Gurkha Governor's Private Blend (Double Perfecto)

[chain_gang]

Intro / Pre-Smoke Judgement:

I smoked this because my Fantasy Football team (Gurkha 4 Life) was victorious in the first week, and I needed to pay my respect to The Gurkha himself. I've got a bad average with Gurkha, sitting at about two enjoyable smokes outta at least 8-10 different lines - so around 1/4 - 1/5. Horrible average, but I stick to my neutral leanings with the brand, stay somewhat optimistic, and represent my team's inspiration by dedicating one smoke a week to the Mighty Gurkha...and to also jokingly taunt my current stats to the league.

Overall:

This was my first double perfecto, so I didn’t make a cut at the cap (yet). Good draw and nice amounts of smoke were brought through the tiny opening. The first ½ was pretty impressive for a Gurkha. Nice caramel-ish notes made it kinda sweet. Nice tobacco. Nice white ash. Nice residual. Probably medium-plus bodied. Pretty good flavor consistency. The burn stayed nice, and it was never a problem. I didn't pay a whole lot of attention to what was going on, because I'm trying to finish up my current book. I ended up making a V-Cut, that was probably too far up the capped end, around the time the burn was at the end of the tapered foot where it met the 60 gauge (became a little tight). The draw became way too loose – more than likely operator error. The flavors stayed nice but became diluted. Keeping it evenly burning was a chore. I learned from this mistake, thankfully, it was a $1 Gurkha. Eventually around midway, the burn was kinda consistent, but over-drawing due to it being loose, probably caused the flavors and burn to be on/off. I didn’t realize that until writing the review up, so overall it might have just been bad technique that made the cigar become worse. It wasn’t bad after the 2/2, but wasn’t nearly as enjoyable as the ½.

Trial By Smoke Judgement:

Definitely recommend for Gurkha fans. Recommended for the Gurkha haters. I’m neither, but would try to score another single around the $1-2 price point, so I could see if the 2/2 half was messed up by me. I don’t mind Gurkha - it’s definitely not a preferred brand, but scoring them cheap has been fun, and the for the price I get to learn about the brand first-hand.