
Make Your Best American Black Ale
Call it black IPA, Cascadian dark, or anything else—whatever you call it, this American black ale goes all-in on flavor with dark malts and robust hopping.
92 articles in this category

Call it black IPA, Cascadian dark, or anything else—whatever you call it, this American black ale goes all-in on flavor with dark malts and robust hopping.

From Offset Bier in Park City, Utah, this session-strength IPA—which features the new public hop, Vera—is fresh off a gold-medal win at the Great American Beer Festival.

With its clear and pale look, juicy hop flavors, and balancing bitterness, bright IPA has become an emerging style in New Zealand. This recipe from Mount Brewing in Mount Maunganui showcases an experimental hop as well as Motueka and Nectaron.

Jeremy Pryes, founder and head brewer at Pryes in Minneapolis, says they give this beer its regional designation “because of its distinct balance between the hops used and the sweetness from the malt.”

Ope! Midwest IPA is just gonna sneak right past the two coastal substyles as a unique approach all its own, rooted in modern tradition while evolving for the future.

Over the years, this recipe has gotten a bit darker and a bit lighter in body, but the goal is the same: to shape an IPA that is distinct from stylistic “neighbors” such as American brown ale.

From owner and head brewer Rich Nuñez at Radicle Effect Brewerks in Rock Island, Illinois, here’s a homebrew-scale recipe for the local cult favorite they release only twice per year—four kegs, and it’s done.

With a gluten-free grist of 100 percent rice malt, this homebrew recipe comes from Jim Eckert, the rice-malting pioneer who founded Eckert Malting & Brewing in Chico, California.

This award-winning Northwest IPA is a flagship for Von Ebert in Portland, Oregon, with a berry-forward hop flavor driven by lots of Mosaic, plus Simcoe and Strata in the dry hop.

Inspired by the tasting notes of the beer writer Michael Jackson, Breakside in Portland, Oregon, recently brewed this West Coast–style IPA to honor Jackson and raise funds for the Michael Jackson Foundation for Brewing & Distilling.

Twice per year, the production teams at Austin’s Hold Out and Live Oak breweries get together to brew what they call “the king of tater beers.”

Does the world need a new style of IPA? Never mind, don’t answer that—instead, we’ll let Beachwood brewmaster Julian Shrago respond with this recipe for what he calls a “hyper IPA.”

From Burial in Asheville, North Carolina, here’s a recipe for the hop-forward porter that thrilled our blind-review panel. As an internal brewery favorite, this beer is, cofounder Doug Reiser says, “exactly what we hope comes back into style.”

This bright and bitter American IPA—still with a light touch of caramel malt—won gold medals at the 2023 World Beer Cup and Great American Beer Festival, then went on to become one of our Best 20 Beers in 2023.

Billed as a “hop sandwich” by the St. Louis brewery, 2nd Shift’s Art of Neurosis is an evolving American IPA that features loads of Columbus and Simcoe with just a kiss of caramel malt.

Before there was hazy or even a defined West Coast style, there was an IPA that emerged as a brashly hopped counterpoint to British ale. It never went away—but it evolved. And today’s brewers are making it better than ever.

With thanks to Brian Grossman, Scott Jennings, and the production team at Sierra Nevada in Chico, California, and Mills River, North Carolina, here’s a homebrew-scale recipe for their fresh-hopped annual throwback.

Kevin Davey and Lisa Allen of Heater Allen in McMinnville, Oregon, share this recipe for the first cold IPA in their Gold Dot line of beers—with, Davey says, “a warning for its sneaky strength.”

Released only last year, Allagash’s first year-round IPA is a modern take on classic American versions—golden, juicy, with hop-derived notes of pineapple, grapefruit, tangerine, and pine, balanced by refined bitterness and a dry finish.

From Cloudburst founder-brewer Steve Luke, here’s a recipe for a modern interpretation of an old-school, unfiltered Pacific Northwest IPA, leaning into Chinook, Centennial, Cascade, and Simcoe.