Tiny Tim's Cigar World!: Muestra de Saka Nacatamale (6 x 48)

Video review HERE.

(Description taken from Cigar-Coop.com website)

Just before the 2017 IPCPR Trade Show, Dunbarton Tobacco & Trust had
started taking pre-orders on the second installment of the Muestra de
Saka series, the Nacatamale. Muestra de Saka follows a “one size, one
blend” model where each installment of the series has a unique blend
mapped to a particular vitola. The Nacatamale features an Ecuadorian
Habano wrapper over Nicaraguan tobaccos from a single farm.  It is
available in one size, measuring 6 x 48. Like the first installment, the
Muestra de Saka Exclusivo, the Nacatamale will be packaged in an
individual coffin with seven coffins packaged per box. Production for
2017 is 2,250 boxes.

Saka explained some more background on the project on this social media post:

What made this cigar a unique blending challenge was I went “viejo
granja” style with it. For over a century most cigars’ entire filler
recipes were comprised of just ONE farm’s tobacco and any complexity was
introduced by extremely careful leaf processing, selection and
positioning within the bunch. Whereas these days as we have hundreds of
ingredients to work and blend with to create interesting and satisfying
ligas.

So, the challenge was to see if I could make an “old farm” style liga
that could hold its own with the modern blends we create today. I am
genuinely curious to see what the feedback on this cigar will be and I
have probably poisoned the pool a bit by stating it is a single
ingredient liga, but at the same time I am really proud of this blend –
amazing the amount of effort it took to pull this one off and of all the
Muestra’s I don’t believe any other will be as challenging skill wise.

This cigar is considerably more robust than the Exclusivo and since this
puro’s tripa are all from just one small, independent farm in Jalapa,
Nicaragua, I will not be disclosing the name of the vega.

Note: The Nacatamale Coffins feature a crossed knife and fork to make
them identifiably different than Exclusivo when viewed in the coffin on
the shelf.

Saka says he has sold 99.5% of his inventory and will be keeping the remainder for himself.

The cigar is flawlessly made. Almost no visible veins. The wrapper is
dark brown and oily. The density shot shows a very dark assortment of
tobaccos.

The cap is finished with a small pigtail.

The test draw after cutting the cap was very good. The initial flavors
were a candy-like orange citrus, cream, cinnamon, brown sugar, heavy
leather, and a black coffee base. There was a massive amount of black
pepper rated at an 8 1/2. The leather, although heavy, is smooth and
makes an excellent bridge connecting all the sweet flavors. The leather
is in no way oppressive. It tastes like it belongs there. The cigar is
very sweet and the leather compliments those sweet flavors perfectly.
The cigar tastes full bodied. The finish is a leathery cream with slight
citrus aspects and heavy lingering black pepper. The cigar had an
excellent start.

2
inches in (28 minutes) the citrus notes are morphing over to a sweet
cedar. You also have a lot of brown sugar and cinnamon to go along with
it and now there are nice, sweet, thick, rich honey notes. The leather
notes have decreased but they continue to be smooth and in the perfect
amount. There remains a black coffee base. The front end flavors are so
very sweet and rich. The black pepper remains very good and lingers very
nicely on the finish. The cigar is medium to full bodied at this point.
The cigar is somewhat complex due to the changes it is making. The
cigar is almost perfect at this point. The first third rating is 95.

At
the midpoint (48 minutes) the previously described flavor of sweet
cedar is again morphing back to a citrus but it's like a citrus liquer.
It's very sweet and deep. The honey notes continue to be amazing. There
are nice brown sugar notes and cinnamon plays a big part in the flavors.
I also got white chocolate. That's a lot of flavors but that's what I
got from the cigar. The leather continues to be creamy and works so
nicely with the other flavors. The subtle coffee base continues, as
well. The black pepper remains very good. The cigar is full bodied. The
finish is unchanged and very good. I urge you to smoke this cigar as
slow as you can. You will get all these amazing flavors. At the midpoint
the cigar continues to be great. The midpoint score is also 95.

The
cigar lasted 1 hour 13 minutes. It continued to have those amazing
flavors but it changed just a bit. At the end the orange liqueur had a
lot more brown sugar and cinnamon notes. Rather than white chocolate I
got a much darker flavor of molasses although the honey notes are still
there. The leather notes continued to be creamy and smooth. The light
black coffee based continued. The pepper remained very good. The cigar
is very full bodied. You can feel the ligero surging through your veins.
The finish was unchanged. This was nothing short of an excellent cigar.
You will be hard pressed to find these but if you do you will be in for
a treat. The final third score is 95. 

Overall score: 95

Tiny Tim's Cigar World!: Muestra de Saka Nacatamale (6 x 48)