American Porter Bee Cave Brewery Robust Porter

[EdWort]

Ed what happened to the rest of that recipe? I remember you having yeast instructions and estimated OG and FG?

I don't know what happened to the database part. It just disappeared.

 

[jimba009]

it isn't in your recipe drop down anymore either... boo!

 

[jacksonbrown]

Ed, Question about this brew. I just hooked it up to the gas this past saturday and drew my first sip last night. It was very, very sweet. Unpleasantly so. The only change I had made was to use MO as my base. Also, my hydrometer broke that day so I didn't get an OG reading. But my 4 brews leading up to it had gotten 92% eff, and I had forgotten to reset BeerSmith from 75%, so I think I ended up with an OG around 1.085. My FG was 1.021 and I'm fairly certain I didn't have a stuck fermentation.
SO... back to my question (yes, I did have one). Is this supposed to be a sweet porter? I've never used malto dextrine before and am wondering if the sweetness could be a result of that. I realise that with a FG of 1.021 it'll be sweet regardless, but this, as I said, is just not pleasant. I'm hoping some extra vols will ease that up somewhat, but if you have any ideas I'd love to hear em. Thanks!

EDIT: I don't know if it's an aging thing too, but it's been 9 weeks since brewday.

 

[EdWort]

Ed, Question about this brew. I just hooked it up to the gas this past saturday and drew my first sip last night. It was very, very sweet. Unpleasantly so. The only change I had made was to use MO as my base. Also, my hydrometer broke that day so I didn't get an OG reading. But my 4 brews leading up to it had gotten 92% eff, and I had forgotten to reset BeerSmith from 75%, so I think I ended up with an OG around 1.085. My FG was 1.021 and I'm fairly certain I didn't have a stuck fermentation.
SO... back to my question (yes, I did have one). Is this supposed to be a sweet porter? I've never used malto dextrine before and am wondering if the sweetness could be a result of that. I realise that with a FG of 1.021 it'll be sweet regardless, but this, as I said, is just not pleasant. I'm hoping some extra vols will ease that up somewhat, but if you have any ideas I'd love to hear em. Thanks!

EDIT: I don't know if it's an aging thing too, but it's been 9 weeks since brewday.

1.085????? Cheese und Krackers! That's over 10 points too high. The finishing gravity should be around 1.020, but that is due to the malto-dextrin. Nottingham will ferment it out dry and the malto dextrin adds a bit of mouthfeel and chewiness to it.

My porter is not sweet. It has a hint of roastiness and chocolate, but not cloyingly sweet. I would give it time.

 

[jacksonbrown]

I could be wrong about my OG, but at 75% attenuation that would be about the ballpark. Yeah, I'm not getting any of that roasty chocolate flavor. Just sweet. I'll wait it out. Which is too bad since I had planned on bringing it to our club's holiday party on the 13th.

 

[BeerPressure]

FYI: This is a very active ferment, blew the lid off of my ale pale that had a blowoff tube on it.

 

[BlackNotch]

This Porter started off my EdWort brew weekend on Saturday, and finished with his Kolsch on Sunday.

 

[Warpig75]

Ed - after all the rave reviews of your recipe i've decide to do a partial mash version (unfortunately Im not quite equipped for AG yet)

I love sam adam's honey porter so if I were to add honey to this recipe; how much would I add and when would I add it?

 

[EdWort]

I love sam adam's honey porter so if I were to add honey to this recipe; how much would I add and when would I add it?

I've never made one before, but googling honey porter recipes show folks adding 1.5 to 2.5 pounds of honey at 10 to 25 minutes left in the boil.

 

[humann_brewing]

So sounds like the porter turned out great. So did my batch. What did you do different with the Phantom Planet porter? I see you got a second place with it but the picture is the same as this one.

Phantom Planet Porter - morebeer

 

[BeerPressure]

I just bottled my batch that i brewed on 11/29. I got 48 bottles. Beersmith said my actual abv is 6.66% so i'm calling it satan's porter

 

[Chello]

Any thoughts about using US-05 instead of Nottingham on this?

 

[EdWort]

Any thoughts about using US-05 instead of Nottingham on this?

Nottingham will give you some fruity esters that US-05 will not. Porter is an English beer, so I would stick with Nottingham.

 

[chefchris]

I used 05, for lack of Notty, on my first batch on this and it won an award. So it won't turn out bad. When I brewed it a second time I used Nottingham.

 

[BeerPressure]

My robust porter has been primed with a packet of priming sugar. Bottled about 2.5 weeks ago, and i just opened a bottle to sample. It has very little carbonation, no head. Anyone god ideas?

