Belgian style yeasts and hops

Hey everybody! I'm starting to rough out plans for my next brew and was hoping for some feedback. I'm planning on brewing a Beligan Dubbel. I'm looking for a yeast strain that will give me some nice spicey notes without being overly fruity, as well as a hop that will lend some earthy / spicey notes.

I'm most interested in what yeast strains / hops you have used in the past, how it turned out, and what you would recommend?

i like white labs belgian ale yeast, and ive heard the belgian abbey ale yeast is good to. gotta deal with the fruitiness though, its a feature of any belgian yeast strain. or you can try cultivating smoe yeast off a belgian beer you like, assuming you can figure out if its the primary strain. it seems like most belgian ales like the german noble hop varieties, but im not too experienced with brewing belgian beers (only done one so far), just drinking them.

I'm figuring that I can control the fruity notes (primarily banana and bubblegum notes) by keeping the fermentation temps down. Not looking to get rid of the fruity flavors all together, I just don't want to be drinking banana juice when it's all said and done

I'm going to brew a Belgium Dubble this weekend, which I have never done before. I am using liquid yeast, when I get home I'll find out specifically what it is (guy at homebrew shop recommended it) and let you know.

Dubbels (and most Belgian beers) don't use a lot of hops at all. One of the noble, low-alpha hops like Saaz would be appropriate, but not much, and no late additions. You don't want a hop nose in a dubbel.

It's a wonder I love Belgian beers with their attitude toward hops

Cheers!

After reading through style guidelines, it looks like what I have in mind is closer to a Tripel then a Dubbel. Saaz sounds good hops wise. Haullertaur (sp?) is also looking like a candidate.

Tripel is still going to want to be very lightly hopped. Hallertau is a good choice. For a Tripel, I would definitely add sugar, since you want a very high alcohol beer with not too much body (unlike a dubbel, which is somewhat malty...and should also most likely have sugar). I have read that the color in a dubbel comes primarily from dark candi sugar. Me? I'd use invert sugar in either one of them...