Sarah has had a request on deck for quite a while: Cascadian Dark Ale (CDA, aka Black IPA) 🙂 Inspired somewhat by Hop in the Dark, as well as a few recipes on HBT, and given what’s on-hand at home and at Nepenthe, I cobbled this together.
Recipe Type: All-Grain
Yeast: WLP001
Yeast Starter: two pint jars of trub from Batch 32, taken 4/13 so approximately 2 weeks old (approx. 250ml of junk, unclear even approximately how much of it is yeast)
Batch Size (Gallons): 5.5 gallons
Original Gravity: 1.0?? (before cold-steep addition)
Final Gravity:
IBU: ~64 (depends on what app you ask)
Boiling Time (Minutes): 60
Color: 40+
Primary Fermentation (# of Days & Temp): pitched yeast at 68*
Mash:
8# Rahr 2row
1# Torrified Wheat
.5# C60
Mashed in with 3.8g of water at 164* into the red round mash tun. At 5 and 20 minutes post-mash, temperature held steady at 151*
Hop/addition Schedule:
4 oz CTZ (17.5% AAU) added, 8g a minute, from 15 minutes to the end of the boil
1 whirlfloc added at 10 minutes, with the immersion chiller
Cold steeped (start: 1:15p) in 5 quarts of room temperature for 8 hours, then held at 170* for 10 minutes, then cooled and added to the fermenter:
1# black malt (dehusked)
.5# roasted barley
.5# pale chocolate
after 2nd runnings (of 3), 1.029G at 135* (corrected to 1.043)
start of 3rd runnings, 0.995 at 138* (corrected to 1.009)
UPDATE 5/16/14: racked 6+ gal to 2ndary, dry hopped with 1oz cascade leaf, 1oz Columbus pellet
UPDATE 5/26/14: racked to keg, force carb’d at 25psi rocking the keg for 15 minutes. Amazing beer. Black as night. Quite bitter, but complex with a rich and silky mouthfeel. Hops aren’t as present as I want them to be, but this may be a water profile issue (i.e. fixable with water adjustments). Also, though my memory is a bit hazy, I recall Hop in the Dark being a bit maltier, maybe caramelier. I should try to be more true to the posted (and roughly stated, on Deschutes web site) recipes. Either way, good beer. Really gonna enjoy this one!
Sarah thought it was too bitter 🙁 And I can see that. Not a problem for me because I like bitter, but next time: add brewing salts to accentuate hops, maybe add less hops for the late addition, cut down on the black malt (maybe 0.5#?), and add oats, munich, and maybe 0.5# more C60