Tag: connoisseur

Review of the Lebanese Wine called Musar Jeune Rouge

Lebanese Wines: Chateau Musar Jeune Red 2020

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Name: Chateau Musar Jeune Red 2020
Type: Red Wine
Grapes: Cabernet Sauvignon, Cinsault, Syrah
Year: 2020
Country: Lebanon
Region: Bekaa Valley
Date Consumed: May 4, 2025

If you’ve never tried a Lebanese wine before and you make the Chateau Musar Jeune your first, I’d consider it a good start.

Here we have a full-bodied blend with strong tannins and notes of black fruits, cassis, olive oil, and spices. It’s a wine with a strong personality. Every sip is as assertive as the one preceding it, almost as if one is pushed to turn his sips into swigs. And then, by the time the second glass is emptied, one can taste in every swig the promise that the next one will be richer, fuller, and much more satisfying.

A warning, then: When one bottle is uncorked, many bottles may follow. So, when you open a Chateau Musar Jeune, make sure that you have a second one on the bench… just in case.

Lebanese Wine Review: A Red Wine by Couvent Rouge

Lebanese Wines: Al Dayaa 2014 by Couvent Rouge

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Name: Al Dayaa 2014 by Couvent Rouge
Type: Red Wine
Grapes: Tempranillo, Cabernet Sauvignon
Year: 2014
Country: Lebanon
Region: Deir El Ahmar, Bekaa Valley
Date Consumed: February 2, 2025

An interesting discovery. This is good quality wine, and I’m happy that I tried it.

I bought it a while ago from a small mouneh shop located near the Monastery of Saint Maron in Aannaya. They had a selection of wine, and I just picked the one I was unfamiliar with. (You know me. I’m on a mission to try every red wine made in Lebanon.)

I uncorked the bottle on Sunday when we were having dinner with the family in an Airbnb apartment in Faqra. And all those who tried it liked it. It’s a smooth, easy-to-drink wine with notes of ripe red fruits and tiny hints of tomato and tobacco.

Unfortunately, since it isn’t really one of the famous wines of Lebanon, I couldn’t find anything about it on the internet. However, I got enough information about the bottle from the label — it mentions the name of the grapes used (Cabernet Sauvignon, Tempranillo) and where it was bottled.

It was bottled in Couvent Rouge, and I’ve tried one of their wines before.

Review of Lebanese Wines: Chateau Heritage 9 from the Bekaa Valley

Lebanese Wines: Chateau Heritage Nine 2020

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Name: Chateau Heritage Nine 2020
Type: Red Wine
Grapes: Cinsault, Cabernet-Sauvignon, Syrah, Grenache, Carignan, Merlot, Tempranillo, Cabernet-Franc, and Mourvèdre
Year: 2020
Country: Lebanon
Region: Bekaa Valley (Beqaa Valley)
Date Consumed: May 18, 2024

The Chateau Heritage 9 is a medium-bodied red wine with friendly tannins. But it doesn’t lack complexity. Made with nine different types of grapes, every sip of this wine contains a symphony of notes, including red fruits, black fruits, licorice, and oak.

Before uncorking it, I thought of the Chateau Heritage 9 as a mere experiment. After all, a blend of nine grapes isn’t ordinary.

I said, “You have to be someone like Des Esseintes from Against Nature by Joris K. Husymans to enjoy such wines.”

Honestly, I did not expect it to be this good.

And I wasn’t the only one to be impressed by it. Whoever tasted it liked it.

I’m giving this wine an 88/100.

A Quote:

He made his way to the dining-room, where in a recess in one of the walls, a cupboard was contrived, containing a row of little barrels, ranged side by side, resting on miniature stocks of sandalwood and each pierced with a silver spigot in the lower part.

This collection of liquor casks he called his mouth organ.

— Joris K. Huysmans, Against Nature