Seth's Humidor

McDonald’s has the Big Mac, Nabisco has the Oreo, Philip Morris USA has Marlboro, The Cocoa Cola Company has Coca Cola and Alec Bradley Cigars has Tempus. Long before the Tempus Alec Bradley Cigars was around and making great cigars but the Tempus in my opinion really put them on the market. The Tempus is truly a magnificent cigar that has grown on me more and more. Upon its initial release in 2018 I believed the high ranking its churchill vitola got was a little steep but the more and more I smoked the line I took back what I thought. Tempus is Latin for time and when reading the description on the company website it is quite fitting. The amount of time that goes into the cigar for the tobacco to mature in the fields, for it to properly ferment, for the tobacco to meld together and form a great cigar and to enjoy the cigar is incredible. Cigars in general take a good amount of time, but when a company strives on making a premier cigar it takes even more time. When looking at everything that goes into this cigar it is no surprise that this cigar is great and the companies premiere. The cigar is made in the Raices Cubanas factory in Honduras and the production is limited to only the best 20% of the rollers as well. The cigar is composed of incredibly unique and flavorful tobacco from throughout Central America and Southeast Asia. The filler in the cigar is composed of some of the best tobacco from Jalapa, Nicaragua and the Trojes region of Honduras, which is just north of the Nicaraguan border. The binder on the cigar is an Indonesian Embetunada and is draped in a wrapper of either Criollo 98 from the Trojes region of Honduras or a San Andres maduro wrapper from Mexico. Both versions are great and for this review I chose the maduro version.  The size I picked up was the Quadrum vitola which is a box pressed robusto extra measuring 5 ½” with a 55 ring gauge.

The cigar has a wonderful aroma of coffee, wood, caramel and a sweet spice, and the wrapper is unique in color showing some faded dark brown areas but predominantly very dark in color. The cigar is wonderful from the get go showcasing wonderful rich characters. There is a sweet earthy flavor to it with also a wonderful coffee and woody spice finish. The cigar burned incredibly well through the first third and it also produced a wonderful amount of smoke. Entering the second third of the cigar the sweet earth notes are still present and there is also this coconut sweetness with it that once again finishes with a nice sweet spice. Smoking wise, it was still burning well throughout and so far is a wonderful smoke. When I get into the final third the flavors grow in intensity and the cigar has gone from medium to medium-full in body. The cigar still has a nice spicy finish but the earthy sweetness that is present early on has faded some and is replaced with nice flavors of leather, nuts and wood. 

This was a really great cigar and probably one of my favorite maduro cigars. I am typically not a maduro man and I don’t smoke them often but when I do this is one of my favorites. I feel that San Andres maduro and Pennsylvania Broadleaf maduro are two of the best wrappers out there for a maduro smoke and this really showcases that high quality and rich flavor I like. I give this cigar a 90 and I always look forward to finding on these in my humidor. If you haven’t tried a Tempus Maduro you need to because it is a great counter-part to the Criollo ’98 version. If you haven’t had a Tempus you need to and grab a couple of each, one will be spicy and the other sweet. Oh and like the name, Tempus, take your time on the smoke and truly enjoy it. 

Alec Bradley Tempus is available at all retailers I recommend but the maduro version is limited to Cigar.com and Cigars International. Also the Quadrum size is limited to them as well. Enjoy!