Not Better, but Different: Celebrating Lebanon's Chateau Musar with Marc Hochar

Class transcript:

All right, here we go. Welcome one and all for a very special edition of Tail Up Goat Wine School. It's a pleasure to have you all with us as always, not least of all because we are joined by winemaking royalty Mark Houchard, live from Munich in his waiting room. It's raining in Munich as we speak, not to rub it in Mark, but it is a really beautiful day in Washington, D.C. For all of you joining us locally, we thank you for joining us in spite of the beautiful Memorial or Labor Day rather weekend weather. It is an honor to have you with us for; this is our 24th weekend straight of these wine sessions, Mark. I'm sorry it took us so long to get to Lebanese wine. No, no, it's okay.

One of the many birthplaces of wine. And certainly a place that we love and want to celebrate. And so we're making up for lost time a bit. We're celebrating with a special flight of three different vintages of the Moussar Estate's red wine. And we'll talk about that and talk about why the wines kind of have such distinct personalities from one vintage to the next. And talk about how that's one of the kind of most special things about them and something that, you know, Mark and I want to continue to celebrate in these, you know, lovely idiosyncratic kinds of wines. And they are, you know, very much steeped in Lebanese history, but, you know, they're singular, you know, they are of Lebanon, but they are also, you know, very unique nonetheless.

So we are going to honor the tradition that Moussar has of tasting red wines before the kind of, you know, more what we traditionally think of as lighter offerings. So, George Hoshar, Mark's father, used to say that his biggest red wines were his whites. And so whenever you taste, you know, with the Hoshar family, with the owners of Chateau Moussar, you taste the reds first, and then you move into the whites, which, you know, I think people, you know, would kind of screw their faces up at a little bit. But, you know, the whites as they age, you know, they each in their own way, every bit as big as the reds. And it's kind of a fun way to taste.

And, you know, I think it's a great way to So, I really want to start with, you know, the wines across these different vintages and kind of make the flight, the centerpiece, the kind of, you know, entree into understanding the estate. Zoe is with us as always to help us monitor the chat. And we have a lively commentary at Mark, and I'm sure they'll be sending all sorts of questions your way throughout the lesson. So, without further ado, then, you know, let's kick it off. So, thank you all again for joining us. We are at, you know, 70, growing for the sake of members. Special greeting to you all who are joining us for the first time on this holiday weekend. We are thrilled to be celebrating Chateau Moussar.

And I was overwhelmed by the response to this lesson. We got, you know, emotional notes from people passionate about Lebanon, passionate about Lebanese wine, who wanted to kind of share their personal stories, you know, as, kind of, having Lebanese ancestors or having, you know, special memories of the place and Moussar in particular. So, thank you for sharing those with us. We are, as always, going to kick things off here with a bit of verse. And naturally, we have a Lebanese poet kicking things off, Nadia Twoni. This is a poem called Beirut. It's a little longer than many of the other poems that we've read. It's a poem that, you know, we have worked with. So, bear with me.

It is worth, you know, a little more time, this poem, because I think it is, you know, ever so relevant, you know, in, you know, this moment, you know, given everything that the citizens of Beirut have gone through. So, a poem simply entitled Beirut from Nadia Twoni. Let her be courtesan, scholar, or saint, a peninsula of din, of color and of gold, a hub of rose, sailing like a fleet. Which stands the horizon for a harbor's tenderness. Beirut has died a thousand times and been reborn a thousand times. Beirut of a hundred palaces. Beirut of the stones where pilgrims from everywhere have raised statues that make men pray and wars begin. Her women have eyes like beaches where lights shine by night, and her beggars are ancient as the Pathanesses.

In Beirut, each though inhabitants, each thought inhabits a mansion. In Beirut, each word is a drama. In Beirut, thoughts deliver filibusters of the mind in caravans, bear priestesses and Sultan's wives. Let her be a nun or sorceress or both or let her be the hinge of the sea's portal. Or the gateway to the East. Let her be adorned or let her be cursed. Let her be thirsty for blood or holy water. Let her be innocent or let her be murderous by being Phoenician, Arabic, or of the people of Levantine. Or of such a dizzying variety of strange and fragile flowers atop stems. In the Orient where a man can dress himself in light. I love the way she embodies the contradictions of the place there, you know, really beautifully.

That is a poem that was written originally in French, and that is a very good translation, it should be said, of the French into English, but I do lament the fact that in the original French, the rhyme scheme is quite beautiful, and, you know, that translation doesn't quite preserve it, but at the very least, you know, I think it gives you a sense of the place and a sense of, you know, how beautiful, how rich the culture is, but, you know, how fraught the history has been over time, and, you know, I don't think that you can separate one from the other. I don't. It's the kind of place where, you know, joy and suffering are so closely kind of knitted one with the other, you know, that the people who live there kind of understand their lives that way, and I think they take more joy in the simple pleasures of life, things like food and wine because of that, and, you know, in as much as, you know, I've never been to Lebanon, and I've never met Mark's father, you know, I feel like Lebanese people celebrate, you know, their birthplace so much that I have a sense of the country through the food, through the people, and through the wine, and I think, you know, at its best, that's something that wine does really beautifully, so I'm going to try to keep this short and sweet. We are going to, you know, just go into the interview with Mark and let him speak to his estate. I just wanted to give a bit of grounding in Lebanese history before we do that. Lebanon, truly a one of the cradles of wine culture, wine history, seven six thousand years strong of winemaking history, dating back to the Old Testament, you know, most famously Hosea 14:17, they say that they dwelt under his shadow, shall return, they shall receive as the corn and grow, as the vine, the scent thereof shall be as the wine of Lebanon, so people have been celebrating these wines for centuries and centuries upon ends, and the Lebanese, rather, I think they very much see themselves as descendants of the Phoenicians, to some extent, in you know, culturally, at the very least. Lebanon, modern-day Lebanon, historically was Canaan, and then Phoenicia, and the Phoenicians were famous traders, and they were really among the first people to commercialize the wine trade. You can get a sense of the trading network here, and it all originated in modern-day Lebanon. You can see here, and the Phoenician winemakers made wine on an unprecedented scale.

They did so in the fertile valleys of Lebanon, in the Beqa Valley, which is the source of Musar's fruit to this very day. They, pretty much, taught the Egyptians; they taught the Greeks; they taught the Romans thereafter how to make wine, and the cradle of all that was the Beqa Valley, and the Beqa Valley is home to some of the most beautiful Roman ruins in the world, cheaply among others one of the most well-preserved Roman temples of its era, and this is a temple to Bacchus, and I love what Serge, again, Marc's father, said about Bacchus. I loved the word εὔμē, and thought it was, you know, about this. He says this particular site, this particular temple, which is in the Beqa Valley, at a site called Baalbek, is the only serious temple erected to Bacchus, the god of wine, anywhere in the Roman world.

