A Chef Rolls Into the Cigar Game

A former fine dining professional is set to debut his cigar brand next month, and the launch looks nothing like a typical newcomer release. Michael Martello Jr. spent years in restaurant kitchens before turning his attention to tobacco, and he draws a direct line between the two: just as a dish passes through dozens of hands before reaching a plate, a cigar carries the labor of every person who touched the leaf from seed to band. His debut cigar, Ortolan, is a 6 x 50 toro rolled at El Titan de Bronze in Miami -- one of the country's last great hand-rolling shops -- using an Ecuadorian habano wrapper, a Nicaraguan binder, and fillers that include medio tiempo, the rare high-canopy leaves that grow above ligero on a fraction of tobacco plants and deliver concentrated intensity. Each cigar is packaged in a porcelain jar holding ten sticks, priced at $26 apiece, with production capped at 750 jars total. The name itself is a nod to the ortolan, a French delicacy eaten under a napkin to hide the diner's face from God. If Martello wanted to signal that this is not a mass-market project, he found the right bird.