Porter Critique

[steelcity]

I am fairly new to the home brewing process with only about 10 sessions under my belt. I started off with extract kits and quickly realized all grain was the way for me to go. Here is a recipe for a porter that I designed using BeerSmith and brewed my last session that I was looking for some comments, critique, and advice.

For a 5 gallon batch I used:

6# 8 oz Pale Malt (2 Row)
3# Caramunich
1# 8oz Carmel/Crystal 10L
1# Chocolate Malt
1# Flaked Barley

Mash at 152 for 60 mins

60 Min Boil
1 oz Northern Brewer 45 mins
1 oz Northern Brewer 15 Mins
1 oz Willamette 5 mins

1 pack English Ale #WLP002

1.046 OG
40.5 IBUs
31.6 SRM

I thought that the beer turned out pretty good and a couple buddies that tried it out that it was good as well. This being one of my first attempts at my own recipes I thought I would get some feedback on it.

 

[cshamilton]

That's a lot of Caramel/Crystal malt! I would imagine your final gravity would be high with a sweet finish. I'm guessing you were shooting for more of an English Brown Porter. Nothing wrong with caramunich, just cut back to a lb maybe. I personally would Replace with some Marris Otter or similar - depending on what your base Pale Malt is. If you want to go more London style throw brown malt in. If you want more roast/ chocolate flavor replace 1/2 the chocolate malt with Black Patent.

 

[BigEd]

My initial reaction is that the recipe has a ridiculous amount of crystal malt. It's at ~35% as it stands. To each his own but if you make it a second time try cutting that amount at least in half. While there's no official rule 5-10% crystal malt is a common amount in the style.

You do have a very high IBU to OG ratio for a porter so that is tempering what is certainly a big residual sweetness factor from the massive crystal malt addition. By getting the crystal malt down to maybe 10-12% and dropping the IBUs by 25% you'll make a beer with much better attenuation and higher ABV due to the bigger percentage of fermentable grist. The resulting beer will still have a nice touch of residual sweetness but you might find it more "drinkable".

One other thought would be to include a bit of darker crystal in the mix which can add a nice toffee/dried fruit touch of complexity in a porter.

 

[TheBigLebrewsk1]

Try some variant of this

8# Maris otter
1# crystal 40l
.25 # crystal 120l
1# chocolate malt
.5 biscuit malt

 

[JKaranka]

What works well for me is: 10-20% Brown Malt, 2-8% some roast malt / grain (Chocolate Malt, roast barley or Patent Malt) and 0-10% optional Crystal Malt. IBU to OG between 0.6 and 1 to taste. Brown Malt does impart some body to it and plenty of subtle and complex dark flavours.

A very straightforward beer is going for an OG of 1.055, 15% Brown Malt, 5% Chocolate Malt, 80% Maris Otter, bring the IBUs to just below 50. But that's to my taste: dry, bitter, complex and drinkable. Not overpowering either, quite balanced.

 

[Dirty25]

Cut that crystal down to 8oz and turn the caramunich into Munich. Do away with your late addition hops. simplify the hops some also get your bitterness at 60m and maybe some late addition hops.

My Porter is something like 90% base, 4% c80, 4% chocolate, and 2% black patent. 1oz cent at 60m and pitch your favorite American/British yeast.

 

[m00ps]

to reiterate what others have said:
mother of god, that is a ton of cara/crystal malts. You are at like +40% specialty malts. Are you making beer or fermented chocolate milk?

 

[MapleGroveAleworks]

Look up popular recipes or BYO articles for the beer style you're interested in brewing. That would clearly show you that you have way too much crystal malt.

 

[steelcity]

Thanks for the advice. I will try some of your guys suggestions. I will tweak the recipe a little or a lot and let you know how the next batch turns out.