The Greek Grape Lebanon Decided to Try

Assyrtiko is Greece's great white grape — the backbone of Santorini's famous whites: bone-dry, mineral, built to handle heat without losing its nerve. Winemakers have tried it elsewhere — Jim Barry's Australian one is well regarded — but it's still very much a Greek grape at heart, and nothing has rivalled the originals.

So when a Lebanese family planted it on their own mountainside, it wasn't to challenge Santorini — it was a hunch. Lebanon's climate isn't so different from Greece's — long, dry summers, cooled by altitude — so a grape that thrives in one should thrive in the other. It just took someone willing to try.

That someone is the Bou Sleiman family of Château Oumsiyat — fourth-generation winemakers 1,000 metres up in the Bekaa Valley, on the high ground between the Mount Lebanon and Anti-Lebanon ranges. They were the first in the country to make a wine from Assyrtiko: a small piece of pioneering that could easily not have worked, and did.

Château Oumsiyat Assyrtiko, Bekaa Valley, Lebanon, 2024

The wine is built around Assyrtiko, with a dash of Sauvignon Blanc for extra lift — plenty of peachy stone fruit, a citrus tang and loads of freshness, bright and mouthwatering. It's an Assyrtiko that's great for everyday drinking, and proof the hunch was a good one.

Enjoy it with seafood, a spread of mezze, or any warm evening that calls for something cold and zesty. And if you're a Sauvignon Blanc drinker after something a little different, it's a great one to branch out with.