Cigar Tasting Notes & How To Use the Flavour Wheel

One of the reasons we smoke cigars is for the taste. Now, I want to start by saying taste is subjective, and not everyone will pick up the same flavours. Some might pick up dried fruit, and others might pick up raisins. One of the best practises when it comes to picking up flavour notes in a cigar is to go in with an open mind, and the second, in my opinion, is to smoke more.

When I first started, I was smoking one, maybe two, a week at most. When I started to smoke more frequently, and even multiple times a day, my palate developed very quickly. Now, I’m not saying for you to do that, as it’s not going to be the right fit for everyone, mainly because it’s a quick way to blow your palate out, and also not very practical on the financial side of things.

Now, there are many sensory factors that come into play when smoking a cigar, and these are Taste, Smell, Mouthfeel, and Combustion. Today, we are going to be focusing on Taste. Now, our palate can only taste a few things, that being sweet, sour, bitter, salty, and umami.

However, there are subsections within these that are used within the cigar-tasting flavour wheel. I am going to talk you through what the flavour wheel is and how you can use it to enhance your smoking experience and develop your palate.

This is where the flavour wheel above comes into play. This is going to be your friend when first learning about and smoking cigars. From the flavour wheel above, you can see that we have a few of the core common flavours within cigars, that being leathery, earthy, spicy, woody, sweet, nutty, floral, and herbal.

I am going to describe the following categories below and give some information on each one, then I am going to go into detail on how you can use the flavour wheel while you're smoking, but also how you can use this flavour wheel to develop your palate during the times you are not actually smoking.

When it comes to tasting notes of a cigar, they are not always what you get from a blend. What this means is flavours of a cigar often remind you and your palate of things you have tasted in the past.

So what does this mean? If I describe a cigar tasting like dried fruits like raisins, it means that when I’m smoking, the flavours remind me of a time I had raisins. That’s why tasting notes are subjective, because a person who doesn’t like or has never eaten raisins might not pick that note up.

Leather

So let’s start by describing leather. This tasting note is going to seem strange to new beginners because no one really eats leather, so how can you taste it? The taste of leather goes hand in hand with smell. That’s why not all tasting notes rely on taste. As described above, there are many factors that come into play, such as smell and texture.

When experiencing leather in a cigar, even though you’re tasting leather, the taste is like chewing an old boot; the taste is like an old leather wallet or jacket. It’s earthy and dry, not sweet or vibrant. It’s easier to describe the taste of leather when you factor in the smell. As I mentioned, smell and taste go hand in hand. So, to train your palate to recognise these tastes, I would recommend smelling different types of leather, new and old if you can.

Earth

When a cigar is described as earthy, it's not always a bad thing. An earthy cigar is dry, sometimes damp; it’s almost like a soil-like taste. Depending on the types of minerals where the leaves were grown will determine the type of earthy note within a cigar. So don’t be afraid when a cigar is described as earthy. In fact, in some cases, earthy cigars are usually the most favoured.

If you want to train your palate to pick up earthiness within a cigar, I would recommend smelling fresh soil after rain, or even plant potting mix, or even wet moss. As you will see from this list, it’s often the smell that dictates tastes within a cigar.

Spice

Even though the flavour wheel above describes spice a little differently, for this section I am going to cover a few different spice types. Spice within a cigar can refer to a pepper spice and/or a baking spice. When I describe a cigar as spicy, I usually refer to the two different categories. For example, a pepper spice note would refer to black, white, or red pepper, and a baking spice would refer to nutmeg, cinnamon, and clove.

Depending on if it’s back of the tongue, front of the tongue, on the retro, or the mouthfeel will determine the type of spice you are picking up. For example, a sharp tingle on the front of the tongue may refer to a pepper heat, whereas the back of the tongue would refer to a chilli heat, and usually the retrohale is where you would pick up the more sweet and aromatic spice such as cinnamon and clove.

If you want to train your palate to recognise these tasting notes, then I would recommend tasting a little of these spices on your tongue, then try smoking a Habano or Corojo cigar and try and think back and see if you can identify those flavour notes.

Woody

Wood notes are among the most foundational and versatile flavours in cigars, often forming the backbone of a blend, even when other notes (like spice, chocolate, or leather) dominate. When a cigar is described as woody, it usually refers to the aromas and flavours reminiscent of freshly cut wood, aged oak, cedar, or a forest.

When finding a woody note within a cigar, there are many factors that come into play, not just taste. These additional factors determine what wood note you are picking up. For example:

The aroma could be like the smell of cedar, oak, pine, or sandalwood. A wood note can be dry and papery—think of the inside of a cigar box—or it could be sweet and smoky like aged oak.

The taste could be dry and clean or sweet and spicy—think of red wine or oak-aged spirits.

The retrohale enhances the flavours of the cigar and amplifies the cedar, sandalwood, or toasted oak notes of the cigar.

If the smoke feels aromatic and fragrant but not sweet, that’s wood.

If you want to train your palate, then I would recommend smelling raw cedar (from a humidor or cigar box), comparing oak and cedar (open a whisky aged in oak barrels), lighting wood chips (like the ones you get in cocktail sets). You can also smoke slowly and retrohale after each third and notice the wood notes change, or even keep a cigar journal noting the different cigars and their notes.

Sweet

Sweetness in a cigar refers to the natural sugar sensation on your palate. The sweet notes come from many different factors such as the cigar's fermentation and age, so depending on how that leaf was grown, fermented, and aged depends on the type of flavour you would pick up, such as brown sugar, honey, molasses, cocoa, and toasted caramel.

