help with porter recipe

Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum

Help Support Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

timmy7649

Well-Known Member
Joined
Nov 9, 2010
Messages
157
Reaction score
16
Location
lafayette
8 lbs light lme
1lb chocolate malt
1/2 lb crystal 120l

1oz northern brewer hops 60 min
1 oz kent golding hops 30 min

1 bar of brewers licorice ??? not sure if to much?

wyeast 1056 ??? not sure the best yeast to use


what do you think? first time porter,don't want it to harsh. lol
thanks guy's
 
I like a little crystal 40 in my porters - maybe 1/2# and only go 1/4# on 120
 
The higher the kiln rating, the more vinous and sweet the malt profile becomes. Next time you are in the shop, take some grains and chew them up from various crystal kiln levels. The lower numbers are softer and soft caramel candy like, the higher you go, the more raisony like a thick port wine or like prunes or other stone fruit.
So, you want a touch of 120 to add a depth, but not be a foreplayer in the overall profile.
 
The higher the kiln rating, the more vinous and sweet the malt profile becomes. Next time you are in the shop, take some grains and chew them up from various crystal kiln levels. The lower numbers are softer and soft caramel candy like, the higher you go, the more raisony like a thick port wine or like prunes or other stone fruit.
So, you want a touch of 120 to add a depth, but not be a foreplayer in the overall profile.

awesome thank you very much for the info!! will that still give it the dark color?
 
revised!!

8 lbs light lme
1lb chocolate malt
1/2 lb crystal 40
1/4 lb crystal 120l

1oz northern brewer hops 60 min
1 oz kent golding hops 30 min

1 bar of brewers licorice ??? not sure if to much?

wyeast 1056 ??? not sure the best yeast to use
 
Looks good to me. The chocolate will make it plenty dark.
This puts your SG at ~1.065, should be 6.0-6.5% ABV

Another question: Will you be doing a full boil? Or partial then topping off in carboy? This will make a difference for your hops. If full boil, you'd be ~40 IBUs, if partial it'd only be ~25.

Not sure on the licorice, I've never used it.

1056 will work great - most clean American ale yeasts make good porters. You could also use an English yeast for maltier/fruitier finish - search the forum for different strains to get an idea of what each one does. There are TONS of great porter recipes on here.

EDIT: One other comment - because this is a higher gravity beer, make sure you're pitching enough yeast. You can either make a starter (plenty of threads showing you how) or use dry yeast. This website is very helpful for proper pitching rates:
http://www.mrmalty.com/calc/calc.html
 
Consider using a small amount of black patent, if you want a nice burnt note to add to the chocolate malt. It's my favorite part of a porter, personally. Slight coffee, dark chocolate, roasty goodness. I would keep it around 4oz.

Also...don't tell anyone, but I even do 1oz of roasted barley with mine, that gives the slight coffee flavor. Most people will say roasted barley only belongs in stouts, but in that small of an amount, it's a nice addition.

I'd say no licorice...try it with regular malts, and make adjustments from there. I really don't like the taste of licorice though, so I'm kind of biased.

Good luck...I love Porters!!!!
 
Looks good very similar to my recipe, the 120 goes along way, I like my beers with less crystal for the most part. The chocolate malt is such a dominant flavor any how. But I suggest an english yeast. This is an english style so, I go with an english yeast, more complex to me more depth of roastiness and malt.
 
Looks good to me. The chocolate will make it plenty dark.
This puts your SG at ~1.065, should be 6.0-6.5% ABV

Another question: Will you be doing a full boil? Or partial then topping off in carboy? This will make a difference for your hops. If full boil, you'd be ~40 IBUs, if partial it'd only be ~25.

Not sure on the licorice, I've never used it.

1056 will work great - most clean American ale yeasts make good porters. You could also use an English yeast for maltier/fruitier finish - search the forum for different strains to get an idea of what each one does. There are TONS of great porter recipes on here.

EDIT: One other comment - because this is a higher gravity beer, make sure you're pitching enough yeast. You can either make a starter (plenty of threads showing you how) or use dry yeast. This website is very helpful for proper pitching rates:
http://www.mrmalty.com/calc/calc.html

my boil is going to be 2.5 gallons. thanks you have been really helpfull.
 
Looks good very similar to my recipe, the 120 goes along way, I like my beers with less crystal for the most part. The chocolate malt is such a dominant flavor any how. But I suggest an english yeast. This is an english style so, I go with an english yeast, more complex to me more depth of roastiness and malt.

will do. thanks
 
Consider using a small amount of black patent, if you want a nice burnt note to add to the chocolate malt. It's my favorite part of a porter, personally. Slight coffee, dark chocolate, roasty goodness. I would keep it around 4oz.

Also...don't tell anyone, but I even do 1oz of roasted barley with mine, that gives the slight coffee flavor. Most people will say roasted barley only belongs in stouts, but in that small of an amount, it's a nice addition.

I'd say no licorice...try it with regular malts, and make adjustments from there. I really don't like the taste of licorice though, so I'm kind of biased.

Good luck...I love Porters!!!!
the reason for this recipe was to make a licorice beer. but thank you for your insite
 
the reason for this recipe was to make a licorice beer. but thank you for your insite

Ahh, I didn't realize that, somehow you had me under the impression you wanted to make a Porter...:cross:

My input on licorice was only an afterthought to my response. I just thought I'd suggest that if you haven't made a Porter yet, to keep it simple and determine how you want to modify the next one. However I will still suggest considering Black Patent(even though you could easily argue that would be further complicating the recipe), as it is commonly used in Porters, and if used in a small quantity, won't be too harsh, but will add a little more of that nice roasty bite that a lot of people look for in porters. Just my .02 :D

Also, the "Recipe Database" is to add your tried and true recipes that you'd like to share with the community. There is a specific area of the forum to discuss recipes/ingredients. Looks like the mods actually moved it to the right section, so just for future reference.
 
Sorry for posting in the wrong area! Thanks for the good info. Only reason why i picked the porter was because i thought it would support the licorice the best. But thanks again for all the help. :)
 
No worries, I think this would definitely be a good style for licorice, if any. The black patent should keep it in check too, where it still will be a nice balance. Good luck! I'm sure no matter what your final recipe is, you'll be happy with the results. Porters are awesome! A few months back I did 10 gallons of porter, split it into 5g carboys and put pumpkin spices in one of them...good stuff!
So much you can do with a porter. Vanilla, oak, smoke, pumpkin, chocolate, coffee, licorice...the list goes on!
 
I second the versatility of a porter - last night I took a bottle of my base porter and added bourbon, vanilla, ginger, cinnamon and allspice and mixed IN THE GLASS - other than losing most of the CO2, it tasted awesome. Inspiration for the next batch.
 

Latest posts

Back
Top