Call me crazy, but when someone handed me the 12-gauge model of the new A-10 American sidelock for the first time, it evoked a $100,000 pigeon gun by the ultra-exclusive Italian firm of Tullio and Ivo Fabbri.

Even though the Krieghoff Essencia took the Silver Award at the 2003 "Gold Medal Concourse d'Elegance of Fine Guns" and won the Shooting Sportsman Award for a contemporary, custom-fitted gun that best typifies the upland hunting ideal, our Peer Review group approached the Krieghoff Essencia with a measure of skepticism.

Everyone seemed to be wondering the same thing…