BIAB#3: Black IPA

[IainM]

OK, so yesterday I put on a Black IPA, my third BIAB and the first recipe I created myself, and the first time using liquid yeast.

Total in fv: 24 litres
IBU: ~72
SRM: ~31
OG: 1.074

Grain bill:
5kg Pilsner
500g Melanoidin
300g Midnight Wheat
200g BlackPrinz
1 can Coopers Lager, add after chilling

90 min mash at 65C, in 20L of Tesco Ashbeck. 7L sparge in three runnings. The final running had gravity of 1.026 @ 49C (= 1.035 corrected for temperature), so I probably could have done more, but didn't want to overdo the volume.

Hop additions:
30g Nugget leaf (15.4%AA) @ 60mins
20g Citra leaf (14.6%AA) @ 5 mins
0.5 whirlfloc @ 5 mins
1tsp yeast nutrient @ 5mins
30g Citra leaf (14.6%AA) @ 0 mins, after cooling to 80C, left for 25 mins before chilling

I added 2L of chilled water to get it down to pitching temp (22C), before beating the hell out of it. I pitched with a healthy 3L starter of Wyeast 1272 (American Ale Yeast II), which had a good 2cm of white yeast at the bottom and was still active. The wort was jet black and had a decent bitter kick to it, but not much in the way of roastiness. I plan on dry hopping with:
50g Citra leaf
25g Mosaic leaf
25g Galaxy leaf
25g Summer leaf
30g Falconer's Flight 7Cs pellets.

Everything went smoothly, and the hop filter actually worked this time. I've gotta say, I'm really really looking forward to this one.

 

[Covrich]

Sounds good, did you hit your target OG ?

 

[IainM]

Sounds good, did you hit your target OG ?

Close enough. Brewers Friend said 1.081 at 23L, and I got 1.074 at 24L, so not far off. I could have got more out of the sparge, but as long as its strong and hoppy I'll be happy :smile:

 

[Covrich]

I work it out as 67% efficiency roughly so that's not too bad :smile:

 

[machin05]

That's quite the dry hop schedule!

 

[IainM]

That's quite the dry hop schedule!

It is. Until I flicked through DIYDog I would've thought it too much, but I do love a hop-bomb. My next planned brews are much more sensible.

 

[Leon103]

Sounds a nice brew. Need to do a bipa soon

 

[IainM]

This really took off. Went away for the weekend and came back to my beer escaping out the fv and going into the flexi-bucket. I cleaned it out and was amazed by the amount of yeast!

 

[IainM]

Right, it is stable at 1.017, giving around 7.5% abv, which is just about what I was looking for. I dry-hopped today with 20g FF7C pellets, 42g citra leaf, 20g summer leaf, 20g mosaic leaf and 20g galaxy pellets. I also made a hop tea with 5g FF7Cs, 10g citra, 9g summer, 5g mosaic and 10g galaxy. The trial jar tasted promising, so I've got high hopes for this one.

 

[IainM]

Bottled this yesterday. I got 22L into the bottling bucket and batch primed with 150g boiled table sugar, as I do like a bit of fizz. Boiled muslin over the sediment trap worked a treat in keeping all those hops out without getting blocked. I got 41 500ml bottles in the end. I've got quite a stash at the moment, so if any forumites find themselves near Cambridge (or possibly Maidenhead) areas and fancies trying it, you're more than welcome to come pick up a bottle.

 

[Leon103]

Bottled this yesterday. I got 22L into the bottling bucket and batch primed with 150g boiled table sugar, as I do like a bit of fizz. Boiled muslin over the sediment trap worked a treat in keeping all those hops out without getting blocked. I got 41 500ml bottles in the end. I've got quite a stash at the moment, so if any forumites find themselves near Cambridge (or possibly Maidenhead) areas and fancies trying it, you're more than welcome to come pick up a bottle.

I don't live near you but we can do a beer swap once my packaging arrives?

 

[Covrich]

Sounds Good IainM.. I think you can get away with a bit more fizz in an IPA especially since thats a heavy looking one!!!.!

Stick a picture up when its ready and in the glass!! Given its strength I wonder how young you can get away with drinking it?

Have thought about a BIPA for a while now, never done one..

 

[IainM]

I don't live near you but we can do a beer swap once my packaging arrives?

Sounds great. I still have the packaging from BrumBrew's win a bottle, so I can use that.

 

[IainM]

Sounds Good IainM.. I think you can get away with a bit more fizz in an IPA especially since thats a heavy looking one!!!.!

Stick a picture up when its ready and in the glass!! Given its strength I wonder how young you can get away with drinking it?

Have thought about a BIPA for a while now, never done one..

Yeah, BIPAs are full of contradictions. They are dark, so use hard water, but also hoppy, so use soft. They are American IPAs, so should be fizzy, but are dark ales, so shouldn't. They are strong, so should be aged, but are hoppy so should be drunk young. Perhaps it was a little foolish of me to choose this style as my first recipe design! My intuition is that they can be drunk early, but I guess I'll find out in the coming weeks.

 

[Covrich]

You have made it a little stronger than I would have gone for myself. But you may get away with it being drunk early

I did the HBC american DIPA last year which I split in two without the equipment at the time to do full scale brew.. First half was bang on 6.5% and coudl be drunk nice and early. the second half my efficiency was much higher and like yours 1078 ish.. as a result it had a hot alcoholic taste and despite the dry hop it needed a few extra weeks before that wasn't dominating..

Will be interesting to see which works..

 

[Leon103]

Sounds great. I still have the packaging from BrumBrew's win a bottle, so I can use that.

Drop me a pm and we can arrange.

 

[IainM]

I couldn't help myself. Nine days in the bottle and I crack one open. Carbed up nicely, and wonderful and hoppy. If it tastes this good now, I can't wait to try it again in a couple of weeks!

 

[IainM]

This is, by far, the best thing I've brewed so far. Shame I only have five left! I picked up a bargain on ebay for �£12.50, including a pressure barrel, CO2 kit, fv, hydrometer/spoon etc... and it came with two kits, a Coopers European Lager and another Coopers Lager. I still have some Blackprinz and Midnight Wheat left, and I'll definitely be using the Coopers Lager and dehusked malt to make another version of this. I'll probably go for pilsner malt again, perhaps with melanoidin but maybe something else. Nugget worked well for the bitterness, but I'd like to change the hop combo. Hmmmm.... decisions decisions.

 

[IainM]

OK, I got up early to put another version of this on yesterday. Managed to get this in the fv, kitchen tidied and 42 bottles of Hobgoblin clone bottled all before lunch. I wanted to use up bits that were lying around, hence the carapils and flaked barley.

5.00kg Pilsner
0.75kg Munich
0.20kg Midnight Wheat
0.30kg Blackprinz
0.25kg Carapils
0.25kg Flaked barley
75min mash @ 67C with 24L water, followed by 10L dunk sparge @ 70C

31g Nugget @60 mins
0.5 protofloc @10 mins
20g Falconers Flight @flameout

1 can Coopers Lager added to the fv after the boil

2x Wilko Gervin, rehydrated. Pitched @22C, now sitting at 19C.

The pilsner and Munich malt were crushed over two months ago, so I was expecting low efficiency, and there was still sugar in the grains after the sparge. Consequently, the 26L I got in the boiler with gravity of 1.055, so only 68% efficiency in the kettle. Ended up with 24L in the fv after adding the kit, with OG of 1.071. Will dry hop with 30-40g each Cascade and Amarillo and 80g Falconers Flight. I hope this turns out as well as the previous one, as that went down very nicely indeed.