Black IPA Malts?

Here's the clone recipe that Stone gave out for Sublimely Self Righteous:

Grain Bill:
90% pale malt
5% 60°L Crystal
5% Weyermann Carafa III Special

OG target 1.082
Terminal Gravity target 1.016

Hops:
Bittering at start of boil: 100% Chinook
Flavor hops added at end of boil or whirlpool: 50/50 blend of Simcoe and Amarillo

Target 120 IBU’s.

Ferment with good ale yeast.

Dry-Hop with 50/50 blend of Simcoe and Amarillo, use LOTS!

 

I think the IBUs might be closer to 90...real IBUs maybe? (pg. 78)

 

I like Carafa III Special or Midnight Wheat. Do a cold steep for 24 hours then add to the boil with 5 mins left or do a short boil and chill overnight sealed in a mason jar and add it to the fermenter for the smoothest character you can get. I would recommend putting some Simcoe, Chinook, or CTZ alongside that FF. Black IPAs are really good with some dank or pine in the mix with fruits.

 

This beer should make everyone happy!

 

It can get some of the more acrid flavors if it is used hot. The other option is to mash the Base and Crystal for how ever long you mash for then mix in the Carafa just before you start your vorlauf, let the grain bed settle again, then run off and sparge. It all depends on what you are trying to achieve. Black IPAs (like SSR) are IPAs that are Black, CDAs are meant to show more of the roast character with over the top hops - like an over hopped porter or stout. Cold steeped and short boil will give the least amount of roast character and just color.

 

Make sure you get carafa special (aka dehusked or debittered) and not regular carafa, otherwise you'll end up with a stout. I've seen a lot of confusion over this, a lot of people aren't aware that there's two types.

 

I can understand that. My info was from talking with brewers up here in CDA country that were part of the defining and naming discussion to try to get CDA be the new official name a few years ago. They stated that the CDA has more roast/chocolate character with IPA hopping, opposed to SSR which wants color only and very little to no flavor impact (Stone rep agreed). There is a large overlap, and a lot of people making hoppy stouts calling them Black IPAs and a lot of IPAs turned black calling them CDAs. I personally like to make mine an IPA that is Black.

The whole debate over what it is and what it is called is why I have named every one I brew "Identity Crisis".

 

Ha, funny you mention that. I was judging a homebrew comp 2 weeks ago with Jamie Floyd, the brewer for Ninkasi. We were judging the IPA flights and had 2 nubee judges at our table with us and we were trying to explain the difference between English, American, and Double IPAs, and I mentioned that even in the American category there are East Coast and West Coast IPAs. Jamie then corrected me that there is actually East Coast, So Cal, and PNW IPAs.

 

Another option is to use a chocolate wheat...Weyermann makes one similar to Briess's Midnight wheat ... I believe almost all wheat is huskless to start with.

 

I like doing my black IPA's this way:

Nottingham yeast (has produced 2 really great black ipa's for me recently)
45-60 ibu's
3.5% chocolate wheat (or midnight wheat)
2.5% carafa (II or III special)
a touch of high lovibond caramel malt
a boat load of carapils (in my experience, black ipa's tend to come off dry and thin so I try to counter that)

do whatever you want for aroma / flavor hops, but centennial is my favorite "driving hop" in a Black IPA.

 

Yeah, it definitely isn't a part of the BJCP, but when judging it is good to have the ability to say, "I like my IPAs to be like X" and if the beer in front of me doesn't match X it doesn't matter, I am here to judge the IPA against the BJCP style guidelines and not against my preferences of the style. I like more of the SoCal version, sugar in the kettle, super dry, little to know crystal, and tons of hop flavor/aroma.

 

Can we stop with this CDA nonsense? Some Black IPAs have a little more roast than others. It's called an intepretation of a style, not a completely new style. IMO, styles need to be a little open to allow for intepretation.

 

I recommend starting with the Stone ratio first then tweaking it later. A common mistake people make is adding too much roasted malts and that is generally where astringency starts happening with the high hopping rates. I pretty much just do 90:5:5 but I like to add few ounces of Pale Chocolate malt just to give it a touch more chocolate character.