Musar Jeune 2010 Bekaa Valley Lebanese Wine

This Musar Jeune 2010 Bekaa Valley Lebanese Wine pours a deep port red, and has the rich aroma of blueberries, spice and leather. It has the intense vibrant flavour of redcurrants and blueberries, along with floral tints of violets. The finish is soft, with a nice lingering spice and floral effect.

Musar Jeune 2010 is one of a range of youthful, unoaked wines, aimed at opening up the range of wine styles to come from the Lebanon. The label style really is as per the picture – a blob of red and a few drips elsewhere. Call it modern art, it doesn’t really work for me, as it seem to belittle the wines quality. But then again it is memorable. I look forward to seeing the labels on the others in the range.

At 14% abv this wine is typical of the Bakka Valley wines, leaving long legs in the glass for you to appreciate. This Musar Jeune howver doesn’t feel that it is a high alcohol level, and retains the lightness of structure and tannins that is pleasingly unexpected for such a youthful wine.

As with most Château Musar wines, this needs to be decanted. Let the bottle stand, decant at your leisure and then you are ready to enjoy it.

Château Musar wines are very varied, and this breadth of range may explain its general popularity in the UK. I say, popularity loosely; it is still very hard to find any Lebanese wine in stores today.

You may also like to try the Lebanon Chateau Musar Red 2005

Château Musar was founded 1930 by Gaston Hochar in the cellars of the 17th century Mzar castle in Ghazir, overlooking the Mediterranean sea. Serge Hochar, Gaston’s son, joined the business in 1959 having studied oenology in Bordeaux, and is part of the growing community of winemakers who have studied their art in France. Serge was Decanter magazine’s first ever ‘Man of the Year’ in 1984, which shows the skill and art in this winary.

Musar is a big player by Lebanese standards producing around 700,000 bottles annually, but is by no means near the largest producers in the Lebanon. Since 2006 much of their vineyard has been certified organic, though Serge points out that the Bekaa is so remote and unspoilt that the vineyards were basically ‘organic’ by default before the term was coined.

Musar is not typical of the main wineries in the Lebanon in that often their choice of grape blends includes the older traditional vine such as Merweh and Obaideh in white and Cinsault and Carignan rather than the more common Muscat and Syrah. This is not a complaint, just a good reason to sample a range of Lebanese wines.