And the Romans put it there in the Beqa. Why? Because the Romans and Greeks, the Phoenicians, the Minoans, and all the peoples who came before them, they all knew that Beqa is the spiritual birthplace of wine. So, you know, we're on hallowed ground here, but it should be said that, you know, kind of from the, you know, kind of era of the Old Testament into the modern era, the winemaking kind of history in Lebanon was interrupted by the expansion of, you know, Arab peoples from the Arabian Peninsula into the Middle East, by the Crusades, although the French became great champions of winemaking Lebanon, and then by the growth of the Ottoman Empire. But, you know, you have this amazing mix of cultures, mix of, you know, religious traditions, and, the French driving, you know, Lebanese history into the modern era, bringing their wealth of, you know, kind of wine history and sharing it with, you know, those more ancient traditions in the Middle East, and kind of flash forward into the modern day, and you have Chateau Moussar, which is established in 1930, and Mark is a third generation winemaker. Mark, I wanted to give you a chance to talk about the establishment of the estate, and I'm going to pull up a map of the Bekaa Valley, and if you could situate Moussar within Lebanon, because it is not the winery itself in the Bekaa Valley, where most of the fruit is. So, I'll share this map and give us a sense of where your vineyards are located, where the wine is located, and how the winery came about.

Okay, wow, I'm very impressed, Bill, by your presentation. I mean, you've really done a lot of homework, so thank you. That's quite impressive. Okay, yeah, so you have a map here, so let me see where we are. Okay, so on this map, well, you have the Mediterranean Sea, which is to the west of Lebanon. You have Beirut in the center of the country on the coastline. I don't know if I can. Well, you have just to help out Mark, you have the Bekaa's in green here. Yeah, and so you have the ridge of Mount Lebanon, which is, you know, I always thought it was like a single peak, but it's actually like a ridge. It's a bunch, it's a row of mountains, is it not? Exactly.

Yeah, it's like, actually, Lebanon is made of two chains of mountains that run north to south. And so you see them here. I guess, yeah, the Bekaa Valley actually is surrounded by these two chains of mountains. So the green part that you see here is surrounded by these two mountains that go from north to south. And that's really significant, because you have the mountains kind of protect the valley on either side, both from the desert and from the sea. Correct, yes, the Bekaa Valley. So the Bekaa Valley is a mountain that goes from north to south. The Bekaa Valley floor itself is at 900 meters, so 3,000 feet. And the mountains go up to 10,000 feet at the highest point. And so you have roughly 7,000 feet of difference between the Bekaa Valley floor and the top of the mountain.

So effectively, the mountains protect the Bekaa Valley from the heat coming from the desert in Syria to our east, and it also protects from the humidity that comes from the west, from the sea. So you have a microclimate in this Bekaa Valley that's quite unique, actually, to the region and to us. Now, historically, and you actually pointed out that, obviously the Phoenicians used to produce wine, they used to produce probably in the Bekaa Valley and also on the mountains, on the, you know, going up to more than the 3,000 feet altitude of the Bekaa Valley floor. And the, so the wine production, has been there for a long time. And so when my grandfather decided to start the winery, we're talking 1930, we had, unfortunately, phylloxera in Lebanon prior to that.

So all of the reds, as far as I know, had disappeared. Any reds that were planted ahead of that were gone. The whites survived, particularly the Obeide and the Merouah, the two local varietals that are used in our Chateaubriand are white. But the reds were not there. So because I guess we're close to France in Lebanon, we speak French, my grandfather actually had studied also in France, not studied wine, but studied medicine actually, and came back liking wine and decided in 1930 to start the winery. If you look at the history of Lebanon, actually in 1920 or 1918 was the end of World War I. The Ottoman Empire, the Ottoman Empire disintegrated. The French were posted in Lebanon to help set up the government. And so the army was there.

So in 1930, 10 years later, they needed wine. And so the idea came of my grandfather to start the winery. Now- So he did it to supply the French troops with wine. He knew there was a thirsty local market and he was gonna take advantage of it. He was gonna tap into it. I don't think it was made exclusively for the French, but the idea was that there was a demand that was gonna grow. And obviously also local demand from Lebanese consumers. But the decision actually that was quite important was that he decided to plant the vines in the Bekaa Valley, which is where we know was mentioned in this altitude in the Bekaa Valley at 3,000 feet. But he didn't have actually any land at the time, any money at all actually.

So he used as a wine cellar, and the vats and everything were all set up in; if you look at the map, the north of Beirut, you see on the coastline, Antelias, and then you see Jounier. And then a little bit higher, you see Chateau Mizar, exactly. And so he decided to set up Chateau Mizar in that location because, well, first it was the location in the old castle called the Mizar Castle, owned by a cousin of his. So, the history of the name Mizâr comes from that old castle named the Mzar. Mark, what does Muzar mean in Arabic? Muzar means it's almost a convent, a place where people gather together. It's a place of meeting point for either travelers or just a gathering point.

So that's the origin of the name Mzar and then because we spoke French and he wanted to have more French label rather a French name rather than an Arabic name, he added the U to make it Muzar. I love that so essentially, that kind of Lebanon in a nutshell. You have you know an Arabic origin and then you know have it's like overlay of you know kind of French, you know, I don't know, veneer, whatever you want to call it, yeah, yeah, just to make it easier also to pronounce because to pronounce in Arabic or eventually, you know, we he didn't know at the time, obviously that he would be we be selling our wines everywhere in the world but it actually is much more useful to have a name that's easier to pronounce.

But I guess the important part was that so he had the winery and designed the winery and the vats in and the cellars in Chateau Mizar on the coastline, whereas the vineyards were planted in the Bekaa Valley because of the history of I guess winemaking. The Bekaa Valley is actually also the breadbasket, in terms of agriculture, for Lebanon, so it made sense to have the grapes there; so it's a three-pronged vineyard. It's a three-hour truck drive and we've always done it that way I think it's not something you would do today you know out of the box if you had to create a new winery you probably would not do it that way but this is how it was done at the time and that trip from of the grapes that are put into you know big trucks and then transported for three to four hours that's part of the probably what gives the identity of Mizar as well during the war times from 75 to 1991 there were some years where it was more difficult to bring these grapes and these trucks through the the treacherous worlds and you know passing through all the different checkpoints at the time before that we had slower trucks so it everything with regards to this trip of the grapes has an impact somewhere on I guess the final result of what Mizar is about yeah I am you know it's kind of like you have this really you know it's kind of like you have this really you know unique style and it's kind of come about by solving problems of your own making in a really interesting way and you know so the estate founded by a grandfather but I think you know for most people really synonymous with your Father Serge, how did he come to be making wine?

He also didn't study winemaking initially, yeah correct so he actually he studied engineering as your brother now yes exactly we've engineers in the I guess in my family although none of us actually eventually really worked as an engineer but you still think like engineers yes yeah to some extent yes engineering you know it's just a way of thinking and then you expand it to any other business activity that you have. Yeah so my father in 1959 he was 20 at the time decided to join, actually well to join he was asked by my grandfather to join the business and at the time the reaction of my father was to say no I don't want to join the business so my grandfather supposedly asked the second time same answer no third time the answer was okay I'll do it but you have to leave as in grandfather have to be and the reason he did that was he had a vision my father had a vision of what he thought wine should be even though he hadn't studied the winemaking but his approach was that as more and more technology was getting into wine more and more products were being added I think at the time of my grandfather we still used to find the wines and filter the wines but my father's approach was different he wanted to do something Where basically natural fermentation would occur, we wouldn't add any yeast; he wanted to do something that was pure and all raw. And that was his approach. So that's why he asked my grandfather, not necessarily to leave the winery, but at least to let him express himself and do whatever he wanted with the wines. How did Serge arrive at that philosophy? You know, kind of what informed, you know, his desire to make wine that way?

