What is the BEST Way to Cut a Cigar? | Complete Cigar Cutting Guide

to blame the lateness of this episode on that damn hurricane living in Florida that thing had my schedule totally messed up last week hurricanes have a tendency to be inconsiderate that way frickin hate hurricanes hate hurricane season in general but anyway we're here we got a cigar let's talk about some man [ __ ] [Music] today we are back talking about cigars and today's subject is probably as polarizing as putting water and whiskey putting ice and whisky or hell even what's better scotch or bourbon any of those type subject that people have a strong opinion on what they prefer probably going to stir up some uproar in the comments we're gonna be talking about the different ways to cut a cigar [Music] this is a Bellas Artes is it that would be a I don't know if that's assume that's Bellas Artes huh and Spanish usually to ELLs or Y's would that be Vegas artists there you go so that way even though I butchered the name you can see what it's called in a box press lancero it's an excellent cigar and I'm drinking coffee today no whiskey cheers to my brother Calvin over in the UK I know I've posted stuff before and he's not a drinker so we're doing one with coffee today coffee in a cigar it's this coffee from this company oaken bond really excellent stuff you guys should check them out they actually barrel-aged coffee beans in whiskey barrels they have Scotch version they have a bourbon version they have a rye really pretty cool stuff so definitely check those guys out not sponsored just big fan of their stuff so just wanted to mention them real quick but back to the subject at hand cutting cigars there's a whole lot of opinions on the best way to cut a cigar there's really three main ways to cut a cigar you've got your punch cut you got your v cut got your straight cut now there are other ways to cut cigars obviously I've seen guys use just their fingernail to get the cap off I've seen guys bytom seen guys use pocket knifes you're gonna have some people that argue and say this is better than that or that's blasphemy shouldn't do that I follow the same rules with cigars though that I do with whiskey and this comes straight from our good folks over at the whiskey ball if you've never checked out the whiskey balls it's a great channel if you're into whiskey definitely check that out with whiskey you get people saying that adding ice and stuff is blasphemy it's your whiskey drink of how the hell you want whichever way you enjoy the most is the correct way to do it same with cutting cigars in my opinion it's your cigar cutting however the hell you want that being said all the methods do have some inherent pros and cons and there are some general guidelines it's probably a good idea to follow up to help from tear in your cigar up in the process for any you knew guys out there let's just go over the different parts of a cigar at the closed end of the cigar you have the cap which is basically just a little piece of the cigar leaf there's a fix to the end to kind of hold the wrapper together and seal off the cigar some cigars are single caps you have double caps and you have triple caps that end of cigar is also referred to as the head and at that end you also have the shoulder of the cigar it's going to come in important later when we talk about how to the middle of the cigar is called the body and in the open end of the cigar that you like is called the foot the basic premise behind cutting a cigar is just to remove a little bit of that cat as to allow air to flow through the cigar you don't cut some of it off you're not gonna get any air through it I know I've done it myself I forgot to cut cigars before I know maybe some of you have done the same foot it your mouth you go to light it nothing try to only remove just as little of the cap as you can to achieve the airflow that you desire a lot of guys who haven't cut cigars before or new and cigar hobby have the tendency just to go in and lob off the whole end of the cigar and if you get down past the shoulder past all the caps what's gonna happen is your wrapper leaf is just gonna come unraveled and that is gonna make for a really crappy smoking experience now quick tip something I like to do all guys may not agree with this I like to moisten the tip of the cigar before I cut it it's really hard to say moisten the tip without you know my 14 year old self getting a chuckle out of that but I like to give a cigar just a quick little just twist in my mouth just to get a little moisture on the end of the cigar before I'm cutting it I would only do that if you're using your cutter if you're using somebody else's cutter you don't have your own don't do that because then there's saliva on there and you don't want to go gumming up somebody else's cutter with your spit that's just nasty but I have my own cutters so I like to do it what that does is safeguard against cracking the end of your cigar if your cigars are properly humidified you've got a nice sharp cutter that shouldn't be necessary but you never know the condition of the cigar you're smoked and if you buy it from a store or if it hasn't been in your humidor long enough so just as kind of a safeguard I like to add a little moisture to the tip before cutting it and that leads us right into the next tip which is make sure your cutter is sharp and this applies to all the different cutting methods if you don't have a sharp blade on your cutter it's gonna smush or you're gonna have to apply too much pressure and it's gonna crack your leaf so whatever cutter you're using make sure it's nice and sharp probably the most common the one you'll see the most is the straight cut straight cuts are generally done with these guillotine style cutters you can also be done with scissors and some other ways but generally speaking most of them you're going to see are these guillotine style one of the great things about the straight cut is you can cut basically any cigar with it you can cut small cigars you can cut fat cigars you can do box press cigars you can do figure Otto shaped or torpedo type basically any cigar you can slap a straight cut on it and you're good to go to perform a straight cut pretty cut-and-dry unintended you're gonna want to take your cigar you're going to place it through the cutter line