Knuckle Sandwich Avant-Garde

Among sayings go, the one about never getting a second chance to make a first impression is as famous as any. In the case of the Knuckle Sandwich brand, one of its newest lines seems to be trying to get that second chance.

It’s called the Knuckle Sandwich Avant-Garde, and it was created to be a new cigar that the brand hopes will be approachable for a wider consumer base, meaning it’s presumably milder than many of the existing Knuckle Sandwich releases, which are generally known for being both strong and spicy.

Avant-Garde uses an Ecuadorian habano oscuro wrapper over a Nicaraguan binder and Nicaraguan fillers, and comes in a single 6 x 54 toro extra vitola that is priced at $18 per cigar and comes in boxes of 10 cigars. AJ Fernandez’s San Lotano Factory in Ocotal, Nicaragua makes the cigars, while Espinosa Premium Cigars distributes and sells the Knuckle Sandwich lines.

Production is undisclosed, with the cigars offered to retailers at the 2026 PCA Convention & Trade Show as part of a sales incentive. The company wouldn’t commit to the line’s future beyond the first round of orders, but representatives said that with enough of a response, more could be produced and it could turn into a regular production line.

• Cigar Reviewed: Knuckle Sandwich Avant-Garde
• Country of Origin: Nicaragua
• Factory: San Lotano Factory
• Wrapper: Ecuador (Habano Oscuro)
• Binder: Nicaragua
• Filler: Nicaragua
• Length: 6 Inches
• Ring Gauge: 54
• Shape: Round
• MSRP: $18 (Box of 10, $180)
• Release Date: June 2026
• Number of Cigars Released: Undisclosed
• Number of Cigars Smoked For Review: 3

The Knuckle Sandwich Avant-Garde is a thick toro, dressed in a fairly dark oscuro wrapper, and it feels like the color of the wrappers and the bands both absorb light, giving the cigar a dark feel. That said, the third cigar looks like lighter in color than the other two, more well-tanned and better playing into the copper and red of the band rather than serving as a dark backdrop for them to shine. Beyond that variance, the cigars all look fairly familiar; there are some veins, but they are small and unobtrusive, while I can see the seam lines, but they are all perfectly flat. All three cigars are consistently firm, giving me just a little bit of give to show that they’re not rock hard. I don’t feel a lot of oiliness, but that doesn’t mean the cigars are dry; rather, they sit in that midpoint where they feel familiar, sort of an aggregate of all the other cigars I have felt over the years. The first cigar has a cool and sweet cold draw that is a bit fragrant, like a floral spring cologne, with a touch of very light pepper on the finish. The second cigar is largely the same, though the brightness is still surprising. The second round of smells reveals a little bit of chocolate wafer and a bit more potent pepper. The third cigar gives me lemon pepper, which tingles my nostrils quite pleasantly. As for the cold draws, the first cigar is slightly firm and nowhere near as flavorful as the cold draw was aromatic. At first, there is kind of a buttery chocolate chip cookie sensation, but also with the taste of really crisp edges. There’s also not a lot of pepper to be found. The second’s draw is smooth and easy, less firm than the first, and has some of that chocolate wafer or cookie flavor, but it’s not really bursting with flavor. The third cigar has a firm draw and a flavor that is drier and more lip-tingling, though subsequent flavors reveal a little sweetness that reminds me of a thick vanilla frosting.

The Knuckle Sandwich Avant-Garde starts off with a light white pepper that drives the main sensation on the palate and in the nose. Behind that pepper is a bit of very light creaminess and sweetness, and at some point in all three cigars, I have the thought that this wouldn’t be what I would expect from either the Knuckle Sandwich brand or a cigar that has a fairly dark wrapper. That’s not to say it’s a completely mild cigar or one of the “not your father’s Connecticuts,” but the first two cigars are on the mild side while the third is medium-minus. The cigar immediately lets me know that I need to space my puffs and retrohales out a bit; when I take a couple of retrohales on back-to-back puffs, my nostrils get tingling to the point where it’s not enjoyable or beneficial to the experience. But when enjoying them with a bit more space, they provide a pleasant tingle in my nostrils that lingers around for a couple of beats after the smoke is exhaled. In the third cigar, there’s a bit of baked vanilla cream, a flavor that I absolutely love and now wish had been in the first two cigars. Flavor and body sit around medium-minus, while strength is mild. Construction is great thus far, and I’m pleasantly optimistic about how things start.

