EVEN ROLLS-ROYCE TURNS OUT A LEMON EVERY SO OFTEN

  I grew up smelling Cuban cigar smoke from all the Encyclopedia salesmen my adopted father knew. Years later when I was in Canada I encountered that same aroma again and knew instantly what I was smelling. 
  The taste of a Cuban cigar, likewise. No other cigar tastes like a Cuban. They haven't tracked down the reason but I would hazard a guess that it is much like the reason one cannot make SF Sourdough bread outside the City & County of San Francisco (the bacteria "Bacillus Sanfranciscanalis" doesn't grow anywhere else). 

 

  This does not mean that all Cubans are the best. It just means that they are Cuban. Case in point; the Cuaba figurado a friend gave me. Now this guy isn't the friend I usually speak of so it is possible that the Cuaba was a 'fake' but it did have a tinge of Cuban about it and he had good bonifides. It was the most tasteless Cuban cigar I've ever had. It tasted like balsa-wood. This was shortly after the Cuaba Line had been introduced and, hopefully, they have improved since. I only smoked one but one was enough. 
  Another Cuban cigar that did not pass muster was the Vegas Robiano, Churchill. Now the taste of this cigar was great but out of the box I got of 25, 24 were plugged so hard they might have as well been wooden sticks. The one that would draw was so stiff that it gave the muscle of my diaphragm a charlie-horse. Made all the worse because the taste I did manage to get was fantastic and Cigar Aficionado had just rated them at something like a 98 0r 99!  
  Truly heartbreaking and I never had a chance to get my mitts on any more.