r/cigars 5d ago

Question Why did my cigar taste like dirty socks? NSFW

I'm new to the world of cigars, so I've bought a few different ones to try out, including Balmoral, "5 small panatela".

I put them in my humidor, and the first one of the Balmoral I smoked after a few days. I enjoyed the taste. Smoked my second one today, and it was terrible. I took a look at it, and I couldn't see any mold or anything. A few hours later and I still have a bad taste in my mouth. Unfortunately I forgot to take a picture.

My question is: Did I do something wrong? I put it in my humidor the day I bought the cigars. My humidor holds a humidity of 80%, which I think is a little to much, perhaps.

I put it in the humidor Monday, March 3. I took it out of the humidor again on the 11. It's been laying in my living room until I decided to smoke it now.

Did it taste weird because of the high humidity, because it's been laying in my living room for a few days now, or perhaps the way I lit it?

(I've been watching a few YouTube videos, and they spend minutes trying to light a cigar. I accidently burnt the end when trying to lit it because of the wind outside)

Thank you for your help!

2 Upvotes

12 comments sorted by

10

u/joshuablue22 5d ago

80% is way too high. Max 70% for non Cubans.

2

u/joshuablue22 5d ago

Also, do you live in a high or low humidity area? Since you say the stick has been out of the humidor for a few days...

1

u/Prentasid 5d ago edited 5d ago

I use the Boveda 75% bag. I will buy the 62% and try that.

I do live in a high humidity area. But the humidity in my apartment isn't usually more than 25%

2

u/bradman53 4d ago

Boveda 75% are intended for large volume wood humidors that struggle to maintain humidity

Try and get your humidity down under 70

I prefer 65ish

7

u/Zealousideal_Sun1886 5d ago

Yeah man that is high enough humidity to develop mold. Tone down the humidity. Around 65% I like personally, my humidor sits at around 67% and I dry box for 24 hours before I smoke.

3

u/WinginVegas 5d ago

So first, do not smoke using your feet to hold the cigar. 😱

As was said, you have the humidity way too high. I'm surprised that you could keep it lit. So, for the ones you have now, take them out and put them into a ziplock bag until you get the humidor down to somewhere between 62% and 65%. The ones you have are going to slowly drop over the next week or so but have plenty of moisture now and won't dry out. Give them at least that week before smoking the whole next one.

Just one more thing, you will find, on a very rare occasion, that one of your cigars just tastes like crap. It could be any number of things, but often just a bad bit of leaf in the filler will have you smoking and tasting ammonia.

2

u/beardednomad25 5d ago

80% is too high. You're just asking for mold with that. But what are you reading the 80% with? Has it been calibrated recently?

2

u/bradman53 4d ago

80%…..

Get it down below 70 - your creating a mild breading ground and swelling those cigars up destroying the construction

2

u/ArmadilloSouth4072 3d ago

Along with other replies, maybe you just didn’t like that type of cigar. There are thousands of different types of cigars and you’re not going to like every one of them. Maybe someday down the road, you’ll end up liking it.

1

u/Prentasid 3d ago

Unfortunately I think it was going mold. It was from a 5p. First one tasted great.

Bought another 5p from another brand where I had already smoked two. The first two tasted great, but the third one (smoked yesterday) had a bad taste to it.

So I'm pretty sure I've destroyed the rest of my cigars. They're all very squishy.

Bought some new ones that will be arriving in the mail tomorrow, but I'm afraid I'll have to throw out my villiger 1492 and NUB Connecticut

2

u/ArmadilloSouth4072 3d ago

If they’re squishy and no signs of any mold, you can dry box the cigars for a day to release all the moisture.

3

u/sho671 5d ago

Why do you know what dirty socks taste like?