Doing anything only out of passion for one's art has an inherent nobility, especially when it's done in the teeth of adversity. In the world of wine Chateau Musar makes an excellent exemplar of this. The chateau is in the Bekaa Valley in Lebanon and the label still carries the name of its founder, Gaston Hochar (pronounced oh-shar) although the business is now run by his two sons, Serge and Ronald. Despite the vagaries of war and all its disruptions, the family continued and still continue to make great wine year after year. Curiously, Ireland was their first foreign market, so it's perhaps not surprising that Lebanese wine and Chateau Musar have become almost synonymous here.

Recently I sat beside Serge Hochar at a typically fine lunch in Chapter One, where he had talked us through a number of his vintages. It was an illuminating talk, not, as is so often the case, filled with dull facts and meaningless statistics, but instead full of passion - passion for what he does, and passion for his product. We tasted a range of vintages from 1980 to 1996, noted the changes in colour and character, let our palates discover the developing complexities, and listened while Serge explained his intentions in making each of the vintages. For him it's akin to an art form, balancing and blending nature's bounty. There's no doubt that Musar is not a wine for the dilettantes, it can be austere and not easy to approach, but it's that very uncompromising style that makes it a great wine. When asked was he influenced by the new style of fruity wines, he replied simply 'I don't make fruit-juice, I make wine.'

To perform his magic, Serge uses a blend of Cabernet Sauvignon, Cinsault and Carignan grown in three surrounding villages. The resulting wine of each variety is kept separately in French oak barrels for a year. After that they go back into vats where Serge selects his final blend, depending on each varietal's development. Despite the homogeneity of the house style, this accounts for the variations in each vintage.

Serge is especially proud of his whites - big, sinuous and vinous. At the lunch we drank his 1997 white at room temperature and as an accompaniment to the roast duck. 'This is a wine that will last 100 years', said Serge. Certainly it's no average white; at room temperature it's big enough to hold its own with ease accompanying roasts - I know of no other white that could do this. It's made from two indigenous grape varieties; the Obeideh and the Merwah.

Wine of the Week

Chateau Musar 1996

'Any Musar over five years old needs decanting', says M. Hochar, so this will need it. Marginally more austere than the approachable '95, it has all the length, complexity and finesse that we've come to expect from Musar. It's a big and tannic wine that would age beautifully, if you could resist the temptation to drink it.

Widely available, RRP about €22.