Ch. Musar Dinner with Serge Hochar

A super evening with the ever-enigmatic and endearing winemaker of Ch. Musar. The FCC did a great job of producing a menu that really complemented the wines and showed them to their best. On Serge's instructions all the reds had been decanted for around 6 hours beforehand.

• 2006 Chateau Musar Rosé 90 Points

  Lebanon, Bekaa Valley

  Deep transparent rose hip colour. Nose is high alcohol and deep fruits....smells more like a red wine than a rose. Palate is a red wine of strawberries and deeper red fruits with powerful and mounting acidity towards the back end. Good dry finish. Gets much more powerful and honeyed with time and has some resonance in the head, which is almost unknown previously to me in a rose. Only marred by rather high alcohol at the moment. Impressive....as I don't generally like rose. If you tasted this blind I think you'd mistake it for a red....an Hochar Per et Fils probably. Praise indeed! Enigmaticaly as usual, Serge briefly observed that "of course, it's not really a rose".

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• 2003 Chateau Musar Blanc 91 Points

  Lebanon, Bekaa Valley

  Deep golden bronze colour. Nose is immediately rich marzipan and high alcohol and high notes...melding into brioche, baked apples and acacia honey...no oxidative hint at all. Palate is sweet green acidic apples and acacia honey, then some honeysuckle.....like a Condrieu but with distinctive whisps of Patchouli oil on the finish. Good length and impressive resonance on the finish........honey comes through more and more with extended time in the glass. Very enjoyable.

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• 2003 Chateau Musar Hochar Père & Fils 92 Points

  Lebanon, Bekaa Valley

  Almost transparent light Burgundy red colour. Nose is ....rich ripe strawberries, spice at the back, fresh oak, heady spices like cinnamon and Eastern temples. I could sniff this all night. Palate is sweet Eastern spices and red Turkish Delight and deep, deep rich strawberry and red fruits then tons of Eastern temple smoke and spice market on the back end. Rich and powerful but very balanced except for a touch of heat which should even out with a couple of more years in the bottle. Loads of length and impressive resonance inside the head on the finish. Classic Musar... beautiful and very Burgundian. It is the most Ch. Musar-like of the Pere et Fils that I have drank, which I think is all years. The best wine to drink on the night and it held up forever in the glass.

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• 2003 Chateau Musar

  Lebanon, Bekaa Valley

  Lighter in colour and depth than the 1999....as always with young Ch. Musar. Nose is very reticent despite 5-6 hours' decanting....pretty much unyeilding but with a typical high note of acetone. Palate is very sweet and fine but totally closed. It has a heady finish. This was a perfect example of the dictum Serge Hochar gave me many years ago that you shouldn't really drink Ch. Musar until it's 15 years old. I didn't score this because it is barely beyond the barrel sample stage and as yet there is no pleasure in drinking it.....as Serge also remarked. This is why they have the 2003 Musar Pere et Fils, which I loved to bits, to keep us going until the "proper" wine is ready.

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• 1999 Chateau Musar 93 Points

  Lebanon, Bekaa Valley

  Deep almost opaque blood red colour. Nose is no brett, deep brooding dark red and black friuts, sweet molasses, red liquorice shoelaces candy, hints of Eastern spices like cinnamon stick and coriander powder...but quite reticent despite around 6 hours' decanting. Palate is round, velvety, tingling tannins and vibrant acidity with a back end finish of deep Turkish coffee grounds which rolls into a slowly mounting and endless finale that is totally resounding. This is still a very young wine by Ch. Musar standards but it is beginning to open up beautifully - especially the length and resonance - and it has put on a lot of weight since I first drank it with Serge Hochar in 2008. This could possibly become the best-ever Ch. Musar in 5+ years' time. Gorgeous.

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We finished off with Arak de Musar, which was clean, fresh and palate-cleansing.

This effortlessly re-kindled my lifelong love affair with Ch. Musar...... the Pere et Fils was the standout wine of the night for me simply because I haven't previously cared for it except in its first two or three vintages in the late 1990s. The 1999 Ch. Musar could become a legend.