommend. If you're going Disney, just do all the things. like just do Just do everything at Disney. you no You're going to be there three or four days. just do all the things.
01:32:33
Speaker
If you want to do Universal, this is what you do. You do three or four days. And you do it between August and November so that you can do horror nights for a couple of the days.
01:32:46
Speaker
Because horror nights is so cool. the The other parks are still open. if you're you know if If you've got a group and you have one or two people who are okay with being terrified, um they can do horror nights and everybody else can go to Epic Universe or Islands of Adventure or something where they don't do scary stuff.
01:33:06
Speaker
At least not as much. um Oh, there was... My my son got a little taste of Horror Nights at Epic Universe. I'll circle back to that in a second. But Horror Nights, Halloween Horror Nights is an absolute blast.
01:33:21
Speaker
We get to do like six or seven... Might might even be ten ah haunted houses that are themed after usually just whatever's popular that year.
01:33:33
Speaker
This year, it was terrifier and... five nights at freddy's stranger things i think had one again this year i
01:33:46
Speaker
don't know there's a couple more there's a couple that aren't you know that are uh that are non-copyright themed they're just kind of general i think it was this year that they had one that was inspired by like the day of the dead um the holiday not the movie um but it's, it's very cool. If you're okay with being scared, Halloween Horror Nights is a blast. It takes over the entire Universal Park, like the main Universal Studios Park, and they have scare zones where you walk through and all of a sudden it gets all foggy and there's people jumping out from behind everything, scaring you, and you can drink some beer and eat some spooky burgers and stuff.
01:34:26
Speaker
It's a blast. Um... But Epic Universe, if you're going, should be should be on the list of things to do. All right. So the thing... so you walk into the spoopy area, the the Universal Monsters area.
01:34:41
Speaker
The spoopy area. And the way that they have it set up, you walk through this big tunnel. It's only 15 feet deep, like but it's 12 feet tall and stuff, and it's a big circle that you're walking through. And as you go through, it has, like, you hear...
01:34:56
Speaker
uh frankenstein's electricity zapping the monster back to life kind of stuff and but as you walk through the music changes from whatever generic music they had playing outside and it changes to spooky music and you walk through and there's mist and you're coming out in a graveyard and there's uh they had a i wanted to get a picture of it but it was there was always somebody standing right in front of it They had a coffin that you can like stand in like Dracula. They have like a grim reaper statue that I took a couple pictures of. And we stopped there to look at the map or something.
01:35:28
Speaker
And then the mist happened. And at Halloween horror nights, that's when, you know, it's going to get little spooky. The mist happens. There's fog machines that are going all of a sudden you can't see five feet in front of you And then everybody's jumping out in front of you with blown red eyes and battle axes and stuff. Hell yeah yeah. I love it. And Igor.
01:35:46
Speaker
igor Yeah. Igor comes walking out of the mist and he walks up and he says, hello, how are you? To my son and and goes to shake his hand with a severed hand.
01:35:58
Speaker
And my son's just like, ah And it it just surprised him. He's not super freaked out by stuff like that, but he he really enjoyed it So they have like characters walking around there and stuff. Man, it was it was a blast.
01:36:13
Speaker
All right. Pairings of the night time now. ah Sam's is unsurprisingly, I think Balveny Caribbean cask. Cause that whiskey is fantastic.
01:36:26
Speaker
I think mine is going to be the courage and conviction. cask. ah I really liked what lacto cooler brought to it, how it kind of brought out with the sourness, that brightness in the cigar, those, those kind of more citrusy flavors.
01:36:42
Speaker
um So I thought that was a shockingly good pairing, ah but this whiskey just went really well. Like I talked about before, the Barrel Age Ambarana is like, it's one of, i think, my favorite beers I've ever tasted.
01:36:59
Speaker
But it has too much going on to have a cigar with it. there's just There's just so much flavor in that beer that it overpowers the cigar a little bit and and more more so than that, distracts from the cigar.
01:37:12
Speaker
So my brain is focused on the beer rather than the cigar, and I want to be shifting my focus between the two. What about you, Dennis? What's your pairing night? I'm very curious because you had op three wildly different pairings.
