Chateau Musar

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Frederick Blais
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Location: Porto, Portugal

Chateau Musar

Post by Frederick Blais »

I was invited this week to attend at a vertical of Musar with the presence of Serge Hochar and his nephew Ralph.

Before this day I had never tasted his wines, but I did often encouter the name of his wine in magazines, books and friend's lips. It is not the kind of wine that brings unanimous comments on the quality and the style.

First I was impressed by Serge. This person is so passionnate about wine and he speaks with greate wisdom and interest about the topic. He seems to never get tired nor bored of explaining his relation with wine, the background of Musar and how it has evolved trough years with the changes in the winemaking.

It is interesting to note that 1996 was the first vintage he did use sulphur. Still it has less than 10mg per little. Volatil acidity is part of the Musar personnality. He does not deny it and tries to put it in balance with the wine which I believe is a success. Some knows beforehand that from analysis it has VA and will call it in the tasting as disturbing just because they know it is there, even if it does not show in the wine. 96 and 97 though at this moment are showing strong VA presence but none of the other 8 were. Serge told us to be indulgent with wines as he told us one exemple of 1959 of his white that was completly disgusting one night and the day after it was a perfect marvel. Same with one of his wine that I think is the 1984, he said it was so bad that he did not sell it on the market. But 23 years after, it is so good, just like a great Madeira, now he is delighted to have wait on this wine.

I'd say that Musar is a very classic styled wine. It is fresh, elegant, silky with sharp acidity, nicely grained tannins, dominated with fresh young red berries like cherries and rasberries, fresh herbs notes too. With age the fruit will become riper, candied, flavours of leather, spices, old wood and sandal wood, nuts, balsamic notes will mix into the blend.

Here is my order of preference of the tasting :
89,95,93,79,2000,98,91,97,90,96

Musar is a disting wine, it is not a crowd pleaser but a wine to intellectualise and meditate on. You need some background as a taster to fully appreciate and understand this wine, or a quick meeting with Serge Hochar :wink: For the price, I can't think of a wine that will age and develop qualities over years like Musar can do. It is not a fantastic wines, lacking the layers of flavours and complexity great ones can build, but for the price it is delivering much more than one can ask for.

Chapeau!
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Roy Hersh
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Post by Roy Hersh »

i consider Serge far more than an acquaintence as I have dined with him on any number of occasions as recently as April and taken part in a handful of vertical tastings of his wines (with him). I have enjoyed his whites and reds back to 1959 vintage.

There are two unique characteristics about Musar, which Serge will freely admit:
a. His white wines are "bigger" then his red wines and demand longer decant times.
b. The red wines have no particular house style and one year the Musar Rouge may seem Burgundy like and the following year a CdP and then the third year it might just emulate a finely knit Bordeaux. He is one of the masters of letting the grapes speak for themselves.

As you mentioned Fred, Musar is not for everybody. It typically polarizes a crowd into: "I love it" or "I hate it" sides, with nary a wine lover caught betwixt.
Ambition driven by passion, rather than money, is as strong an elixir as is Port. http://www.fortheloveofport.com
Frederick Blais
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Joined: Sun Jul 31, 2005 10:07 am
Location: Porto, Portugal

Post by Frederick Blais »

I agree on the style, if it was served blind I'd either go for burgundy or a silky C9DP.

One thing he said that was interesting about the style is that until 1978(+- one year) He was trying to do Musar in a St-Julien way. He was so impressed by his trip to Bordeaux that he wanted to do a wine like this. Then he realised that it was not the Musar personality and he should move on and do what he feels is right with Musar.

Another thing I should add is that the wines for 14% of alcool are balanced and light compared to many wines with that much alcool. This is another fact that I find remarkable with this wine.
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Otto Nieminen
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Re: Chateau Musar

Post by Otto Nieminen »

Frederick Blais wrote:Here is my order of preference of the tasting :
89,95,93,79,2000,98,91,97,90,96

[...]

It is not a fantastic wines, lacking the layers of flavours and complexity great ones can build, but for the price it is delivering much more than one can ask for.
What a lovely report, thank you! I love Musar - it is alongside old Madeira one of my greatest vinous loves. I'm surprised to see that the '91 is relatively low on your list of preferences as that with the '72 is my all time favourite red Musar. Tastes will (gladly) always vary, so no problems with this, I'm just interested to note this detail. Was the '91 decanted long? It seems a rather primary Musar still despite its age and recent bottles have needed five hours to show well.

Did you have any whites at the tasting? I just love their whites when they get some age on them - the '75 Blanc is perhaps my all time favourite wine!

"Layered" & "complex" are such subjective words that I hope you don't mind me saying that I find Musar (especially the white) to be amongst the most layered and complex wine of all! I am very happy that you enjoyed the tasting! I hope we'll meet one day to share some Musar and Ports...

-O-
Frederick Blais
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Joined: Sun Jul 31, 2005 10:07 am
Location: Porto, Portugal

Post by Frederick Blais »

All the wines where decanted 1 hour before the tasting and put back into the bottle for the service. The wines where tasted during 1hour, some kept their glasses up to 3 hours. We did not taste the wines blind, the Musar fans were expecting the 91 to be the best of the night as it is reported by many critics. Maybe the bottle was just not perfect that night.

We did not have any whites unfortunatetly. We have a problem in Quebec that the Musar have too much VA and not enough sulfur to be sold trough SAQ. The lab constantly refuse them because of those 2 elements. Serge Hochar was in Québec especially to try to make them understand that it is possible to make good wines despite that. Stupid office employess pushing pencils all day long :twisted:

I am thinking of going to Finland one day Otto, I have a few friends living there... If only I had more than 2 weeks per year of vacation and I was not that much "addicted" to Portugal :shock:
Living the dream and now working for a Port company
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