Orval & Some General Thoughts

Well, what a beautiful few days its been. This has given me more time to sit in the sun and drink, as well as working on things at home. At the moment, I'm embarking on a "Good Life" type thing at the moment, planting out a large garden for fruit and veg and, dun dun daah, starting brewing.
It still in the pipeline though, so I'll be talking about that in a the coming weeks.
In the meantime, I'm going to talk about a beer called Orval. This is a Trapist beer, so, like the breed, its a fairly aromatic ale. However, it goes beyond what you'd normally expect, and it stands out from the crowd. Where it stands is pretty much left field. It's scented, almost to the point of being perfumed, with a nice little taste of wheat in the background, just to remind you that it is a beer, and not channel No.5. In many ways it was similar to a sparkling wine, and I find myself wanting to state that it had a fine mousse, in that it formed a strong head of small bubbles. If it were a wine, it would be something in the Gewürztraminer area, and incidentally I've got one of those in the fridge (again, courtesy of Ben), and I'll be talking about it in the near future. In what may turn into a tradition for me, here's a picture I borrowed to give you kind people an idea what to look for.


If anyone would like to know more about this particularly interesting beer, here's the website for their brewery http://www.orval.be/an/FS_an.html , of course, it's no substitute for going and buying a bottle and tasting it. However, for me it's not going to be a regular, it's a bit too perfumed for me, but I aim to drink a few Trappist beers, and then have another go at it to see if I change my mind. For now, I gave it 14/20.