The second third of the Knuckle Sandwich Avant-Garde starts off with a really enjoyable complexity, suddenly mixing creaminess, nuttiness, a bit of earth, some pepper, and a flavor I’d describe as soft pretzel crust. Given that the first third of the cigar kind of kept things simple and straightforward, eschewing any notions of complexity, it’s a very noticeable transition. As this section begins, white pepper begins to intensify and keeps doing so with each puff, with my nostrils really lighting up with a tingling sensation not too far into this section. Around the midpoint, the cigar gets a little fuller and even more flavorful, but there’s now a bit of sharpness to the flavor. I get another round of sweetness as this section begins to wrap up, reminding me once again that this has a profile that is a little departure from what might be considered that of the other Knuckle Sandwich lines. Retrohales continue to deliver a good amount of pepper that is vibrant against a somewhat thin smoke, delivering more tingle than nasal oomph. That nice sweetness finishes out this section in the first cigar, reminding me of a light combination of honey and lemon. Flavor sits closer to medium, body is medium as well, and strength is just into mild-medium territory. The draw, burn line and smoke production are all good, though there are some combustion issues in the second cigar, which seems a bit more finicky with staying lit than the other two.

A dry profile kicks off the final third of the Knuckle Sandwich Avant-Garde, a flavor that reminds me of a combination of baked pretzel and just a little bit of salt. There is some pepper in the profile, but it’s so innocuous that it serves as a minor accent. Soon into this section, there’s also a light and bright baking spice, almost an apple cinnamon flavor, with the positive of the apple negating the negative of the cinnamon for my palate, as I am not a fan of cinnamon. Keeping with the trend that this cigar has been on, and with its stated purpose and blend direction, the final third holds its course with flavor and intensity. If anything, maybe taking its proverbial foot off the accelerator just a touch. I’m getting a flavor combination that draws on a bit of creaminess, some of the pretzel crust from earlier, just a little earth, and some pepper on the finish. Flavor and body are still around the medium mark, while strength is mild. All three cigars do well with draw, burn line and smoke production, but once again, combustion is the source of problems. Combustion really slows in all of the cigars, eventually reaching the point where relights are needed.

Final Notes

• The Knuckle Sandwich Avant-Garde shipped alongside the Chef Special 2026, the fifth installment in that annual limited edition series.
• I’m really intrigued to see if this line expands into other vitolas, as I would really like to try this in a standard corona vitola. I say that because there’s a good amount of flavor in the blend, but not enough flavor to match up with the size or the time needed to smoke it.
• The name is also interesting; avant-garde is French for vanguard or advance guard, and has commonly come to mean being on the leading edge of fashion, culture, art, music and the like. That said, this cigar seems to come from the pool of familiarity rather than off the bleeding edge.
• I don’t know what the bleeding edge of cigar blending and making is, though I would have to think it would involve new varietals and growing regions more than some kind of rolling technique.
• I’d also say that there’s some room in the aging rooms to experiment, much like Nelson Alfonso of Seleccted Tobacco is doing.
• There was nothing readily apparent about why the final third would slow its combustion the way that all three cigars did here. My primary suspicion is that the final third needed to breathe and dry out a bit more, something that is a common issue given how cigars are made and aged, and something I’ve seen factory personnel trying to figure out ways to address over the years.
• My best answer is starting to become a bit of dryboxing, often once the head has been clipped, so as to help that end of the cigar breathe. That said, I didn’t do that here.
• I didn’t find any appreciable nicotine strength from any of the three Knuckle Sandwich Avant-Garde that I smoked. Given the positioning of the Avant-Garde line, I think this was a spot-on outcome.
• The cigars for this review were purchased by halfwheel.

• The company lists these as a 6 x 54 toro gordo. The numbers above are the measurements we found for the three cigars used for this review.
• Final smoking time was two hours and 45 minutes on average.
• Site sponsors Atlantic Cigar Co., Cigars Daily, Cigars Direct, Corona Cigar Co., JR Cigars, and Small Batch Cigar carry the Knuckle Sandwich Avant-Garde.

Espinosa Premium Cigars
Knuckle Sandwich Avant-Garde
Knuckle Sandwich Cigars
Nicaragua
San Lotano Factory
Toro Extra