The Fonseca 5-50 received an 88 rating from Cigar Aficionado and, according to Cigars International, a "Superior" rating from Rudman's guide.

The 5-50 is a 50 ring gauge cigar with a 5 inch length.  The cigars are hand-rolled in the Dominican Republic.  They're made from Dominican long filler, a Dominican/Mexican binder, and a Connecticut shade wrapper.  

The Unlit Fonseca, Awating a Flame

The cigar I reviewed lit easily and burned extremely evenly, almost a perfectly straight burn.  It gave off generous amounts of wispy white smoke while lit, even when not being drawn. 

The flavor was very mild but evoked the taste of coffee in my mind, with a light touch of leather to it.  There was a light peppery note that started about half way through the cigar.

The cigar's construction was very firm and sturdy.  The ash was similarly very firm and a light to medium gray color.

Even burn, competent blend, and mild flavor

The K. Hansotia Signature 101 cigar reviewed here is described as an "unbelievable new blend" by Cigars International.

The cigar's wrapper is a darker Costa Rican Maduro leaf. The filler blend was supposedly created by Mr. Hansotia himself for his own personal enjoyment. The filler contains Honduran, Dominican, and Jamaican long-leaf tobaccos. It's a fine-looking cigar, made a bit more special looking by the addition of its "signed" silver band.

The Hansotia Signature 101 lit very easily and burned very slowly and evenly to the end. It stayed lit quite well even as I moved about from task to task as I smoked it. If you smoke one of these, I recommend using a punch cutter or a "V" cutter rather than a straight slice across the head. The reason I suggest this is that the wrapper wanted to unravel after I sliced it.   I was able to prevent that from happening by moistening the end, but it did tend to want to still unravel a bit.

The flavor of the cigar to me had a strong chocolate note to it, more like cocoa powder or very dark chocolate than a Hershey bar. Although described as a complex and full-bodied flavor, all I could say that I picked up was the chocolate flavor and a very mild peppery note. The flavor seemed fairly consistent to me throughout.

The smoke coming from the Hansotia Signature 101 was very thin and wispy when exhaled. When drawn into the mouth it was sometimes hard for me to tell the smoke was there. The aroma of the smoke was bitingly sharp and my nose definitely knew it was there when I inhaled some that way.

The Hansotia Signature 101's strength was very mild initially, but picked up significantly during the last third of the burn. I would describe it as a slightly above-average strength.   I definitely felt it by the end of the cigar, but it wasn't quite as potent as the Gurkha Vintage Seriest (also made by Hansotia).

All things considered, I liked the Hansotia Signature 101 but don't feel it was quite as special as some do. Still, it is quite a good cigar and I am not disparaging it here. On a 1-10 rating, the cigar deserves about a 6.5 - perhaps leaning more toward 6 than 7.

Cigars International refers to Gurkha as the "Rolls Royce of cigars". They tell us that Gurkha is "known for offering some of the most prestigious and highly-rated blends in the world". The Gurkha Vintage Series is one of Gurkha's milder cigars.

Gurkha Vintage Series Toro Wrapper 

The wrapper of the Gurkha Vintage Series (as you can see in the image below) is a slightly oily Connecticut shade. It's a very firm cigar.   The Toro size measures 6 inches long with a solid 50 ring gauge. It's firmly rolled and feels quite solid and sturdy in your hand.

Gurkha Vintage Series Toro Cigar, Unlit and with Bands Intact

I had the opportunity to purchase 12 Rum Runner Buccaneer cigars from Cigarbid.com in late March. This weekend I lit one of them up to try it out. I'd heard a lot of people really like Rum Runners, perhaps because they were infused with real Caribbean Rum.

The Rum Runner Buccaneer is a hand-made cigar with 100% Dominican filler, an Indonesian binder and Indonesian Wrapper. The cigar is a 42 ring gauge size approximately 4.7 inches long. It'll last the better part of an hour depending on how often and how hard you draw.

The construction of the cigar was solid but it felt a bit "mushy" compared to others like the Macanudo or Cohiba. This didn't detract from my enjoyment of the Rum Runner buccaneer cigar, but I note it here because some folks don't like a cigar that isn't rock-hard firm.

In the shot below, you can compare the Rum Runner Buccaneer to the stubs from the Macanudo Vintage 1997 and the Cohiba Red Dot Pequeno in the ashtray...

Rum Runner Buccaneer, unlit