Val-Dieu Triple

Brewed by Brasserie de l’Abbaye du Val-Dieu
Style: Abbey Tripel
Aubel, Belgium

Frothy long-lasting white head on a deep golden body. Nice sweet aroma. Filling taste, notes of fruits and spices, no alcoholic taste at all, and that’s a fine achievement. I would dreink this beer anytime again. One very good blonde.

Probably a 2003 or 2004 bottle at the Downtown Liquors Trippel tasting 3/24/05. Explosive uncorking with mountains of foamy white head and a dulled copper-gold body. Good head retention and plenty of lacing. Aroma has notes of lemon sugar cookies, not much funky yeast, honey, cookie dough and light perfume. Alcohol VERY well masked in both the aroma and flavor. Flavor is immediately malty sweet. Good mouthfeel, this stuff really wraps around the palate and has quite a substantial body to it. Light lemon zest notes, lots of pils and/or caravienne malt sweetness. I get no hops out of this, though many mention them. Yeast is very restrained in this one, which is my only complaint. This almost seems like an Americanized version. No musty, corky, dry yeastiness, or little of it, anyways. Perhaps it’s just the force of the malt. Regardless, this stuff has a wonderful body, mouthfeel and wonderfully extracted malts. A big surprise, as I’ve never heard any raves about this stuff. It’s strange, as usually I like very dry, overly yeasty, highly phenolic trippels, and this one is about as far from that as I’ve had.

750mL bottle. Date on the cork: 09/05. I was always hesitant on getting one of these. I’m not really sure why, Val-Dieu seems Wal-Martish, I guess. Looks like any other Tripel. Aroma is pretty good, banana, citrus, yeast and peppery spices. First few sips are rather sweet, the banana and the citrus really greet you. There’s a very slight peppery spice going on in the background. It’s always there, but always in the background. Toward the end of the bottle, there’s a lot of sediment, and the alcohol sits up and says hello. It finishes with a sting and some dryness. It’s good, but nothing really separates it from others in the style. (Kind of like WalMart)

Fairly pale frothy beer with a particularly light aroma and a strong fermented flavour that does nothing for me. Overall a disappointing beer.

On tap at Humpy’s, Anchorage AK (2003). Poured golden with a nice fluffy white head. Nose is banana, clove, pepper, yeast, alcohol...fruity and spicy. Taste was an extension of the aromas with bananas, pepper, cloves, and alcohol dominating to the finish. My wife liked this a lot more than I did.

750 ml caged and corked bottle. Pours hazy bright golden yellow with lots of floating yeast chunks, nice cream colored lasting head that leaves good lacing. Fruity and spicy aromas. Fruity vanilla, tropical fruit and pepper flavors, very dry and crisp finish. Full bodied with a full and crisp mouthfeel, alcohol well hidden and very drinkable.

Light honey yellow color, dusty and light orange nose. Peppery grapefruit Taste. Some vanilla notes come through too.

Bottle Conditioned at The Criterion, Leicester, (RB Crawl). Gold to straw colour, struggling head. Sweet vanilla like beer with a spicy aroma. Some clove and orange in the body but a little cloying and mixed up. Light body but mostly unimaginative.