01:37:25
Speaker
They were all really, really different. Listen, the Loverboy thing was a pleasant surprise. I really liked it. But I think, start to finish, this Jaeger is awesome. And I just poured a little bit more in in my lovely... Your stag coat. Now, hold on. let me Let me drink this so I can show you what it looks like, because it's beautiful.
01:37:52
Speaker
Here we go. It's pretty cool. As I'm dripping all over my keyboard... um It's actually really pretty and a really cool special edition holiday thing that they made many years ago.
01:38:06
Speaker
I've never seen it ever again. This is my prized, I love this thing. If someone comes to my house and I wanna share something with them, I pour it in this.
01:38:17
Speaker
Nice. Because it's so special. And I think, again, going back to like the culture of cigars, culture of spirits, culture of beers, you have that you know You have that one glass, we all have that one glass that we love to drink from. We have those things that are nostalgic for a particular reason. We have those cigars that to anybody else are not special, but to us they're special.
01:38:40
Speaker
And so this, for me, this shooter kind of is evocative of that. It's it's this this really special thing. Oh, my God. I'm burping a lot. Excuse me.
01:38:53
Speaker
Me too. That sour beer messed me up, dog. It's this really special thing that you want to share with somebody, and that's what it's all about. And, you know, similarly, we do that with cigars as well.
01:39:05
Speaker
So I think the Jaeger worked really well. um I have finished my cigar because my cigar was a slightly different Vitola than yours, i think. right I had a Toro. You had a ium Torpedo.
01:39:18
Speaker
You had a Toro as well? Yeah. Oh, well, I smoked too fast, I guess. That's all right. That's all right. That happens. But yeah, dude, the Jaeger, it sounds weird.
01:39:30
Speaker
Try it. Not in a party boy kind of way. I think the Jaeger works really well. I want to i want bring back the name of Jaeger. I want people to appreciate it for what it is is and not just go, oh, that's the shit that I mixed you know with with Red Bull. That i drop a shot glass of into my Red Bull, yeah.
01:39:46
Speaker
You know, Jaeger bombs, great. It is legitimately a great a great cocktail. and Any day, I will do a Jagerbom with you, but um I think it deserves the respect to to have it neat and to have it maybe a nice if you like ice.
01:40:03
Speaker
um Good example. Today, it's snowed. We get about five inches of snow. moving So I went outside and I did my classic drink.
01:40:15
Speaker
You've heard of a scotch egg, right? You know what scotch egg is? Mm-hmm. food? Yeah, and a hard-boiled egg covered in sausage. Right. Now, in the colder regions where it snows, I have my own thing that I call a scotch egg. And what I do is I take a, not this, but I take like a wine, you know those little wine glasses are like the little... Like a stemless wine glass?
01:40:38
Speaker
Stemless wine glass, and the you can palm it, right? I fill that with snow. I pack it in all the way with snow. And then I put three ounces of scotch in that. And eventually, in a couple of minutes, it melts down a little bit.
01:40:52
Speaker
And I collect fresh snow, put that in there, right? Put the scotch in there. And then i so I spin it around until eventually it forms into what looks like an egg.
01:41:03
Speaker
But it is snow and scotch. A snowball with scotch. in a Yeah, exactly. So it's it's essentially like a Scottish shaved ice. and That sounds incredible. just chewed on that for a while.
01:41:15
Speaker
I did that today. And it makes me wish that I had any any chance of seeing snow. It was so good. It is currently 66 degrees. here
01:41:28
Speaker
Bullshit. it is I think it's about 12 where I'm at right now. ah If you're lucky. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But anyway, so it's something like that. I think this is the Jaeger is really great. You can do that the same snow and scotch thing with Jaeger.
01:41:46
Speaker
um Yeah, so your one for the road, was that was it the park? Nope. I got a real one for the road. All right, let's hear it. Actually, I have two because one of them...
01:41:59
Speaker
I want to talk about, but a lot of people probably aren't going to be able to partake. ah So, my first one... Heroin? Heroin is it? No. No, it's even harder to find.
01:42:11
Speaker
Oh, Jesus Christ. So it is... I went to see a movie this week. I sat in a movie theater for approximately five hours so that I could watch Kill Bill, The Whole Bloody Affair. Oh.
