However, one point of contention many of you have with us has become increasingly loud and clear - a point best expressed by a metaphor I’ve heard from a handful of sources. “When you see a girl in a bar,” one will ask, sarcastically, “do you ever say, ‘Wow, she’s a 4.5!’ Or, ‘Boy, I met a real 4.7 last night!” My equally snide rejoinder - “If so, you’re probably hanging around the wrong bars” - usually puts a good-natured end to the subject, but the point is a valid one.

SMOKE Cigar Ratings
Rating	Quality
0-5.9	Poor
6.0-6.9	Fair
7.0-7.9	Average
8.0-8.5	Good
8.6-9.0	Very Good
9.1-9.5	Excellent
9.6-10.0	Superior

To any reader for whom it isn’t obvious, this politically incorrect dialogue refers to the unique 5-point rating system that Smoke has employed in its Cigar Review for a number of years. The narrow 1-to-5 scale, I’m told more often in the past few years, just doesn’t carry the weight that a more traditional 10-point scale would. And while we pride ourselves here on being original and independent, we also pride ourselves in listening to our paying customers. Hence, this issue’s inaugural judging based on a 1-to-10 system - appropriately enough, in this first issue of 2005, Smoke’s 10th anniversary year.

The other small change sharp-eyed readers will notice is that we’ve retired the “Recommendations” in our General Comments category. It’s an effort to eliminate some of the seeming inconsistencies that inevitably arise when 20 different reviewers apply their own subjective standards to rating cigars. In other words, one panelist may have given a cigar a 4.1 out of 5 and still only “Mildly Recommended” it due to his own taste, whereas that same 4.1 may have earned a “Highly Recommended” from another panelist for whom that cigar really clicked. In place of the recommendations, from this point forward, we’ll be using the descriptor that corresponds to the numerical rating from the box below (9.6 and up equals Superior, 9.1 to 9.5 equals Excellent, and so on).

Numbers may change, but great, quality cigars will shine as always, regardless of brand name or price. Our first 9-and-above “Excellent” scores were awarded to a couple of dark horse entrants, the new Cuban Classics Toro (9.2), with a Honduran/Nicaraguan filler blend, made by Florida-based Reel Smokers, and the Topper Cosmo FBT (9.0), an old-fashioned perfecto made at the Camacho factory in Danli, Honduras. The Excalibur Royal Sterling Fortis (8.8), Carlos Toraño Nicaraguan Selection Robusto (8.9), La Aurora 100 Años Belicoso (8.8) and the Cuban San Cristobal El Morro (8.7) were among the many standouts of this issue’s new-look Review.