Trinidad Club Selection Toro

For nearly 100 years, the Trinidad brand was a full-bodied, full-flavored cigar manufactured in Cuba and touted as one of the world's richest and most flavorful handmades. Now it's expertly handcrafted in the Dominican Republic's southern city of La Romana and offers the same robust, full-bodied smoking experience as its big brother from Cuba. The Trinidad Club Selection features a chocolate brown Brazilian wrapper that is draped over a zesty Nicaraguan binder and packed full of Nicaraguan tobaccos. Together, this medium bodied blend will lend notes of rich tobaccos with hints of nuts and a dash of white pepper. Smooth and balanced throughout, we recommend pairing this smoke with a Bulleit Bourbon.

Though tobacco is indigenous to Hispaniola, the tobacco industry in the Dominican Republic existed in the shadow of Cuba’s dominance through the 1960s. When the exodus of Cuban cigar makers began in the wake of the revolution, many decided the Dominican Republic would be ideal for the resumption of their livelihoods. Unrest in Nicaragua in the 1980s fueled the Dominican cigar industry further. The country now makes more than half of the premium cigars imported into the U.S.

The Cibao Valley and the nearby city of Santiago are the center of cigar production in the Dominican Republic. Three main varieties are grown here: the mild and native Olor Dominicano; the intense Piloto Cubano, brought from the Vuelta Abajo of Cuba; and San Vicente, a milder and more acidic Piloto hybrid. Dominican puros were once unheard of as it was widely thought impossible to grow quality wrapper leaf on the island, but new growing techniques are now allowing some exceptional puros to be produced.