Hellfire Porter

75% efficiency
5 gallon all-grain
1.044 OG
4.7% ABV
39.6 IBUs

9.0 lbs 2-row malt
0.5 lbs chocolate malt
0.25 lbs de-bittered black malt
0.5 lbs brown malt

0.75 oz Target (10.7%) 60 min
0.75 oz Hallertau (6.2%) 15 min
0.25 ozHallertau (6.2) 5 min

8 oz cocoa powder (secondary)
3 chopped dried ancho chilis (secondary)


White Labs WLP002 English Ale yeast

Primary: 2 weeks @ 65F
Secondary: 2 weeks @ 75F

Bottle conditioned for 3 weeks

I basically took a generic porter recipe and added some dark cocoa powder and dried chilis in secondary as an experiment. While it turned out pretty damned good, it's not quite what I was going for. With the ancho chilis, the heat is most noticeable at the back of the throat, while I was hoping to have it blend in with the chocolate flavors a bit more. I'm thinking about trying a mix of serrano and either jalapeno or poblano peppers next time to get a more pronounced burn that mixes in with the cholocate and the coffee flavors a bit more. I also screwed up the batch sparging by leaving the damned ball valve open when adding the last few gallons of sparge water, killing my efficiency. I'll update this recipe when I can remember to not do that again.

Even so, it's a pretty good beer on its own. My girlfriend (who only kinda likes some beer) absolutely loves this one and is really starting to get into darker beers like porters and stouts. Over the weekend, we went to BJ's Restaurant & Brewhouse and she loved their Imperial Stout so much she chugged 2 within the space of 10 minutes.

Yes, I drove back home. No, I only had one beer.

UPDATE: After about a month, the heat seems to have mellowed out a bit more than I was expecting. I'll be brewing this one again in a few months after my keezer is built (which will depend on whether or not I end up going to Oktoberfest) with some recipe changes. Primarily using a mix of ancho and serrano peppers, possibly with a pinch of cayenne pepper as well. I'll also be adding in about 1lb or so of oats to the mash as well to smooth things out a bit. I meant to do that this time, but forgot about it (much like I forgot to clsoe the damned ball valve on the mash tun during my last batch sparge.)

Fyi, from my experience the cayanne pepper acts in much the same way as the anchos...back of the throat.