LEBANON: Eastern promise

This small Middle Eastern country has made precious few inroads into the UK wine market to date, but, discovers Gabriel Savage, Lebanon has plenty of potential.

Let’s leave consumers out of this for the moment – even within the trade Lebanon remains largely off-piste territory. Rarely amounting to more than an odd-bottle curiosity on the UK shelves, its commercial potential is generally as a passport for those seeking a foothold in the prolific Lebanese restaurant sector.

Yet this is a country which currently boasts 33 producers – not bad given it is half the size of Wales with a level of political tension that is hardly conducive to the long-term investment required for wine making. While Kefraya, Ksara and Massaya join Musar as the big export names, the past 10 years have seen a surge in smaller family-run operations, generally producing around 100,000 bottles per year.

As many of these seek to distinguish themselves from the established names, the palette of varieties and regions that form Lebanon’s wine identity has been broadening at an unprecedented rate. This makes the country fertile ground for those in search of originality, personality and excellent value, especially in the £7-£20 retail bracket.

It’s not difficult to find full, spicy reds unencumbered by rough tannins or hefty alcohol levels – few wines overstep the 13.5% mark. Yes, it’s hot, especially in the viticultural heartland of the Bekaa Valley and the 2010 vintage [see box, p58], but the best wines compensate for their latitude with plenty of altitude, commonly reaching 1,200m, and sometimes as far as 1,700m, helping winemakers to balance ripe fruit with plenty of acidity and often naturally low yields.

This altitude also paves the way for fresh whites and rosés, often reminiscent of the styles coming out of the Languedoc – unsurprising really when you look at the ingredients. Viognier, Chardonnay and Sauvignon Blanc tend to dominate the scene, often with Clairette and Muscat in supporting roles. Dig a bit deeper, however, and several of the newer producers are embracing the challenge of proving Lebanon’s suitability for less obvious varieties.

At Château Khoury, winemaker Jean Paul El Khoury has combined his 1,300m-high vineyards and Alsatian family roots to plant Pinot Noir, Pinot Gris, Gewürztraminer and Riesling alongside the more usual suspects. El Khoury admits to difficulties with Pinot Noir and Gewürztraminer, saying: “In wet years they are fresh with no aroma; in dry years they’re expressive but not fresh.”

Blending offers a solution to this issue, as demonstrated by the Khoury Rêve Blanc mix of Chardonnay, Riesling and Gewürztraminer, which is currently listed by London restaurant Arbutus among others.

Into the mainstream

It is this ability to break beyond the confines of the Lebanese restaurant sector that will play a crucial role in Lebanon’s image shift from ethnic curiosity to mainstream. Many of the newer producers in particular have been keen from the outset to avoid being pigeonholed into the vinous equivalent of the world music section.

Habib Karam, owner of Karam Winery, maintains: “I could have sold everything in my first year if I’d stuck to ethnic restaurants, but for me this is not getting Lebanese wine out into the world, so I refused.” Instead Karam began selling his wines to non-Lebanese restaurants in Washington DC and has since built a presence in markets ranging from the US East Coast to west Africa and Australia.

Within Lebanon itself, wine consumption is largely restricted to the 40-60-year-old demographic, but Faouzi Issa, winemaker at Domaine de Tourelles, is seeing a shift. “Younger people are starting to discover wine more and get used to different labels.

"Lebanon is a very young wine-consuming country, but we are at the foot of a slope that is going up.”

Beirut and its legendary nightlife remains the hub for domestic sales, with Issa observing: “Lots of wine bars in Beirut are now looking for a wine that can differentiate them from other bars.” This is a potentially valuable lifeline for those newer producers, many of whom are small family concerns or businessmen keen to indulge a passion or impress friends.

The general feeling among their peers is that a number of these will fail to become profitable and fold or be taken over. This year saw 11 wineries from the Union Vinicole du Liban come together for the country’s first generic campaign in the UK, a further sign that Lebanon is building a critical mass of serious producers committed to making an imprint on international markets.

