Puros Indios Reserva Maxima Maduro Piramide

The Puros Indios cigar factory in Danli, Honduras is run by Rolando Reyes, Sr., a man with more than 70 years under his belt as a cigar maker. Need we say he knows his stuff? In spite of his age, he’s recognized as one of the hardest working men in the business, putting many of us to shame with his work ethic. It is said that he inspects every single cigar rolled each day. Created in 2002 to celebrate Don Rolando Reyes’s 65 years in the business, Puros Indios’s Reserva Maxima is a worthy line indeed. Sniff this medium-bodied stick before you light it and you can smell the aromatics. This famed cigar boasts tobaccos from four nations. The filler consists of leaves from Brazil, the Dominican Republic and Nicaragua. They’re bound to the sultry sun-grown Ecuadorian Sumatra Maduro wrapper by an Ecuadorian binder. Expect notes of understated toffee and espresso, rounded out by menthol notes and strong cedary-sweet floral aromatics in the creamy finish. This cigar is so coveted that a special security code is included in every box to prevent counterfeiters. Holds up to a domestic Barleywine style ale and is nicely complemented by a cola.

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.