So as described above, there are a few different types of sweetness, but how would these be described? Well, if we take a look below, we can see that:

Cocoa/Chocolate sweetness – Deep, dark, and roasted bittersweetness (think dark chocolate).

Caramel/Molasses sweetness – Syrupy, toasted, brown-sugar-like (brown sugar/caramelised sugar).

Honey sweetness – Light and floral, soft flavour (honey and/or vanilla, usually on the retrohale).

Fruity sweetness – Dried fruit such as raisins or figs.

Creamy sweetness – Soft and silky smooth.

Sweet notes can appear on the lips, on the palate, and on the retrohale, so take slow draws, let the smoke rest in your mouth, then out through the nose, and see what you can pick up.

To train your palate for this one is simple: try tasting a few different sweet notes such as honey, unsweetened cocoa, vanilla, and molasses, and while doing so, try and think of the texture of each.

Nuts

Nuttiness within a cigar is one of those tasting notes that you tend to pick up towards the final third of a cigar when it picks up in flavour and strength, but it doesn’t mean that you can’t develop your palate to pick them up sooner. Nuttiness is usually a warm, toasty, and slightly oily flavour. When I think of nuts within a cigar, I think of almonds, hazelnuts, walnuts, peanuts, or even cashew.

Nuttiness is a savoury and creamy element that is always balanced. Just like every other tasting note, you can taste the nutty notes of a cigar on the cold draw, first third, retrohale, and, as I mentioned above, the final third.

Depending on the type of nut notes within a cigar can depend on how you are experiencing them. What I mean by this is that an almond note may be light, slightly sweet/buttery, whereas a walnut may be earthy, dry, and slightly bitter, or a cashew would be soft, creamy, and delicate. So while smoking, try and think of the character of the smoke and see if you can pick out whether the note is dry, toasted, creamy, light, etc.

To develop your palate for tasting nuttiness, I would recommend smelling roasted almonds, hazelnuts, peanuts, and walnuts separately, then making a mental or physical note of their oiliness, dryness, and intensity. Then the next time you have a cigar, try and recall or look back at your notes and try and pick them out of the cigar.

Floral

In my experience, a floral note is one that is the last to develop, but when it does, it usually means you have refined your palate, as floral notes are the delicate and light fragrant sweetness of a cigar. A floral note doesn’t smell like perfume; it smells like fresh dried blossoms or tea leaves. You can get them on the cold draw, the retrohale, the palate, and on the finish. Take the Karen Berger AJ Fernandez cigar—once that cigar is removed from the cellophane, and especially when lit, it smells and tastes like a strong fresh tea leaf.

There are a few different types of floral notes that are light and elegant as well as fresh, fragrant, and sweet, such as jasmine, lavender, violet, rose, and blossom. Floral notes are usually fragrant sweet, not the sugar sweet.

To train your palate for detecting floral notes, I would recommend smelling dried flowers, drinking herbal teas, and trying to notice the sweet and fragrant qualities they offer. Then, when smoking, focus on the retrohale, make notes, and try and detect these notes. You could also try cigars from different countries such as the Dominican Republic or Nicaragua and see if you can notice the differences within the cigars.

Herbal

So we have come to the final tasting note of this article: the herbal note. Now, this one to me can be few and far between noticing; however, it doesn’t mean you can’t find them within certain cigars, for example Oliva Serie G, Camacho Corojo, and a few others.

For me, the herbal note is usually described as reminiscent of sage, thyme, basil, mint, green tea, and dried herbs. Now, depending on the type of herbal note, it would be described as dry, savoury, aromatic, cooling, refreshing, or even rustic.

To me, herbal can be a mix of all the previous tasting notes, so being able to hone in on these specific notes would require a lot of palate practising, patience, and trying a variety of cigars.

So, herbal notes can be found on the cold draw with hints of dry hay, age, or green tea. It can also be on the draw as a fresh aromatic dryness on the tongue. Even on the retro and finish, it can be clean, refreshing, sometimes even slightly bitter, like a herbal-tea-type aftertaste.

So, for this one, I would recommend spending extra time practising training your palate, such as smelling and tasting fresh herbs such as basil, thyme, sage, etc. I would also recommend comparing the taste and smell of fresh vs. dried herbs, as there is a difference in the flavours.

I would also advise to brew some different types of herbal teas and make note of how they can hit your palate. Make notes on all you experience. For this one, I would recommend smoking mild-to-medium cigars, as these herbal notes are more prominent in these cigars.

Final Thoughts

So, my final thoughts, or recap if you will, are: when developing your palate, it’s not a quick overnight process. It takes time and patience, but it does 100 percent pay off in the end. When using the flavour wheel above, I recommend saving it to your phone, getting either the notes app on your phone or even a little notebook, and making a similar copy to what I have done in this article for you.

Write out the categories, and under each one write down, for example, Herbal, and underneath basil, thyme, sage, green tea. Then go about smelling and tasting each one, making a note of the smell, taste, texture, mouthfeel, etc. Then, the next time you have a cigar, take a look through your notes, have the flavour wheel at hand as well, and try to focus on each category and see what you can pick out from the cigar you are enjoying.

Remember, this is a process. Try not to have any distractions while doing this. The only way to develop your palate is to put time and effort into it. If you don’t, then your palate is never going to be able to pick out the wonderful subtleties of cigar tobacco.

The flavour wheel is one of the most important pieces of information you can have, not only when starting out smoking, but at any point within your smoking journey. You can always develop your palate further, especially when there are hundreds of cigars released each and every year.

As we have now come to the end of this very long article, I appreciate you sticking around and reading all that I had to talk about. Thank you.