Costa Rica

Known for its extraordinary ecosystems, volcanoes, and tropical forests, Costa Rica has emerged over the last decade as a boutique grower of premium cigar leaf.  While the country produces some premium filler and binder tobacco, dark and maduro wrapper leaf from Costa Rica is becoming a popular substitute for Brazilian, Mexican, and Broadleaf varietals.

Honduras

Honduras is regarded as an ideal place to grow Cuban and Connecticut seed varietals for premium cigars.  In the southeastern part of Honduras, just north of the Nicaraguan border, lies the most significant premium cigar tobacco producing region in the country;  the town of Danli and the Jamastran Valley, both in the province of El Paraiso.  These areas are the epicenter of cigar production as well as a primary growing region for the country's best tobacco.  Since the 1960s cigar makers have been likening the Jamastran Valley to Pinar Del Rio, and judging from the full-bodied tobacco they grow, there are many similarities.  Today, Connecticut shade-grown and corojo shade-grown tobaccos are cultivated extensively throughout the region.   In addition, Honduras also produces very large amounts of Cuban seed sun-grown filler tobaccos which are found in hundreds of brands today.  Honduran premium cigar tobacco production is of high quality, dynamic, and consistently improving.

Mexico

In the San Andreas Valley, southeast of the port city of Veracruz, and nestled between volcanoes and a large lake, is the heart of Mexican cigar country.  While some Mexican cigars have had a less than spectacular reputation, it belies the fact that many premium and famous brands use Mexican fillers and wrappers in their blends.  Soil in the San Andreas Valley is extraordinarily rich and produces a distinctive tasting tobacco.  Until 1996, when tobacco import duties were dropped, Mexico produced primarily Puros, which consumers either loved or hated.  Regardless of personal preference, Mexican tobaccos are distinctive and satisfy a special niche in the marketplace.  The most famous of Mexican cigar tobaccos is San Andreas Negro, like Connecticut Broadleaf,

Nicaragua

Since the 1960s, Nicaragua has had many political difficulties which have disrupted and inhibited cigar tobacco production.  But, over the last decade it has proven itself capable of producing some of the most rich, spicy, aromatic, and complex tobacco in the world.  In the northern part of the country, not far from the Honduran border, are the towns of Esteli and Condega.  Esteli is home to the majority of Nicaraguan cigar production, but both towns are surrounded by volcanic soil and fertile land that produces lush fields of Cuban seed tobacco.  Northeast of Esteli and Condega, lies the Jalapa Valley.  Like so many locations in the world of cigars, Jalapa is remote and difficult to get to.  But the land is fertile and produces tobacco of extraordinary quality.  If the last decade is any indication of the potential for Nicaraguan cigar tobacco, then our palates have a lot to be excited for.

THE DISCOVERY OF THE BRIAR BURL

Some years after the introduction of the meerschaum pipe, smokers began to realize that the best material for pipe bowls was wood-of a very special kind. Clay, porcelain; and meerschaum, despite their admirable qualities, were too fragile; metal pipes, while sturdy, heated rapidly and were too heavy. Pipes carved from cherry- and willow-wood, however, met with little success. The creation of the ideal pipe, the universal pipe, had to await the discovery of the briar wood.

The introduction of briar wood as pipe material was quite accidental. It was linked to the cult of hero worship which sprang up shortly after the death in 1821 of the French emperor, Napoleon Bonaparte. One of those who glorified the emperor's memory was a French pipe maker, who decided to honor his hero by making a pilgrimage to the Mediterranean island of Corsica, Napoleon's birthplace.

Being a passionate smoker, the pipe maker took one of his most beautiful meerschaum pipes with him. In an unlucky moment, however, he broke the bowl of his pipe, and was left without means of smoking. Fortunately, in that same Corsican village there lived a farmer known for his skill in carving. The Frenchman promptly commissioned the farmer to carve a new pipe for him out of any suitable wood.

The farmer soon presented the pipe maker with an attractive pipe, made of a hard, close-grained, pale golden wood. The pipe had so many fine qualities that its owner brought back to France several specimens of the wood from which it was made-the burl of the tree-heath, or bruyere, as it is called in French. Eventually the name "bruyere" was anglicized, first into "bruyer," then "brier," and later, "briar wood."

Enthusiastic over his discovery, the pipe maker brought his briar wood samples to St. Claude, a small French town from whose factory he usually bought his wooden pipe stems. This town, located in a remote valley of the Jura mountains, had a remarkable history as a center of wood-carving.

The craft had been introduced to St. Claude during the Middle Ages by monks, to while away the long winter months when heavy mountain snowfalls kept both people and livestock indoors. At the great Abbey, the center of the medieval settlement, the monks carved rosaries, crucifixes, and ordinary household goods out of boxwood, which grew abundantly in the neighborhood. The peasants began to imitate the monks, and wood-carving soon became the chief occupation of the inhabitants. The former monastery grew into a thriving town; its ancient Abbey church became a cathedral.

The French pipe manufacturer asked the clever craftsmen of St. Claude to try their hand at the new material by carving out some pipe bowls. The artisans soon found that the briar wood presented some problems; the wood had to pass through a complex seasoning process before it could be fashioned into satisfactory pipes. Also, the knotted and gnarled briar burls were all different, and contained many flaws. It took a good deal of experience to learn to make the proper cuts so as to carve the blocks to advantage.

Despite these difficulties, the briar wood pipe industry developed and took hold in St. Claude, eventually dwarfing all the other carved goods manufactured in that town. A century after the discovery of the briar root, 5,000 inhabitants of St. Claude were busy turning out some 30,000,000 pipes a year. Thus the broken meerschaum pipe bowl in Corsica led to the foundation of a new and thriving business. Briar pipe making spread from France to England and then to America, and the briar root quickly eclipsed all other pipe materials.