New Belgium Brewing Spiced Imperial Dark Ale

Va D’Or, the valley of gold. It’s in this pastoral corner of Belgium that elegant stone buttresses and sun-kissed statues mark Orval Abbey, producers of one of the finest golden beers in the world, Orval. Valley of gold, indeed. For our final Lips of Faith collaboration this year, we teamed up with Orval brewmaster Anne-Françoise Pypaert to craft a counterpart to the classic golden ale: Spiced Imperial Dark Ale.

This bold beer’s brewed with layers of specialty malts, dry-hopped with herbal French Strisselspalt, and spiced with citrusy grains of paradise and spruce tips. We then steeped toasted American oak spirals in the beer for two weeks, bringing a subtle spicy, vanilla flavor to tie the chocolaty malts and citrus spices together.