You know, he studied under Armand Pinot, you know, who's a very famous, you know, you know, professor of winemaking in France who advocated a, you know, kind of more aggressive, you know, interventionist style of style of winemaking. Yet your dad went a very different direction. Yeah, yeah. So actually, so when my father took over from my grandfather, he made the 59 vintage, 60, 61, which are amazing, which today are just absolutely beautiful wines. And at the time, he hadn't really studied winemaking. So he really made it out of his, I guess, instinct. He then studied in Bordeaux with Emile Pinot in 63 and 64. And actually, there's a very funny story because so he came back, continued to make the wines with a bit of influence from Bordeaux or for the French way of making and from 64 until 70.

And then in 70, he said, OK, you know what, I'm going to go back to my way of making wines the way I did. And he said, OK, I'm going to go back to my way of making, the way I used to like them and the way I used to do them even before study. And 10 years later, I think in the early 80s, he met Emile Pinot at a wine fair and they were having a conversation and Emile Pinot was tasting the wines. And he actually told my father, congratulations, Mr. Rochard, this is actually, you know, very, very impressive. And then my father turned around and told him, 'You know, I'm I must admit, Mr. Mr. Pinot, Professor Pinot, I actually made the wines in exactly the opposite way that you thought.' And there, so Professor Pinot actually had a very good answer.

He said, 'Yes, but, you know, in a way, we as professors or as teachers were supposed to give you knowledge, but you are supposed to have know-how.' And this is the difference between the techniques and the, I guess, the courses, the theory. And what is real practice. So now as a winemaker, really take a terroir, decide which varietals to use, when to harvest, how to harvest. Then what's the greatest arrive at the winery? How do you make the wines? You know, what do you, where do you intervene? Where do you don't do or do not intervene? When do you start to bottle? When do you blend? These are all decisions that are, you know, made by the winemaker. And this is really, again, I guess, a description of your own palate, your own taste, your own personality.

That's great. That's actually a really great segue, Marc. So I know the students, you know, might be getting a little thirsty and typically they're not shy though. Typically they do, you know, start drinking before, you know, they get an honest to God prompt. But I wanted to approach these individual vintage wines. And I'll first ask you, you know, for the sake of these wines that do have quite a bit of age. So, you know, it's 2020 now, we're tasting a 1997 vintage, a 2000, and 2003. You know, as someone who, you know, grew up with this, you must have, you know, memories of, you know, tasting, you know, these wines around the table, you know, as early as you can remember anything.

How do you approach, you know, tasting a 1997, a 2000, when you open a bottle at home? Well, the thing is with Mizar, you're always going to have wines in a glass. So when you decide actually to open a bottle, whether it's 2000, 2003, 1997, you're going to want to do is really taste the wine exactly at the point where you open it. And then you're going to want to see that evolution of the wine over half an hour, one hour, two hours, three hours, up to maybe three days, four days, five days, even if you can, if you're, you know, strong enough to actually keep it. This is really the beauty of Mizar. So it's the evolution that you can get in your glass over the course of up to, you know, several days, you know, and even in cases of up to a few months, we've done that with some whites that I tasted, you know, after a few months.

And so it's that evolution that's really fantastic in the wines. I mean, I'm often asked, when should we decant or how long should we decant before, let's say, drinking the wine? You know, when you decant, you air the wine, you allow it to open up. A lot of its character starts to show. But what is interesting is often to see where the wines start when you've just opened them and how much they evolve, you know, to grow and open over the course of, let's say, one, two, three or four hours. Because if you taste a wine that's already, let's say, not that it's big, but it's already, you know, really reached like a fairly opened-up stage, you might enjoy it a lot, but it's so much greater to understand that top-level stage if you've seen where it started.

And it's really that evolution that gets you into what I call the journey of every bottle, where you see, you know, these steps as it moves on and goes forward and it opens up. Yeah, it's one of my favorite things about these wines. And, you know, one of the reasons they always stood out for me is that they're very much wines that, you know, are about the journey. You know, I think a lot of people when they taste wine, they want to jump straight to the destination. You know, they want to, you know, this is, you know, a 90, 91 pointer and, you know, it's giving me this, this and this. And, you know, most always something you kind of, you know, let evolve over time.

And, you know, part of the joy of drinking is letting it unfold. And, you know, sometimes that's an unexpected journey. Sometimes, you know, you know, it, you know, takes turns that, you know, are surprising. And, you know, other times it's closer to the end. And, you know, it's, you know, it's, you know, it's, you know, closer to what you expected initially. And I think that's, you know, something that your father in particular was very committed to in terms of the life of the wines. I think, you know, in as much as he had his own children, he also had, you know, his children, the wines that, you know, were kind of, you know, taking all of these, you know, unexpected twists and turns too.

Yeah, because we produce our wines in a way that, I guess, preserves life. Because, you know, we don't add any added substances. To our wines, we add a bit of sulfur because our wines need to travel. So they need to be stable enough. But apart from that, we don't add anything. And so I think we preserve really the life that's embedded into these wines. We don't filter them. We don't strain them or we don't take anything away from them. And so they have this ability to behave like, you know, not human beings, but like living, living things. And so they have this ability to change on their own. And you would, you should not be surprised if you open two bottles of the same vintage at the same time, and they're not the same.

They're not the same because they will evolve each one at its own pace. That one might open up, let's say, a bit more fruity. The other one may be a bit more closed, introvert. And then, you know, they'll evolve. And what's fascinating is that if you ever had, you know, you can do this experience of two bottles at the same time, is that you might decide that, okay, you like the, let's say, bottle number one the most at the beginning when you start tasting them. After half an hour, you might decide that, okay, I know, I prefer number two. And then maybe after two hours, you'll say, I know, I'll come back to number one. And it's really, this is where it's challenging, but it's a reflection of real life.

You know, when you have twins, identical twins, they don't evolve at all in the same way. You know, one will start talking a bit earlier than the other. One will walk earlier than the other. Is one better than the other? No, they're just slightly different. And they each have their own, I guess, character and individuality. And so this is typical also of every bottle of Mizar because we don't really treat the wines. We don't format them. So they will have this ability to express themselves each one in its own way. Yeah. And it's, you know, the approach is, you know, kind of informed by the wines of Bordeaux in the sense that it's a wine that, you know, is a blend of three different varietals.

And we haven't spoken to, you know, the kind of recipe that Serge arrived at over time. And just to give folks the clip notes before we talk about that. The 97, you know, from what I've read of it, your dad used to talk about the Moussar man being Cabernet Sauvignon as the skeleton, Carignan as the musculature, and then Sanso as the skin. And each of those grapes, you know, very important to the wine in and of their own, you know, kind of in their own way. And the percentages kind of can change quite a bit from what I understand from year to year. And I think one of the, you know, fun parlor games for people that follow the wines is, you know, saying, oh, this is a, you know, this is a Sanso year, this is a Cabernet year, this is a, you know, when I've tasted with you all, it feels like that's not a game that you necessarily want to play.

