My Favorite Cigar
Dr. Bill Lumsden • Whisky Maker • Montecristo No. 3
Dr. Bill Lumsden, a master of distilling, picks and chooses his cigar moments. They are reverential experiences for which he pursues the right setting, the right mood, the right music, seldom without a whisky by his side. But sometimes he has to make concessions—like when he recently visited Islay’s Ardbeg distillery, with its propensity for tempestuous weather.
“It was lashing with rain, so I perched myself on the window ledge of my hotel room,” Lumsden recounts. “With one hand I was hanging on to the window frame and with the other hand I was holding my cigar and picking up my whisky. The challenge of that absolutely matched the whole experience and it just seemed to make it all the more worthwhile to me.”
The director of distilling for Glenmorangie and Ardbeg has a predilection for Cuban Romeos and Montecristos. A peaty Scotch is not always his first pairing choice. “I’m looking for a little bit of sweetness, so I would probably be erring towards some of [Glenmorangie’s] more Sherried expressions,” he says. “They have this completeness of flavor that you get in a very well married whisky.”
