TheCaldwell The King Is Dead Escape Plan Grand Tour takes one of Robert Caldwell's most distinctive blends and asks a tobacconist's kind of question: what happens when you use essentially the same tobaccos but handle them differently? The original King Is Dead is an all-Dominican blend built around unusual Negrito and Corojo tobaccos. For the latest Escape Plan, Caldwell returned to that Dominican foundation but selecteddifferent primings, changed the percentages of the filler leaves, and subjected the wrapper and binder to different fermentation processes. It's a good reminder that a cigar's character isn't determined simply by the names on a tobacco recipe—where the leaf comes from on the plant and how it is fermented can make the same family of tobaccos behave very differently.
The5" x 54 Grand Tour is a softly box-pressed Robusto wearing aDominican Negrito wrapper over Dominican binder and filler. Compared with the regular King Is Dead, expect a richer, more concentrated presentation, with the Negrito bringing dark earth and cocoa-like sweetness alongside wood, coffee and warm spice. There's a creamy quality underneath that keeps the heavier tobacco in check, while the short, broad 5 x 54 proportions put plenty of filler into every draw. The box press changes the feel and combustion of the cigar as well, making Grand Tour a genuinely different interpretation rather than simply another size of The King Is Dead.
If you're already aKing Is Dead smoker, Grand Tour is especially worth picking up because it lets you taste what different primings and fermentation can do to familiar tobacco. And if you've never smoked the line, this is a compelling place to start: compact enough to stay focused, broad enough to show the depth of the Dominican core, and made in relatively limited quantities rather than as an ordinary core-line extension. I'd recommend buying a few rather than a single—the comparison with a regular King Is Dead is half the fun, and this5 x 54 Grand Tour is exactly the kind of cigar that rewards a second visit.