But, you know, it is, it is quite interesting. Yeah. So, you know, actually, the percentages are almost the same. So we have usually one third Cabernet. We always say one third Cabernet, one third Carignan, one third Sanso. Now, it might not be exactly a third. We don't actually calculate exactly the percentages. I mean, this is, the blend is done after two years. You don't have a harvest intern keeping track on a? No, definitely not, because it's all based on taste. So when we, two years, we've, you know, we would have kept each varietal separate for two years, one year in cement vats, one year in barrels. And then at the end of these two years, we see and understand the character of every varietal of every plot of land.

And this is when we really make the blend. Now, on average, it's roughly one third, one third, one third. Is it exactly that? No, I'm sure not. But I think it's not even the actual percentage that's important. Because we, although we're very much south, because of the altitude, because of the snow in the winter, because of rain, because of heat waves in the summer, we have a very, we have very different years in terms of climatic conditions. And every varietal behaves in a certain way, depending on climate. So you can get a year where you have a good heat pattern, but not too much. And that year, and the long summer, let's say, before harvest, that year, typically Cabernet would ripen well. Cabernet being such a dominant varietal, it would take over the vintage, not necessarily in percentages.

You know, you might have not 33, but even, let's say, 30% Cabernet Sauvignon in a certain year. But if that Cabernet is so ripe, so developed because of the climatic conditions, then you have a good heat pattern. And that year, it will take over the vintage in terms of its taste. It's like cooking with like a really aggressive spice. It's like, you know, cooking with, yeah, like saffron or cloves or, yeah. Exactly. Yeah. Or cooking with the salt. You could have a salt that is not that salty and another salt that is extremely, yeah. And so it really depends on the climatic conditions for every varietal. And so you end up with years where, because we have blends, maybe 97 is more Cabernet dominant. 2000 is what I would call a more classical vintage.

And 2003 is more Carignan dominant. And if you, and I saw some notes on 98. 1998 is more Sasson dominant. This is 1997. I know, I know. But somebody on the chat, I just mentioned 98 and 97. Yeah, 1993. Is more Sasson dominant. Now, a Sasson dominant vintage will give you more red berries, like light-colored red berries when it's, you know, when it's, you know, when it's, you know, when it's young, and move on to more earthy tones, more animal as it gets older. A Cabernet dominant vintage will have much more dark berries when it's young in terms of fruit components and will stay on that fruit for much longer. So the 97 appears actually almost probably younger than 2,000 if you're tasting it now. 2,000 already has these earthy aromas on it.

97 is just taking its time. And so each one of these vintages, depending on, I guess, the dominance, if there is a dominance of a particular varietal, will age with its own pattern, sometimes a bit faster, sometimes a bit slower. It's like a man who starts to have gray hair at 30 or at 40. When did you get yours? More than 40. But it doesn't mean that, you know, you'll die earlier. It's not because you get gray hair at 30, you're going to die at 40. So it's like you and Anderson Cooper are going to live forever, right, Mark? We'll see. Yeah, no, I love the tasting notes on these wines and I love the individuality of the vintages. You know, they are, you know, there's definitely a house style.

You know, you can definitely, you know, regardless of, especially with these state wines, you know, which, you know, vintage you taste, you know, it's recognizable as Moussar. You know, there's a signature, but they each have these like really distinct personalities. And sometimes, you know, you do have to spend a little time to, with the wines to understand them. So 97, you know, it's an interesting vintage from what I was reading of it. It was relatively mild, but then it was a very long harvest interrupted by rain. And I read something Serge said, it was almost like two vintages. There was a vintage before the rain and a vintage after the rain. So they got, you know, some fruit that was a little more acid driven, but some fruit that was, you know, maybe even like overripe as well.

So it has this like weird duality. And it does, it is, you know, kind of, it's a wine that is a little shy. I think it takes a little while to come into its own. And, but it really does in the glass. And I think, you know, sometimes I try this wine and, you know, when I first opened the bottle, I don't quite know what to make the 1997. But, you know, with time, you know, it grows on you. It's kind of insidious that way. Whereas I feel like the 2003 is kind of the opposite. Like, it is very showy, you know, it's fuller fruited right up front. And, you know, there's breadth to it. And it just, you know, it's a little more exuberant.

And then, you know, I think, you know, 2000 is, you know, it has some power to it. I need to spend a little more time with the bottle. I haven't had, you know, much, but you do get a sense of the Cab dominance on the 2000. I like that Serge called it a lioness of a wine. Yeah. 2003 is in a different stage compared to 1997. Usually, I mentioned that because it's important with Mizar in terms of when you want to drink the wines. When we release the wines at year seven and between, let's say, seven years and 10 or 12 years of age, the wines will show mostly fruit or like fresh fruit components. When they reach 12 to 15 years, depending on the vintage, the fruit moves on to more what I call cooked fruit or stewed fruit, more jammy components.

Not jam in terms of weight on the palate, but just jam in terms of concentration and taste in sugars. And this is the phase where 2003 is today actually. It's that very, very, very early phase. Very exuberant, almost port component on the sweetness. And then if you wait another three, four, five years, depending again on the vintage, you move on from that concentrated cooked fruit component to earth. 2000 has started to move to that phase. 1997 also has started to move to that phase. And if you taste the 98, it's already moved even further. This is where the vintage variation makes an impact. But if you were to taste 03, 04, anything from 2002 to 2005 today, you will get this cooked fruit component. And that's just a phase of the wine.

So if you Some people who like the wines when they're younger with the fresh fruit, when they get to this maybe concentrated cooked fruit component, they don't enjoy them anymore. It depends on the people. And then my message is just wait. If you don't like that phase and you don't want to taste it then, then just wait another five years and then you'll get to the point where it gets to these earthy aromas. And, and, you know, so there's with Mizar, there's always a phase that you will like. It's just a question of when do you as a person decide to drink it. It's just, it goes through that these different steps. Hey, Zoe, do you have any questions for us? I know people must be lighting up the chat and Mark has been keeping track.

I always find that difficult. And not everything but I just saw a 98 number coming out that time. Yeah, absolutely. And there's quite a few questions here already. To start off, how long, on average, can a bottle of Chateau Moussard age in a cellar? What would you recommend? So, the Chateau, so our estate, can age basically as long as you want. We, my father used to say that, you know, he would outlive his wines. He actually did 55 vintages. And we're still opening vintages, you know, that he did at the beginning of his career in wine as a winemaker. So 59, 60, 61 are still wines that we sell. We actually, there was a Decanter article three months ago. There was an MW in London, who asked us and Decanter wanted to do an article.

And we sent many wines, including a 61, 1961. And his comment on 61, was obviously you know that was the bottle that he enjoyed the most with 75 white, but his comment for me that maybe answers your question is when he looked at ageability and what is the drinking window of 1961 he put 20/20 to 3000, that's cool it's because he was shocked by how youthful the 61 was and so that comment alone just explains that yeah our wines have this ability to age you know as far as we know many many many decades. What was the recipe like for the 61 mark I mean I know that your dad hadn't yet arrived at the kind of the same Troika that he's using now, yeah he probably had the same varietals maybe not in the same percentage yeah to be honest I don't think at the time he took any notes so we don't have any specific idea of what he was drinking but There was probably Sasso, probably Cabernet and Carignan, because these were the main varietals with which he was working, but maybe at the time the process was different, maybe it wasn't bottled after you know two years like we do today, maybe it wasn't blended after two years I that I'm not 100% sure, sorry. Bottled at year three, usually we bottled at year three. Now at the time, I don't know if this is what he'd done, what else you got down um well, we did pass along a very instructive video that's on your website, but if you could verbally speak towards um how to handle corks with some of the older bottles, we had some of our friends.

