Black Chai

Black Cream Ale Brewed with Chai Tea

A sumptuous black cream ale that immediately entices the senses with rich aromas of dark specialty malts, cardamon, nutmeg, and ginger. The deliciously creamy mouthfeel gives way to the layering of flavors within. Ranging from big chocolatey roasted malt characteristics, to a bouquet of playful spiciness that lingers pleasantly into the finish, all followed by a hearty bitterness and even some slight peppery notes.

  • Pub Brews
  • Herb/Spiced Beer - India Cream Ale

  • ABV: 5.0%
  • IBU: 50
  • ABW: 0%
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Origin Story

The beer is called Black Chai: India Cream Ale and as you can probably guess, it is brewed with Chai tea, but also has milk sugar and was brewed with a special new yeast specifically designed for making cream ales. The idea for this beer was basically a collaborative effort between Aaron Smith's desire to brew a beer using Chai tea and Tony Hansen's craving to make a Black Cream Ale. The over abundance of hops was most likely the result of working at Short's for so long that we don't know how to brew beers anymore that don't utilize a ton of hops, not that there is anything wrong with that. Cream Ales are very similar to the American light pale lagers. Technically an ale, this style is often fermented at a cooler temperature or cold conditioned like lager beer. Sometimes lager yeast is added during the conditioning process or lager beer is mixed directly with the ale after fermentation and conditioning is complete. This strips away many of the noticeable ale qualities and produces a cleaner flavor, similar to most lager beers. By using a new yeast strain developed by White Labs, which is essentially a pre-blended mixture of lager yeast and ale yeast, the strains work together to create a clean, crisp, light American lager style ale. This allowed us to skip the step of blending two beers together or having to add a separate lager yeast addition near the end of the conditioning. By utilizing specialty grains such as midnight wheat and adding hefty doses of hops throughout, our brewers instantly created a brand new variation of a Cream Ale compared to how we typically see this style represented. Then they took it a step farther and added Chai tea. Chai essentially means tea in most parts of the world. However, in America, we tend to think of the version of Chai tea from India, which is a spiced milk tea that has become increasingly popular in recent years. This version of Chai is generally made up of rich black tea, heavy milk, a combination of various spices, and a sweetener. The spice additions are quite possibly the most interesting and intriguing part of this type of tea. When served in this fashion, the most common spices tend to be cardamom, cinnamon, ginger, cloves, and pepper. The addition of the sweetener, typically sugar, and milk allow for the intricacy of each spice to come out and helps bring balance to this complex beverage. It has been said that Indian Chai produces a warming, soothing effect, acts as a natural digestive aid and gives one a wonderful sense of well being.

Hops

Perle, Fuggle, Styrian Golding, CTZ
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