Top 10 Cigars of 2006

An unranked editorial retrospective of lines available by 2006, informed by manufacturer accounts. These selections are not historical award results or firsthand tasting notes from cigars produced that year.

A cigar begins long before it reaches the rolling table. Ashton ESG directs attention to the estate; Oliva Master Blends 3 to the selection of leaf; Hemingway to the hands that shape it. Our look at the best cigars of 2006 follows that path from agriculture to craftsmanship. Tatuaje Havana VI adds another development along the way, showing a young brand extending its reach through a new line with a familiar sense of style.

Ashton ESG

Estate Sun Grown brings Ashton’s relationship with Fuente into the field. ESG’s Dominican tobacco and estate connection give it a story of its own within the Ashton range. The initials resemble VSG, but the agricultural focus is distinct: this cigar directs attention to a particular growing relationship and the blend built around it.

Tatuaje Havana VI

Havana VI gives Tatuaje a recognizable red-band expression made in Nicaragua. Alongside the Miami-made Selección de Cazador, it shows Pete Johnson’s brand developing across different production settings. The expansion retains a connection to the original Cuban-inspired approach, giving a relatively young name another way to express its craft.

Oliva Master Blends 3

Oliva describes Nicaraguan ligero filler and a Broadleaf sun-grown wrapper in Master Blends 3. Those specific choices give its artisanal-series position substance. The line draws attention to selection and assembly: which leaves the maker chooses, how they are combined, and how a focused blend earns a separate place within the range.

Rocky Patel The Edge Maduro

The Edge Maduro has the economy of a well-chosen name. Its substantial maduro expression gives Rocky Patel a straightforward proposition beside the estate and commemorative cigars of the period. A clear style carries the line, leaving the cigar’s recognizable presentation to do much of the work.

CAO Italia

Italian-grown Habano-seed tobacco gives Italia an agricultural story well beyond the usual cigar-making map. CAO uses that origin as a point of discovery, inviting attention to the journey of a component leaf. Beside ESG’s estate connection, Italia reveals how differently a maker can approach the question of where a blend begins.

Diamond Crown Classic

The original Diamond Crown concept gave Connecticut shade tobacco a generous 54-ring-gauge format. Developed through the Newman–Fuente partnership, the Classic combines that physical scale with a milder profile. Its presence here keeps proportions and blending in the same conversation, with ample room for a gentler approach.

Fuente Fuente OpusX

OpusX gives the Fuente growing story another expression: Dominican wrapper completing an all-Dominican blend. Established since 1995, the original line supplies useful context for ESG’s estate emphasis. The relationship runs through agricultural experience, while each cigar carries that experience into its own brand and blend.

Arturo Fuente Hemingway

The Hemingway perfecto brings the discussion from the field to the roller’s hands. Its tapering form requires control over a changing shape, making construction visible at a glance. Fuente’s revival of this tradition gives the cigar a durable attraction: the finished object preserves a skill that is difficult to take for granted once noticed.

Rocky Patel Vintage 1992

Vintage 1992 combines an Ecuadorian Sumatra wrapper with Dominican and Nicaraguan tobacco. The blend crosses borders while retaining a clear outer-leaf signature. In this year’s company of estate cigars and country-led brands, it offers another model of the maker’s work: selecting complementary material from several origins.

CAO Brazilia

Brazilia completes the geographical sweep with Brazilian Arapiraca wrapper over Nicaraguan binder and filler. The CAO name points toward one country while the composition connects two. Its appeal within this group comes from that explicit tobacco story, placing a particular leaf at the entrance to a broader blend.

Looking back at 2006

The journey from estate to rolling table gives 2006 its shape. Each stage leaves something in the finished cigar: the origin of the leaf, the maker’s selection and the roller’s execution. These ten lines reward attention to that sequence, revealing how much work lies behind an apparently simple object.