Broadening horizons

Wine making in Lebanon dates back more than 7,000 years but there are some who have yet to discover the delights of the troubled country’s finest exports, says Jonathan Ray

WINE is made in a lot of unlikely places, or seemingly unlikely. Good wine, too. Only the other night I had a jolly tasty Pinot Gris from Holland and a textbook Malbec from Peru. One of my favourite sub-£20 traditional-method sparklers comes from Luxembourg (the Bernard-massard Cuvée de l’écusson Brut NV, since you ask) and, although I probably wouldn’t seek it out especially, the Monsoon Valley white from Thailand I had recently was really quite drinkable. Or so it seemed after a bucketful of coconut martinis and piña coladas and a dance or two on the table.

And there’s Ontario, Canada, which makes sublime sweet icewines but whose reds and whites are now turning heads, too. Only last week I had a wonderful Norman Hardie Pinot Noir from the Niagara Peninsula. And as for Bordeaux blends, who knew that the 2017 Octagon from Barboursville Vineyards in Virginia, USA, could be so darn complex and rewarding?

Even though the UK has long been the centre of the world’s wine trade and we lucky islanders are exposed to a wider variety of vino than anyone else, it’s still often a surprise to learn that such places make wine of note or, indeed, wine at all.

At least we’re more sophisticated than some. I visited Le Marche, Italy, many years ago with a group of supermarket wine buyers. There was one particular producer whose Rosso Piceno and Rosso Conero wines the buyers admired greatly. He was delighted but expressed his exasperation that British wine buyers were so blinkered as to buy Valpolicella, Bardolino and Chianti instead of wines such as his. Why didn’t they broaden their horizons?

The chap from Tesco said that he understood the producer’s frustration but wished to point out that British wine lovers were buying Chilean Cabernet Sauvignon and New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc these days rather than Valpol or Chianti. The producer stood wide-eyed, jaw agape. “They make wine in Chile?” he asked. “They make wine in New Zealand? Oh stop it, you’re making fun of me.”

The poor man was genuinely astounded. He could think only of what his rivals in the Veneto and Tuscany were making and couldn’t grasp that anyone further afield might make wine. As someone fetched the smelling salts, he agreed that maybe it was his horizons that needed broadening rather than ours.

There is one country, though, that still comes as a surprise to many when they discover that it makes wine – and seriously fine wine at that – and their surprise always surprises me. I’m talking about Lebanon. Yes, yes, I know that you know that Lebanon makes wine and that you’ve been buying Ch Musar since you were a pup, but there are others to whom this is breaking news. I think what surprises them is not that they ever made wine in Lebanon – they’ve been doing it for 7,000 years – but that they still make wine there, given the 1975-90 Civil War, the 2006 July War, the corruption, the economic collapse, the 2020 Beirut port explosion and the fact that the country is currently on its knees. It’s all but a failed state.

Lebanon produces around 11 million bottles of wine a year. Most of the vineyards are in the Bekaa Valley and in the foothills of Mount Lebanon and although humans have managed to screw things up – there is little electricity or fuel, raw materials are scarce, the devaluation of the Lebanese lira means buying new kit or paying workers is almost impossible – nature is kind. Warm days and cool nights make life easy for the vine with little or no irrigation, pesticides or fertilisers required.

Ch Musar is the best-known producer, with other major players including Massaya, Ch Ksara, Ch Kefraya, Karam Wines, Domaine Wardy, Ch Héritage and Domaine des Tourelles. The reds are mainly glorious, headily scented, richly flavoured southern Rhône-style wines based on Syrah, Grenache, Cinsault, Carignan and Cabernet Sauvignon, while the whites are deliciously inimitable, based on grapes you won’t see anywhere else, namely Obaideh and Merwah.

Lebanon needs our help and we should be drinking buckets of its delectable, keenly priced vino. Buy a bottle today and immerse yourself in the remarkable documentary Wine and War on Amazon Prime. You’ll never want to drink anything other than Lebanese wine again.

Lebanon needs our help and we should be drinking buckets of its delectable vino