 

[BlackNotch]

I'm trying a glass of this right now...MMMMMMM! This was brewed 4 weeks ago, its only been in the keg for a few days and its might fine! I did make one change, I added another 1/4 oz of Cascade at 30 minutes, I was trying to get close to the hop flavor of a Sierra Nevada Porter, and it's pretty close. This is a keeper..

 

[BeerPressure]

Well, I rolled the bottles around to kick the sediment back up. That did the trick in carbonating.

This is a damn good beer.

Ed has some pretty kickass recipes, i love them. I am bringing a sixer of haus pale and and robust porter to a homebrew club meeting tomorrow.

 

[GroosBrewz]

Hey guys-

I bought all the stuff to try this brew today.. My first attempt at anything other than a pale/IPA/amber ale... It's for my wife.. she likes porters.. Anyway, I didnt see anything at the LHBS that said "Black Roasted Barley".. What they did have was something called "Domestic Black Barley" (500L).. It says on the package that its the dominant flavor or dry stouts, and that is adds roastiness, acrid dry flavor and lowers mash ph.. It also says that the grain will impart it's character without mashing and to use a grain steeping bag...

Two questions-
#1 is this the same as black roasted barley?

#2- Should I mash this??

Thanks guys

 

[kevincad]

11# 2 Row
1# Chocolate Malt
1# Crystal 40
4 oz. Black Patent
1 oz. Black Roasted Barley
8 oz. Flaked Barley

Mash at 150 degrees for 60 minutes

Add 8 oz. of Malto Dextrin to boil at 20 minutes

Hops.

1 oz. Northern Brewer at 60 min.
0.5 oz Cascade at 60 min.

Hydrate a package of Nottingham.

Ferment for 2 weeks, then rack to keg or secondary.

I haven't went all grain yet, but getting ready. One thing I'd like to know about these recipes is how much it makes. I just plain don't understand how someone would know what amount of water to mash in with, and how much to batch sparge with etc. Please help me understand!!!!!

 

[humann_brewing]

I haven't went all grain yet, but getting ready. One thing I'd like to know about these recipes is how much it makes. I just plain don't understand how someone would know what amount of water to mash in with, and how much to batch sparge with etc. Please help me understand!!!!!

Biggest suggestion I can give is to try out beersmith software and keep reading on this forum.

To address your questions though, the general rule of thumb for most cases would be to mash with 1.25 quarts of water to 1LB of grain. So if you have a 10LB grain bill, you would mash with 12.5 quarts.

For batch sparging, I drain the mash/tun before putting sparge water in so my dead space is already taken up from the initial amount. So I take the amount I got from the initial run and subtract that from my pre-boil volume.

For example if I need 7.5 gallons to boil and I got 2 gallons from my first runnings, I would batch sparge with 2.25G twice to get the remaining 5.5G needed. This way I maximize the gravity without leaving too much liquid in the mash/tun.

 

[kevincad]

Biggest suggestion I can give is to try out beersmith software and keep reading on this forum.

To address your questions though, the general rule of thumb for most cases would be to mash with 1.25 quarts of water to 1LB of grain. So if you have a 10LB grain bill, you would mash with 12.5 quarts.

For batch sparging, I drain the mash/tun before putting sparge water in so my dead space is already taken up from the initial amount. So I take the amount I got from the initial run and subtract that from my pre-boil volume.

For example if I need 7.5 gallons to boil and I got 2 gallons from my first runnings, I would batch sparge with 2.25G twice to get the remaining 5.5G needed. This way I maximize the gravity without leaving too much liquid in the mash/tun.

So for the recipe given, where there are no volumes given, how would I know what the volume is supposed to be? I admit, I'm confused, please bear with me!

 

[IrregularPulse]

If it is a recipe you grabbed here it is most likely a 5-5.5 gallon recipe. The best way to know if you have the right volume is to enter the recipe and look at the projected OG. If it matches you're correct.

 

[humann_brewing]

So for the recipe given, where there are no volumes given, how would I know what the volume is supposed to be? I admit, I'm confused, please bear with me!

Ed bases his recipes or at least this one on a final ferment volume of 5.5G that way you have a little more to loose to trub and test with and hopefully get 5 gallons into the keg or bottled.

I still have a little of this on tap and it is quite good. It was also my first AG brew.

 

[kevincad]

Ed bases his recipes or at least this one on a final ferment volume of 5.5G that way you have a little more to loose to trub and test with and hopefully get 5 gallons into the keg or bottled.

I still have a little of this on tap and it is quite good. It was also my first AG brew.

Cool, thanks. I'm looking for a not too heavy porter that has a decent hops finish. Is this one like that? See, I still really don't know enough to look at the grain bill and hopping schedule to tell!

