My Favorite Cigar
Ed Rabin • Former President, Hyatt Hotels
Partagás Serie D No. 6
Ed Rabin has been smoking cigars since the 1960s, introduced to them when he was serving in the U.S. Army. “I think someone handed me a Swisher—the gnats didn’t like it,” he says. His cigar selection improved when he began a run of 37 years at Hyatt Hotels Corp. in 1969, retiring as president. Today, the 75-year-old splits time between and the U.S., and smokes quite a few Cubans. His favorite is the Partagás Serie D No. 6. “It’s short and it’s fat—an easy half an hour to 45 minutes,” he says. “It’s just my size. I can smoke that down until it gets hot on my finger.” He also enjoys Padróns and Davidoffs.
The well-traveled Rabin enjoys a cigar just about every day. “At the end of the evening, when the lights go down and before I go to bed, I’ll catch up on whatever reading I have to do and have a cigar. It’s almost a ritual. It doesn’t feel like I have to have it, but it’s something I look forward to.” He often pairs his smoke with a sip of Cognac, a Japanese whisky or a bit of red Bordeaux.
