My Favorite Cigar
Dale DeGroff • Cocktail Expert • Fuente Fuente OpusX Double Corona
You probably know Dale DeGroff for his essential cocktail books, but back in the day, when the man known as King Cocktail was spearheading the cocktail rebirth, he ran the bar at New York’s famed Rainbow Room. It was a glorious time when you could do what came naturally and light up in such drinking palaces. In 1995, DeGroff hosted an event there marking the debut of a new, luxurious cigar from Arturo Fuente. It made an impression on him, and today that cigar—the Fuente Fuente OpusX—remains his favorite.
DeGroff now does much of his smoking on the porch of a bocce club in Rhode Island, the sometimes home of the peripatetic bar man. “It’s a perfect place to unwind and with a big cigar you’re committed for at least an hour.”
DeGroff enjoys cigars with both cocktails and neat drinks. For mixing, he calls out the Oaxacan Old Fashioned in particular. The well-studied bartender describes it as a riff on the original formula for a cocktail (spirits, sugar, water and bitters). Instead of the typical whiskey, it has Tequila as the base spirit, with a touch of smoky mezcal as a floater. When pairing with unadulterated spirits, he looks to single-malt Scotch, or his own DeGroff New World Amaro.
