Lebanese Wine from Chateau Musar

By Jay McInerney

Jay McInerney/The Wall Street Journal
Carla Rzeszewski and Serge Hochar

Food and wine pairing is always a tricky business, but somehow I suspected that the wines of Serge Hochar and the cooking of April Bloomfield would make a perfect match.

Bloomfield’s cooking is earthy and elemental, characterized by intense flavors and quirky in the best sense, always surprising us somehow, and much the same could be said about the wines of Chateau Musar, the Lebanese winery founded by Serge’s father Gaston Hochar in 1930. Last night Hochar was at the Spotted Pig hosting a dinner that featured some of the most original and eccentric reds, whites and roses that I’ve ever tasted.

I’ve been following the reds for many years, having first tried the 1975 back in the mid-eighties. It was a brilliant wine, and reminded me of a little of a great Bordeaux, though it was ultimately something altogether original.

“Ah yes, that was a good one,” the imperturbably cheerful Serge said last night. “Unfortunately we didn’t get to make a 1976 because of the war.”

Chateau Musar is located in the Becca Valley some fifteen miles north of Beiruit and the Hochar family has often found itself on the front lines of the civil war in Lebanon. Battle raged around the vines again in 1983 and 1984, and Serge was again unable to produce a wine in the latter vintage. The winery took direct hits from shelling in 1988 and 1989. In recent years, he’s only had to contend with nature, and the challenge of getting grapes from his vineyards to the winery, a distance of more than a hundred miles. The very unusual style of both his whites and reds may have something to do with this issue of transport.

The 2001 red was very pretty and complex, served with chargrilled lamb with swiss chard, like a sort of hypothetical combination of a Bordeaux and a Chateauneuf du Pape; (it’s a blend of Cabernet, Cinsault and Carignan). The 2000 had a sort of bitter herbal quality, not unpleasant, which put me in mind of Fernet Branca, and a touch of volatile acidity which I often found in these wines (due to a long hot truck ride perhaps?), though it didn’t spoil my appreciation of it. The 1993 was mind blowing–layered and complex and long on the finish, with years of life ahead if one wished to hold it.

Not many people would pair a white wine with a lamb tartar, but Serge Hochar did and the combination was wonderful. Chateau Musar’s white’s are very rich and powerful and somewhat oxidative. They have been compared to white Bordeaux and white Burgundy, but I find them utterly unique, and indeed when I asked Serge about the grape varieties he told me that the white was made from a blend of ancient varieties native to Lebanon. By his estimation the vines from which he gets the fruit were more than a hundred years old. They tasted like it. “I like to say that my best red wines are my white wines,” he said, a statement which made more sense once we tasted the 2001, 2003 and 2004 whites along with a very intensely flavored spatchcocked quail marinated in cinnamon and saffron (complete with head and feet.) It’s not often that a wine maker serves his whites with such a powerfully flavored dish, let alone after his reds, but that was the case last night and the whites were more than big and powerful enough to follow his excellent reds.

Spotted Pig wine director Carla Rzeszewski, who organized the event, said that the first time she tasted Musar, specifically a 2001 White paired with a sea urchin at the John Dory, tears came to her eyes. I thoroughly understand her sense of emotion, although my own reaction to tasting that wine in conjunction with April’s quail was more exuberant and boisterous and heathenish.

I would advise all wine lovers in search of an emotional experience to seek out the wine of Musar.

Bill & Sheila’s Wine
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