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Oliva Master Blends 3

kit_luce

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Oliva Master Blend 3
Churchill 7.0"x50 Box Press

20181205_111009.jpg

Prelight:
Prelight inspection shows a dark oily smooth wrapper with a large vein running down the side. Great aroma, the cello was just the slightest bit discolored. At the advice of @Glassman who this stick came from it was good to whenever. V-Cut cleanly, easily. Toasted with indirect heat until cherry glow on end, one exhale to clear lighting smoke. Took flame quite well. Slightly firm feel, good looking cigar overall, except for the large vein. I would expect this to be uncommon for this line.

First Third:
In the first third I found myself thinking, is this leather already? Normally I havent found a leather note to show up in a cigar until later into the stick. Behind that leather was a backbone of just a kiss of spice on my tongue. After exhaling the solid amount of smoke this guy is producing I found flavors of cream across my palate. Good even burn through the first third, no issues at all.

Second Third:
This is where things take a turn for the interesting. First of all the large vein I mentioned above now comes into play. Surprisingly, I only needed to give it a little touch with heat to help get it burning once and it traced it's way down evenly for the rest of the cigar. Now on to the second third flavor. Very complex. I started to pick up just a slight hinge of sweetness that I couldnt place for a draws. Then a bit of earthiness opened up, which combined with the spice back bone lent itself to flavors of mexican molé. Which, is outstanding. The entire second third for me was very good. Very complex. More towards the end of the second third I started getting some cedar notes upon drawing, with a residual leather flavor. And I should add, the spice is still building.

Final Third:
Pepper. As if a switch had been thrown. This thing got spicy. Imagine chewing up about 10 black peppercorns. And all complexity had disappeared. This stick was spicy enough on the finish that my better half could smell the spice on my breath.


Final Thoughts:
Good smoke, the complexity in the middle has me looking forward to the other one in have been bombed. This one came to me courtesy of @Glassman in my newbie deal. I would buy a 5er of them for sure but I dont think this has me thinking of chasing down a box.
 

kit_luce

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Interesting. I don't recall getting a big pepper blast from any of them before.
Mostly the leather, cream, cedar, baking spices etc.
So far they seem to be the second most elegantly blended Oliva I've had, right behind the melanio.
I might have smoked it quick I suppose, smoke time was only an hour and then minutes.
 
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Good review @kit_luce. Glad you’re doing a few of these. I don’t remember the exact complexities of this cigar, only that I enjoyed it. Like you, I probably wouldn’t buy a box & wouldn’t buy the Churchill size again, but wouldn’t mind having a fiver of Robustos on hand to smoke now & again. This & the Olivia V are the only two from Oliva I’ve tried that I’d actually buy more of. Some of the others were Okay, but there are better, to me, cigars that could be had at their price point that I’d purchase instead.
 

Glassman

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Good review @kit_luce. Glad you’re doing a few of these. I don’t remember the exact complexities of this cigar, only that I enjoyed it. Like you, I probably wouldn’t buy a box & wouldn’t buy the Churchill size again, but wouldn’t mind having a fiver of Robustos on hand to smoke now & again. This & the Olivia V are the only two from Oliva I’ve tried that I’d actually buy more of. Some of the others were Okay, but there are better, to me, cigars that could be had at their price point that I’d purchase instead.
Hmmm, personally I would rarely pay full price for almost anything, but I've always thought Oliva represented a great value. Good quality for the price point. (especially at sale prices)
Particularly the G maduro.
And the Connecticut.

Same for Cain and Nubs.

There has been a lot of great competition added to the market in recent years.
 

squaresoft

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Glassman

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squaresoft

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Serious bargain for sure.
serious enough that it sets off my too good to be true senses for real. I've purchased it twice though and they smoke fine and taste like an MB3 should...the "robusto" size in the sampler is def. not 5 x 50 though, its more like a corona size
 
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I try to always keep some of these at the year mark ready to smoke. I hit the monster deal too. I like the variety of sizes in the deal. Great review.


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Holt's monster deal on these is a steal, for sure. I think I bought a regular box through them on sale for around $80, it was my first box purchase and I wanted all the fancy propaganda :D I smoke about one a month and I don't remember any of them turning into a pepper bomb, though.
 
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