With the weather changing and cooler days finally rolling in, the cigars we reach for start to change, too. New flavors and new profiles seem to fit this time of year a little better. So Chris Herath, Kane Coles, Alan Britt, and I each picked two cigars from our fall rotation, blind, without knowing what anyone else was bringing. We sat down at Low Country Pipe & Cigar one morning to light them up and see where our preferences landed.

[Chris Herath]: Tyler, before we started filming, you mentioned you might have an argument against picking cigars for the changing seasons.

[Tyler Caldwell]: I don't know if it's necessarily an argument, but maybe the argument is because of where we live. Here in South Carolina, we get three weeks of fall and three weeks of winter. There's no spring, and the rest of the year is summer. For me, the idea of a fall cigar doesn't truly exist here. But I did pick two that I would smoke in the fall.

[Alan Britt]: To piggyback off that, we get fall from about 7 to 11 a.m. From 11 a.m. to 5 p.m., it's 90 degrees, and then it drops into the 50s at night. But for me, fall means football. I'm a huge football guy.

[CH]: Same.

[AB]: A Saturday night, a fire pit, football on the patio. I picked cigars that give me that general autumnal flavor profile, the kind that reminds me of pumpkin pie and spooky movies and all those goodies.

[CH]: For me, it was very much tied to the flavor profile I was looking for. When it's hot, I'm typically looking for something lighter, not a thicker wrapper. It also gets a little breezy here when the weather cools down, so I'm looking for something a little more durable in a wrapper. Kane, do you want to take us through where you started?

A Sentimental Season

[Kane Coles]: For me, fall is a very sentimental season. You start being a little more reflective as the weather cools down. You're thinking about friends and family, and that's why I chose the ChiMolly Pioneer. It has a Connecticut Broadleaf wrapper, a Nicaraguan binder, and Nicaraguan filler with a touch of Dominican. That's a blend style I've loved since I started smoking cigars, really. It makes me think of the people I've shared these cigars with, people who meant a lot to me. Not to be so sentimental here, but that's what fall means to me.

The flavor profile is fantastic, too. Espresso, dark earth, and chocolate are notes that get me warmed up for winter, and fall is just the start of that. It's a blend I smoke all year round, but it certainly fits that fall season for me.

Fall All Year Round

[TC]: I like the way you said that, a blend you smoke all year round, because I want fall all year round. To me, it's the perfect season. You get the cooler weather, and you can still wear T-shirts, or a flannel or a hoodie if you need to.

Going back to what you said, fall is about the flavor profile for me, too. When I think of fall, I think of hot coffee as opposed to iced coffee in the summer. I think of baking spice and all the holidays coming up, with the cookies and pies and sweet treats we're going to eat. Baking spice is my favorite thing to look for in a cigar, so I chose the Cataclysm by HDA on purpose, because it reminds me of what I want from fall every day.

Broadleaf for the Back Patio

[CH]: As far as components go, your pick is very similar to mine, which is the Mi Querida by Dunbarton. When I start talking about Broadleaf, one of my favorite wrappers, I always go to Dunbarton and Steve Saka, the master of Broadleaf. This is the 6" x 48, one of my favorite sizes. It's a Connecticut Broadleaf wrapper with fully Nicaraguan filler and binder, and for me, it's so sweet.

As fall and Halloween come around, I start raiding my kids' candy stashes after they go trick-or-treating. It's that sweetness in the Broadleaf that I don't grab as much in the summer, when I'm looking for lighter-bodied stuff. But as it cools down outside, I'm looking for some Broadleaf, and the Mi Querida 6" x 48 is my favorite. I call this one the Blue version, and I like the Red version, the Triqui Traca, when I'm looking for a little more oomph.

And also that thicker Broadleaf. For me, when I'm not at the office, I'm typically on my back patio, and it gets a little breezy. Broadleaf holds up well to the breeze. You don't seem to get any burning up the side when it's windy outside, so it's a really good outdoor cigar.

[AB]: Your pick is super sentimental for me. I didn't draw the comparison until you were talking, but I spent a whole lot of Saturdays here at Low Country Pipe & Cigar smoking that cigar and drinking White Russians in my imbibing days. It was a fall football tradition: on Saturdays, I smoked Broadleaf cigars and drank White Russians. I love that cigar so much, I got it tattooed on me.

[CH]: I'm pairing it with Methodical's Blue Boy coffee, and even at 8 a.m., when we're filming this, it's a really nice pairing.

[TC]: Out of everything we're smoking right now, it looks like we're all in that medium-to-full range. I think that's also something to be said for fall, and especially winter. There's something about that stronger, warm feeling. And all of these pair very well with coffee.

[CH]: We all picked these blind, so I was really excited to get here this morning to see where all of our preferences went, just with the theme of it being a cool-weather fall cigar.

The Soups of Cigars

[AB]: We're smoking the soups of cigars. I made my first soup of the year, or of the season, on Saturday, and I was pretty stoked about it.

[TC]: It's officially soup season.

[AB]: So I chose a cigar I've smoked a whole lot of in the last year, the Intemperance Volstead from RoMa Craft. You guys have seen me smoke a ton of RoMa in the office and rant and rave about how much I love their portfolio. But the first time I ever smoked a Volstead, my exact thought was, "This tastes like fall." I get this caramel sweetness, and it reminds me of roasted peanuts and cinnamon, those general fall flavors. It could taste like pumpkin pie. Every time I smoke it, even in the dead of our 100-degree summers, it reminds me of fall, and that's super comforting.