Several of Lebanon’s winemakers are also keen to send out the message that there is life – and vineyards – beyond the Bekaa Valley. While the majority of the country’s wine, including its most famous names, does indeed come from this region, a few pioneers are exploring alternative terroir such as Batroun, 50km north of Beirut, and Jezzine, which lies 40km to the capital’s south.

This spirit of exploration lies at the very heart of Ixsir’s approach, one of Lebanon’s youngest wineries. General manager Hady Kahale explains: “We want to find the regions where we can have the optimum conditions for each variety.” As a result the three-year-old operation currently has vineyards across five different regions and is currently looking for a suitable spot to plant Petit Verdot.

Jezzine is also home to Karam Winery, where the predictable likes of Cabernet Sauvignon, Syrah and Viognier are joined by Albariño, Graciano, Touriga Nacional and even Norton, a native North American, not entirely vinifera variety. Karam praises the latter, describing it as “similar to Mourvèdre but tougher”.

Pastures new

It’s not just the newcomers who are casting their net further afield. Tarek Sakr, winemaker at Château Musar, reveals: “After the 2010 heatwave we are looking at other places.” Although for the moment he remains tight-lipped as to the precise locations being considered. Setting this within a wider context for Musar’s future – and perhaps that of Lebanon as a whole, Sakr observes: “The Bekaa is still the best place to make wine, but why not look elsewhere too?”

Even within the Bekaa itself, the majority of grapes used for wine production are grown at the western end of the valley. Back in 2002 Akram Kassatly, managing director of Château Ka, bought 100ha of land near Baalbek in the east Bekaa. In such close proximity to the temple of Bacchus, it is no surprise that he describes the 1,200m high site as “divine for growing grapes”.

Likewise Elie Maamari, export manager at Château Ksara, praises east Bekaa’s “very good terroir which gives a mineral quality to the wines, especially Chardonnay”. For the moment though, political sensitivities in this region are an understandable deterrent to other winemakers who might otherwise follow Kassatly’s lead.

More generally, the window of opportunity that allowed such expansion and new start-ups during the last decade is, for the moment at least, slamming shut as land becomes the investment of choice rather than stocks and shares. Back in 2002, Kassatly remembers being able to buy land at £2 per square metre; now he reports prices have reached 10 times that amount.

While it’s always good to see some creative pioneers at work exploring fresh options, as a general rule Lebanon’s traditional red blends remain its calling card. Cabernet Sauvignon and Syrah dominate here, with other Bordeaux and southern Rhône varieties making regular cameos.

The latter certainly seem a better fit to the dry heat of the Bekaa Valley, which marks a sharp, welcome contrast with the humidity on the Beirut side of the Mount Lebanon range.

A slight fixation with planting “noble”, ie international, varieties is certainly producing some smart, commercially appealing wines, although there is a lot to be said for the less flashy character of those blends where well-adapted local varieties, especially the much-maligned Cinsault, are given a role. Dismissed by many as suitable only for arak, along with its fellow Merweh and Obeideh, there remain those who believe that in the right hands these varieties can yield rewarding results.

“If you let it have high yields then it’s not a good wine,” warns Sakr of Cinsault. He also takes the opportunity to fly a flag for Carignan, saying: “For me it’s the best grape for Lebanon.” Meanwhile Domaine Wardy’s general manager Aziz Wardy, reveals his own perseverance with the white Obeideh, which he introduced this year. Although currently struggling with its low acidity, he maintains: “We would love to keep it because we need these typically Lebanese grapes.”

The pressure to produce showy, thoroughbred, critic-pleasing wines is understandable and Lebanon almost certainly has the tools and know-how to achieve this. Hopefully, however, there are enough producers who can remain committed to creating and further exploring styles that can do a better job of capturing the character of this complex but captivating nation.

Gabriel Savage, December 2010