The story of the Arturo Fuente Opus X is by now a familiar one to many cigar smokers. In 1980, Don Carlos Senior, the Fuente family patriarch, decided to move his family’s cigar business to the Dominican Republic. A decade later, his son Don “Carlito” Carlos Junior became determined to develop a radical “puro” all-Dominican cigar that would ultimately transform the industry he was born into upon its release. A true landmark smoke, it was such a breakthrough cigar that it quickly evolved into the reference stick by which all other premium smokes are judged in modern times.
In the early 2000s, Carlito decided to take the same sun-grown Rosado binder and filler tobaccos that are in standard-issue Opus X cigars and age them in an isolated part of his factory in barrels once used to store Calvados, an apple brandy produced in the Normandy region of France (by contrast, standard Opus X tobacco is aged in rum barrels).
The result is the Opus X Forbidden X cigar line, which was officially released in 2007 — after being talked up and previewed as early as 2003 — and shipped to outlets inside a glass chamber sealed within a hand-blown bottle of Calvados.
Seven different types of exceptionally rare tobaccos are used in the Forbidden X, including leaves that are taken from the middle primings of the plant, resulting in a sweeter taste and a smoother draw than those of the standard Opus X. The Corojo sun-grown wrapper is from the brand’s storied Chateau de la Fuente estate.
Flavors of the Forbidden X include leather, aged oak, creamy milk chocolate and maple sugar, along with bits of white pepper, coffee and flowers.
These cigars are medium-to-full-strength, possessing a firm draw and producing copious smoke. For those who have sampled the renowned Opus X on previous occasions, the Forbidden X represents a way to “branch out” and savor the other tastes Arturo Fuente has on offer at the family’s famed Chateau; smokers will quickly discover the original Opus X is not the only treasure to be uncovered there…