This was always made up of a clubby bunch of people who liked to overindulge. Cigar Aficionado Magazine is still around and still looks prosperous. The usual format would be: a multi-course dinner paired with wines or spirits and, of course, cigars. They still hold these events. Never really enjoyed them, and used to try to get a table near an open window…
So they smoke while they’re eating? Sounds disgusting. A table by a window? Why go there at all???
Sometimes I would be doing business with a particular restaurant and they sort of ‘invited me’…
Ah yes, the price one must sometimes pay. Yuck.
Well, I do like the smell of cigars quite a bit, but if it was a cigarette or pipe dinner I wouldn’t have anything to do with it.
I’m insanely allergic to cigar smoke – I like the smell of them when they’re not burning, but my lungs just slam shut and I can’t breathe. I don’t like cigarette smoke and prefer to not be around it, and pipe smoke doesn’t bother me at all. I don’t pretend to understand the above – but I have to live within those boundaries!
So no…I’d give this a very wide berth.
And yes, living in Tampa, known for its production of cigars, can sometimes mean I don’t get to go to events that sound like a lot of fun.
I’m not familiar with the concept of cigar dinners but suspect I wouldnt like them - even back in the days when I smoked cigarettes and drank alcohol.
That said, I do love passive smoking. Sixteen years on since I last had a cigarette, the smell of the smoke is still great.
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Loathe cigar smoke. Tried to convince myself for a while that I liked smoking them at poker games (as I had quit cigarettes), but wasn’t successful.
Don’t enjoy smelling cigarette smoke at all, whereas I really dig pipe smoke.
I have attended a few cigar dinners, however none that paired a cigar with each course of a meal. Traditionally the ones I have attended were thrown by liquor companies that served a meal (generally steak) followed by their product and cigars post meal.
I haven’t been to one in 10+ years, they seemed to have slowed down as smoking in restaurants and bars has become banned in my state. I still on occasion enjoy a nice cigar, most recently on the cruise I was on a few weeks ago. Smoking in general tends to turn me off, even if I do partake now, like on the cruise I seem to regret the decision and the post smoking cotton mouth and breath that lasts a day or so after. Cigars should just remain a romantic memory that I stop trying to relive.
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As one who occasionally (i.e.: 1-2x a year) smokes a cigar, I don’t necessarily “see” anything wrong with the concept, as long as the cigars came after the meal, with Porto or Cognac, perhaps a whisk(e)y. OTOH, the room had better be damned well ventilated!
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I’m involved in a couple of cigar groups. Our local group gets together monthly for dinner and cigars. We smoke before and after but not while we eat, yeah that would be yuk
Great to explain it Scooby . I couldn’t figure how you would pair a cigar with a crab cake .
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Mostly it’s just a good way to get together, socialize, enjoy a cigar and get some dinner before heading home
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Is this in a restaurant or a private home? Or are y’all outside?
Restaurant, outdoors
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Sometimes in a private room at a restaurant, too…
Back in the 1980s, I belonged to a Port & Cigar Club with a number of others in the the wine trade, in one form or another (winemakers, importers, restauranteurs, wholesale reps, wine buyers, etc.). We all chipped in to buy a super-powerful air purifier for the wine bar we held these events in once a month, and would have three bottles of Vintage Porto . . .
The first bottle would be a vintage between the 1890s and 1948; the second would be from 1950-1966; and the final bottle – which is when we’d put away the Stilton and start with cigars – was from 1970 or younger . . .
Love the port and cigars combo. Vintage ports can be wonderful
They still do those? I thought they died around 1999… I oversaw a few of the first big ones in NYC, back when I was a cigar and pipe tobacco expert and blender in the mid to late 90’s.
The laws about smoking in restaurants have changed over the years, but I have seen them promoted in private at restaurants around the metro area. And, the glossy Cigar Aficionado still exists…
