Ramón Allones Short Perfectos (ER Italy 2014)

As has become quite common with Habanos S.A.’s Edición Regional program, the Ramón Allones Short Perfectos—part of the 2014 set—arrived a bit late, albeit in early 2015.

The 5 x 50 petit pirámides was supposed to be the 2014 release for Italy. Once again, the cigar came adorned in the green on white band that reappeared first on the Allones Extra a few years ago and reappeared on the Perfectos that was an exclusive for Switzerland last year.

The Short Perfectos are limited to 5,000 10-count boxes with pricing at €105 ($115) per box. While the price is quite reasonable, shipping the boxes out of Italy is illegal, which means they aren’t proliferating the secondary market at the same rate as regionals from countries like Canada and Spain.

As Brian Burt noted a few days ago, this is one of three Ramón Allones Edición Regionals from the 2014 program to be released so far.

• Ramón Allones Caprichos Edición Regional España (4 1/2 x 52) — Petit Robusto (5,000 Boxes of 10 Cigars)
• Ramón Allones Perfectos Edición Regional Suiza (5 2/5 x 48) — Perfecto (5,000 Boxes of 10 Cigars)
• Ramón Allones Short Perfectos Edición Regional Italia (5 x 50) — Petit Pyramid (5,000 Boxes of 10 Cigars)
• Ramón Allones 898 Edición Regional Alemania (6 7/10 x 43) — Lonsdale (2,000 Boxes of 25 Cigars)[ref]Not yet released.[/ref]
• Ramón Allones Sur Edición Regional Líbano (5 1/2 x 52) — Robusto Extra (3,000 Boxes of 25 Cigars)[ref]Not yet released.[/ref]

For those unfamiliar with the Edición Regional program, I’ve summarized it a few times on the site:

The Edición Regional program sees Habanos S.A., the marketing and distribution company behind Cuban cigars, create unique, limited vitolas for its distributors around the world. Sizes must be those that are in the Habanos S.A. portfolio, but not amongst the regular production offerings for the brand, although some discontinued regular sizes can be created. New vitolas created for a certain brand are also not eligible to be used. In addition, the “global” brands—i.e. Cohiba, H. Upmann, Hoyo de Monterrey, José L. Piedra, Montecristo, Partagás and Romeo y Julieta—are not eligible to be made into an Edición Regional.

Since 2012, distributors have been limited to a single release per year, a change from prior years when some distributors would receive multiple releases per year. Distributors are the ones to initiate the idea of a new release, and the cost for any new Edición Regional must be underwritten by the distributor. There is no guarantee that any particular region will get a new release in a given year.

• Cigar Reviewed: Ramón Allones Short Perfectos Edición Regional (2014)
• Country of Origin: Cuba
• Factory: n/a
• Wrapper: Cuba
• Binder: Cuba
• Filler: Cuba
• Size: 5 Inches
• Ring Gauge: 50
• Vitola: Petit Pirámides
• Est. Price: $11.50 (Boxes of 10, $115)
• Number of Cigars Released: 5,000 Boxes of 10 Cigars (50,000 Total Cigars)
• Date Released: Jan. 12, 2015
• Number of Cigars Smoked for Review: 3

I think Ramón Allones, particularly the script on the box, has some of the best designs in the Habanos S.A. portfolio. As for the green on white band, it’s fine, not something I prefer over the original, but I think it works great as an alternative—so long as it doesn’t get overused. As for the cigar, the petit pirámides is rolled well with some very obvious roll lines up the torpedo caps. There’s a large amount of sweet cinnamon, salty and floral flavors from the foot of the Short Perfectos. The cold draw is concerning with some twang, but a lot of bitterness and sourness. Behind that there’s some nuttiness, graham cracker and granola, but they are all secondary compared to the unpleasant flavors up front.

Fortunately, the cold draw doesn’t seem to be a sign of things to come. The draw of the Short Perfectos tightens once lit and full flavors of cedar, floral, nuttiness and white pepper emerge. As the cigar progresses, that quickly turns into an interesting mixture of peanuts, creaminess, generic woodsiness, coffee grounds and dark bitter chocolate with cinnamon and pepper in the back and a bit of wheat on the finish. Flavor-wise, the Ramón Allones is full, aggressive and bright. Strength-wise, it’s only medium-plus, but it does seem to want to increase.

The peanut and creaminess notes morph into a thick peanut butter flavors. There’s no jelly, but there’s still cedar and a more vanilla-like creaminess. I would definitely describe this as an evolution and not a flavor transition like many cigars as outside of the vanishing coffee and bitter cocoa, it’s pretty challenging to separate the first third and the second third. The flavor remains quite full and the strength is still medium-plus, which is not something I expected this far into the cigar.

While there may have not been much of a flavor transition between the previous third, the final third of the Ramón Allones Short Perfectos is quite different. The smoke physically gets warmer, which seems to help the peanut butter transition into a generic nuttiness, while the dark cocoa returns. There are some herbal flavors moving from the finish, along with a piercing sweetness and some sweet grapes. With around a half inch left, it turns back to the nuttiness, along with some big cedar notes. Somewhere along this point, the flavor has jumped to medium-full, much later than I expected. Eventually, the temperature of the cigar gets to me and I put what little is left of the Ramón Allones down for good.

Final Notes

• One of the samples I smoked had a band that had a bit too much glue.
• Speaking of the band, it’s actually slightly modified from the Allones Extra and Perfectos, as the top of the band reads “Short Perfectos.”
• The flavor is very full, almost overwhelming. While I definitely don’t have an issue with the balance, it’s not the most balanced approach.
• I smoked one of these a few weeks ago and let the cigar go out on accident. That was a big mistake. The other three Ramón Allones Short Perfectos I smoked have all burned well and had great draws.
• Strength ends at medium-full and stays just shy of that mark for most of the cigar.
• For whatever it’s worth, I smoked cigars from multiple sources for this review. I couldn’t notice a difference.
• Diadema S.p.A. is the distributor for Habanos S.A. in Italy.
• Cigars for this review were purchased by halfwheel.
• Final smoking time was one hour and 25 minutes.