BACKGROUND: Pete Johnson has been a leader in the cigar industry in many ways. Seven years ago he developed what would become one of the quintessential boutique cigar brands called Tatuaje. And this was before the term boutique was used to describe the phenomenon of the smaller startup company. Johnson started with a bang with the original Tatuaje Cabinet blend.

Tatuaje cigars fueled the already burgeoning trend in fuller-bodied cigars and Pete would go on to not only in blend a wide variety of unique cigar creations, but would also push out of the box with seemingly outlandish marketing schemes that all had one thing in common: they've worked.

Since the early days, Pete Johnson has cranked out one hit after another, but it hasn't come easy. He's endured packaging snafu's and trademark disputes, but he has continued to bring unique and trendsetting cigars to the market.

One of his latest achievements is the Tatuaje L'esprit de Verite. Verité, means truth, and the L'esprit de Verite is a cigar that is all about the spirit of truth. This new line promotes the disclosure of information, it exemplifies transparency in marketing and demonstrates revelation in packaging.

This new line, which includes two different blends, is essentially taking a vintner’s approach to cigarmaking by creating a brand using tobacco from a single vintage and a single farm. Johnson chose a 2008 harvest from the La Estrella farm of José "Pepin” Garcia in Estelí, Nicaragua. The new cigar consists of Criollo tobacco grown from Habano seed. Johnson took a decidedly unorthodox approach to constructing this brand. Not only is he using tobacco from one year, and from only one farm, he has also skipped the traditional aging process, by letting the tobacco age in the form of a completed cigar rather than aging the tobacco in bales.

Today's featured cigar is the 5-inch by 50 ring gauge L'esprit de Verite 2008 Robusto.

TASTING NOTES: The cigar comes out of the gate with tons of spice and full flavor on the palate. There is a mouthful of espresso bean and aromatic cedar. And the retrohale brings a full dose of pepper spice during the first inch, but then that mellows to more sweet and floral notes as the cigar progresses.

The draw and burn were excellent. Smooth draw and a thin black burn line accentuate the excellent burn characteristics.

In the second half, the L'esprit de Verité Robusto displays tobacco sweetness and the espresso flavor of the first half mellows slightly into a medium-full-roast coffee with good complexity. The cigar displays a long, earthy finish that leaves a lasting good impression on the palate. After smoking just 3 of these cigars, I am left uncertain as to their aging potential. I will get a much better idea about that as I continue to smoke these cigars and then revisit them in my postscript review in about a year. What I do know at this point in time is that the L'esprit de Verité is a fine smoke in both construction and flavor and I would recommend it to those who like fuller bodied smokes. The price/value of the cigars is really up to the consumer. At $16 per stick, this cigar may be out of the price range of many cigar smokers. However, I want to give some props to Pete Johnson for providing a true vintage smoke and for committing to continuing this vintage cigar program into the future. I also want to go on record that, with the Verité line of cigars, Pete Johnson and Tatuaje have raised the bar for other manufacturers to provide more detailed information about their cigars on their packaging. I can only hope that more cigar manufacturers will follow this lead.

~Doc