Have a little bit of difficulty earlier today, yeah. So with the corks, um, you always have the risk of actually the cork getting stuck to the glass, this is an issue that happens, um, and so what happens is when you're inserting your coil with the opener and trying to pull the cork, you're trying to pull the the cork is stuck to the side of the glass, so you pull the inside or it crumbles or as you're pulling it out it breaks. The easiest way actually is to use prongs, I don't have them in front of me now, actually, but they're just it's a opener which has let's say a top piece and two blades and you just insert these two blades into The bottle into the top of the cork and then you twist around, and then take it out, and pull it out, and so it doesn't put any pressure on the cork.

Um, there is a YouTube video actually that I would prepare it or on our website you will find it as well or YouTube, that's probably the easiest where it describes how to use these prongs. There's the risk of these prongs is that you sometimes push the cork into the bottle so the best technique is actually actually to start with a an opener, insert slowly your coil bring it down secure the cork so that it doesn't fall into the bottle anymore and then you add your two blades uh in addition. Then, you pull 'um or yeah swirl and and pull out at the same time, and so you get to one piece. This is this is an this is actually a device that's more expensive than it should be like $150, but um if you like old wine, it's it's worth it.

It's called the Durand. Uh, we are not paid uh endorsers for Durand. Maybe one day uh, you know we will be, but uh, it is useful because you insert this piece into the the cork in the center and then you use the ears on the side. I do find it is a very useful uh device for pulling the corks on on all the bottles, but I think people get people think that um, you know if the cork's bad they're not not even bad if the Cork is you know brittle and the wine is bad or something like that, and there's no real relationship there. You know, you should be suspicious if an old bottle doesn't have a cork that is somewhat brittle; um, if it then you know if the cork feels like it's you know new, um, you know maybe the bottle's been recorked but you know it could also be that the wine's not as old as they claim.

Is so you know that's just what happens with age in our case actually we; um, we all also recondition old bottles; anything that's 95 and older would typically have been uh opened at the winery, tasted, topped up with additional wine and then. Put a new cork, so you won't find uh, you know, 95 uh and all the vintages from Mizar that are released today uh, with old corks. They'll typically be typically be with new corks. That sounds like a fun job, Mark. Yes, yes, I mean it's a lot of work, and that's why unfortunately we don't release as many older wines as we used to because it's just extremely uh time-consuming. But it allows you know, today if you buy a bottle of '61, '64, or '66, these wines can still age probably another 20-30 years.

But will you buy it if you're not comfortable at the cork necessarily after 50 years? When you're not comfortable with the cork, will it last, maybe not so so. That's why we do that effort um, with the old bottles yeah, and I mean wine old wine is a fickle thing um, you know there's a classic expression that you know they're no great old wines they're only great old bottles um, I think you know, and and you know Mizar being a living wine there can be a a depending I think it's vintage depending I feel like some with some vintages there's a little more variability between bottles than others but you know with 97 in particular like you know there's uh, you know even just opening those and tasting those for our flights you know there's you know individual bottles that have different personalities.

Within that vintage, kind of a cool way, yeah, yeah, and again, this is linked to the the aspect I was talking about earlier of life, you know, every cork is different, every bottle will have its own path and so it's it's it's normal um the only way if you really want to uh homogenize or standardize your wine it means you need to treat it and if you treat it, you take away this ability to basically you know uh it's like an artist on whom you put a cap and you know you don't give him the the way to express himself so it's the same for wine um what else you got joe yep uh mark this happens at least once uh every week in spite of the fact that we've been doing this for as long as we have uh we accidentally mute zoe um and uh yeah yeah it's it's a tradition uh what do you got though you have any favorite vintages or  memorable vintages um 83 for me because that was a vintage when i started really drinking wine um that i enjoyed a lot it's a vintage where because of the the trouble and the i guess the war at the time it was a late harvest uh so a little bit more ripe than our typical uh misar vintages but i think it's a little bit more ripe than our typical uh misar vintages uh but i think it's a a little bit more ripe than our typical uh misar vintages uh but i think it's a little bit more ripe than now when when i was started to make vintages uh uh when when i was starting really to drink a lot of wine that when i was starting really to drink a lot of wine that was a vintage that really was a vintage that really you know appealed to me at the time um you know appealed to me at the time um today today you know i like to drink wines uh of you know i like to drink wines uh of misar that are in the 20 year old misar that are in the 20 year old uh age bracket again then they're very uh age bracket again then they're very different different um 21 2009 98 97 all different i like um 21 2009 98 97 all different I like 98. I'm more like a sensual person than 98.

I'm more like a sensual person than any of the other varieties, um, but you necessarily better. What was it like to you know your father is this icon, you know kind of within nerdy sommelier community and he traveled widely and was this kind of force of nature, you know, who became kind of synonymous with the Lebanese wine industry? What was it like to grow up under him and you know how did you go from you know the finance world and engineering world into finally you know coming into the wine game? Yeah, I mean, when I grew up, when I was much younger, you know, we were producing wine and that's it, so my father was my father as a father not other as a wine producer and we were not that known either.

I mean, it's true that in '84 he was the first person to get the Decanter Man of the Year award at the time, so yes, that's when I started realizing okay maybe he is good at what he does but otherwise you know as a young person. I don't really know; he's just a father. He was your dad that traveled a lot. Yes, and that's it. And I didn't hear too much about what was happening outside; it's really when I started traveling with him in 2010, actually my uncle convinced me to come and join the winery and work with the family. I used to work in finance before that, and it's really when I started touring I guess with my father making tastings in Asia and the US that I realized that I was not a wine producer.

You know the I guess the the importance that he had for wine how people treated him the the reverence they had towards you know what he had done and to towards his wines and and so unless you see it you don't necessarily realize it okay you read about it a bit but it's really in person that you start to realize how you know how he had an impact on people and on wine in general I think it speaks to how you understand your parents differently as you grow up too I think you know as a child you understand your parents as a son and I don't think you really get to know them as fully realize human beings until you become an adult and you you know face adult challenges yourself and you realize I think this guy is pretty cool you know this guy it's like you know that whole time he was doing something really you know interesting yes yeah exactly you know as a son as or even as a father you you you know an aspect of the you know your parents life but you don't necessarily know everything especially when you're younger you don't necessarily realize. I know so I read your dad or not your brother rather Gaston who's named after your grandfather I read an interview he said the trouble with journalists is that they always want to bring in the war and I don't want to I don't want to you know make the winery about you know a history of civil strife because I think Lebanon is about so much about more than that and I think the beauty of the place is it's not you know the the tragedy or the turmoil it's the way that people triumph over that and you know have created this you know a amazingly vibrant culture you know on top of that that's the story but what was your experience of the war like growing up we I think well the when we were young my biggest experience was when I think it was three years into the war, Beirut was completely shelled and so we and I was less than 10 years old at the time and we decided to move to the winery and actually I was 10 years old at the time and we decided to move to the winery you know it was a big difference between the two countries.

and we used to live in Beirut but then we moved to the winery with our whole family so my extended family as in the all the brothers and sisters of my father all the cousins of mine you know so we were 32 in the house so my my memory of the war was uh you I remember the good times you know with the family I remember that one summer we rented three for three months a house on the sea to get away from the life and so yeah I spent three months at the beach that was fun I mean of course you could feel the you could feel the pressure uh our parents were very stressed but in a way you know as a child I was you know at the beach all the time so you I took the good parts of it we were shielded from the really bad parts by my parents so from that I'm very very thankful and grateful um but we had to change lives we had to change schools almost every year because we're moving throughout the country all the time to get away from the the hotspot and then eventually we left We left the country, um, so, yeah, it had some negative impacts, but in a way it also allowed us to to become who we are, uh, me as a person and Mizar as well as a winery.

