What this is
A black IPA at 6.6%: an American IPA hop load over a bill that is 86% pale ale malt, with just enough dark malt to make it black.
The grain bill has been fixed since May 2022 — three brews at exactly 6.0 / 0.35 / 0.35 / 0.30 kg. Everything that has moved since is hops.
Roast for colour, not flavour
The whole trick of the style is getting the colour without the beer tasting like a porter, and this bill solves it with restraint: 4.3% Dark Chocolate malt and nothing else dark.
That is a small enough proportion to give the beer its colour and a whisper of roast while leaving the hops in charge. The 2020 precursor used Carafa Type 3 at a similar rate — a dehusked malt, which is the other conventional answer, since removing the husk removes most of the astringency roast malt would otherwise bring.
Crystal and Munich at 5% each are doing more for the palate than the dark malt is. Between them they give the beer enough body to carry 340 g of hops without reading thin.
Hops
Simcoe, Riwaka and Mosaic in all four brews, and 300 g of that total is the same in each: Simcoe 150, Riwaka 100, Mosaic 100.
The weighting is unusual and worth copying — 160 g of the load goes in at flameout, with only 20 g in the boil proper. That gives a heavily aromatic beer at moderate bitterness, which is what keeps the roast and the hops from fighting. A black IPA bittered hard on top of dark malt gets harsh quickly.
The dry hop is 120 g of Riwaka and Mosaic, with Pacific Jade as an optional extra when there is stock to use up.
The 2020 precursor
Black Riwaka IPA, December 2020, is the same beer before it settled: the same Ale, Munich and Medium Crystal weights, but Carafa III instead of Dark Chocolate, a 90-minute boil, and 150 g each of Riwaka and Simcoe. It came out at 7.3% from 1.071, noticeably stronger than everything since.
It is in the lineage because the spine is already there. What changed after it was the dark malt and a settling of the hop rates.
Brewing it
Mash at 68°C, high, which suits a beer that wants body under a big hop load and finishes at 1.010.
Consider a late addition of the dark malt if you want the colour with even less roast — steeping it in the vorlauf or adding it at mash-out is a common approach for the style, though this recipe has always mashed everything together.