Here's to Beer! A Lesson From Belgium: Part One

Westvleteren Trappist Ale

It's mid-Sunday afternoon and myself and a group of other beer enthusiasts are making the pilgrimage up to the Abbey of St. Sixtus, where the Trappist beer Westvleteren is brewed and served. Our mini bus traverses the increasing smaller roads that wind through increasingly smaller towns in this far flung corner of Belgium. We pass through the town of Vicht, and I have a glimmer of excitement as we pass the Verhaeghe Brewery, where one of my favorite beers, Duchess de Bourgogne, is brewed. The excitement fades quickly as I realize the brewery is closed. We travel on as the surroundings begin to evolve into farmland. Some of the farms are clearly hops producers, with trellises bare during this off time of the season.

Finally, we reach the Abbey, and proceed to their tasting room. Westvleteren is a special beer in that it is the only Trappist beer which is not exported for sale in other countries, which makes it somewhat rare to say the least. The monks of St. Sixtus like it that way, and place strict controls on the amounts of beer that even the locals may buy. They do so via a reservation system in which individuals may buy only fixed quantities over a set period of time.

For the enthusiast, it’s really best to make the journey to the Abbey and sample it there. This shows respect to the wishes of the monks who produce the beer, and once you visit, you can begin to understand why they feel this way. Sitting out on the back porch, looking out over the expanses of countryside, smelling the fertile earth, and sipping your Westy, you gain an understanding of what makes this beer, and the place itself, so very special. It’s an alembic of sorts, where people, land, and culture form an elixir which speaks to you from your glass.

Westvleteren comes in three varieties, the 6, the 8, and the 12. These numbers technically refer to the degrees Plato of each beer (a measurement of gravity, or concentration of malt sugars in the beer). The 6 is a bright, hoppy blond ale. The 8, a fruity dubbel, and the 12 is a massive strong dark ale with a complex flavor and long finish. The commonality amongst them is a peppery, clove-like spiciness that can only be attributed to the Westmalle yeast they use. My favorite of the group is, to my surprise, the blond ale, and its assertive hoppiness, courtesy of indigenously grown Northern Brewer hops.

When it was time to leave, some in our group scrambled to get one of the bottles that were in very tight supply at the tasting room store. I had come to this place with designs on doing just that, but ultimately, it felt somewhat like taking home a seashell from the ocean, just so I could desperately listen to it later and attempt to hear the waves crashing, and perhaps get some small whiff of salt water.

I left the Westvleteren at the Abbey, where it belongs. We made our way back to the town of Aalst, where we were to spend the night amidst a crazy Carnival. It was there I encountered a beer of quite a different sort...

Check back next week for part two of this post!

Rich Coffey is a professional chef and the first certified Cicerone in the state of Washington. Find out more about him here.