Cheers!
Musings Over a Barrel
Since 2007
Ramblings on cigars, whiskey, craft beer, shooting sports, and life.
Thursday, July 10, 2025
Too Hot for the Porch: AVO Syncro Nicaragua in the Lounge
Cheers!
Tuesday, July 8, 2025
Port, Spice, and Smoke: Isaac Bowman Meets the Oliva Melanio
For a recent cigar and bourbon pairing, I reached for a couple of familiar old friends: Isaac Bowman Port Barrel Finished Bourbon and the Oliva Serie V Melanio.
The Isaac Bowman is produced by A. Smith Bowman Distillery, located right here in Fredericksburg, VA. Despite the distillery’s proximity, their core expressions can be surprisingly hard to come by — even here in Virginia. The Isaac Bowman Port Finish, fortunately, is generally found on store shelves, but that doesn’t make it any less desirable.
I’ve long been a fan of port-finished bourbons as companions to full-flavored cigars, and the Isaac Bowman is no exception. The bottle bears no age statement but is believed to be aged in oak for 4 to 5.5 years, followed by a 3 to 6 month finish in port barrels sourced from both Virginia and Portugal (using a mix of American and French Limousin oak). It’s bottled at 92 proof (46% ABV).
The port influence is immediately evident on the nose, offering notes of dark cherry, sweet apple, and vanilla. The palate carries those same port-aged qualities forward — delectable hints of sweet fruit, brown sugar, creamy vanilla, and a touch of mild spice. The finish is long, warm, and very satisfying.
The Oliva Serie V Melanio has made more than a few appearances in these Musings and on my Instagram feed. I can’t recall a time when I didn’t have either the Serie V or Serie V Melanio — usually in several vitolas — resting in my humidor. It’s a versatile, well-rounded cigar that pairs just as well with whiskey as it does with beer or coffee.
This cigar features an Ecuadorian-grown Sumatra wrapper over Nicaraguan binder and filler tobaccos, including Jalapa-grown ligero. Medium to full in body, it delivers a beautifully balanced profile of peppery spice, caramel, coffee, sweet nuts, and chocolate. The lingering mouthfeel is creamy and smooth.
This particular stick was from a box of Robustos I purchased in April 2024. It was brimming with the expected rich flavors and maintained an excellent, cool burn from start to finish.
The combination of the cigar and the port-finished bourbon was an absolute delight — perhaps one of the best pairings I’ve enjoyed in recent memory.
Cheers!
Friday, July 4, 2025
Five O'Clock Friday: The Hazy Craze
Here's hoping your weekend beer options are numerous.
Cheers!
Celebrate Freedom, Defend Liberty
![]() |
“For ourselves, let the annual return of this day forever refresh our recollections of these rights, and an undiminished devotion to them.”
Wednesday, July 2, 2025
Bold Flavor in a Small Package: Dunbarton Polpetta Petit Puros
I typically drink my coffee hot and black, even on warm days. But on this particular afternoon, the heat had me craving something cooler — so I brewed up iced coffees for my wife and myself. Then I reached into the humidor for a quick smoke.
The Dunbarton Polpetta Petit Puros is a cigar I hadn’t tried before. It recently showed up in two different cigar-of-the-month subscriptions, so it had definitely caught my attention.
Cheers!
Monday, June 30, 2025
Smoke and Spirit: La Madonna Negra and the Legacy of Uncle Nearest
I’ve enjoyed the Black Label Trading Co. La Madonna Negra numerous times over the past couple of years, and recently revisited one that had been resting in my humidor for nearly two years — left from my original pre-release order.
Cloaked in a rich U.S. Connecticut Broadleaf Maduro wrapper, the cigar features an Ecuadorian Habano binder and fillers from Nicaragua and Pennsylvania. It boasts a soft box press and is dressed with striking black, white, and gold-accented bands that contrast beautifully against the reddish-chocolate hue of the wrapper.
This well-aged stick burned evenly and delivered a medium- to full-bodied experience. Dark chocolate, espresso, and dark cherry took center stage, while subtle notes of black pepper and cedar added depth and complexity in the background.
That said, this particular cigar did present a tight draw initially. After a few minutes of struggling, I reached for the PerfecDraw tool and extracted a sizable stem that had clearly been restricting airflow. Once cleared, the draw opened up nicely, producing copious smoke and allowing the cigar’s full flavor profile to shine through.
As I enjoyed the La Madonna Negra, I reached for a nearly depleted bottle of Uncle Nearest 1856 Premium Whiskey — a bottle I realized I’ve somehow never written about in these Musings.
Uncle Nearest is a Tennessee distillery named in honor of Nathan “Nearest” Green, the formerly enslaved man who taught Jack Daniel the craft of distillation. The “1856” marks the earliest documented involvement of Nearest Green as the master distiller for the operation that would eventually become the Jack Daniel's Distillery
While technically not a bourbon due to Tennessee whiskey's legal classification requirements, Uncle Nearest 1856 is extremely close in profile. It undergoes the Lincoln County Process, which involves filtering the spirit through sugar maple charcoal before aging — an essential characteristic of Tennessee whiskey. In every other respect, it meets the legal standards of a bourbon. Whether Tennessee whiskey is bourbon remains a long-running (and mostly semantic) debate — one I’ll leave to others.
On the nose, the 1856 offers notes of vanilla, caramel, and toasted oak. The palate brings brown sugar, maple syrup, charred oak, and a touch of spice, all carried with a gentle heat from its 100-proof strength.
Compared to the Jack Daniel’s Old No. 7, the “classic” example of Tennessee whiskey, Uncle Nearest is richer, bolder, and more layered — closer to a classic bourbon than its softer Tennessee sibling. One reason my bottle’s nearly empty: I've found it makes a fine Old Fashioned and has often been in my rotation for that cocktail.
As for the pairing, La Madonna Negra was an ideal companion to the whiskey. The cigar’s dark chocolate and espresso notes harmonized with the whiskey’s vanilla and caramel, while the 100-proof backbone of the Uncle Nearest stood up well to the cigar’s bold character.
Cheers!
Saturday, June 28, 2025
A Summer Sobremesa: Wine, Smoke, and Setting Sun
Cheers!