Villazon Maduro Presidente

The Villazon factory in Honduras has been said to be a key piece in the cigar industry where skilled artisans have created blends for Excalibur, Hoyo de Monterrey, and Punch to name just a few. Now called HATSA (Honduran American Tabaco SA), they still make some of the best cigars out there rooted in deep tradition. The Villazon Maduro is made with this tradition in mind and is packed full with Colombian, Dominican, and Honduran long-fillers. That three-country blend is then secured with a Connecticut Broadleaf binder and an oily, dark Maduro wrapper. Medium to full in body, this stogie features hearty notes of toasty tobacco and pepper, with hints of dark chocolate that build as the smoke progresses. We paired our smoke with a Black Russian cocktail.

Honduras has been a tobacco growing and cigar manufacturing area for hundreds of years, but it was the Communist revolution in Cuba that really put Honduras on the map. In the 1960s, many Cuban cigar makers fled their homeland and arrived in Honduras to re-establish their way of life. The immigrants took advantage of the climate, soil, and geography, which were well-suited to tobacco growing, and began producing high quality cigars. The center of the Honduran cigar industry is the city of Danli and the nearby Jamastran Valley. The majority of the world’s pure Corojo tobacco is grown here, now that Cuba has stopped production of this iconic, spicy, and rich variety in favor of Corojo hybrids. Other important areas of Honduran cigar production include the Talanga Valley, Copan, and Trojes.