01:42:26
Speaker
ah So this is both of the Kill Bill movies, which I saw in theaters when they came out with my dad. Took my dad once again, see the whole bloody affair this week.
01:42:37
Speaker
This is the the two Kill Bill movies put together originally. So this is this is a little film geek history. Originally, when these films were when the movie was written, it was written as one long, like three and a half hour movie.
01:42:52
Speaker
And ah Quentin Tarantino got pressure to a lot of pressure. He basically was told, we're not going to pay for the movie if you make it one movie. So he started filming his one movie and they said, yeah, this has to be two movies. We're we're not doing a five hour, four hour movie.
01:43:11
Speaker
Oh, not like Das Boot. Yeah, they were not interested. This was Miramax. This was Harvey Weinstein at the height of his horribleness. um And he was not interested in any long running movies like that. They, he wanted movies that you could get people in and out of.
01:43:28
Speaker
um So he cut Clinton down to two, two, two hours, 15 minutes or so per movie and said, make it two movies. um So he, he rewrote it and ah reconfigured shooting so that they could film it as two movies.
01:43:43
Speaker
ah A couple of years later, like we're talking 2007 or so, is when Quentin Tarantino first revealed the whole bloody affair.
01:43:54
Speaker
So he had made his own edit and kept a private print of it that he would basically show to friends. Like if he was having a New Year's Eve party,
01:44:07
Speaker
he would he would do a showing of the this four and a half hour cut of Kill Bill. um And it was shown at a couple of events over the years, I think 2014 or so.
01:44:19
Speaker
He showed it at his theater and in Los Angeles for a couple of weeks. But last week was the first time ever that it was seen across the country.
01:44:31
Speaker
um It was released four hours, 41 minutes, That includes a 15-minute intermission. It's not something I've seen in a movie since The Hateful Eight in 2016.
01:44:47
Speaker
Fun fact. Another Quentin Tarantino movie. If you watch movies in a theater in the Caribbean, classically in the Caribbean, most most countries of the Caribbean, when you go to the movie theater...
Cinema Experiences and Recommendations
01:44:59
Speaker
to watch a modern film, whatever wherever movies are out, they actually have 15 to 20 minute intermission in the middle of every movie. Wow. So whatever whatever movie you're watching, they go, okay, intermission, go pee, go get snacks, get whatever, come back.
01:45:15
Speaker
That's like a thing. That's awesome. It's wild. so Which is cool. We went to see this movie. It was fantastic. it's ah There's a couple of parts cut out. There's a couple of parts added The...
01:45:26
Speaker
the ah Again, people who aren't nerds like me aren't going to know this, but in Kill Bill 1, there's like an eight or so minute scene near the end where she fights the crazy 88. Yeah, I remember this And it suddenly cuts to black and white.
01:45:43
Speaker
yep It cuts to black and white because that scene was too bloody for the ratings board at the time. I was telling my dad had to cut it i was telling my dad how like the ratings board has been all over the place, even throughout just my lifetime, where yeah sometimes anything goes. like You can do whatever you want on screen. And then 2003 happened to be a time when they were starting to cut back on violence a little bit.
01:46:06
Speaker
Um, so it got an NC 17 rating. So to get rid of the NC 17 rating, he cut a couple of shots out of that scene and made it black and white, black and white blood. Isn't as scary as red blood.
01:46:17
Speaker
So they gave it an R rating and he was able to release it. These days things have changed a lot. You can put terrifier in a movie theater. Now that doesn't even, they don't even show anybody that they just like, here's the movie it's done.
01:46:30
Speaker
Um, they give it to the theaters. was a series of films of hot damn for a modern theater audience. Hot damn. And they're all unrated. That's the thing. So there used to be a, I don't know if it was a gentleman's agreement or kind of a ah legal thing, but theaters would not show any movie that was not rated by the ratings.
01:46:53
Speaker
If it was, if it was unrated or even if it was NC 17, no theater in America would show it. No major theater. There were a couple of small theaters that you could watch stuff like that.
