Coffee Kiln Cascadian Dark Ale

[jeremymgood]

I'm still pretty new to creating my own recipes, but I have been experimenting with Beersmith as well as comparing with other people's recipes.

My local homebrew club is having a competition where everybody received some kiln coffee malt and has to brew a beer with it. The style is open ended so I thought I would try a Cascadian Dark Ale.

I brew extract with specialty grains on my stovetop. I wanted to use some piney hops for this beer so I chose Chinook and Centennial. Please let me know what you think. Comments and suggestions are welcome.

Ingredients
Amt Name Type # %/IBU
1 lbs Kiln Coffee Malt (160.0 SRM) Grain 1 10.6 %
8.0 oz Cara-Pils/Dextrine (2.0 SRM) Grain 2 5.3 %
8.0 oz Carafa III (525.0 SRM) Grain 3 5.3 %
8.0 oz Caramel/Crystal Malt - 80L (80.0 SRM) Grain 4 5.3 %
4.0 oz Chocolate Malt (350.0 SRM) Grain 5 2.7 %
6 lbs 10.7 oz Dark Liquid Extract (17.5 SRM) Extract 6 70.8 %
1.00 oz Centennial [10.00 %] - Boil 60.0 min Hop 7 24.2 IBUs
1.00 oz Chinook [13.00 %] - Boil 30.0 min Hop 8 24.1 IBUs
0.25 tsp Irish Moss (Boil 10.0 mins) Fining 9 -
1.00 oz Centennial [10.00 %] - Boil 10.0 min Hop 10 8.8 IBUs
1.00 oz Chinook [13.00 %] - Boil 10.0 min Hop 11 11.4 IBUs
1.0 pkg American Ale II (Wyeast Labs #1272) [124.21 ml] Yeast 12 -
1.00 oz Chinook [13.00 %] - Dry Hop 7.0 Days Hop 13 0.0 IBUs

 

[Brewsader1]

Sounds like an interesting idea! Hop schedule looks good to me...you may want to move the addition at 10 min to a flameout/whirpool addition and could even add another oz or two for more flavor component. A few more ounces of dry hop wouldn't hurt either.

What SRM rating did beer smith give you? I would think this would give you an incredibly dark beer. With a black ipa, you want the color and some of that roast backbone but not so much that it clashes with everything. Carafa III is the way to go IMO since it is huskless and will add the color and flavor without any ashy or harsh roast character, so I would drop the chocolate malt and use a pale extract.

I hope it turns out - report back the final recipe and how it turns out!

 

[TooDogly]

Yeah, I would just use regular pale extract, unless all you have is dark extract. You will get enough flavor and color from your grains. It depends on your preference, but a little more sweetness could be nice, like maybe some 120L crystal? I'm not personally a fan of 30 min hop additions. I like a 60min and then 15, 10, 0, but again its up to your preference.

Remember that the roasted malts, and maybe the coffee, will give a bitter taste anyway. This will make your 70 something IBU beer taste even more bitter. If its not balanced by higher ABV and/or sweetness from crystal malt it can be a little too much. At least that's what I've experienced with my CDA home brews.

If I were making this, I would change the hop schedule to: 0.5-0.75 oz of each hop at 60 min, 0.5-0.75 oz of each at 15 min, 1.0 oz of each at 0 min, and 1-2 oz of each for dry hopping.

Good luck and welcome to the forum!

 

[sabotenfighter]

Looks ok, but one little nit-pick. CDAs should NOT have notes of coffee or roast. It should be a beer that does not taste it's color, though a slight chocolate is acceptable. Therefore, Id use Carafa SP III (debittered), or just more chocolate. But as you'll add coffee, kinda defeats the purpose. If you don't want to change much, call it an American Stout and you'd be good.

Also+1 to the above suggestion to go for pale malt extract. You'll get plenty of color from the dark malts.

 

[jeremymgood]

Thanks for the suggestions. I will go with pale malt extract. I moved the first Chinook hop addition from 30 minutes to 15 minutes and added an extra ounce of Chinook for dry hopping.

Regarding the style, I guess I just won't be completely true to the CDA style. One of my favorite beers is Firestone Walker's Wookey Jack Black Rye IPA which definitely has some roasty notes. Since the purpose of this beer is to use a pound of coffee kiln malt, I won't be cutting that from my recipe. I guess I'm making something in between an American Stout and a CDA. I did use the American Stout style guidelines in Beersmith since they don't have CDA or Black IPA guidelines.


