Deschutes Black Butte Porter clone

I just brewed my third batch since starting back brewing after a long hiatus. I was trying to do a clone of Deschutes Black Butte porter, and went to their web site and found ingredients, just not quantities. So, I struck out on my own and got after it.

Did a full 6 gallon boil with extract and specialty grains, and the color turned out fantastic! The taste from the hydrometer jar sample was sweet and hoppy at the same time. Beersmith gave estimated OG at 1.056, mine was 1.055. Recipe follows:

7 lbs. light LME
1 lb. crystal 60
1 lb. carapils
1 lb. choc. wheat
.75 oz. nugget pellets(13.5%) at 60 min.
1 oz cascade(6.4%) at 15 minutes
1 oz. tettnang(4.8%) at 5 minutes
1 tsp. irish moss at 10 minutes
1 pkg. of Safale 04 yeast

I steeped the grains for about an hour at in between 155 and 150 degrees, then added that liquid to the 5 gallons of water heating up in my brew kettle. I added 1/2 of the LME at the beginning of boil, and rest at 15 minutes to go. I used a paint stirrer and drill to stir while adding the LME, and it worked great!
Cooled down to 75 degrees with chiller, and pitched yeast by just sprinkling on top, put on lid and airlock, and now the wait begins!

I just bottled my first all grain, a Cream of 3 Crops, Saturday, and am waiting on it to carb in the bottle for at least 2 weeks before I crack one of those open and see what it turned out like.

This is getting addicting again!

Edit to add: approximately 2 hours after pitching yeast, the first bubble gurgled in the airlock! Hope this one turns out good!

nice looking recipe....

i recently did a porter/stout that ended up more astringent/bitter than i wanted.

i'm working on refining my process for brewing dark beers, and i have a couple questions for you if you don't mind.

1. how much water did you steep your grains in?

2 when you finished steeping did you squeeze the bag out or sparge? (i think this was one of my big problems..i was squeezin' when i shoulda been spargin'..i think...)

3. why did you decide to steep for 1 hour...i'd heard 30 min was the max...dunno.

thanks!

skullwithwings said:

nice looking recipe....

i recently did a porter/stout that ended up more astringent/bitter than i wanted.

i'm working on refining my process for brewing dark beers, and i have a couple questions for you if you don't mind.

1. how much water did you steep your grains in?

2 when you finished steeping did you squeeze the bag out or sparge? (i think this was one of my big problems..i was squeezin' when i shoulda been spargin'..i think...)

3. why did you decide to steep for 1 hour...i'd heard 30 min was the max...dunno.

thanks!

Click to expand...

1. I steeped in about 3/4 of a gallon of water.
2. I sparged with the rest of the one gallon jug of water, or about 1/4 of a gallon, then did mash the bag just a little, not really squeezing, just pressing down on it a little.
3. I thought I read somewhere on here about steeping for one hour, never heard that 30 min. was the max. Can't really say why I went for the hour for sure!

I just hope it turns out as good as it tasted on the first sampling!

They made a clone of it on 'Can You Brew It'. You might want to take a listen. If I remember correctly, they used 2 types of Chocolate (about a pound total; US 450L and UK 350L), plus a pound of Oats, a pound of C120, and a few ounces of carapils. Pretty good try.

The Brewing Network.com - :
Interview with brewer and recipe.

Here's another thread: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f12/can-you-brew-recipe-deschutes-black-butte-porter-176186/