your cigar up make sure it's 90 degrees from the cutting surface you're getting a good straight cut watch where the blades are at to make sure you're only right there below that cap still up on the shoulder so you're not over cutting and then you're just going to snip just removing the very top cap of the cigar to allow air to flow through it now if you're straight cutting a figure Otto same basic principle it's gonna go a little different though if you're using something like this Cuban crafters you're just gonna open it up got a little hole for your tip to go through and you're just gonna snip off just a little bit of the end generally maybe a quarter inch or so I've seen a lot of guys that end up cutting these torpedo shaped cigars all the way down to here and basically making it a pair a hoe which kind of defeats the purpose of smoking this type of cigar so I would generally say less is more with all cutting that's a good rule of thumb to go by you could always cut more off you can't put it back on once you cut it so I usually just trim a little off take a test draw see if it's got the drawl I want and then I'll nip off just a little more in a little more until I get to draw that I want trying to leave as much of that taper as possible there is no real shoulder on these cigars but you do want to be careful not to go down too far to where your cigar comes unraveled because that's going to screw the pooch and ruin the whole experience one other quick thing that I have seen some guys do on these types of cigars is some guys will angle cut them so instead of going at 90 degrees like you generally do with the cigar some guys will put it in an angle and snip it which gives you a little more surface area because you've got an angled cut and some guys like that draw better the main drawback of the straight cut is if you've got a normal cigar cutter like this and you're a beginner put it way too far down and just lob off the whole end of the cigar the good news is straight cutters come in a huge variety some which will help resolve that issue all are not created equal those should be these guys right here I wouldn't even recommend using these these are your single blade cheap plastic cheap steel just shitty these are gonna more likely just mangle your cigar more than cut them so I probably wouldn't recommend using that now this style these double bladed plastic ones while definitely not cream as a crop generally do a fairly decent job as long as the blades are relatively sharp because it's a double blade style it generally can do a pretty decent job and they're super light and cheap so they're nice just to throw in your pocket or throw in your car to always have one on hand if you lose it who really gives a crap one of my favorite style straight cutters is this guy right here from Cuban crafters it's called the perfect cutter and one of the reasons I like this is it really takes out the guesswork for guys that are fairly new to cigar smoking or even people that are advanced and just don't want to think about it too much because it's got this backstop in here which prevents you from over cutting your cigar so you just put your cigar in there flat until it hits that backstop you cut and it's gonna automatically cut off the perfect amount they're also like less than 20 bucks so really great cutters I've cut a ton of cigars of this thing and it's still nice and sharp I would be remiss if we're talking about straight cutters if I didn't take just a moment to talk about this sweet little bit of awesomeness sent to me by urban EDC supply this is the BMF cigar cutter from red horse knife works let's just take a moment of silence to appreciate the awesomeness of this cutter this thing is sweet now this is a high-end cigar cutter this thing is like over 220 or 230 bucks somewhere in that range I can't remember the exact price this is definitely for somebody who is more into cigars and they're looking for a little pocket jewelry a little bling to add to their cigar repertoire this thing is a titanium frame with an m3 90 blade if you guys are into knife so you know anything about that m390 is some really awesome high-end steel it has ceramic bearings that ceramic detent it has g10 inlays you can also get it in carbon-fiber I mean this thing is really next level it is crazy crazy sharp it also has a as we've talked about most everything has these days has a bottle opener and you might notice by the shape of this guy that in an emergency it could be used for other things I don't advocate violence but in an emergency if you had to defend yourself you know really really awesome cigar cutter if you're big into cigars really really cool tons of different options out there for straight cutters straight cut is a really really good option and a ton of guys use it next up we have one that might be a little controversial I feel like guys either love this or hate this and that is the v-cut this guy here happens to be av cutter from Calibri and in my opinion this is the only v cutter worth having don't get me wrong some other companies out there have some nice ones there's some pretty good ones out there from xikar but I've tried a bunch of them and the V cut from Calibri is the only one that I like be cutting your cigar is really simple it's got a cradle kind of backstop little area your cigar goes in you're gonna place your cigar inside cradle and push down to cut it's one of the things that's great about the v cut it's kind of hard to screw up if you push it to the back stop push down you're gonna be cut it correctly it's my preferred method for cutting box press cigars I really like how clean of a cut it is it leaves a little more of the end of your cigar intact I feel like it usually gets less tobacco in your mouth it also holds more of the end of the cigar together so I find you generally speaking have left unraveling problems and the reason I really like for a box press is I found that some box press cigars because they're square a round cut doesn't always sometimes you can kind of crack it puts weird pressure on the sharp edges where a v cut you can just put in there and cut right through the middle some guys are gonna tell you they taste differences in these different types of cuts that you're gonna get a different flavor from a straight cut than a v cut than a punch