February's collaboration is with Manchester's Track Brewing Co. We first met Track at the Tilquin British Beer Festival in Belgium. What is the inevitable result of two breweries hanging out over some beers in Belgium? Collaboration, that's what. Tasty, tasty collaboration.

Round One, we visited Track in Manchester, and we brewed Tales of Woe, an IPA that was far more cheerful and delicious than its name would have you believe.

It’s only polite to return an invitation, and this February, we had Round Two, when Track came down to Tottenham. While neither of us are strangers to a classic IPA (if you haven't tried a Track IPA, stop what you re doing now and drink one. It's okay, we will wait.), we figured it might be time to revisit an IPA style that hasn’t been getting the attention that it deserves.

Black IPAs, how we have missed you. You never left, of course, only waited in the darkest corner of our hearts, ready to wreak delicious havoc on us again when we least expected it.

Tiger Tail brings all of the roastiness of the dark malts and the juiciness of the hops that you would want from this style. For an extra layer of flavour, we smoked some orange zest to mingle with the fruity hop profile and the toasty malt backbone. The result is a Black IPA with a complex and fruity profile, a Black IPA reinvigorated for 2019.