I was fortunate enough to be invited to tour the La Aurora cigar factory by the fine folks at Miami Cigar (Nestor Miranda) and La Aurora. They flew a group of bloggers down to the Dominican Republic for the weekend to see what they do.
We arrived at our hotel in Santiago at about 9pm Thursday night after traveling most of the day. They had dinner, drinks, and cigars waiting for us when we arrived. After dinner we spent the rest of the night talking cigars, regulation, taxes etc. with Guillermo Leon (head of La Aurora) and Jose Blanco (Director of Sales).
Woke up Friday morning for breakfast and a tour of the factory.
Not a bad view while you eat breakfast at the hotel.
When we arrived at the factory we were treated to the famous Jose Blanco tasting seminar. We sample 5 different kinds of puro grado or pure grade tobacco, which is just a single type of tobacco(i.e. Criollo '98) from one place, from one priming, rolled up into a small cigar for tasting purposes.
After the tasting seminar we all got to create our own blend to make our very own cigars.
Blender extraordinaire Manuel telling us how many of each type of leaf we need to make the blend percentages that we wrote down
My blend and all of the leaves I need about ready to go roll the cigars. (sorry the blend is proprietary information lol.)
All my different leaf sorted out ready to get to work bunching and binding the blend. (We cheated and used the Lieberman)
After we were done bunching and binding (sorry don't have a picture of them at that point) the cigars were put into a press and we headed off to tour the factory.
First stop was the de-veining room. Here they are taking the vein out of the middle of the wrapper leaf. The pile under the machine is the veins.
Next is the wrapper aging room where the wrappers are aged in pilones.
Then we went to the room where the wrappers a fermented. Jose Blanco showing us the product. The wrappers are turned over every 20 days to help them get a uniform color during fermentation (notice no dye).
Then the area where the finished cigars a labeled, cellophaned, and boxed.
We then saw the room where some of the "hand finished" cigars are made by machine before being capped by a person.
Fumigation Bins and Blast Chiller for beetle prevention were next.
Quality Control (draw testing)
Last was the wrapper softening machine which sprays a fine mist that allows them to soften the wrapper leaf in about an hour. Traditionally steam is used and that process can take up to 24 hours. So this new machine is a big improvement.
After the tour we had lunch and then it was off to put the wrapper on our cigars. This was much tougher than it looked although not as tough as bunching was for me.
Picture of the finished product, notice the rough looking caps.
After that it was time to go back to the hotel for dinner, drinks, and more cigars.
The second day we went Guillermo's farm and just took it easy smoking some cigars, drinking Presidente, and eating lunch and dinner. Those pictures are attached below.
All in all it was a great trip, I learned a lot about the cigar making process and La Aurora cigars.
We arrived at our hotel in Santiago at about 9pm Thursday night after traveling most of the day. They had dinner, drinks, and cigars waiting for us when we arrived. After dinner we spent the rest of the night talking cigars, regulation, taxes etc. with Guillermo Leon (head of La Aurora) and Jose Blanco (Director of Sales).
Woke up Friday morning for breakfast and a tour of the factory.
Not a bad view while you eat breakfast at the hotel.
When we arrived at the factory we were treated to the famous Jose Blanco tasting seminar. We sample 5 different kinds of puro grado or pure grade tobacco, which is just a single type of tobacco(i.e. Criollo '98) from one place, from one priming, rolled up into a small cigar for tasting purposes.
After the tasting seminar we all got to create our own blend to make our very own cigars.
Blender extraordinaire Manuel telling us how many of each type of leaf we need to make the blend percentages that we wrote down
My blend and all of the leaves I need about ready to go roll the cigars. (sorry the blend is proprietary information lol.)
All my different leaf sorted out ready to get to work bunching and binding the blend. (We cheated and used the Lieberman)
After we were done bunching and binding (sorry don't have a picture of them at that point) the cigars were put into a press and we headed off to tour the factory.
First stop was the de-veining room. Here they are taking the vein out of the middle of the wrapper leaf. The pile under the machine is the veins.
Next is the wrapper aging room where the wrappers are aged in pilones.
Then we went to the room where the wrappers a fermented. Jose Blanco showing us the product. The wrappers are turned over every 20 days to help them get a uniform color during fermentation (notice no dye).
Then the area where the finished cigars a labeled, cellophaned, and boxed.
We then saw the room where some of the "hand finished" cigars are made by machine before being capped by a person.
Fumigation Bins and Blast Chiller for beetle prevention were next.
Quality Control (draw testing)
Last was the wrapper softening machine which sprays a fine mist that allows them to soften the wrapper leaf in about an hour. Traditionally steam is used and that process can take up to 24 hours. So this new machine is a big improvement.
After the tour we had lunch and then it was off to put the wrapper on our cigars. This was much tougher than it looked although not as tough as bunching was for me.
Picture of the finished product, notice the rough looking caps.
After that it was time to go back to the hotel for dinner, drinks, and more cigars.
The second day we went Guillermo's farm and just took it easy smoking some cigars, drinking Presidente, and eating lunch and dinner. Those pictures are attached below.
All in all it was a great trip, I learned a lot about the cigar making process and La Aurora cigars.
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