Porter recipe need suggestions

[Golddiggie]

I've produced a solid porter with using chocolate malt, roasted barley, and flaked barley. You just need to make sure you don't go too heavy with any of them...

Flaked Barley: Adds significant body to Porters and Stouts. High haze producing protein prevents use in light beers.

Flaked Oats: Adds body, mouth feel and head retention to the beer
Used in oatmeal stouts and porters
Adds substantial protein haze to light beers
Protein rest recommended unless flakes are pregelatinized

Roasted Barley: Roasted at high temperature to create a burnt, grainy, coffee like flavor.
Imparts a red to deep brown color to beer, and very strong roasted flavor.
Use 2-4% in Brown ales to add a nutty flavor, or 3-10% in Porters and Stouts for coffee flavor.

Chocolate Malt: Dark malt that gives a rich red or brown color and nutty flavor.
Use for: Brown ales, porters, some stouts
Maintains some malty flavor, not as dark as roasted malt.

You can also add some Caramel Malt, just make sure you add the ones that will give you the character you want, but stay within the style you declared. Nothing wrong with going outside a style, just be sure to say that you want to... Such as a sweet porter, or chocolate porter, or honey porter, etc...

 

[msmylie]

Thanks for all the advice everyone. I ended up making a Robust Porter extract with specialty grains that is similar to Jamil's recipe...here it is, comments welcome.

Steeped at 155-160 30 min:
1.5 lb. