CAO Gold Churchill

Founder and creator of C.A.O., Cano A. Ozgener started making some of the best-known Meerschaum pipes in the world in his garage as a hobby. While traveling to different trade shows, he noticed the need for humidors and started making those as well. During the cigar boom of the 1990’s, he was introduced to Carlos Toraño who then introduced him to Nestor Plasencia. The rest is, well, history as the pair began creating unique blends that have developed into the cigar brand that we all know and love today.

Today we are featuring a classic from C.A.O., the Gold Line that was introduced in 1996. The Gold Churchill features a Connecticut-seed Ecuadorian wrapper and Cuban-seed Nicaraguan fillers and binder. This mild-medium cigar has hints of cinnamon and amaretto and a rich core and finish of earth and wood. Being rated with a 90 from Cigar Aficionado, this cigar is well balanced with a sharp burn. Consider pairing it with a witbier.

Honduras has been a tobacco growing and cigar manufacturing area for hundreds of years, but it was the Communist revolution in Cuba that really put Honduras on the map. In the 1960s, many Cuban cigar makers fled their homeland and arrived in Honduras to re-establish their way of life. The immigrants took advantage of the climate, soil, and geography, which were well-suited to tobacco growing, and began producing high quality cigars. The center of the Honduran cigar industry is the city of Danli and the nearby Jamastran Valley. The majority of the world’s pure Corojo tobacco is grown here, now that Cuba has stopped production of this iconic, spicy, and rich variety in favor of Corojo hybrids. Other important areas of Honduran cigar production include the Talanga Valley, Copan, and Trojes.