Conditioning a CDA.

[Charlie]

We're having a club comp next week and the style is Cascadian Dark Ale (CDA, or whatever you happen to call it). Anyway, mine was kegged November 24 and I will beer-gun up a six right before the comp.

I brewed my CDA late because I was trying to preserve some of the hop aroma for the comp, but I've noticed some changes in flavor since it was kegged. In particular it has lost some of the "hoppy porter" character and acquired a creamy flavor. It's quite nice.

In what ways would you expect the flavor of a dark hoppy beer like CDA to change over time? What might be the optimum age for this beer if I want to enter another comp with it?

Charlie

[BDawg]

I think you are seeing it now.
The bitterness will drop and mellow out over time. The hop flavor will also become more muted.
You will gain some coffee and caramel character and possibly taste more fruit.
Tannins will drop, too, causing less biting roastiness. Some oxidation will kick in, adding sherry notes that weren't there either.

[thatguy314]

Roasted malts are very friable and have an tendency to form a powder when crushed. Since it's so small, it takes a while for this powder to settle out after fermentation. Once it does you have a smoother less tannic character to the roastiness. That could also be contributing to the effect on your CDA.

[Charlie]

Roasted malts are very friable and have an tendency to form a powder when crushed.

I'll say they do! I used Carafa II, and after I mashed in it looked like activated charcoal in the bottom of the bucket!

If you've got an open brew day I recommend you try a CDA. I was worried about the recipe because I've never tasted the style, but I based it loosely on Barley Brown's Turmoil (Zymurgy 33 (4):26-31 (2010) July-Aug)
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Barley Brown's Turmoil

Vol 5.5 gal
Eff 80%
OG 1.076
FG 1.011
IBU 94
ABV 8%
Boil 75 min

10.5 lb pale 2-row
1.1 lb Munich Malt
0.7 lb Wheat Malt
1.0 lb Crystal 40L
1.1 lb Carafa Special II

4.25 oz Columbus (sparge hop, weird!)
1.4 oz Simcoe (first wort)
1.6 oz Magnum 60 min
0.9 oz Simcoe 60 min
1.15 oz Amarillo 30 min
0.9 oz Cascade 15 min
0.9 oz Cascade 2 min
1.75 oz Cascade 0 min
4.25 oz Amarillo dry

Wyeast 1056 American Ale Yeast or White Labs WLP-001. Mash at 152F. Ferment at 70-72F. Transfer and age 8 days at 64F before kegging.
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When I tweaked it for my numbers and preferences I had;

Boil 7 gal
Wort size 5.5 gal
Eff 80%
OG 1.079
FG 1.011
IBU 96
SRM 38
ABV 8%

11 lb pale 2-row
1.25 lb Carafa Special II
1. lb Munich Malt
0.5 lb Wheat Malt
0.5 lb Crystal 40L

1 oz Chinook (mash hop)*
1 oz Magnum (90 min)
0.5 oz Simcoe (60 min)
0.5 oz Columbus (20 min)
0.5 oz Magnum (20 min)
0.5 oz Centenniel (20 min)
0.5 oz Cascade 10 min
0.5 oz Citra 5 min
0.5 oz Crystal (0 min)
2 oz Amarillo (dry 14 days)

Mash at 150, 1.25 qt/lb. Wyeast Green Belt (Austin Homebrew special release)

*I'm not really sure how the mash hop got in there, but it looks suspiciously like a Tasty APA influence.

Charlie

[kcschmitt]

I've made two CDA's and both hit their peak around 4 weeks in the keg. I made super hoppy ones so the upfront bitterness had dropped out a little and the hop aroma and flavor melded really well with the roasted malts.

[jgourd]

I've also made two. The first was hard to judge in terms oh how it aged since we floated the keg at a party. So it basically lasted about 2 weeks in the keg. I made one recently and kegged it a few days ago. It's headed to the same competition! Good luck!

[Charlie]

I made one recently and kegged it a few days ago. It's headed to the same competition! Good luck!

I just got back from the comp. We had ten entries, and a pretty narrow field. I snagged first, and 'ol jgourd up there got a very close second. Ours were, by far, the hoppiest brews in the comp. In fact, his came by on the 2nd flight, and I thought it was mine! If it'd had a week or two to age I think we'd be fighting it out for half points.

We scored the comp based solely on the judge sheet totals. I'm going to put the numbers in a spreadsheet, run some statistics, and see what we have. It's a club comp, and the members need to be aware if they're scoring far outside the mean.*

Bravo Brew-Bro! We whupped 'em!

Charlie

* JG: The raw data should be posted on our website tomorrow. *