Coffee Kiln CDA
American Stout
Type: Partial Mash Date: 11/17/2016
Batch Size (fermenter): 5.00 gal Brewer: Jeremy
Boil Size: 3.67 gal Asst Brewer:
Boil Time: 60 min Equipment: Pot ( 4 Gal/15.1 L) - Extract
End of Boil Volume 3.38 gal Brewhouse Efficiency: 72.00 %
Final Bottling Volume: 4.60 gal Est Mash Efficiency 109.9 %
Fermentation: Ale, Two Stage Taste Rating(out of 50): 30.0


Ingredients
Amt Name Type # %/IBU
1 lbs Kiln Coffee Malt (160.0 SRM) Grain 1 10.3 %
8.0 oz Cara-Pils/Dextrine (2.0 SRM) Grain 2 5.1 %
8.0 oz Carafa III (525.0 SRM) Grain 3 5.1 %
8.0 oz Caramel/Crystal Malt - 80L (80.0 SRM) Grain 4 5.1 %
4.0 oz Chocolate Malt (350.0 SRM) Grain 5 2.6 %
7 lbs Pale Liquid Extract (8.0 SRM) Extract 6 71.8 %
1.00 oz Centennial [10.00 %] - Boil 60.0 min Hop 7 23.4 IBUs
1.00 oz Chinook [13.00 %] - Boil 15.0 min Hop 8 15.1 IBUs
0.25 tsp Irish Moss (Boil 10.0 mins) Fining 9 -
1.00 oz Centennial [10.00 %] - Boil 10.0 min Hop 10 8.5 IBUs
1.00 oz Chinook [13.00 %] - Boil 10.0 min Hop 11 11.0 IBUs
1.0 pkg American Ale II (Wyeast Labs #1272) [124.21 ml] Yeast 12 -
2.00 oz Chinook [13.00 %] - Dry Hop 7.0 Days Hop 13 0.0 IBUs

Beer Profile

Est Original Gravity: 1.062 SG
Est Final Gravity: 1.015 SG
Estimated Alcohol by Vol: 6.1 %
Bitterness: 58.0 IBUs
Est Color: 37.6 SRM

 

[TooDogly]

Nice! Looks delicious. What's the name of your homebrew club? I'll be visiting my parents in Mac in a few weeks.

 

[jeremymgood]

Nice! Looks delicious. What's the name of your homebrew club? I'll be visiting my parents in Mac in a few weeks.

It's called M.A.S.H. (McMinville Area Social Homebrewers) Here's our facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/groups/McMinnvilleHomebrewClub/

We meet once a month on the Third Thursday of the month.

 

[jeremymgood]

So today was brew day. My LBHS didn't have Carafa III so I got Carafa II. I accidentally got my temp a little high for my steeping grains, but when I tasted the wort it tasted great. My OG was slightly lower than expected at 1.056.

My plan is to have my local homebrew club taste this beer when it's ready and see if they can tell me what they think the style is, either an American Stout or a CDA. I like both styles and I'm not a purist, so I'm sure this beer will be just fine whether it's classified as a stout or CDA.

 

[TooDogly]

The Carafa II is just a little lighter than the III. If you got the Carafa II "special" then it's de-bittered (de-husked) but as far as I know the regular Carafa II is husked and would be similar to a pale chocolate malt as far as its color and roast flavor profile.

I also like my CDAs with a decent amount of mild roast flavor. I like them in the 8% abv range (like wookey jack) which tends to smooth the edge of the harsher bite of roasted malt and hops. I really don't understand the reasoning behind trying to make a regular IPA with some black malt added only to make the color black, seems like a gimmick. Give me a true CDA with balanced roast and piney hops. I'm not making this up either, I've worked with the guy who could be credited with inventing that style. Shawn Kelso won the 2010 gold medal at GABF for Barley Brown’s Turmoil CDA. He told me he had been brewing various versions since 2007. His CDAs were usually 8-10% abv, around 100 IBU and had a strong and complex roast character that underlaid the hoppyness. They were usually dry-hopped with chinook or other piney hop. A beer he made for 10 Barrel in 2012 when I worked there, Cynical CDA, is my all time favorite beer that I've ever tasted.

Dammit I think it just talked myself into brewing a CDA this weekend.

 

[jeremymgood]

I've been drinking this for a few months now. The beer turned out well, but I can see why CDAs are usually brewed with less roast character. The coffee kiln malt was a little out of place, but it is an interesting beer. I was very happy with the chinook hops and will use them again for another black IPA in the future.