La Aroma de Cuba is a new line of cigars from the fine folks at Ashton, announced and released at the 2002 RTDA show.  If you take a look at the Ashton website, they describe La Aroma de Cuba in the following terms:

"Its fabulous appearance is characterized from its oily and deep dark wrapper made from proprietary Cuban seed Honduran grown tobacco. It is quite elegant to view. It's also wonderful to smoke with an enticing aroma and extraordinary full flavor created from its careful blending of Cuban seed Honduran and Nicaraguan tobaccos. It draws easily and offers a big, enchanting flavor delivered smoothly with lots of finesse."

Hmmm, "delivered with finesse", "quite elegant to view", "enchanting flavor"...is this a cigar or a luxury car?  We always get a bit nervous when the market terms get this flowery, but since Ashton kindly delivered the VSG, perhaps they'll do it again.

The cigar is quite attractive, the band shows off, and the wrapper is darker than most, with a strong feel.  You get the hint by looking at this cigar that there will be some force behind the flavor.

"Quite an attractive smoke, I look forward to taking this cigar for a test drive"

"I don't mind staring this guy down.  The deep colored wrapper (but not dark) leads me to believe I may be in for a mouthful"

I wish we could say that the looks matched the flavor.  Unfortunately, a river of disappointment spilled down on this cigar from our reviewers.  As the reviews rolled in, it was quite obvious that appearance and construction were attributes well received...and then the roof fell in.

"What in the name of all that is sacred is that taste?  This cigar is trying to be full bodied, but is only pulling off full of crap!"

Granted not all comments were that succinct, but they didn't stray far.

"This cigar had a awful aftertaste.  This dry and oppressive taste started half way through the cigar, and never let up.”

We ended up with 5 disappointed reviewers.  While the attractive price of La Aroma de Cuba is going to attract some buyers, there are far to many cigars in this price range, and flavor target that get the job done better.  We gave the La Aroma de Cuba Monarch a grade of “C” as it may get better with age…but were not sure who will be around to see.