The Particulars

The Review

This review for the Room101 15th Anniversary - Toro (6 x 52) is based on the journal entry dated 2025-06-10

Appearance & Construction (0-3):  Good (3)

Warm chocolate brown, the wrapper has a nice sheen, heavy mottling, and a nice medium tooth covering it. There’s a handful of veins, but they’re thin and light with only one creating any bulges. The seams are tight but visible, with a hint of edge lift. There’s a slightly rustic vibe to it, but it looks good and has a nice firmness. Big fan of the design, colors, and paper quality on the band too.

Draw (0-3) & Burn (0-4):  Average (2) / Great (4)

The draw is spot on and the burn starts nicely. The burn does get uneven and wavy quickly, but within the bounds of being controlled and slowly improving. The ash is a very light gray with good, even spacing of the cracked striations. There are super tiny oil crystals on there, but they’re nearly impossible to see. The ash holds through about the first third. By the midway point, the burn line is dead even. The draw tightens a bit in the final third, getting worse to where I need to apply light pressure to open it up on the draw.

Flavor Profile (0-5):  Excellent (5)

Immediate pepper blast. Yep, this instantly feels like it has AJF’s fingerprints on it. Baking cocoa, baking spice, and fruity sweet come in right after. Charred oak and a lot of earth on this one early, with some barnyard must, but the pepper and baking spice keep things lively. The finish is super creamy as well. I’m getting no harshness, just peppery tingle. The fruit sweet is citrusy with a lot of zest.

Into the second third, the baking cocoa picks up and the charred oak, earth, and barnyard take a seat. Very spicy brownie right now. This isn’t the most complex blend, but it’s well balanced and hitting the right notes for me. I should be talking more about it, but I’m just basking in it. 😎 The charred oak does make a comeback as the pepper subsides a little, giving it a nice mesquite BBQ feel. And that zesty sweet just never quits. 🔥

Overall Experience (0-5):  Great (4)

Another AJF-made 🌶️💣 that hit the mark. If I have one thought, it’s that it felt very much like it shared the DNA with blends he’s done for other brands. I wonder how much input the folks who run those companies get. Do they actively collaborate or simply put in guidelines and choose a finalist from the test blends that AJF puts up? Regardless, this is a fantastic cigar that’s worth checking out. 🔥

Review Base Rating (0-5):

4.50

Would I Buy It Again?

Signs point to yes (recommended)

Review Final Score (0-10):

8.83

Overall Score and Individual Journal Entries

While the review is based off one instance of journaling this cigar; there’s a number of reasons you can have different experiences smoking the same cigar multiple times. A blend can evolve with age (for better or worse), palates evolves, preferences change, and sometimes you just get a bad example!  This section captures the ratings from each journal entry and the related journal photo.  Below you’ll find an aggregate score based on every time the cigar has been journaled. Unless it was a gift or on-off smoke, this section will be updated every time I journal this cigar!

The Flavor Wheel

With every cigar I journal, I capture simple ratings of the basic flavor categories that I experience.  These are more generalized than what you would see in a review, but a distinct profile can still be built out.  When multiple instances of the same cigar have been journaled, the scores are averaged out in an attempt to build a reliable flavor profile based on my palate.

The values entered for the strength of each flavor range from 0 to 3.

• 0:   No flavor detected
• 1:   Mild flavor
• 2:   Medium flavor
• 3:   Strong flavor

Note: desktop / large screens will see a flavor wheel while mobile / small screens will see a bar chart.

With every cigar I journal, I capture simple ratings of the basic flavor categories that I experience.  These are more generalized than what you would see in a review, but a distinct profile can still be built out.  When multiple instances of the same cigar have been journaled, the scores are averaged out in an attempt to build a reliable flavor profile based on my palate.

The values entered for the strength of each flavor range from 0 to 3.

• 0:   No flavor detected
• 1:   Mild flavor
• 2:   Medium flavor
• 3:   Strong flavor

Note: desktop / large screens will see a flavor wheel while mobile / small screens will see a bar chart.