Friday Friday Friday!
Woot! I'm celebrating this wonderful end of the work week with a Belgian beer made by monks, Orval. Its an incredibly effervescent beer due to the addition of wild yeast. The wild yeast gives it a tart taste similar to buttermilk. The malt backbone is simple and slightly sweet. It does more to showcase the yeast character than anything else. This bottle also has some hoppyness to it. I've had an older bottle that did not show much hops. Both are good. The hops are not the focus of this beer, however, if drank fresh i'll bet they would be quite strong. This beer does well with age in part because of the hops and because of the wild yeast. The wild yeast acts slowly but can ferment the beer to 'bone dry' in the bottle. This can cause even more carbonation so be careful when opening.
Posted via email from Ian's Posterous