Cigar Aficionado

Pairing cigars with brown spirits is fairly easy. Pairing cigars with wine is a more complicated affair, so complicated that Big Smoke hasn’t done a wine-pairing seminar in more than 20 years. With a few decades to mull it over, Cigar Aficionado brought wine back to its seminars this year, and with it, three passionate, cigar-loving authorities in their respective fields. 

It was nearly 3:45 in the afternoon and the final Big Smoke seminar was signaled when the Resorts World staff began pouring the first of four red California wines. Up on stage, Cigar Aficionado’s executive editor and Big Smoke emcee David Savona introduced the distinguished panel: Jorge Padrón of Padrón Cigars Inc., Chuck Wagner, owner of Caymus Vineyards in California and Bruce Sanderson, senior editor (and passionate cigar smoker) of Wine Spectator magazine, Cigar Aficionado’s sister publication.  

The idea of the seminar was quite simple: light up the Padrón Serie 1926 No. 90 (94 points, $23.50), and sip four different Caymus wines while you smoke. Find the pairing you think works best. Perhaps the ideal pairing will change throughout the seminar. Cigars progress as they’re smoked and wines tend to change as they’re exposed to air—and this is the fun of a pairing. 

“I’m very pleased to have to my right Chuck Wagner. He has Napa running through his veins,” Sanderson said, adding that Wagner’s roots in Napa span for generations. Caymus’ first vintage was in 1972. 

“I’m not just a winemaker, I love cigars,” Wagner said. “I also know Jorge Padrón and his is the cigar I smoke most of, so it’s appropriate that we’re tasting these wines along with the cigar.”

The first wine was The Walking Fool Suisun Valley 2021 ($38), one of the company’s newer creations and a combination of Zinfandel and Petit Syrah from the Suisun Valley, east of Napa. 

“Walking Fool is a little lean, in terms of higher acidity,” Wagner said. “Let your palate go to a neutral position about two or three minutes in between each wine.”

The second wine was Caymus’ Sea Sun Pinot Noir California 2021, a coastal pinot informed by the cooling breezes of the Pacific Ocean. “Sea Sun is made to be a round, lush, soft wine,” Wagner said. “It’s the screaming deal out of the group today.”

The Sea Sun retails for only $20, a relative bargain when considering California pinots, but how did it pair with the cigar? 

“If you taste the first wine and puff on the cigar, the wine has this peppery quality which brings out the pepper in the cigar as well,” Sanderson suggested. “The Sea Sun, it’s very smooth. It’s a little bit softer and blends well with cigar, but you get more of the cigar character on the finish.” 

Things got richer and more intense with the third wine: Caymus Vineyards California Cabernet Sauvignon 2021 ($65), a new wine from Caymus that sources its Cabernet all over the state rather than from a single appellation. 

“Two or three appellations on the label would be confusing. Hidden pockets exist here and there,” Wagner said. “We’ve branched out to other counties that have gravelly soils and south-facing slopes. We searched out areas with good healthy vines, and good aspects... It’s an exciting wine for us. We want it to taste like Caymus Napa Valley Sauvignon, and we think it does.” 

Like Caymus, Padrón is a family business and one that strives to sincerely express the terroir of Nicaragua the way Caymus aims to reflect the terroir of Napa and beyond. This similarity wasn’t lost on Sanderson. 

“Jorge, there are some parallels between what Chuck’s doing and what you’re doing in terms of blending from different sites,” Sanderson observed. 

“We grow in Estelí, Condega and Jalapa,” Padrón answered. “Those have been the traditional areas for growing tobacco in Nicaragua since the early ’70s. The soils are very different. Of course, we grow all sun-grown tobacco. Rather than one large farm, we’ve always thought it better to have different farms so we can have tobacco that tastes different.”

It's not just the blending of different tobaccos that has given Padrón such distinction. It’s also been the age of his tobaccos. Padrón’s cigars ascended to a new realm in 1994 when Jorge had the idea to celebrate the company’s 30th anniversary by making a cigar composed of more aged tobacco. Cigars like the Serie 1926 No. 90 smoked at the seminar are perfect examples of how complex a Nicaraguan cigar can be if made with leaf that’s been properly aged.

“The Padrón family has been making cigars since 1964,” Savona said. “Jorge turned it from a local brand to a national brand, and now, an international cigar.”

To this day, Padrón remains the record holder for winning Cigar of the Year the most times, including the very first time the magazine presented the award for 2004. Since the passing of company founder José Orlando Padrón, Jorge is now the owner and patriarch.

“My father always said that he makes the types of cigars he likes to smoke. And the ones he didn’t smoke, he’d sell,” Padrón said. 

The fourth and final wine was a flagship Caymus label, the Special Selection Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (2018). With a retail price of $225 per bottle, it may not be the bargain of Sea Sun, but it delivers an intensely concentrated experience, and, like Padrón, is a record holder, as it’s the only wine in the history of Wine Spectator to be named Wine of the Year twice. 

“It’s one of the most consistent Cabernets coming out of Napa for the last 50 years,” Sanderson said. Wagner answered by speaking a bit about the wine’s production without getting too technical.

“The berries look like blueberries on the vine,” Wagner explained. “We let them ripen further, harvesting the fruit when the seeds are brown. There’s less liquid and the tannins on the skin are no longer bitter. It produces a very soft style of Cabernet.”

Sanderson noted the chocolate aspects present in both the wine and the smoke before Savona asked the entire room for a show of hands as to which wine they preferred. All the wines had their fans, but the overwhelming winner was the last—the pricey Special Selection Cabernet. 

After applause at the seminar’s conclusion, the room quickly emptied as everyone readied themselves for a Big Smoke evening that was going to start in an hour. The Resorts World staff began to clear off everyone’s place setting—around 600 in total—where almost every glass was empty. 

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Don’t Miss A Big Smoke: The Big Smoke Returns To Las Vegas On Friday November 1 and Saturday November 2. Save the date.