2012 Stogie Rate Doc Diaz BPC – Special Report- Kentucky is More Than Bourbon
Kentucky is More Than Bourbon
Monday, February, 9, 2009
I love Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskeys. And to me, there is nothing better than a well-aged Kentucky Bourbon. EXCEPT, perhaps, a well-aged Kentucky Bourbon AND a premium cigar made with a Kentucky-grown broadleaf wrapper. The match seems poetic, something that surely must come from a Mark Twain novel.
It may surprise people to know that Western Kentucky has been growing broadleaf for over 150 years. In fact, the first strains of tobacco indigenous to North America were a broadleaf variety. Since that time, University and Corporate research has further developed virus and soil resistant strains and hybrids to the present.
To my knowledge, there is currently only one cigar manufacturer that is using a Kentucky-grown Broadleaf Maduro wrapper on a premium cigar, and that manufacturer is Black Patch Cigars. Black Patch is headed by tobacco grower Eric McAnallen, who has been harvesting Kentucky Broadleaf since 2003 for use in his Black Patch Cigars.
The Black Patch Kentucky Broadleaf has a lot in common with its blood brother, Kentucky bourbon: The broadleaf is cured in an oak barn, and the bourbon is aged in oak barrels. The corn used in the bourbon and the tobacco used in the cigar are both grown in the same rich Kentucky soils. And the culture of Kentucky has a deep love of both tobacco and fine bourbon.
I sat on my back patio last night and poured myself a dollop of Elijah Craig 12-Year Bourbon and fired up a Black Patch Reserve Amos (a 5.0 x 54 Belicoso). What a match! The bourbon and the cigar were rich and sweet and ripe as Mississippi mud. It doesn’t get much better than that.
I’ve always had a burning desire to travel the “Kentucky Bourbon Trail;” witnessing a little bit of history and sipping a bourbon or three, as I go. And, if I have the great pleasure of traveling to Kentucky, I will sample both its bourbon and its cigars under a bright southern moon. At the same time, I will confess along with Abraham Lincoln, “I hope to have God on my side, but I must have Kentucky.” Kentucky Bourbon and Kentucky Broadleaf, that is.
For more information on Black Patch Cigars:
Interview with Eric McAnallen
SF5 Podcast Featuring Black Patch Reserve: Episode 145
Contact Information:
Eric McAnallen: info@blackpatchcigarco.com
Black Patch Cigars: www.blackpatchcigars.com
Phone: 859.948.0487
For more information on the Kentucky Bourbon Trail:
www.kybourbon.com/english/pages/trail.html