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The Aficionado

By Anna Ross

Dan Krekeler smoked his first cigar “too long and too many cigars ago to remember,” but after 10 or so years of lighting up and taste-testing the sizable supply of cigars on the market, he’s figured out what he enjoys most when he’s capping off the end of a busy day or savoring a stogie at the 19th hole. In summer, you’ll find him “on the patio with a nice glass of red wine or an icy margarita” and a fine cigar; in winter, he stops in at the Ritz-Carlton lobby or lights up at one of the cigar-friendly establishments around town.  When it’s time to refill his cedarwood humidor, he checks out what’s new on the market and restocks his favorites at The Cigar Box or Jon’s Pipe Shop.

Size and overall taste are Krekeler’s measuring rods for a good cigar. For a comfortable size, he reaches for the Robusto, a thick, short cigar measuring just over 5 inches long, with a ring gauge of 50. (The ring gauge is a measure of the width or thickness of the cigar, with 1/64 inch as its base; the Churchill, at 7 inches, may be longer than a Robusto, but its ring gauge is narrower, at 47.) The question of taste he approaches as solemnly as a sommelier: “I like a cigar with a clean finish; oaky, woody and with a hint of chocolate.” What about flavored cigars? He winces. “To me, they’re like special flavored coffee. After a while, you just get kind of tired of the taste.” 

Lighting up with his cigar torch and taking a long draw may feel like the perfect finish to a hectic day, but sometimes Krekeler cuts a corner timewise, extinguishing a cigar he’s just fired up. It’s a mistake that leads to his biggest pet peeve, “not giving myself enough time to smoke the cigar through and having to relight it. If I find myself having to go somewhere in 10 minutes, I don’t want to have to put it out and relight it. Within an hour or so, that might be OK, but keeping it overnight is a definite no, because the cigar will have an ashy taste.”

Krekeler regularly reminds inexperienced smokers, “You don’t want to ash your cigar.” Translation: “Let the cigar burn on its own. A well-rolled cigar will hold its ash—set it down with an inch or more of ash, and it can hold the flame.” Called a “clean burn,” the ash is “straight-tipped and not crumbly, an indication of the quality of production rather than a reflection of the quality of the cigar.”

Does price matter? Not as much as you’d think, he says, once you’ve climbed away from the cheap flavored cigars at the bottom of the barrel. “A $5 or $10 cigar is a decent cigar and the normal range for me,” Krekeler says.

Krekeler’s Choices

Rocky Patel Premium Cigars: A boutique brand that makes a good old-fashioned cigar, strong and bold with a lot of depth and flavor. For cigar-lovers, not novices.

Pádron Aniversario Series: Cuban cigars the way they were before Castro. Well-made, bold, with a square shape. Also probably too strong for a novice.

Arturo Fuente Gran Reserva: The “Short Story,” part of the “Hemingway” series, is tiny enough to enjoy in 20 or 30 minutes, if you don’t have time to smoke a huge fat cigar, and it’s medium to mild.

Bolivar Robusto: Named for Simon Bolivar, and worth exploring. It’s strong and spicy, but never overpowering; fine for beginners.

La Gloria Cubana: Very inexpensive—usually about $5 a cigar—but mild, flavorful and well-made; a good cigar for the money.