01:47:04
Speaker
um And now unrated is fine. So this is the unrated edition of Hillbill with all of those scenes restored in color. There's a couple of other scenes that are very bloody. There's ah like a hand getting chopped off that's super bloody. That's awesome.
01:47:23
Speaker
um And then the the beginning of Kill Bill 2 is kind of trimmed off because but beginning is the part where she's driving in the car, talking to the camera and telling you everything that happened in the first one. You don't need that. You just finished watching the first one.
01:47:37
Speaker
ah But the other thing about that is that I watched it at the Alamo Drafthouse. This is my first time going to the Alamo Drafthouse since 2015 when I was in ah when I was actually in Texas and I i don't even know what movie it was.
01:47:54
Speaker
ah but I went to see a movie at Alamo Drafthouse and i was like, holy shit, this place is incredible. Alamo Drafthouse is the theater Like, you don't have to get you don't have to stop at the the the concession stand and order your stuff. you They come to you. You order it like you're at a restaurant. And since the last time I've been, they now have phone ordering. So, like, it was actually preorder kind of awesome. So, you no, you sit down in your seat.
01:48:22
Speaker
Oh, you order from your seat. Yeah, yeah. They have a QR code. You scan it. You put in what you want. Ten minutes later, it shows up. um Like an airport. Right before the movie starts, they have like a whole thing. like ah it was They probably have a couple of actors that did it, but ours was Aziz Ansari going, all right, put your phone away.
01:48:43
Speaker
No more phones. Don't take your phone out. You have to, if you want something, write it down on the card and push a little button. And even better than that, Aziz Ansari tells you to put your phone away.
01:48:56
Speaker
And then they have, rest in peace, one of my favorite actors, Michael Madsen. They had Michael Madsen pre-roll for the movie where it shows a little little cut of him dancing along in Reservoir Dogs. And then he says,
01:49:14
Speaker
and then he says listen, welcome to Alamo Drafthouse. I'm Michael Madsen. ah No phones. No talking during the movie. Just don't do it.
01:49:25
Speaker
And then it shows another scene and he's like, you talk during in this movie, I'm going to come find you. yes And and then it's uncle then it cuts to black And it says Do not disturb the movie Michael Madsen will tie you to a chair And cut your ear off And then it cuts back to Michael Madsen going yeah Listen If you talk her in this movie going to tie you to a chair I'm going to cut your ear off I'm Michael Madsen and I endorse this message And then the movie starts And I'm like how can movie start any better It's amazing that's amazing Dude you know what
01:50:02
Speaker
The only other time that I've experienced this level of magic is a Tropic Thunder. Because I went i went to see it in the theater and I didn't know, i i wasn't aware about whatever was going on with the film or how the movie was, yeah I didn't listen to like social media or whatever else. I just went like, right, Tropic Thunder, I'm gonna go watch this.
01:50:25
Speaker
And then I sat there and like, is this ah a real trailer? Is this a trailer? It's a trailer for what? What? This is weird. And the trailers start for all the different characters. Yeah. And it threw me for a loop and I loved it so much.
01:50:41
Speaker
If you ever have the chance, go to Alamo Draft House. I don't care what movie you're going to see. Go see Barbie at the Alamo Draft House. Highly recommend. Highly recommend. It's going to be blast. You can get a couple of beers. They have good beer.
01:50:53
Speaker
You can have a couple of beers. You can have some good food. i had some like awesome nacho fries and two or three ah Oregon fresh hop IPAs that were great. Paul Reagan. Yeah, very nice. It was a blast. Anyway, my actual ah one for the road is a movie that will unfortunately cost you $4 to rent on Amazon.
01:51:18
Speaker
ah A movie called Deathstalker. This is written and directed by Stephen Kostansky, and it is a remake of 1983, I think, Deathstalker.
01:51:31
Speaker
It is a goofy, medieval, horror-esque action movie. It reminded me of a mix of Army of Darkness and He-Man.
01:51:45
Speaker
in the best way, just a bunch of goofy characters. There was actually the part that made me like, oh, this is He-Man. Because I was like, oh, this reminds me of He-Man. Halfway through the movie, they have a guy whose head turns inside his little helmet, just like the guy in He-Man.
