Blackberry Imperial Porter

Let me know what you guys think of this recipe, i have done some stouts but not any porters and a local brewery released a one-off beer that was a blackberry imperial porter and i loved it so I figured it is time to try and brew one! Let me know what you think.

Here is what they say about the beer:
Brau Brothers Rubus Black due out soon | Beernews.org

Here is the recipe i put together to try and replicate it:

5 Gallon Batch, 70% efficiency
Est OG: 1.087
IBUs: 37.3
SRM: 62.7
Est ABV: 8.9%

13 lb Briess 2-row
1.5 lb Simpsons Chocolate
1 lb Brown Malt
1 lb Breiss C120
1 lb flaked oats
.75 lbs Simpsons roasted barley
.5 lb Briess Carapils (additional head unneeded maybe)

2 oz Fuggles at 60 mins
1 oz East Kent Goldings at 20 mins

Mash around 156-158
Ferment with WLP 005 21 days (they say a traditional british strain and i know they use white labs)
Secondary 14 days with about 48oz of Blackberry Puree.

Maybe other suggestions for handling the blackberry, or types of blackberry to use?
Maybe sub out some other malts for .5 lbs Victory or Vienna malt? (they say toasted malts, but are crystals toasted malt too?)

Any and all feedback appreciated! Thanks. - Richard from Brookings, SD

Bump, can i get some insight from the community?

Anyone like blackberry porters?

I used 3lbs of blackberry puree in a belgian wit and had good results. My fiancee said the beer came out wonderful and with great blackberry taste. Since it was canned there was no need to worry about wild yeasts or anything. Just make sure to rack the beer carefully and leave the puree behind, otherwise your first few bottles/pulls from the keg will just be puree.

I made a Blackberry Pale Ale last year and it didn't turn out very good. I used 2 lbs. of frozen berries in the secondary.

I can only speculate on how it would work with a porter, but be careful about your choice of hops. I used cascade and I think that was a poor decision because the citrusy hops clashed with the berries. Obviously, you won't be using cascade with a porter, but I just emphasize that so you'll be really careful about choosing hops.

Of course, I still drank every bottle of it, so it wasn't a disaster, but it's been my least favorite that I brewed since I started doing it.

Look for hops that will compliment the blackberry flavors. Bullion, Bramling Cross, and Pacific Gem come to mind, maybe EKG or Fuggles would work (I see those last two are the ones you have selected). Keep the IBUs on the low side of the style range. I would also pay close attention to the yeast selection. Personally I would use Wyeast: 1275 Thames Valley Ale, 1098 British Ale, or maybe 1968 London ESB. Any of those or their White Labs equivilents should compliment the flavor well. Best of luck, let us know how it comes out.

Awesome, sounds like I am on the right path I am going to use fuggles and ekg then the 3lbs of puree sounds good, only thing is that **** costs $15 per 3lb can! As far as yeast you are probably right i was thinking about just going with2 packets of s-04 but I probably should just do the british ale and do a starter. Hoping to brew this mid februaury

Did you ever brew this?

I sure did! Just bottled this weekend and it tasted awesome. I only used 3 lb can of puree in 3 gallons of the batch. Since I made a 6 gallon batch. Also I changed the recipe quite a bit so if you want I can update that when I get home tonight.

Please do! Need to do a blackberry for the summer.

Great, please post your final recipe and some tasting notes...I'm looking into doing something similar. Cheers.

Here is the Recipe I did, i tried editing the OP but it wouldn't let me:

While drinking a Grand Teton - Howling Wolf


Rubus Black Clone - Imperial Blackberry Porter
Brewed: 2/16/12

6 gallons post boil - 65% efficiency
1.087 OG
1.024 FG
32 IBU
8.2% Alc

17.5 lb Briess Pilsner 2-row
1 lb C120
1 lb Chocolate Malt
.5 lb Briess Carapils
.5 lb Carafa III
.5 lb Roasted Barley
.5 lb Flaked Wheat
6.4 oz Crisp 77L crystal
5 oz Biscuit
4 oz Special B

1.50 oz Saaz 7.80% @ 90 mins
.50 oz Saaz @ 15 mins

Mashed at 152 for 60 mins then fly sparged with about 170 degree water for 40 mins

Pitched on top of a US-05 yeast cake from the Honey Brown Ale kit from Northern Brewer in 2 - 6 gallon carboys (3 gallons of wort in each) for 2 weeks. 1 week @ 66-68 degrees and one week @ 72 degrees.

Transferred to two separate secondary 5 gallon glass carboys, half plain and half on 3 lb of canned Blackberry Puree from Midwest Supplies @ 64 degrees for 2 weeks.

Bottled 26 bottles of the Plain version and and 29 bottles of the Blackberry version on 3/17/12

Drawdy - Sounds great. Were there significant differences in the split batch - Fruit vs no Fruit?

I just saw these on Midwest :
Pacific Gem Pellet Hops
Pacific Gem fills the brew house with enticing aromas during kettle addition and has been described as producing oaken flavours with a distinct blackberry aroma. Typically used as a first hop addition and makes its presence felt through an excellent tempered bitterness and flavour. Well suited to a wide range of beer styles and lends itself well to European Lager styles of various bitterness levels.

These may be interesting to try these in a porter...anyone ever use them?

Oh yeah. They are way different. Jury is still out on which one I prefer. The base beer is quite amazing. I really like it.

I just found a wild blackberry bush with about 8lbs of blackberries...

Hell yeah! Freeze them and toss them in secondary on a porter!

How did they affect the porter? Did it make it much more tart? I feel like any bitterness effect would be good, but did it thin/dry it out at all or did your malts take care of that.

Yeah it added quite a bit of tartness, hopefully it will age out

Update: it has aged nicely. I took this to the brewery last weekend and the brewer said the grain bill and yeast favors are accurate but he said they used natural blackberry flavoring, not real purée like I did so that lends to differences but he said it was very close and he liked it so that is encouraging. If i were to go for this again I think I would use both purée and flavorings.