Holy Smoke: #1 Cohiba (Cigarettes)

In life's most profound moments of repose, leaning back on a comfortable chair after a heavy meal or sprawled-out, spent on your bedsheets a smoke seals the deal.

Holy Smoke is Polish Ecstasy's smoker's review. It will concentrate on cigarettes and rolling tobacco until such time as our palettes become sufficiently jaded to move into the world of cigars(for pleasure)or perish the thought, pipe smoking. This column is not for the haggard thirty a day man or woman but for those that smoke for pleasure, when the moment demands it.

#1 Cohiba Cigarettes

I made the discovery of this fine smoke one rainy evening in Knightsbridge a couple of months ago. Having arrived early for dinner and not wishing to dissolve under the downpour I strode across the road from my meeting point and past the doorman straight into the deep carpeted, womb-like warmth of Harrods. Wandering past the the perfumes and the footwear section I came to the tobacconist and stopped in, hoping to pick up something french. I ended up walking out with something a little more exotic. Cigarettes made by Cohiba (the famous Cuban cigar producer)supplied in a stylish black and old gold packet. Back outside I found a sheltered spot under the fabled department store's bottle green awnings to put them to the test.

It was pleasing to see that the tobacco described as Black. The term "Negrilles" ranks Cohibas as at least the equal in flavour strength to the dark brown "bruns" tobacco found in Gitanes or Gauloises Disque Bleu.

In the smoking they share many characteristics with their french cousins. Part-hollow filters are the order of the day with the richness and throat-warming effect common to strong cigarettes there in abundance, along with the faintly sulphuric odour. There is enough taste to cut through the richest of meals or mellow the taste of a post dinner Brandy.

Retailing at roughly what you would pay for a packet of Marlborough Shites in a railway station kiosk, their prolonged smoking is likely to bring about the deterioration of you health faster than your bank balance.

A small warning would be reserved for those that enjoy chain-smoking. The feeling in your torso after smoking a Cohiba Negrilles cigarette can be compared to eating one too many bowls of Trifle in that the thought of smoking another in the following few hours is unbearable.


Score: 8/10

Whilst smoking you might imagine yourself to be: Roberto Bolano (author), Garrincha(bow-legged genius).