The Particulars

The Review

This review for the Avowed The Vow Higher Calling - Toro (6 x 50) is based on the journal entry dated 2025-06-21

Appearance & Construction (0-3):  Good (3)

A medium tan with not much oil to it but some light mottling. The veins are noticeable but thin and light. The seams are tight and the triple cap is perfect. The band is an inverse of The Vow with green on white instead of white on green. All in all, a very nicely rolled cigar.

Draw (0-3) & Burn (0-4):  Good (3) / Great (4)

The draw is perfect and the burn starts nicely. The burn is a little wavy but even to start and quickly trending flat. The ash is a light gray that’s nearly white in areas and pretty tight between the striations. The ash holds through the first third, and by that point, the burn line is dead even.

Flavor Profile (0-5):  Excellent (5)

Roasted peanuts and baking spice, a good dose of cinnamon hit immediately. There’s a light caramel sweetness and cedar woody notes as well. I’m getting bits of floral notes like vanilla, espresso, baking cocoa, and a mild barnyard must. This is just such an incredibly smooth and creamy blend that’s accentuated by delicious bites of spice.

With the second third, I’m getting sourdough breadiness, pepper, and increasing sweetness. Like The Vow, the nuance, complexity, and transitions are just fantastic, but everything is ramped up just a notch. These flavors are just swirling and it’s beautiful. All I can do at this point is wax poetic; this is truly an excellent cigar. A really nice change from The Vow is that while that one seemed to taper off at the end, this ramps up in intensity. A strong finish. 💪

Overall Experience (0-5):  Excellent (5)

If all you’re into is big, bold Nicaraguan pepper bombs that taste like old belts because you’re struggling with masculine insecurity, then kindly move along. 😅 This is a blend with nuance and complexity that wants to have in-depth conversations about philosophy.

I feel like when Klaas Kelner provided the sample of this blend to the guys at Avowed, he channeled a little Justin Hammer:

“These are the Cubans, baby. This is the Cohibas, the Montecristos. This is a kinetic-kill, side-winder vehicle with a secondary cyclotrimethylenetrinitramine RDX burst. It’s capable of busting a bunker under the bunker you just busted. If it were any smarter, it’d write a book, a book that would make Ulysses look like it was written in crayon. It would read it to you. This is my Eiffel Tower. This is my Rachmaninoff’s Third. My Pieta. It’s completely elegant, it’s bafflingly beautiful, and it’s capable of reducing the population of any standing structure to zero. I call it ‘The Ex-Wife.””

I already gave The Vow my highest score and labeled it a top 5 cigar. This is Nigel Tufnel because it’s one louder. I have one box, I’m gonna need another. 😍 There are only 450 boxes being released and once people find out how good this cigar is, they’re not going to last. 💯 worth the price of admission.

Review Base Rating (0-5):

5.00

Would I Buy It Again?

Without a doubt (box worthy)

Review Final Score (0-10):

10.00

Overall Score and Individual Journal Entries

While the review is based off one instance of journaling this cigar; there’s a number of reasons you can have different experiences smoking the same cigar multiple times. A blend can evolve with age (for better or worse), palates evolves, preferences change, and sometimes you just get a bad example!  This section captures the ratings from each journal entry and the related journal photo.  Below you’ll find an aggregate score based on every time the cigar has been journaled. Unless it was a gift or on-off smoke, this section will be updated every time I journal this cigar!

The Flavor Wheel

With every cigar I journal, I capture simple ratings of the basic flavor categories that I experience.  These are more generalized than what you would see in a review, but a distinct profile can still be built out.  When multiple instances of the same cigar have been journaled, the scores are averaged out in an attempt to build a reliable flavor profile based on my palate.

The values entered for the strength of each flavor range from 0 to 3.

• 0:   No flavor detected
• 1:   Mild flavor
• 2:   Medium flavor
• 3:   Strong flavor

Note: desktop / large screens will see a flavor wheel while mobile / small screens will see a bar chart.

With every cigar I journal, I capture simple ratings of the basic flavor categories that I experience.  These are more generalized than what you would see in a review, but a distinct profile can still be built out.  When multiple instances of the same cigar have been journaled, the scores are averaged out in an attempt to build a reliable flavor profile based on my palate.

The values entered for the strength of each flavor range from 0 to 3.

• 0:   No flavor detected
• 1:   Mild flavor
• 2:   Medium flavor
• 3:   Strong flavor

Note: desktop / large screens will see a flavor wheel while mobile / small screens will see a bar chart.