[egg]

Any comments welcome - this is a first attempt for me! Cheers

Colour - I want it to be 'black' in the glass, not brown.  Dark brown in the pour and at the extreme edges would be OK.  I know that sounds unimportant, but I will be disappointed if I produce a brown IPA! Does 37 SRM sound enough? That's Brewmate's prediction, which tends to be about right on my rig.

Taste - I want a reasonable contribution from the carafa - my goal is not to produce an IPA that happens to be coloured black - but neither do I want anything acrid, charred, or just a mess.  The best black IPAs I've had manage to tread that line really well.  Hops wise, am I OK to go entirely for flameout and later, as per below? I always seem to end up with enough bitterness one way or the other.

I will prepare the water to around 90ppm CaCO3, 100 Ca, 100 Cl and 75 SO4

5.25 gal batch to around OG 1.071

Crisp Pale (Flagon) 85.5%
Munich I 5%
Crystal 80 (SRM) 5%
Carafa III (700SRM) 4.5%

153f Mash for 60 mins
WLP007 1.5L shaken starter
Ferment at 63f

Hopping:

None in boil

Flameout: 0.33 oz Citra leaf + 0.33 Galaxy leaf

185f: 0.33 oz Citra leaf + 0.33 Galaxy leaf + 0.33 Centennial pellet

176f: 1.33 Citra leaf + 1 oz Galaxy leaf + 0.5 Centennial pellet

Allow to cool to 167f then hold for 15 mins.

Dry Hop 1 (FV High Kraeusen @63f): 0.33 Citra pellet + 0.33 Galaxy pellet

Dry Hop 2 (FG, secondary @59f; 3 days): 3 oz Citra pellet + 3 oz Galaxy pellet

[Stevie]

My 2 cents - Ditch the C80 for a lighter crystal. Increase the hop amounts.

[egg]

Well I went with the grains as listed above, but it looks like this is stopping out around 1.018 from and OG of 1.068.  It may drop another point yet, but it's certainly almost there.  A bit high.

I've seen some BIPA recipes with a sugar/syrup addition.  I'm wondering whether I should still do that now, just to thin it out a bit; all the hops so far were whirlpooled, so my bitterness is low, and some extra alcohol won't hurt with the amount of dextrins left in there.  Is this a good plan?

I'm going to give it all the dry hops together in secondary - I didn't bother with the small addition mid-primary in the end, and any diastatic effect from the hops is yet to come.  I reckon that the combination of a high FG and a heavy dry hop is a dangerous combination for bottling, when I would typically dry hop at a lower temperature than primary, not that any sugar addition reduces that risk.

[klickitat jim]

How does it taste carbonated?

[Adam]

Well I went with the grains as listed above, but it looks like this is stopping out around 1.018 from and OG of 1.068.  It may drop another point yet, but it's certainly almost there.  A bit high.

I've seen some BIPA recipes with a sugar/syrup addition.  I'm wondering whether I should still do that now, just to thin it out a bit; all the hops so far were whirlpooled, so my bitterness is low, and some extra alcohol won't hurt with the amount of dextrins left in there.  Is this a good plan?

I'm going to give it all the dry hops together in secondary - I didn't bother with the small addition mid-primary in the end, and any diastatic effect from the hops is yet to come.  I reckon that the combination of a high FG and a heavy dry hop is a dangerous combination for bottling, when I would typically dry hop at a lower temperature than primary, not that any sugar addition reduces that risk.

Egg, Do you happen to have another beer going with a different strain of yeast?  You could try and add some fresh chico yeast or even nottingham and see if that would help bring the FG down a little bit more.   

[skyler]

My experience has been that 1.25-1.5 lbs of carafa 3 or midnight wheat added at lauter has been the perfect amount for pitch black. I now usually go with (per 6 gallons wort since I lose a lot to dry hops), .5 lbs crystal 40-60L and 1-1.5 lbs Munich have been my sweet spot.

Sent from my SM-G960U using Tapatalk

[egg]

My experience has been that 1.25-1.5 lbs of carafa 3 or midnight wheat added at lauter has been the perfect amount for pitch black. I now usually go with (per 6 gallons wort since I lose a lot to dry hops), .5 lbs crystal 40-60L and 1-1.5 lbs Munich have been my sweet spot.

Sent from my SM-G960U using Tapatalk

I guess mine is a lot paler then, as I only put about 2/3lb Carafa III in my ending 5.5 gallon batch, which would also be about 6 gallons before kettle losses to trub/hops, though it was all in the mash, and my crystal was darker.  It's definitely dark brown in the pour rather than black, though once it gathers in a sample jar/glass, it's JUST about dark enough.  I've had commerical examples that are a similar 37-40 IBU.

At the moment it tastes very loosely like an English porter.  No acrid roast in there, more chocolate.  I'm allowing for some bitterness from the big dry hop to come, but I do wonder whether a sugar addition would help to dry it out and raise the relative balance/bitterness a little. 

I can't force carb any Jim, but I guess some sparkle in there may cut the high FG a bit... maybe.

Adam, I don't have anything going, though I would acclimatise some SO4 in a starter if I thought it was a yeast issue.  It's at 75%AA and the 007 normally dries things out OK, so I think it was the grain bill, and my mash was 154 in the end.

I've raised it up to 70f in the primary now, and I think I will lower it down gradually to 59 when it's time to add the hops, just to keep the yeast as happy as possible along the way. 

[klickitat jim]

Have you tasted it yet. Reason I ask is a lot of folks see 1.020ish and instantly think "too sweet" and start chasing a fix without tasting. Might just be fine... maybe perfect. Frankly, even a 5% Stout tastes pretty darn good sometimes at an FG a little higher than the same abv in many other styles.

Might be why we don't see many Imperial Dry Stouts

[egg]

Jim - It's dropped to 1.0175 (check me, scraping out every half point! It was around 1.0185 before, so I'm calling that a point...), having had 10 days in primary and not moving.  It is not excessively sweet at all, and the bitterness is more noticeable than it was a few days ago, and it's pretty much cleared down.  Some of the greenness has dropped out too.  I would no longer describe it as particularly porter-like, and I'm hoping it is just a black(ish) IPA awaiting its dry hop! Currently chilling down to 59 for the large dry hop.  It's tidy enough for me to follow through with the recipe, without adding any sugar.

[klickitat jim]

Jim - It's dropped to 1.0175 (check me, scraping out every half point! It was around 1.0185 before, so I'm calling that a point...), having had 10 days in primary and not moving.  It is not excessively sweet at all, and the bitterness is more noticeable than it was a few days ago, and it's pretty much cleared down.  Some of the greenness has dropped out too.  I would no longer describe it as particularly porter-like, and I'm hoping it is just a black(ish) IPA awaiting its dry hop! Currently chilling down to 59 for the large dry hop.  It's tidy enough for me to follow through with the recipe, without adding any sugar.

Awesome! Good job