Water filtered and grain milled for Black IPA

It’s time to brew a Black IPA – or a Cascadian Dark Ale, as they are often called – again.  Steve and I brewed a Black IPA, loosely based on a Steve Altimari recipe, back in 2009, and it is one of the top page views on this blog.  It was an awesome ale, with a huge citrusy flavor and nose.  But, the Sinamar we used for “beer food coloring” to darken the ale, left the ale muddy and I want to try and avoid that this time.  I’ll be using a combination of Belgian De-Bittered Black Malt and Weyermann Carafa III to naturally darken the ale.  Both of these roasted malts bring lots of color, but very little roasty flavor or astringency.  I am hoping for a bit of roastiness, along the lines of Rubicon Brewing’s Capricorn Black IPA.  Also, I’ll only be adding half of the two pounds of dark malts to the main mash grist.  I read on one of the brew boards that you can still get the color by adding the dark malts for the last fifteen minutes of the mash, but it mellows the roastiness and rounds off the edge of the astringency.  I do have some Sinamar on hand in case I’m not pleased with the color of the wort after the mash, but I’m hoping not to use it.

I also changed up the bittering hops in this batch.  I’ll be using Millenium hops in place of the Magnums we used last time.  My home town IPA, Dust Bowl Brewing’s Hops of Wrath relies heavily on Mellenium hops.  In the words of Dust Bowl’s head brewer, Don Oliver, “Think big alpha plus herbal – delicious hop!”  I’m sold!  Finally, I’ll be lucky to get all thirty pounds of grain in my mash tun.  Here’s the updated recipe for Back in Black IPA:

Back in Black IPA 2
14-B American IPA
Author: Mark Ranes
Date: 2/16/12

Size: 10.08 gal
Efficiency: 75.0%
Attenuation: 75.0%
Calories: 347.04 kcal per 16.0 fl oz

Original Gravity: 1.078 (1.070 – 1.090)
Terminal Gravity: 1.019 (1.010 – 1.020)
Color: 29.56 (8.0 – 15.0)
Alcohol: 7.69% (7.5% – 10.0%)
Bitterness: 79.5 (60.0 – 120.0)

Ingredients:
13.0 lb Pale Ale Malt
13.0 lb Maris Otter Pale
1.0 lb Cara-Pils Dextrine Malt
1.0 lb Carastan
1.0 lb Carafa III
1.0 lb De-Bittered Black Malt
1.0 oz Millenium (15.5%) – added during boil, boiled 60.0 m
3.0 oz Amarillo (8.5%) – added during boil, boiled 15.0 m
2.0 oz Simcoe (13.0%) – added during boil, boiled 15.0 m
1 tsp Yeast Nutrient – added during boil, boiled 10.0 m
3.0 oz Amarillo (8.5%) – added after boil, hop back
3.0 oz Simcoe (13.0%) – added after boil, hop back
2 ea Whirlfloc – added during boil, boiled 10.0 m
1000 mL Starter,White Labs WLP001 California Ale
1000 mL Starter, White Labs WLP002 English Ale
6.0 oz Amarillo (8.5%) – added dry to secondary fermenter

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Back in Black IPA Tap Handle

UPDATE! – I’d highly recommend using this updated version of the recipe.  It omits the Sinamar and uses both Carafa III and Debittered Belgian Black Malt for the dark color.

Batch 95

Before a recent Stockton Thunder game, I had the opportunity to enjoy a couple of Steve Altimari’s Black IPAs at Valley Brewing, in Stockton.  It was a big ‘ole IPA, bursting with a wonderful grapefruit finish from massive amounts of Amarillo hops, and dark as night.  Two of them made me really happy and set the tone for the evening:)

I contacted Steve on FaceBook and he was incredibly forthcoming about the hop bill, and how he darkened up the IPA, without adding the roastiness and astringency from dark grains.  The secret is to use Weyermann’s Sinamar, a proprietary extract of their roasted malt, Carafa, add some Magnum hops for bittering, and bunches or Simcoes and Amarillos for flavor and aroma.  What follows is a wide sweep at his recipe (I’m way too lazy to do the math from Steve’s info:) – with lots of late hops to add the grapefruit explosion.

I’m only five batches away from my centennial batch!

Back in Black IPA
14-C Imperial IPA
Brewers: Mark Ranes, Steve Hillestad
Brewer Focus: Maggie Curley
Date: 12/23/09

Size: 10.08 gal
Efficiency: 75.0%
Attenuation: 75.0%
Calories: 385.8 kcal per 16.0 fl oz

Original Gravity: 1.086 (1.070 – 1.090)
Terminal Gravity: 1.022 (1.010 – 1.020)
Alcohol: 8.56% (7.5% – 10.0%)
Bitterness: 100.0 (60.0 – 120.0)

Ingredients:
15.0 lb Pale Malt(2-row)
15.0 lb Maris Otter Pale
1.0 lb Cara-Pils Dextrine Malt
1.0 lb Carastan
1.0 lb Carafa TYPE III- in the Sparge
2.0 oz Magnum (14.5%) – added during boil, boiled 60.0 min
2.0 oz Amarillo Gold (10.0%) – added during boil, boiled 15.0 min
2.0 oz Simcoe (13.0%) – added during boil, boiled 15.0 min
4.0 oz (or more) Sinamar – added during boil, boiled 10.0 min
2 Servomyces Yeast Nutrient – added during boil, boiled 10.0 min
2 ea Whirlfloc – added during boil, boiled 10.0 min
3.0 oz Simcoe (13.0%) – added during boil, boiled 1.0 min
3.0 oz Amarillo Gold (10.0%) – added during boil, boiled 1.0 min
2000 mL White Labs WLP001 California Ale
8.0 oz Amarillo Gold (10.0%) – added dry to secondary fermenter

We’ll be brewing this up at Steve and Maggie’s place, on the Buford 3-10. Additionally, we’ll be fermenting in Steve’s kegmentor (or is that a fermeggle:), so we get 10 gallons of the same wort fermenting in one vessel.  We’ll dry hop with 8 ounces of new crop Amarillo pellet hops that are en-route from Hops Direct.

Black IPAs may simply be a trend, but I’m looking forward to this ale!

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