01:52:00
Speaker
i was like, okay, this is He-Man. um So this is made by the guy who made Psycho Gorman. Dennis, I know you're a fan. Yeah, i love Psycho Gorman. Yes, it's so good. This is his latest movie about a... It's basically like a Conan and the Barbarian ripoff kind of thing.
01:52:17
Speaker
um But it's... It's so much fun because it is a gory ah action movie... that knows how silly and goofy it is. oh But they're really leaning into the practical effects of it all.
01:52:32
Speaker
And it's a blast. yeah I'm looking at the the images from the film. This is... Yes. this This will be right up your alley, dude. Up my alley. So cool. ah oh ah So check it out. I think you in particular will enjoy this. Anybody who likes kind of like goofy stuff,
01:52:51
Speaker
ah we we'll probably really like this. i'm I'm sorry. It's six bucks on Amazon Prime right now. oh to It'll probably be on some streaming service eventually, but with Stephen Kostansky, I wouldn't count on it because he he tends to make weird, very niche movies that don't get enough distribution.
01:53:12
Speaker
All right, Dennis, I'll let you give your one for the road. Actually, first, Sam's is the ultimate cigar book by Richard Hacker. I don't think i i don't think I've got that one. I've got a lot of cigar books, but I don't think I have that one.
01:53:24
Speaker
Oh, and in reference to my rating scene rant, he's a rating board grant. He says Star Wars was going to be G until they put the cutting off the arm scene.
01:53:35
Speaker
There were a shocking number of movies that were supposed to be G Jaws. Jaws was originally going to be a g rated movie. um And then it got the, the R rating because PG 13 and PG didn't really exist. Or sorry, it was going to be PG, I believe.
01:53:51
Speaker
Because I think PG existed, but PG-13 absolutely didn't. Yeah, it was it was the opening scene that they had to like talk about. And another one that will probably shock people that was supposed to be PG ah was Texas Chainsaw Massacre. They were surprised when that got an R rating.
01:54:10
Speaker
um it was It was like, if again, I'm a nerd. I have watched Texas Chainsaw Massacre probably 200 times. It is my favorite movie of all time.
01:54:23
Speaker
But one of the things that I love about it that enough that not enough people know is there's very little violence shown on screen. It's implied violence. Exactly. It's almost all implied violence. There's very little blood. There's very little gore. There's very little even um like he most of the people who get attacked, you don't even see it.
01:54:46
Speaker
But the fear factor of it is what got it in R rating and devastated Toby Hooper at the time. um And he decided to just roll with it and that'd be the right call.
01:54:57
Speaker
um But it has like it has less violence than than most movies that are are maybe Maybe any R-rated horror movie. Yeah, I agree. But yeah, sorry.
01:55:09
Speaker
On to your one for The Road, Dennis.
01:55:12
Speaker
Well, shit. i You know, i for me, my one for the road, it's it's it's a tough thing because i we we are in holiday season, and I have this thing that sits at my desk, which is a an Advent countdown to Christmas.
01:55:36
Speaker
It's an Advent countdown Christmas thing. um It is Nakatomi Tower and is Hans Gruber falling from the tower. And every day you move them down. So I told my my you know the people people on my team, I said, hey, if you want to move them down, give me a quote from the movie.
01:55:56
Speaker
Give me a quote and we'll move them down. Like that's that's the thing we've been doing every day. So Die Hard... almost became my one for the road, but my one for the road is actually Peacemaker, season two.
01:56:10
Speaker
Have you been watching more of it? Well, I'm i like three episodes in. Yes. But... Holy shit, I love it, it's so good. James Gunn, I love James Gunn because his thing with music, his attachment to me It's unbelievable.
01:56:26
Speaker
It fits exactly the way I am. When I watch something, i go, what are the sounds of this scene? If there's a scene that happens that's really intense, people are talking, even if they're just talking, I connect to the the the ambiance of the moment.
01:56:44
Speaker
And it's sometimes it's like you know somebody in a diner clanking, you know the lady doing the coffee or whatever else. i I've always attached myself to that as a kid growing up.
01:56:57
Speaker
And so I love that James Gunn has made that a thing. The sounds of people being people is really cool. But then he does a thing with music. And Peacemaker 2 is no joke for that perspective alone.
