impromptu beer review: Orval

While today is not friday, it was a holiday, and I found myself sitting down on a terrace, with some friends. I was drinking a good beer, and had a camera with me, so I decided to review the beer.

The beer which I drank this time was an Orval. One of the Trappist beers.

An Orval is a fairly light beer. coming in at 6.2% ABV.

It is a refreshing thirst quenching beer, ideal for when you get off your bike, on a hot day (Like I had just done).

The Look

This is an amber coloured beer, with a thick creamy white head of stable foam which will last for a long time. The beer in itself is cloudy.

The Aroma

An Orval is a beer which keeps on changing, more on this later. The one I drank had been bottled about 5 months ago. They should be over 3 months, over 1 year they start to develop a different flavour profile.

The aroma of a "young" orval is one of grain and classical aroma hops (not the modern American Cascades and Armadillo's which hit you with citrus and herbal tones, but the smell of fresh hops, intermingled with somrthing slightly earthy. Even though you can't smell bitter, something in this aroma tells you that this is going to be a bitter beer.

The Flavour

When you drink this beer, it has a crisp and fresh taste. There is nothing sweet or cloying about this beer, and the 6.2% ABV makes for a beer which has a light mouthfeel (not watery, but pleasant and light, what you want when you are thirsty)

The main flavour is bitterness without adstringency, you will find some grainy tones farther towards the back, and in the aftertaste the hops present themselves, again, a classical hop taste, not the newfangled modern ones (which I have nothing against, but that's not what this beer is about.)

Do not let the bitterness frighten you, this one has an IBU value of around 42 (I will not elaborate on what this is so as not to make this post too technical, but feel free to ask in the comments should you be interested).

42 IBU if you are not a beer drinker is quite a bitter beer. If you are a regular beer taster, and have gone through the entire IPA hype of the past years, 42IBU is less bitter than the weakest of IPA's worthy of the name.

Like I wrote. This is a trappist beer. You can recognize Trappists by the hexagonal symbol which is shown somewhere on the label. Inside the hexagonal symbol you can read: authentic TRAPPIST product. (right top of the label in the next picture)

I will review another trappist beer on Friday, in that post I shall elaborate further on what it takes to be a Trappist beer

Despite this being a beer which isn't all that high in alcohol, and which drinks easily, you will notice that one tends to be enough (Although I once did 4)

All the above applies to an Orval which is 1 year old or less. Over 1 year, it starts to become a somewhat different beer, reaching it's best state after about 5-6 years (which is at or past the use by date on the bottle). If I can get my hands on such a bottle, I will review that as well.

The reason for this change, is that for the bottle refermentation, the yeast: Brettanomyces Bruxellensis is added, the same one which forms a large part of the yeasts in a lambic, which makes geuze.

This means that it slowly keeps on fermenting all the available carbon sources, and after some time, it gives a refreshing acidity to the beer (though not approaching the acididy of a geuze or flemish brown)

Something about the brewery and the name

Like all Trappists, Orval is brewed inside the walls of the abbey, in this case the Notre-Dame d'Orval abbey in the Belgium province of Luxemburg.

The abbey was founded in 1132, though the beer dates from the 20th century.

The name of the Abbey (and thus of the beer) refers to the legend surrounding it's foundation. Some duchess had lost her engagement ring down a well, and prayed to God to restore the ring to her.

Not much later, in the nearby valley a fish jumped out of the nearby river, carrying the golden ring in his beak. (Orval is French for Golden Valley). Out of gratitude this duchess founded an abbey on that site.

This legend is also commemorated on the beerglass, where on the back is always represented a leaping fish holding a ring in it's beak.

And with that I bid you: cheers.