Sunday 13 November 2011

Smiths

Cigar mittens, cigar mitts, or cimitts (Smiths) for short.

I'd like to lay claim as the inventor, but alas, I cannot.  Nobody can.  I know of one guy who adapted his mittens for cigarettes by putting a cigarette sized hole into a webbed thumb-index finger construction.  Then there's the ginger bloke who claims that his girlfriend knitted him mittens but without the top part that covers the "smoking" fingers.  I'm not so sure.

Maybe she did, maybe she didn't, but if she did, she really needs to get herself a life, and a new boyfriend while she's at it.  If I was that woman and he asked me to knit smoking gloves, as per his crude design, I'd just get the scissors out and chop the fingers off his normal gloves.  Job done.  I'd probably do his socks while I was at it, taking a diagonal across the big toe area.

So, I don't believe him.  I can easily imagine my own wife's reaction if I put that question to her.  I can actually see her falling off the couch in tears laughing.

My solution, after I googled it, was to buy a pair fingerless gloves, but with a fingers cover for non cigar smoking times.  Johnny D has a lovely pair actually, of fingerless gloves that is, and so using John as inspiration, as I normally do, I invested in a pair of said gloves.

I tried them out last night, which was not particularly cold night, but with the cigar lasting around 90 minutes, and with a cold beer to keep it company, my new gloves proved themselves and passed with flying colours.

The cigar I enjoyed was bought in Dublin last time we visited.  It was rolled and bought at the Decent Cigar Emporium and the guy in the shop sold it to me by saying how great it was.  I believed and trusted this man and I'm happy to report that everything he said was true.

It was a non-banded cigar, rolled with aged (so he said) tobacco by a famous grade-9 torcedor on tour last year and I have to admit, it was one of the finest cigars I've smoked to date.

The burn wasn't great, and I had to keep the torch lighter on hand and give it a blast every now and then.  It didn't actually go out at any stage, it just needed some encouragement along the way.

Those of you that read my blog know that I don't do the full in depth analysis of notes and whatnot, but this one stood out and so I'm going to do one...

The flavours started to come through after a few draws, with leather and spice to begin with followed by strong citrus towards the middle.  The citrus flavour then mixed with the spices and the leather faded away.  The flavours suddenly stopped and I thought the cigar was through, then a few draws later, I was hit by a lovely nutty cocoa flavour which stayed with the cigar until the end.  I almost let this cigar go early as I though it had run it's race, but it came alive again and ended up a finger burner.  A great cigar and when we get back to Dublin for Christmas, I'll have to drop by the shop to see if they have any left. 

The next cigar adventure comes up in a few weeks time when we hit Luxembourg for Johnnys Birthday.  My mission, find suitable cigars.  Good times ahead no doubt.  Last time we visited Luxembourg, John laughed so hard, he fell off his bike.


Real Cigar Mitts

Real Cigar
How to make your own










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