Black IPA as "Regular" Russian Stout -- A Thought Experiment

I think the 1st Black IPA was made by throwing some black malt into an IPA, not throwing more hops into a stout. I think the aim of an IBA is more focused on an IPA than just mouthfeel. Most seem to have just a hint of roast and use american hops which usually means IPA. Pretty sure IBA are mostly jus an ocptical illusion.

I love the style tho. Theres a lot of ways to brew the kind you like.

 

I just had a Mikkeller Beer Hop Breakfast and it raised a similar question. It tasted so much more like a Black IPA than a stout. However the hop presence completely blew away your standard RIS, so I'm not sure it's fair to throw them in the same category. Same lineage, maybe...but not the same.

 

I recently had Old Raspy and Dubhe back to back - had the same exact thought.

 

Black IPAs are very hop forward. RISs are thick, heavily malt based beers, with hops that ride that wave. Even the hoppiest RIS is nothing like a BIPA.

 

When do we get to the thought experiment?

 

I know it may sound like crazy talk but I've aged a few American Black Ales (I personally hate calling a beer both black & pale, but that's my own issue). Most noteably Jailhouse's first "Solitary Confinment" release, Midnight Express, was a 10%+ beast that was super hoppy and big bodied in January 2011. It has aged freakin awesome and now I'd pit it against many aged stouts.
So for me determining which style it's closer to all depends on when you drink it...

 

been a bit since i had a Storm King but i'd say this is a pretty solid analogy

 

Let's replace one misnomer with another?

 

With the craft beer revolution going strong, so many breweries are doing so many different things to styles that to keep them apart would be a fool's labor. Different countries have different trends: if you try a Dutch imperial stout, for example, you'll tend to find a LOT of hops in there. A lot of stouts that are extremely succesful in the Netherlands would be classified as Black IPAs in other parts of the world, because the Dutch like their hops so much. Here in Belgium, you'd be hard-pressed to find that and head more into the biscuity, banana-like quality of our yeast and pale malts.

I know there are standards out there (the BJCP Style Guidelines, for example) to bring a little order in the chaos, but I can agree that there are a gazillion beers out there that blur the boundries between the genres.

Another good example is the Conqueror 1075 Black IPA by Windsor & Eton (UK). If you sold that as a stout in the Netherlands, no one would give it a second thought.

As far as I know the Black IPA is an American invention (I forgot the guy's name), but you don't see them a lot here. Whenever I get a lighter mouthfeel and tons of hops on a stout, I tend to taste it as if it were a Black IPA.

 

Spend a few minutes on google looking at black IPA recipes and RIS recipes, then tell us how similiar you think they are.

 

That's because for most commercial brewers it seems as if the marketing of the style is more important than actaully brewing the style correctly. Unwillingness (for one reason or another) to use enough hops so you recognize it as IPA first, dark beer second has made a mockery of the style - which is not any different than what we used to call a hoppy porter 10+ years ago.

 

In a past thread a poster brought up the discussion as a comparison of Black IPA vs. a Hoppy Porter (vs. RIS). Below is something I posted in that thread:

I think that the brewer of Kernal Brewery (London, England) has a good perspective on the topic of Black IPA vs. hoppy Porters.

“Black IPA (or more simply; IBA) versus Export India Porter

I know that the style, naming, etc. of these dark ales has been discussed to death on here, but hopefully a recent email that I received will add a little more information to the discussion. There may be others, but I could only find one brewery that brewed both an India Porter and a Black IPA and that brewery is the Kernel Brewery in London. So I decided to send off an email asking for some brewer's insight as to what they saw as the differences, given that they decided to brew both as distinct styles. They were more than courteous to explain it as they saw it. I thought that their reply was interesting enough to share here. Here is their reply...

Thanks for the email. We really appreciate the fact that you care enough to ask us about these beers, because for us that is partly the reason for brewing them.

I think that any brewery would have their own take on certain styles, and what one brewery calls style 'x' another would call style 'y'. So we can only speak of our own interpretation of the difference between a Black IPA and an Export India Porter. To put it simply, while both beers use dark malts and lots of hops, the Black IPA should be definitely dominated by the hops, while the EIP should be dominated by the darker malts. There probably is a point between these 2 styles where they may meet, but it is important to us to keep them distinct.

Our Black IPA keeps to a simple IPA recipe, with the addition of Carafa III malt, which is a dark roasted malt, but it has been dehusked or debittered, so it provides colour and a chocolate flavour, but not the roasted astringent flavour of more classic dark malts (roasted barley or black malt). It is not quite a Pale IPA coloured black, but the hops still dominate the flavour profile.

We brewed the first EIP partly to answer the question that was often thrown at us as to what the difference was between a black IPA and a hoppy porter. The recipe we used is from 1855. We kept the grain bill the same, but decided to change the hops to US varieties and have used them in a manner similar to a modern IPA. This is already moving the EIP in the direction of a Black IPA. But the malt still dominates. It is roasty, ashy, astringent, chocolatey, and then the hops kick in with some lighter notes.

Hope this helps. Have you managed to try both of these beers from us?

Let us know if you have any further questions.

All the best.
Evin”

 

This. "Black IPAs" are a stylistic joke to begin with, and they're "closer" to neither an IPA or a RIS. They ARE hoppy porters.

 

BA calls them American Black Ales.


Sounds good to me!

 

I'd say the people making them correctly (correct in my opinion) would never make a porter the way they make a Black IPA. I know I wouldn't. Two different malt profiles in my book.

 

A "real" black IPA is a specific, and unique thing. But yes, hoppy porters calling themselves something else do exist as well. It's a very subtle difference, but I think the Kernel guy explains the essence of it well.

 

Especially this part:

"Our Black IPA keeps to a simple IPA recipe, with the addition of Carafa III malt, which is a dark roasted malt, but it has been dehusked or debittered, so it provides colour and a chocolate flavour, but not the roasted astringent flavour of more classic dark malts (roasted barley or black malt). It is not quite a Pale IPA coloured black, but the hops still dominate the flavour profile."