[TC]: Like you said, we went into this blind. I didn't pick the Volstead, because I knew this was going to be one of your picks. Otherwise, I would have. I'm in the same boat; that is fall all over.

[AB]: It's even the wrapper. It's a hybridized Ecuador-Sumatra wrapper with maybe a hint of orange to it, which I'm assuming is why they paired it with that University of Texas orange band. It's one of the orangest wrappers I've ever seen, and that's fall-y.

[TC]: Leaves changing.

[KC]: It's interesting. We were all worried about crossover, and it's not because we have the same palates, but we certainly seem to have thought of the same cigars. Each one of us would enjoy the cigars the others picked out, and I think that's really neat.

That First Cigar of the Day

[CH]: Alan, at this point you could be called an influencer, because a video I filmed with you about two weeks ago influenced this pick. This is the latest edition of the Yellow Cake line from Caldwell Cigars, the Mooncake, released just a few weeks ago. When we filmed that video, you and Andy talked about how it gave you the feeling of fall, with kettle corn and baking spice notes.

I'm not going to lie, I rolled my eyes when you guys said that. But after that, I spent the last couple of weeks smoking a few of them in different settings, indoors and outdoors, and you were absolutely correct. It also has a bit of that orangish hue to the wrapper you were just talking about with the Volstead. And the Mooncake is at a very accessible price point. If you're looking for a tailgating cigar, something under 10 bucks instead of 12 or 15, it falls into the background, and it's just a great cigar with notes that remind you of fall.

[AB]: When I smoked it for the first time, it took me to my favorite time of day to smoke a cigar, which is the first cigar of the day. My back patio, a crisp fall morning, a hoodie on, a fresh pour-over, and that first cigar. That's exactly what it reminded me of. It's fall, it's a little crisp, and it genuinely reminded me of kettle corn, like a carnival.

Spooky Things in the Woods

[AB]: For my second pick, you guys are smoking Broadleaf, and something about a Broadleaf profile is autumnal, so I went Broadleaf, too. The 7th is probably my favorite Tatuaje Brown Label, and I smoked the 7th Reserva a couple of months ago. When I first lit it up, I thought, "This is good, but I like the Brown Label better." I was nerding out, taking notes as I smoked, and halfway through, I'd decided I liked it but wouldn't come back to it.

Then I had a 30-minute drive, and as I'm smoking it, I keep thinking, "Dang, this is really good." At the end, I wrote one note: "Ethereal spice." It developed into something insane, and that was the only way I could describe it. Jeremy Reeves from Cornell & Diehl uses the phrase "spooky things in the woods" for one of their blends, and that's what it reminded me of. Think the smell of a haunted house. I fell in love with the cigar on that premise.

[CH]: And we could not have a list that is fall- or Halloween-based without Tatuaje.

[TC]: I'm also interested in how many haunted houses you've been in to know what they smell like.

[AB]: I love a good haunted house, man. There are two things I love in this world: a morning cigar and a haunted house.

[TC]: Much like the lore of Low Country Pipe & Cigar. Our resident ghost, George, is here.

[AB]: George is holding it down upstairs. This one's out for George. It tastes like, if I lit this up, it might summon George.

An Oatmeal Cookie

[TC]: Going along with what you said, that first-cigar-of-the-day kind of vibe, my other choice is the Joya de Nicaragua Clásico Original, which I'd put in my top five cigars of all time.

[AB]: Sheesh.

[TC]: The consistency is there. It's much milder than the HDA I'm smoking right now, but again, it's that baking spice. I've told customers for years that the best way I can describe the profile is oatmeal cookie. You still get that nutmeg, that vanilla, that baking-spice vibe that resonates with my palate and with the fall season. It's great with a cup of coffee in the morning, the perfect morning cigar. I could talk about this cigar all day long.

[CH]: I love Joya. I've never been disappointed by anything in their portfolio.

[AB]: I smoked an Antaño Connecticut last night watching some baseball.

[TC]: That thing in a Lonsdale.

[CH]: That could've been on the list, too.

[TC]: It's safe to say we only chose two cigars each for this, but we could probably build a 50-count sampler.

A Thousand Days

[KC]: I had a hard time. I probably built a list of 20 cigars, then took one off, and then thought, "Okay, now I'm down to 19. Where do I go from here?" That's why I chose the Crowned Heads Mil Días. It's a very complex smoke. You get toastiness, a graham-cracker sweetness, light coffee, and baking spice, too. It's just a delicious cigar, and each time I smoke it, I get something different.

This is the Corona Gorda, though the Edmundo is also a great choice. For me, the Corona Gorda is a little more complex and changes so much. To say I could smoke it for 1,000 days, Mil Días, and have it continuously evolve is partly true, I'd say, for sure.

[AB]: Also, the sexy new rebrand. Good packaging makes a cigar taste better, I think.

[KC]: That's for sure. It's that first impression. So many people pass on a cigar without being able to say why, but the way you present it to a customer is the first impression you can make. A lot of people decide right off the bat, "I'm not going to like that cigar if it looks like that." So if it looks good, tastes good, and smokes well, who's going to complain?

[CH]: I was really on the Mil Días when it was released, and I can still see the band. The original branding was very unique, and it really stood out.

[TC]: I was a big fan of the original Mil Días, too, and I could be wrong, but I believe they tweaked the blend a little with the new packaging. It's very sleek.

[AB]: It's more cohesive as a brand, and it looks great on a shelf.

Those are our fall picks. Let us know in the comments which cigars make your fall rotation.