The reason we're known outside is that the war forced us to go outside and sell outside, and this is how we we eventually became more famous, uh, you know, or have the position that we have today, yeah. And you were one of the first really, the first Lebanese producer to, you know, gain an international following for for your wines, I believe, so, yes, yeah, um. Now, uh, just to kind of pivot, how do you approach, um, the other offerings that we have here that people bought, so, Hoshar. Is actually one of my favorite ones, you make um, I think you know for the money, um, it's just exceptional and you know, uh, we're replacing uh, the Carignan that you use in the estate red with Grenache increasingly, um, which I think gives it, you know, um, you know, slightly more approachable character, um, in its own way than the um, than the Carignan, but you know, how do you approach these wines versus um, you know, the the estate wines and you know what do you like about them, yeah? So, the the idea of uh, having three wines um, obviously is that we needed to to differentiate them um, uh, and so we decided to have a blend that uh, is specific to every single Label effectively, so you have the Hôchard Perifis whether we have Cabernet and Sauternes but with the Grenache instead of Carignan, and in the Miseur Jeune Red there's no Carignan, there's no Grenache, there's Syrah instead of Shiraz, and so each one of these labels has a bit of an identity that's specific from that varietal that varietal that specific varietal would typically be around a third of the blend um but we need always our Sauternes in all of these especially in the younger wines because for example in the Jeune you're using Syrah and Cabernet which are very tannic if you want to drink a wine when it's two years old and You're using Cabernet and Syrah, you need to soften it with something, and so Sassol is really the component, the silky side of the Miseur, uh, the feminine side, uh, for the Hoshar. It's the same um, the Hoshar is closer to the to the Chateau label because it's a wine that goes through a little bit of wood, so it has uh some of the aspects that you would typically get with a Chateau label or premium wine, but it's a wine that goes through a little bit of wood, so it has some of the aspects that you would typically get with a Chateau label um, but it's uh bottled earlier, blended earlier, and released earlier because then The there the idea is, you still want to have a fruit component.

It's a single vineyard, so it's really specific to one village, uh, called Ana in in the Beca Valley, um, but it's uh the closest wine to the Chateau, but with less age; will it age a lot? Yes, Hoshar Perifis used to be sold after five, six years and then gradually to those who've been enjoying it a lot, uh, you know we were selling more and more so it we went through the years more, you know I guess faster, and so now it's released after three years; it's 15 years easily. It's interesting too, I think, you know, you the the Chateau very much traditionalist, you know, I think, you. know traditionally wineries used to hold wine back a little more and they moved away from that and I think people you know don't always understand you know that costs a lot of money so it's a cheap you know stock of more five six vintages you know in the cellar you know that is you know incredibly expensive you know for for for a winery and um you know it's a passion project in in a lot of way you know the market has moved in the other direction and people want to drink wines younger um and fewer people are reaching wines and so you know I I see the fact that you know you can get these old bottles that are aged in impeccable Conditions, you know that's kind of a gift from the winery to us, the crazy part also of my father because in the 60s he he used to sell only 50 of the top label because he was convinced that the wines would age very well and that he would you know want to sell them later and appreciate them even for himself later, so I guess he he started this uh approach of really aging the wines at the winery before releasing them and that was for the Chateau um for the younger wines now we release them after one two or three years, really depending on the label, but the Chateau was still released at uh you know six seven years uh because this is The time it needs to to be ready, um, what do you like about the the white and the rosé? I've always loved, um, you know, in as much as people, you know, taste uh, through the the red vintages and talk about them.

My favorite moves are wines are these state whites, um, and I feel like in the the jaune wines, the white and the rosé, you know, very different than the estate white and state rosé. But they do have some of that, like oxidative, you know, saline character, um, so you know, they're younger, you know, they're less expensive, but you know, they still feel Moussar in their own way, um, you know? How do you juggle all that, how do you make something? That you can sell at, you know 13.33 wholesale here and still make something that you feel like um has your house imprint yeah I mean you touched upon the the signature and I guess the identity of our wines I mean every time we prepare a blend um we make sure that we have an identity that's really the rosé maybe the general is probably the one that is the most common uh compared to all of our other wines but the jeune white you know is viognier vermentino chardonnay is that a typical blend definitely not so whatever we we decide to create a wine we obviously we look at our terroir we try to anticipate what it will how things will Work out, and then we try to create something that is unique. Um, the salinity and the maybe the more... I guess uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, developed style that you mentioned, that's because we don't treat the wines and we add a bit of sulfur, but we don't want to add too much because that's part of the approach.

So, as a result, we let all of our wines go through the malolactic fermentation, and malolactic means that you lose a little bit of fruit, you gain complexity, but you will lose some of that fruit, but it will really give you that um, evolution of the wines, that you know, these layers and this complexity that kicks in. It's It's our approach, uh, we like wines that have you know relatively strong characters, uh, so it doesn't mean that our wines are for everybody some people will really enjoy them, some people might not, uh, but that's fair, you know, but it's, you know, a strong character is, uh, meant for those who really enjoy them, uh, with the specific characters that we have, well, that's pretty um so do you have any other questions from, uh, the commentariat I do, the link Well yeah um between Bordeaux and Chateau Moussard is quite evident and the use of Cabernet Sauvignon but where did the choice of using so much Carignan and Sans-eau these Rhone Varieties come from yeah so um because it's basically linked to the climate of Lebanon you have to think that uh obviously because of the relationship between France and Lebanon, it made sense when my grandfather was looking for varietals to go to France, you know, and not to seek out varietals that were either in Italy or in Spain or, you know, France made most sense. Now, within France, Cabernet probably came about because of the relationship or the close friendship between my grandfather and Ronald Barton from Chateau Léoville-Barton. So maybe that's the component that brought in the Cabernet.

The other varietals that are grown, that's basically because of heat and weather. We needed varietals that resisted well to heat. In Lebanon, you know, in the summer, we're at 32, 35 Celsius. So that's close to 100. And so you needed to go with varietals that would resist to heat. And these are, this is how these varietals were chosen. How is the climate changing in the Bekaa Valley? Is it, are you noticing more extreme drought and more extreme, you know, heat waves in the summer? Yeah, we're experiencing both. I mean, climate change means more extreme weather. You know, whether it's cold or hot. So in 2015, we had, for example, in May, April or May, we had three days at minus 10 degrees Celsius. So that's, that's what, that's plus 10 Fahrenheit.

