La Brasserie d’Orval
I mentioned last week that I hosted a “Drink Like a Monk” event at my house for several friends and fellow beer enthusiasts. On our tasting menu that night were beers from five of the seven Trappist breweries located in Belgium and Holland. I decided to start the tasting that evening with the beer from the Orval brewery located in the Gaume region of Belgium. Modern brewing operations at Orval commenced in 1931. Orval brews one beer for commercial release and a low alcohol version of the same beer for consumption within the abbey. This complex dry, hoppy brew is distinct from any of the other Trappist ales. The use of Brettanomyces, a wild microflora commonly used in Lambics, lends an acidic note to the beer. In many places I’ve seen other beer writers describe the flavor as horsey or leathery. One of my friends described it as “wet saddle blanket,” but I have to say I have no idea what these people are talking about. I grew up on a working farm. I had a horse for a pet. I know what horse and leather smells like. I had my nose in my fair share of wet saddle blankets and Orval reminds me of none of the experiences.
Tasters enjoy comparing vintages of Orval. On the bottle is printed the date the beer was bottled. The “best before” date is set at five years from that date, but you can probably ignore it. If you cellar the beer properly (upright at 50-55 °F, Michael Jackson recommends 53 °F or 12 °C, see The Great Beers of Belgium [Third Edition, 1998]) then you can store bottles for years, though don’t expect much hop character to be left in examples that are five years and older. The flavor and aroma will continue to develop such that a five year old Orval will be different from a three year old bottle. I’ve never had a bottle older than five years, so I don’t know how the beer does beyond that. My personal preference is to drink Orval fresh, at or before six months, but while I enjoy Orval my experience of it is not at the connoisseur level (yet). Although the bottle I served at the tasting last week was four years old and I found it to be rounded and pleasing with a full vinous character.
You should cellar the bottles yourself, so that you can be sure of their temperature and storage conditions. Buy them young (two at a time at least). Drink one and put the other in the cellar. After a few years, you’ll have a fine collection for doing a vertical tasting. In fact, that is what I am doing. (You don’t want to buy a bottle that has been sitting on the shelf at room temperature for extended periods. Nor do you want a bottle that has been stored at refrigerator temperatures as this will adversely affect the beer’s development by slowing or stopping the live microflora in the beer.)
Micheal Jackson quotes a former head brewer at La Brasserie d’Orval, Roger Schoonjans, on the variability of Orval:
“People do not want our beer to taste exactly the same every time,” Roger Schoonjans once observed to me. “They want the goût d’Orval, for sure, but they want to be able to chat about it: ‘I think this one is a little more hoppy… yesterday’s was rounder…’ In that respect they treat it like wine.”
This is one of the beautiful aspects of bottle-conditioned beers (beers that are refermented in the bottle with an addition of yeast at bottling time). Not only do they keep extraordinarily well in the cellar, they continue to develop in character, taste, and aroma.
Donavan, nice job of capturing why Orval appeals in different ways to different people.
A couple of brewing points that may affect how Orval ages:
1 - Within the past year the brewery began adding the Brett only at bottling rather than in secondary.
The brewer, Jean-Marie Rock, says that he prefers Orval without Brett character, which won’t come out until 6 months. Having recently tasted three different batches in the 2-4 month range I’d agree the Brett is muted - but there is some.
2 - That beer in that four-year-old bottle you had would have been fermented in open tanks, while today’s batches ferments in tall conicals. The brewery did plenty of tests with an idea of creating the same product, but only years will tell if there are differences in the ways beers from two different processes age.
Back to the appeal of Orval. The next All About Beer magazine will carry something of a roundtable discussion among the five American brewers who took their extreme beers to Belgium in March. For a sidebar I asked them each to pick a training wheel beer for those sticking their toe in extreme waters for the first time.
Vinnie Cilurzo chose Orval. He said:
“At first glance it might seem to extreme for a beginner, but, here is my thinking: When the beer is young there is little Brettanomyces (wild yeast) character, yet lots of hops. In my mind, the hops are more complex than your typical American IPA or Double IPA. As the beer ages, the Brettanomyces comes forth and melds with the hops. Over time, the Brett can come and go. I was amazed when we tasted several vintages of Orval. The two-year old Orval was so full of Brett. At five years the Brett had diminished, yet at seven years it was even more bright than the two-year old. This is what I like about Orval; it is a beer that can age. Orval can age with the best of wines. Orval elevates beer to a level of wine in that it can age, and change, and be a different beer. In a way that is what we are trying to do with a lot of our beers.”
Prosit - Stan