01:57:12
Speaker
um And certainly you've seen some of it, I'm sure. I've seen the whole thing, yes. Oh my God. he threw me for a loop. When I started watching it, like, God damn, this is really cool.
01:57:25
Speaker
Peacemaker, ah John Cena, I love him He's great. He's the perfect peacemaker for me. He's so good. John Cena is one of my favorite actors because he is, like, ah John Cena...
01:57:48
Speaker
what's the other guy's name? It looks like John Cena if he didn't work out as much. Stone Cold Steve Us. No, the guy from Magic Mike. That guy's name. Oh, um... him yeah yeah yeah ah And to a lesser degree, I think Dave Batista.
01:58:04
Speaker
All three of those guys are... They are so in tune with... how huge they are, what huge stars they are, and so willing to be the butt of as many jokes as necessary.
01:58:19
Speaker
And it's so it's like, it's... it's so refreshing in terms of modern day Hollywood, where you have people like Vin Diesel and the rock who have things in their contract that they can't ever, but, you know, they can't get punched and stuff like that.
01:58:35
Speaker
And then you have John Cena, who is a legitimate action star, but is willing to make an idiot of himself on screen. For the laugh, because he is so in tune with what people enjoy and ah just just his status that he knows, you know, if he becomes the punching bag, it's even funnier.
01:58:59
Speaker
And he's now he's willing to just go for it. And I love that so much about John Cena. And it makes him the perfect peacemaker because the character is a moron, but a moron that you really love.
01:59:11
Speaker
Wow, that's really well said. I have a piece of advice for you that will only solidify your love for James Gunn, your man crush on James Gunn and his music choices.
01:59:22
Speaker
Yeah. And we'll also give you slight context that doesn't really matter for Peacemaker season two. After you watch episode five, watch the Superman movie.
01:59:34
Speaker
Which one? The new one, the James Gunn one. Oh, it's on, it's on HBO max. He did one? I didn't know. yeah Oh, yeah. It's real good. ah It ruined Coop for movies entirely. Coop says he'll never see a movie in the theater again because he hated this movie so much.
01:59:52
Speaker
I think Coop's an idiot. Love you, Coop. You're an idiot. ah Because I love this movie. It's so good. It's, it's ah I mean, it's James Gunn's Superman movie. Like, how much better could it be?
02:00:06
Speaker
It has a couple of those needle drop moments in this movie are so, so perfect and so fun. ah Man, there's one in particular that's just such a cool action scene that is, as what James Gunn usually does, set to a piece of music.
02:00:24
Speaker
but it's set to a piece of music in a way that ah if they had, if it had cost them half the budget to buy this song, ah James Gunn would have been like, we already shot the scene.
02:00:36
Speaker
Like, just spend the money. Wow. um Like, the music is so important to him. That's part of why I love him. Yeah, i mean, ah yeah. ah to To your point, he really nails it in the Superman movie.
02:00:54
Speaker
Alright.
02:00:57
Speaker
One more sip of my Ambarana Imperial style breaking my brain over here. um Thank you everybody for hanging out and watching. Thank you Sam for giving us your your one for the road and your your pairings of the night and all of your pairings tonight. as always As always. Yeah, as always. We love you Sam. Thanks for thanks for hanging out with us.
02:01:17
Speaker
ah And thanks everybody else for watching. Check out Deeper Domo Legacy. It is the cigar that changed both my and Dennis's mind about Perdomo.
02:01:29
Speaker
I mean, again, Perdomo has, I don't think ever made a bad cigar, but they've made a lot of cigars that aren't for us. They finally made one that is right in our wheelhouse, very squarely in our wheelhouse and just ah tickles the middles in just the right way.
02:01:45
Speaker
ah So thanks everybody for hanging out and watching. We will be back for you. ah let me Let me double check the calendar. I was afraid that like I was going to say we'll be back next week and it was to Christmas or something.
02:01:58
Speaker
No, we will be back next week. Yeah. um So we'll talk to you guys on the next one. Everybody have a great and safe week. Dennis, do want to catch a phrase and we'll get on out of here. Thank you everybody for watching and listening. and remember, we wanted to drink better, but we wanted to drink less.