We barely have that in the deep, you know, during the winter. So we had it in April. So we lost 50% of the crop. But our most big, our biggest problem now are heat waves that happen in the summer. And so they determine effectively our picking date. Hopefully we don't have, we don't get a heat wave. And then you get the maturity that you want exactly when you want it. But, you know, for the last four or five years, we've had heat waves to deal with. And that's really, it's another contributor to, I guess, yeah, the characteristics of every vintage. But it's also, it pushes us to plant a bit more Sanso, for example, because Sanso is a bigger berry. And resists typically more to heat.

So it has a bit of an influence also on how the wines will behave over time. Can you go, you know, up to, Mark, do you have, do you have, you know, the option of planting, you know, higher at altitude, you know, within the valley? So the valley itself, no, because it's relatively flat. And then you have the mountains that start. The problem is finding land that is not too steep and that is higher. So you might have like hills that go up and then it's flat. And then it goes up. But it's the problem of Lebanon is that the land is extremely expensive. Land in general is very expensive because it's a small country. So it's a store of value for a lot of people.

So finding the right land at the right price is extremely difficult. So our whites are sometimes or often higher also on the terraces on the mountainside. But the reds, you know, we produce 85% red. So finding lots of land for that size and replacing the, all of that is very difficult. So if we can, we do it, but it's been a challenge. Well, she got to know. Um, since 2011, how's the Syrian civil war that split into Lebanon affected viticulture, transporting grapes and your project as a whole? Um, we're, well, I guess we were lucky that although there were, there was a bit of an impact in Lebanon in terms of. Maybe some bombs and political risk, et cetera, uh, it did not affect us in terms of, um, our harvests, actually, it was even easier to get, uh, people to, to do the harvest because there were more people looking for work.

Um, so we were lucky enough that it did not impact us too much. It had the biggest impact was more an economic impact on the whole country and, you know, which has led to where we are today. In a, in a financial distress as a country. Um, but, um, in terms of actual production. Uh, it, it has been, uh, fairly minimal. Possibly the most popular question is, um, how has COVID-19 affected the business as well, or this harvest in, in coming? Yeah. Sorry. You started harvesting. Yeah. Yeah. We, so we started, uh, actually this year, a bit later than usual, 10 days later, uh, usually we start with our main crop white. Yes. Yes. We have only had mainly the whites for the moment.

Um, but it was postponed by roughly 10 days compared to our usual pattern. Um, and, and, but so the impact of COVID actually, well, we, we had to, uh, close the, uh, the winery to visitors, but we're still working in a small groups and small groups at the winery. Um, but we also took that time to plant a new, um, a new vineyard, uh, you know, because we had the six weeks where people were outside, uh, working outside. That's fine during COVID that's not an issue. And so, yeah, we, we planted a new vineyard. And we had purchased, uh, last year, uh, it's interesting too. I feel like vineyard work is very good for social distancing.

Um, but the most, once you're, once you're in the cellar, it gets more complicated, but, um, you know, if you're in the vineyard, you know, that's pretty good, you know, way to be productive and socially distance. Exactly. Exactly. And, you know, COVID hit, uh, you know, in March, in March, there is a bit of work at the winery, but it's not that much really the, when you start really to work at the winery is when the grapes are. So, which is actually now, and, and that's been, that's been okay. Um, and how have you been, uh, affected by the tragedy in Beirut? Uh, well, uh, the city itself is, uh, you know, deeply impacted broken glass, broken doors, broken elevators, you know, 200,000 houses impacted. That's huge.

Um, the winery is quite far, so we were not impacted there. I think our biggest impact is. Well, I guess an accumulation since last October. Yeah. Of, uh, devaluation of the currency, economic, uh, meltdown, uh, plus COVID plus now this explosion that, you know, that's just a huge amount of additional layers of problems. Um, and so, yeah, it's been difficult for the country. I mean, uh, we, we were, you know, I guess in a way thankful that we've had a lot of support from outside as a country. Um, for us also as Mizar, we've had a lot of support from our clients, from our customers, uh, everybody wanting to pitch. And to help as much as they can.

And so, uh, yeah, it's, it's been, uh, very, uh, overwhelming and, uh, humbling to see, you know, how much support we've received and, you know, uh, and it's, uh, yeah, people are buying the wines to support. And also, uh, you know, we even have some, uh, trade clients who propose some of their margins to, uh, to charities. So that's been extremely, uh, Yeah. The, the folks that are participating today, uh, we gave, um, all the proceeds from the flight that we sold to, uh, Seal USA. Um, and, uh, I think we've been able to raise over a thousand dollars for, uh, just through this class for, uh, um, for that organization. Wow. Well, that's fantastic. I mean, this is a one, uh, organization that, I mean, that I know well, and we've recommended it to broadband to our importers as well, because they wanted also to support, uh, um, uh, an organization and, um, thank you very much, Bill, for making this happen.

I mean, that's really been a huge, uh, plus for, you know, and help all of us. Mark, what do you, what are your hopes for, you know, your winery in Lebanon, you know, in the next few decades? Well, we want to continue what we've done. I mean, I think what's most important is to continue the philosophy of, um, making wines in, uh, I guess in an, uh, our approach, which is non-interventionist, um, you know, no additives, no, no treatments, really raw. Um, that's part of our signature. Uh, I think we'll develop. Probably more wines for on the younger, um, uh, younger of younger age, because that's, uh, manageable for us. There's a limit in terms of capacity and production that we can do.

So if there's a bit of growth, we can probably do it maybe with younger wines. Uh, so yeah, we, we might see some new names coming up or some, some new, uh, um, blends, but there'll be not very big in terms of production, but just to have something different over time. But that's, that's hopefully, hopefully would be coming in the next, uh. Five years. What about your hopes for, you know, uh, your birthplace for, for the Lebanese? For, well, you know, I guess the poets that you, the poem that you started with was, uh, very spot on because we're Lebanon. You have all the extremes at everything, uh, religion, politics, uh, wealth, uh, cultural, linguistic, everything. Um, and, uh, times of ups.

And downs and, uh, you know, we've had a very tough time for the last, uh, year, the last month of August has been extremely difficult. We've had a bit of hope with, um, I guess the visit of the French president, uh, hopefully trying to unblock the political situation, Lebanon. We'll see where we're hopeful, uh, cross fingers that it leads to something that's going to be constructive. Um, and we'll see, it's difficult to know, difficult to know the good thing about the wine is that we rely on life. Uh, with politics, you rely on people and sometimes life is better than, uh, than, uh, relying on people, but we'll see. Yeah. I mean, I like your, your dad said that, uh, wine is above politics. Wine is tolerance.

Yes, we try, we try our best to, to preserve that, uh, that philosophy. Uh, well, the cheers, uh, we might have a few more questions for you, Mark, but I want to offer a toast. We always offer a toast and you don't have anything to drink, which is unfortunate. It should be said. No, no, I actually, I just came back from a dinner earlier. And then I forgot. No worries, no worries. So, uh, we always just alone together. Thank you all for joining us. Thank you so much for Mark. Salud. Pleasure. Zoe, what else do you have from the, uh, the commentators? Thank you kindly. Um, how much, um, acreage under vine has expanded over the past few decades? Okay. It's a good question. Um, not a lot. Um.

