Cigar Aficionado is absolutely crazy

[TheRiddick]

Originally Posted by BC-Axeman

FWIW, pencil "lead" is a mixture of graphite and clay. Pencil shavings do have a slightly metallic smell to them.

Graphite it is. And as already stated just above, many of us used to lick the pencil when we wrote (wow, I am how old?). This taste note applies and is used in many a Pomerol wine (right coast of Bordeaux) and is actually imparted by specific barrels used to age wine. Actually helps to id some wines blind although lately some Napa guys are using same barrels to same effect.

I have yet to come across a cigar that said "pencil lead/graphite" to me, but then I've seen page after page of reviews in Wine Spectator where a reviewer used one particular tasting note (say, blueberry stems or whatever) across a couple dozen wines being reviewed. I guess they just get fixated by some tasting flavor on some days and this spills out into reviews somehow.

Don't forget that some CA reviewers also review wine and if, by chance, they smoked tha cigar while also drinking a particular wine, then I could easily see them "taste" pencil lead, no big surprise there.