Tangerine Porter

Well dang it there I go getting ahead of myself again. I planned to make a tangerine porter WITHOUT seeking the advice of others. I keep doing this with poor results... Anyway, here is my recipe:

43.0% 5.00 lb pale malt
25.8% 3.00 lb munich
15.1% 1.75 lb crystal 60
6.50% 0.75 lb honey malt
5.40% 10.0 oz chocolate malt
4.30% 0.50 lb carapils

12 qt water @ 156F for 45 mins
4.5 qt boiling water for mash out for 10 mins

1.25 oz Ahtanum 5.2% @ 60 mins
1.00 oz Ahtanum 5.2% @ 15
0.75 oz Ahtanum 5.2% @ flameout
Tangerine zest @ flameout

1.059 OG
29.8 IBUs
26 SRM

Burton Ale Yeast WLP023

2 weeks primary @ 67
2 weeks secondary @ 67
2 weeks bottle condition

I have NO CLUE how much tangerine zest to add. I want it to be very much present but not overpowering. I was originally going to add around 10 but after reading some other recipes I'm considering halving that because apparently it is just WAY too much. Also, do I strain the zest out, dump it into my primary, or wait to add it to the secondary? Too many questions...

I was thinking that it would be a good idea to swap out half of my hops for something a little more style-appropriate, but I'm unsure what.

The grain has already been milled and mixed so there is no adjusting there other than adding more.

I'm not really concerned that I am going to ruin it. I'm sure it will come out drinkable. I am concerned, however, that I am straying too far from the accepted style and it will be a dark mess of random flavors.

Here was my original plan: Make the beer, add zest at end of boil, dump all of it into primary, rack to secondary, bottle. Correct me if I'm wrong.

Any thoughts on this recipe? Thanks.

Well crap. I did it again. Didn't realize tangerines were out of season so I went an entirely different route. Same recipe but screwed some things up.

1) The mash. I WAY overshot my strike water temp and added ice, which then brought my WAY lower than it should have been. I ended up at 146 for 20 mins and 154 for 40 mins. Oh well.

2) While the mash was working I took 1 1/2 lbs of piloncillo cones and a pint of orange juice and boiled that together till it was nice and thick, right there in the boil kettle. I drained and sparged my wort right on top of that. Gave me a pre-boil gravity of 1.065.

3) I changed the boil schedule to:

1.5 oz Ahtanum 5.2% @ 60 mins
1.5 oz Ahtanum 5.2% @ 15 mins
Whirlfloc Tablet @ 15 mins
0.5 tsp Yeast Nutrient @ 10 mins
1 cup orange juice @ 5 mins

And the new numbers are:
(with the piloncillo entered as 25 SRM and a potential of 1.044)

1.073 OG
33.9 IBU
27.8 SRM
7.6% ABV

I measured 1.072 OG, so not bad.

4) I used my air pump/aeration stone setup without an in-line filter because I forgot to pick up a new one after I got mine wet on my last brew day. From what I'm reading this was a bad bad bad idea. Maybe I should have just dumped it back and forth a couple times instead.

5) It looked, smelled, and tasted pretty great. No discernible orange flavor, but hopefully as the sugars ferment out it will come through.

6) I don't know what the deal was today, but I had more boil-overs with this batch than I think I've had with all my others combined. My burner stand looks like it went mudding. Was it because there was so much sugars in there? I've brewed high gravity before and I don't remember this happening. Oh well. I'll still drink it.

Well I will be surprised as hell if this turns out well. I'll keep it posted. Maybe this will be my first tossed batch. But knowing myself and my family, we will still drink it. Well, unless there are funky bits growing in it, but funky flavors we can handle.

I'll update in two weeks when I rack to secondary.

I racked this one to secondary today. Gravity was a little high but it's still got two weeks to go so I figure it will get to where it need to be. After tasting I figure this will be a nice dark brew. A little more roasty than I had anticipated, but not at all too unpleasant. No orange flavor that I could detect, but that isn't a very big deal. I'll be looking forward to tasting this again at bottling. I am considering dropping in some kind of orange flavoring (extract or a zest/vodka infusion) later during secondary fermentation, but I am undecided.

I wouldn't use extract, when I have it doesn't taste natural. Also if you re-brew try using Summit hops to impart the tangerine flavor your looking for.

If you put the zest in the secondary I think the flavor will come through more.

Centennial hops have a tangerine flavor, btw.

I zest one orange per 5g for a wit, but for that porter I'd do 2 oranges.

AHA had a tangerine porter recipe on their site a while back. Maybe you can find that.

All great suggestions, thanks for the input. I think next time I will cut back on the roasted grains and either A) Use no actual citrus and just do highly citrus flavored hops, or B) Only add low alpha noble hops but use a vodka/zest infusion for flavoring. I really wanted this one to be minimally bitter, but failed just a little. Not bad so far by any means, but yet again it isn't what I was hoping for. Those who fail to plan must plan to fail, I guess. We'll still drink it!

I've had the Lost Coast Tangerine beer, which is where I got this idea from. I wanted to make it for my mom who is absolutely in love with it, but put a different spin on it and add more layers of flavor. I didn't want to attempt a clone and really wanted to try a darker brew with tangerine in it.

Next update in two weeks when I go to bottle.

Maybe next time replace the chocolate malt with chocolate wheat malt which is much less bitter. I've used it and I like it a lot.

passedpawn said:

Maybe next time replace the chocolate malt with chocolate wheat malt which is much less bitter. I've used it and I like it a lot.

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Does this also translate to stouts? It's a hell of an idea and I think the roasted barley I used before is the main reason nobody likes it. Even I have a hard time polishing off a glass and I would hate for this beer to have the same fate.

vinnythering said:

Does this also translate to stouts? It's a hell of an idea and I think the roasted barley I used before is the main reason nobody likes it. Even I have a hard time polishing off a glass and I would hate for this beer to have the same fate.

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Stouts need some of that roast, otherwise they are porters (lots of debate there that I'm not going to enter). But yea, sure, try it. I haven't used it in a stout, but I have used it in an altbier just for this reason - to avoid the roast flavor.

I FOUND TANGERINES! Sorry didn't mean to yell but I got excited. I picked up five of the best ones I could see. They are the larger variety though. :/ Oh well. I figure I will zest maybe two or three of these. Since they're out of season and the porter is pretty rich already I might need a little extra. I will be doing a vodka/zest infusion. I am going to zest a few of these tonight and add that to ~1.5 oz of vodka, let that sit about two days and dump it right in. Well... maybe I will strain it first. Undecided...

Well I haven't tasted this yet, but I am planning to tonight. I have many doubts about it because the process was just so screwed up and all my numbers were off. Also, it was my first time using citrus and piloncillo and even that was a last minute decision. Wish me luck.

Well I wasn't wrong. This was a very disappointing batch. It was drinkable... I guess. Very dry from the sugar and had a harsh bitterness from the roasted malt. Also was a lot darker than I had hoped. The orange/tangerine flavor was *very* slight but the aroma was a little more prevalent. Not much though. I think next time I will definitely use less roasted malt, and also use wheat instead of barley. In addition, I will use about half the piloncillo and no orange juice. I will add the zest AND extract from four or more tangerines as well. This was a hard one to drink and I doubt it will get better with age. Not a dumper though, so that's definitely a plus. I will try another one in a few weeks or maybe a month or so.

Here is an update. This mellowed out and, although still strong, boozy, and rich, tastes great. It's a sipper, mind you, but it is definitely a very good beer. I will give a good description later tonight.