One of the last additions to Val-Dieu's Excellence series, their most prestigious project so far, consisting of barrel aged beers in luxury bottles with hangtag - and usually with a proportionally hefty price tag as well. This particular one is basically Val-Dieu Triple aged in Côte Rôtie wine barrels - Côte Rôtie being a notably highly valued wine, often considered the best in the Rhône region. Bottle from the Delhaize supermarket at the Watersportbaan in Ghent, a leftover from their year-end offers no doubt. Egg-white, plastery lacing, foamy, rocky, firm head (especially for a 'B.A.' beer) over a clear orange-glowing deep golden robe with visible sparkling throughout. Aroma of grape skin and white grape, white peaches, white bread, some vanilla-exuding oak wood, green pear, straw, honey, roses, unripe pineapple, dried chamomile, clove, fresh apple peel, raw turnip. Rounded, sleek sweetish onset, pear, peach and a dash of banana, even a touch strawberry, medium carbonated with rounded, smooth body; white-bready core having acquired a touch of biscuitiness from the barrels, very slick yet full, with orange water, persimmon, strawberry and watermelon hints building up, mingling with retronasal 'oaky' vanilla and this creamy wine element, adding complexity and elegance to an otherwise somewhat crude tripel. Nice tannic effects from the wine and the wood, as well as a lingering yet softish floral hop bitter note and warming, rosé-like alcohol. Not bad - in fact possibly the most interesting of the usually dull Val-Dieu output I had so far, quite complex, but still not worth its price tag for me (though perhaps just a bit more so than earlier Excellence editions).

White, bit fluffy head over metallic, well-carbonated copper beer; some lace. Alcohol, rainwater, aquarium water, waterplants, some grains, faint caramel. Sweet, alcoholic, grainy. Again rainwater and the aquarium nose returns retronasal. Mild phenols and watered caramel. Quite slick, even viscous, alcoholheat. Bit thirteen-to-the-dozen, for the visiting non-picky tourists. Txs to Stef!