 

[humann_brewing]

Cool, thanks. I'm looking for a not too heavy porter that has a decent hops finish. Is this one like that? See, I still really don't know enough to look at the grain bill and hopping schedule to tell!

This recipe is for a Robust Porter, not a brown porter. The recipe works out to somewhere in the 6.5% range for ABV. There is a good balance of hops to this recipe. It is mashed at 150 which will give you a lower final gravity or convert more of the sugars and give you a drier beer, but there is also Dextrose added to bring some of it back.

Here is what Beersmith says


BeerSmith Recipe Printout - BeerSmith Brewing Software, Recipes, Blog, Wiki and Discussion Forum
Recipe: Robust Porter
Brewer: Matt
Asst Brewer:
Style: Robust Porter
TYPE: All Grain
Taste: (35.0)

Recipe Specifications
--------------------------
Batch Size: 5.50 gal
Boil Size: 7.46 gal
Estimated OG: 1.066 SG
Estimated Color: 35.4 SRM
Estimated IBU: 34.2 IBU
Brewhouse Efficiency: 75.00 %
Boil Time: 90 Minutes

Ingredients:
------------
Amount Item Type % or IBU
11.00 lb Pale Malt (2 Row) US (2.0 SRM) Grain 79.65 %
1.00 lb Caramel/Crystal Malt - 40L (40.0 SRM) Grain 7.24 %
1.00 lb Chocolate Malt (350.0 SRM) Grain 7.24 %
0.50 lb Barley, Flaked (1.7 SRM) Grain 3.62 %
0.25 lb Black (Patent) Malt (500.0 SRM) Grain 1.81 %
0.06 lb Roasted Barley (300.0 SRM) Grain 0.43 %
0.50 oz Cascade [5.50 %] (60 min) Hops 8.4 IBU
1.00 oz Northern Brewer [8.50 %] (60 min) Hops 25.8 IBU
1.10 tbsp PH 5.2 Stabilizer (Mash 60.0 min) Misc
8.00 oz Malto-Dextrine (Boil 20.0 min) Misc
1 Pkgs Nottingham (Danstar #-) Yeast-Ale


Mash Schedule: Single Infusion, Light Body, Batch Sparge
Total Grain Weight: 13.81 lb
----------------------------
Single Infusion, Light Body, Batch Sparge
Step Time Name Description Step Temp
60 min Mash In Add 17.26 qt of water at 161.4 F 150.0 F

 

[MX1]

Hello Ed,

I have been eying this Porter from the first day I logged on to HBT. I am going to brew a porter in the next few months, and I would like to use this as my starting point.

I am going to brew this using all UK grains, and the Notty yeast.
Also I would like to make it a Coffee / Chocolate porter. Knowing your beer like no one else, what would you add to achieve this. Would you use coffee or coffee malt? And do you think there is enough chocolate in the beer already to balance with the added coffee.

Here is what I have worked up so far on Beer Alchemy.

Fermentables

UK Pale Ale Malt 9.00 lb
UK Pale Chocolate Malt 1.00 lb
UK Light Crystal 1.00 lb
UK Flaked Barley 0.50 lb
UK Black Malt 0.25 lb
UK Roasted Barley 0.10 lb


Hops

UK Golding 5.5 % 1.00 oz All Of Boil
UK Fuggle 4.5 % 1.00 oz 30 Min From End


Other Ingredients

Malto-Dextrine 8.00 oz In Boil
Whirlfloc Tablet 1.00 oz In Boil


Yeast
Danstar-Nottingham

Thanks for looking
Tim

 

[BeerPressure]

I used pearle in place in northern brewer, and honestly this is my best brew yet. I would like to enter this one in a competition.

 

[EdWort]

Also I would like to make it a Coffee / Chocolate porter. Knowing your beer like no one else, what would you add to achieve this. Would you use coffee or coffee malt? And do you think there is enough chocolate in the beer already to balance with the added coffee.

If you are going to add coffee, I would add cold extracted coffee, use a Brazilian bean, fresh ground. Steep 2 oz of ground coffee in 8 ounce of cooled previously boiled water for 24 hours in a french press.

Add 1 ounce of the coffee extract to your secondary or keg. You can bump the chocolate malt by 8 ounces your first try. Let me know how it goes.

 

[MX1]

Thank you.

Tim

 

[GroosBrewz]

I brewed this last weekend, mainly for my wife who likes porters (I am more of an ale guy but we must keep our wives happy) and you should have seen her salivating along every step of the process.. When she smelled me cracking the specialty grains she was over there grabbing whole kernels out of the grinder and commenting on how "yummy" it was.. the smell of the mash made her mouth water and when i drained the mash/lauter tun, she asked if we could poor milk over the grains and eat it like cereal.. Something tells me she is going to really enjoy this beer... :fro: