Gurkha Ghost Spook (Single Loose Cigar)
- Length: 102mm
- Gauge: 60
- Flavour: Medium
- Wrapper: Brazilian Arapiraca Maduro
- Binder: Dominican Criollo 98
- Filler: Dominican and Nicaraguan
- Origin: Dominican Republic
Gurkha Ghost Spook (Single Loose Cigar)
Somebody at Gurkha enjoyed naming this range. Shadow, Angel, Exorcist, Phantom, and then, for the short stout one, Spook. It reads like the cast list for a village hall pantomime, which I mean kindly.
The Ghost line first appeared at the 2012 IPCPR trade show, and the holographic band was the headline act from the start. The Spook arrived in 2016 alongside the Phantom, packed in boxes of 21 rather than the tubes some earlier sizes were given. The band is the first thing you notice in the photograph: black and silver, an illustrated figure at the centre, and a sheen that catches the light in several colours at once.
The shape is the interesting part. It’s four inches long with a ring gauge of 60, and ring gauge is measured in sixty-fourths of an inch, so we’re just under an inch across, a hair narrower than a ten pence piece. That’s a great deal of cigar to fit into four inches. It tapers to a rounded head in the figurado manner, which gives it a squat, planted look.
Gurkha lists a dark Brazilian Arapiraca maduro wrapper, a Dominican Criollo 98 binder and Dominican and Nicaraguan filler. Maduro leaf goes through a longer, hotter fermentation to darken it, and the photographed wrapper shows the result: dark brown shading to rust, with a matte, slightly toothy surface that hasn’t been oiled up for the camera.
Strength is medium. The maker describes sweet and earthy character with cocoa and cinnamon in the finish, a believable list for a maduro, and I’ve no argument with it.
A single is the sensible way to find out whether a fat little figurado suits you before you commit to a box of 21.