We used to produce 600,000 bottles, um, 30 years ago, 40 years ago, we're still roughly at the same level. What's changed is, uh, although, I mean, we've always had a low yield, uh, production, uh, we're at roughly 25 hectoliters per hectare, which is half of a normal production. The issue with the global warming is that with the same acreage, our yields have been dropping because we've been impacted by heat. So we've had to increase the acreage, even though. We're producing probably the same quantity. You're committed. You typically do not irrigate, you drive. No, I don't. Not at all. Yeah. I mean, at the beginning when we're planting, the third, first two, three years, when you're planting, you have to irrigate. That is done. Um, no.

So we've had to, so we've increased, we used to be at 180 hectares. We're now towards 220. Um, so, uh, we're buying, we're sourcing some grapes, we're sourcing some producers of, uh, some, uh, farmers as well. Um, and, uh. Yeah. But overall, you know, over 40 years, we haven't changed too much. The quantities of bottles that we produce. Do you ever find it hard to balance? You know, on one hand, you know, you have this legacy to protect that is, you know, your grandfather and father. And then on the other hand, you know, everyone wants to kind of, you know, put their own imprint on, on a business. Does that, you know, ever feel challenging for you? Do you ever struggle, you know, kind of with that balance?

Ah, I've struggled with that since I arrived 10 years ago. At the Whitewoods. My father. Yeah. So when I arrived, actually a lot of things, we've changed a lot of things. I've actually contributed to make quite a few things on, in terms of, uh, maybe not the wine production itself, because that's really, I'm not a winemaker, you know, uh, per se. Definitely. No, definitely not. But, you know, in terms of the business and how to develop, uh, the brand, the labels, you know, everything, all the, the strategy that we have, the pricing strategy. So, we've changed quite a few things. Sorry, liquidity, not liquid. Yes, but also now liquid because we, you know, we've launched a new wine in the UK that was, you know, uh, you know, a baby that, you know, uh, helped really, uh, bring up, um, and we're, you know, looking at, you know, potentially new, new blends as well.

So yes, there will be, uh, an impact from, I guess, the third generation, not myself, but, uh, my brother, uh, my cousin, and myself as well. We, we have an evolution of our, uh, of our, of our business, but you know, the, I guess the great, the Holy grail. Which is the Chateau Mizar, uh, top label, uh, wine that will stay the same. This is, you know, sacrosanct that doesn't change, but all the rest can be adapted and, you know, evolves, uh, uh, you know, with time, uh, we, you have to, you have to evolve and adapt. What else you got, Tam? Uh, we have a few questions about, uh, Lebanese, uh, viticulture as a whole. Is it more of a competitive environment or is it more of a, um, rising tides, rise all, all boats?

If you will. Well, uh, it depends on when you look at history, because when we started, we were alone really outside of Lebanon and for 20 years or so, there were probably a few that were exporting, uh, but it wasn't really in terms of quantities that much. Even us, when we started, we were very small outside of uh outside of Lebanon. Um, today there's probably around 40 or 50 wineries. So yes, the tide is definitely definitely growing. I mean, Lebanon produces a tiny amount of wine, uh, 8 million bottles and half of it or maybe 60% is sold in Lebanon. The rest is exported but 8 million bottles is I guess the production of one of the very large Chilean wineries. Uh so it's really peanuts compared to you know the the the total market.

So there's room for everybody to grow and, you know, Lebanon needs, um, uh, uh, thriving. Export business, because this is what we've suffered from not having any exports and wine is probably one of the, the producers that we can, uh, products that we can, uh, actually export well because we have a beautiful terroir. Uh, and so this is hopefully gonna be, uh, the tide, as you say, that helps, uh, and that lifts all the boats. Yeah. Yeah. We have a question about not just you, but the, your other family members who have all been engineers and how that mind has affected the art of making wine. Uh, it's a good, well, it's a good question. Uh, um, well, my father was an engineer, so I guess the, the first answer would be that, you know, it's wine is about taste and palate and sensitivity.

Uh, but it doesn't mean that it needs to be just purely artistic without a sense of, I guess, structure. Um, and the engineering component maybe brings that structure, but you still need to be very, uh, sensitive to, to taste and to palette, uh, and, and your palette. Um, actually when, when we were young, one of the things, when we used to live in, uh, France because of the war, when my father would visit, uh, he used to live in Lebanon and would come, um, one of our weekend activities was take a car on Sunday, drive to a restaurant outside of Paris, uh, uh, Michelin rated restaurant or gastronomy, and then just go eat, taste, and even drink, even though we're not 18, but at least taste. Um, and so.

You, you build up your, your palette, your, your sensitivity to taste, and this is how, um, you know, it doesn't mean that if you're an engineer or not an engineer, it will impact, uh, your ability to taste. I don't know if that answered the question, but that's. No, I, I, I, it's like a, a, a set of problem solving approaches and like a kind of, um, like a rigorous mindset, you know, in terms of how you think about problems that arise in the, in the business. So, I actually I think that similar to your previous question, the, uh, the face of this conversation, right. As opposed to, you know, Pacific program, you know, you made the point about that, so it was not that, you know, he was after a particular end, you know, he was more invested, you know, interested in engaging people as a approach, the, the problem.

Okay. Right. Exactly. Yes. Yeah. Hazrat. Oh, I know, we're open. That's what that means. Um, no, that's it. Um, for the questions from the, leads. Sounds great. Yeah. for your work and filtering all of these questions. Yeah, no, it's been a total honor to have you here. These are, you know, hugely special wines and the more people that, you know, celebrate and drink them, you know, the better, you know, for us and, you know, for the wine drinking public and, you know, I hope everyone that, you know, is participating is inspired to buy more of it and inspired by, you know, the resilience of the Lebanese people. You know, is there, do you ever feel like, you know, your brother said that, you know, people always want to talk about the war, you know, in the context of the winery.

Do you share that frustration? Do you wish that, you know, people had a different perception of Lebanon than they do? I mean, people maybe remember the war, but in the end, in terms of this is the, maybe the first talking point, but once you've covered that first talking point, then people remember maybe the character of the war. The people they've met, the food that they've tasted, the wines, the poets, you know, the designers, you know, the beautiful things. Maybe the first part is war, because this is unfortunately what you see on the news, and this is what attracts your attention at the beginning. But I'm sure the experience of many people around Lebanon is, you know, when you're sitting in the US, okay, maybe you see on TV, something that is linked to war, but that all the rest of your personal experiences, as an individual, and when they're like closer to you, they will be with things that are not about war, that are about, you know, the pleasures and the more beautiful things in life. And yeah, that's the message of hope. And this is why, actually, you probably, I don't know if you know that part, but you have more Lebanese outside of Lebanon than in Lebanon. You have roughly 15, 16 million people living outside of Lebanon who consider themselves Lebanese. So they are the ones who are really spreading. Yeah. I guess the image of Lebanon outside of the country. And we're doing it also a fair bit, or a small bit, with our wines. Great. And you're doing your small bit from Munich as well, so. Yes, as much as I can. Thank you so much, Mark. Thank you, everyone, for joining us. Have a lovely weekend. Thank you very much, Bill. Thank you, Zoe. And thank you to all.