There’s no let-up regarding Drew Estate’s Liga Privada line. Forever experimenting, their unrelenting passion sees this brand conjure up hundreds of distinctive blends and vitolas in their quest for the perfect smoke.
Sadly, many of these samples are not viable for their own stand-alone line, with factors such as tobacco limitations, costs, and construction constraints extinguishing the embers.
However, as they more than deliver in flavor and aroma, the Estate continued to make them for themselves to smoke. Naturally, they still wanted these eclectic and exceptional smokes to be enjoyed by their cult followers and cigar connoisseurs.
Cue the creation of the Liga Privada Unico Serie — a checkpoint for all these unique stogies that deserve the light of day. All cigars within the Unico Serie are not only different in size and blend, but they’re one-of-a-kind, extremely limited, and exceptionally delicious.
With such eccentric names, it’s natural to expect the weird and wonderful when it comes to the Unico Serie cigars. We’re taking you from head to foot through the Dirty Rat to give you insight into this particular line. With its quirky pigtail cap and thick, sun-grown Habano wrapper that glistens with oil, it has a look that’s anything but vermin.
Brand Overview
Established in 1998 with the intention of living up to their tagline “the rebirth of cigars,” Drew Estate’s story is one of resilience, overcoming adversity, and daring to stand out from the pack. Their cigars are manufactured in Nicaragua and are known for their bold exploration in tobacco curing and blending.
Two college fraternity brothers (Jonathan Drew and Marvin Samuel) started the company in a small 16-square-foot retail kiosk in the World Trade Center, NYC. With generational pedigrees so powerful and prevalent in the cigar industry, it’s refreshing to see these guys succeed without a Cuban lineage or great grandfather that farmed tobacco.
Cigar Specs
- Country of Origin: Nicaragua
- Strength: Full
- Wrapper: Connecticut Broadleaf
- Binder: Nicaragua
- Filler: Dominican Republic/Nicaragua
- Sizes Available:
- Dirty Rat (5 x 44)
- Feral Flying Pig (5.37 x 60)
- L40 Lancero (7 x 40)
- Nasty Fritas (4 x 52)
- Papas Fritas (4.25 x 43)
- Ratzilla (6.25 x 46)
- Velvet Rat (6.25 x 46)
Cold draw
Despite its name, there are some fantastic smells coming from the Dirty Rat in the pre-light draw. It’s like I’d gone down for breakfast and pressed my nose inside a cereal box with warming hits of cinnamon, sweet cream, and apples.
Flavor profile: first third
As you would expect from a stogie that packs seven different tobaccos into a slim, 5 x 44 Corona size, the flavors are bold and in-your-face from the word go (not recommended for novices).
Upon initial light, there’s a flurry of black pepper and spicy earth. After my puff count reaches double figures, the intensity starts to dial back a touch.
The profile becomes creamier towards the end of the first third, with dark chocolate and cedar trickling over the punchy notes.
Flavor profile: second third
The spice picked back up a bit, but I particularly liked the complexity of the retrohale. It had a strong red pepper note with a rich and earthy espresso bean. Some coffee and toast notes started to emerge on the palate, but it was the dark chocolate that really came to the fore.
The strength of the cigar was noticeably building and certainly packed a wallop. As the middle period concluded, the profile enjoyed a better balance (much like the first third), with the peppery bite creeping back into the mix.
Flavor profile: final third
The underlying spiciness carries on its journey, although the red pepper in the nose has faded tremendously, replaced by wood and leather. Many of the previous flavors I’d reveled in earlier were present in the latter stages, but the balance reached its peak quicker and for much longer.
The creamy, spicy, and sweet combination made this part of the smoke particularly memorable. It’s one of those moments where you sit back with your stogie in hand and let the cigar do the talking (or smoking), while marveling at the effortless transitions from heavy cream and sweet cedar to pepper spice and crushed coffee bean.
Conclusion
The Dirty Rat certainly fits the bill for the Unico Serie — there’s no other cigar like it. It delivers a textured smoke and has a complexity that justifies its higher price tag compared to similar vitolas. Not for the faint of heart, its perfect for a special occasion — just don’t count on it as an everyday smoke.
You won’t need to be calling pest control on this one, but you can contact us on (877) 702-6864 to arrange your box of 12 Dirty Rat cigars from Cigars.com today.