cut because it funnels and kind of directs the smoke differently I'm not gonna say it's [ __ ] some guys have more advanced palate to me I don't notice any flavor difference between the three different types of cuts I just use different cuts based on the size the shape of the cigar stuff like that for utilitarian purposes what I think cuts the cigar best and gives me the best airflow the one drawback to a V cut is you have to be kind of careful if you have a shallow cap on a V cut times this deep-v can cut down too deep and then you will run into issues of your cap coming off and then your cigar coming unraveled so generally speaking I don't use this on smaller gauge cigars or cigars with a very shallow cap that's just something to look out for now last but certainly not least you have your long sheet on this edge you have your punch cut you have a punch that is basically just gonna take a little hole out of the end of your cigar a lot of guys love this I used to punch cut cigars quite a bit I don't really punch cut stuff anymore but it is a relatively easy and clean way to open up the cigar and it's great for beginners because it's kind of hard to screw up much cut to do a punch cut what you're gonna do you're gonna just line up your punch in the center of the head of your cigar and you're gonna slowly twist the cigar in the punch and apply gentle pressure until you penetrate penetrate that's it there goes that 14-year old mentality again I swear I'll grow up one day but anyway you're gonna just slowly rotate until you penetrate through the wrapper and then pull a little plug out and what you're gonna end up with is a really nice clean hole and end of your cigar one of the great things about a punch cut is that it is probably the cleanest the least amount of tobacco in your mouth way to cut a cigar basically keeps the majority of the end of the cigar intact because you're just taking a punch out of the middle there's not really much risk of over cutting the cigar with a punch cut you can also kind of customize your airflow with a punch cut you can put one punch in there if there's not enough airflow you can just go to the side a little bit add one more punch to test draw if you don't like it punch to the side of that a little bit keep repeating that process until you get to draw you once punch cuts are really small portable you got little guys like this that basically go on your keychain the other great thing is they also include punch cuts on the bottom of a lot of lighters I don't have one at the moment that has a punch on the bottom of it but if you're traveling or you're out and about you don't have to pack an extra cutter things like this cigar tool have a punch cut integrated this one is a modus two cigar tool pretty neat little cigar tool really it has several different tools in it it has a number on one end so you de nub cigars if you're like me and you like to smoke them down to the bitter bitter end it has a draw tool draw tools okay it it's not as good as like the perfect drawl I actually prefer that as a draw tool but nevertheless it does have a draw tool and then at the very end here it does have a nice punch this is a pretty handy little tool to be able to pack around with you it's also about the size and shape of a cigar so you can put it down in a cigar case and take it with you and you've got a whole little toolbox with you at all times and that's one of the benefits of a punch cut is they do integrate punches into a lot of different cigar accessories so it's pretty easy to always have one on you the only real downside of a punch cut is it does take a little longer it's a little more you have to fidget in you're over there twisting and it's not as satisfying to me I like the click of like a guillotine cutter or even of a V cut you know these are spring-loaded which is kind of fun to fidget with you know these aren't near as fun so to me it's not as satisfying you also can't cut all cigar types with a punch if it's a really small cigar like a little Lance arrow you could punch it but at that point you're really it's the same diameter at the end of the cigar so you might as well just straight cut it it's kind of difficult to punch cut a cigar like this I have seen guys come in at an angle and do weird [ __ ] like that but I mean just snip the tip off I don't really get it anybody who tells you one is for sure better than the other is generally blowing smoke man I'm really full the puns too but it's really boiled down to personal preference how the cigar feels in your mouth how much tobacco gets to your mouth how much draw different shape of cigar different size of cigar all these different things my opinion is go out there try some of these different cutting techniques on different shapes sizes of cigars and see which one you prefer the best I personally use v-cut and straight cut the most interchangeably depending on the type of cigar I'm smoking alright guys so that wraps up another episode of man [ __ ] soozee 1/3 from whatever day this video makes it out as always I will link all the cutters and stuff we talked about today down below so if you're interested check any of that stuff out you know where to find it hopefully you got some good information out of this video and you enjoyed hanging out with me for a little while today if you did feel free to smash that like button that always helps us out if you're not a subscriber please consider doing so we'd love to have you on board I hope everybody is having a fantastic week happy smokes and long ashes to all of you we'll see you in the next okay here in Georgia Rex and my cigar had to relight the thing that week on today's video I was talking my mother [Music] telling you not sponsor like whiskey you like coffee and cigars mixes them all together little happy menage at wah [Music]

Channel: Jeremy Siers

Views: 3,555,048

Keywords: cigar cutter, how to cut a cigar, best way to cut a cigar, cigar straight cut, cigar v cutter, cigar v cutter vs guillotine, cigar v cut, cigar v cut vs straight, cigar punch, cigar punch cutter, cigar cutting, cigar cutting techniques, cutting a cigar, best cigar cutter, cigar, v cut vs straight cut cigar, straight cut, v cut, v cut cigar, straight cut cigar, punch a cigar

Id: MmbKcpCeigA

Length: 16min 37sec (997 seconds)

Published: Mon Sep 16 2019