Alhambra

Under Spanish administration the Philippines were the other great cigar country: the Cagayan valley supplied a tobacco that Manila rolled in industrial quantities for the whole of Asia and part of Europe. Alhambra was born of that era, alongside Tabacalera.

The name comes from the palace in Granada, but it says nothing about where the capital came from: the company founded in Manila in 1898 was SWISS, not Spanish. In 1912 it set up its factory in Tondo, in the north of the city, and became for Tabacalera a serious and cordial competitor — the two houses would share the market for decades.

Philippine production declined through the twentieth century without disappearing, and Alhambra keeps a clientele in Europe, notably in Switzerland — a swing of the pendulum its birth certificate made almost predictable.

Including the brand in the atlas is a way of recalling that the geography of the cigar has not always been confined to the Caribbean.

Range Depth

• Alhambra Corona

  Wrapper Cagayan tobacco · Strength Medium

  The tobacco of the Cagayan valley, drier and more peppery than Caribbean leaves. A profile few smokers know, and one that resembles nothing else.

  Corona

• Alhambra Especiales

  Wrapper Cagayan Claro · Strength Light

  A short format and a light register, in the tradition of the Manila cigars that colonial Asia consumed in quantity.

  Petit Corona

🥃 Pairings

• Oolong tea

  Other

  The obvious Asian pairing, and the aptest: the green note of the tea follows the dryness of the tobacco.

• Philippine rum

  Spirits

  Sweet and light, it rounds out a naturally peppery profile.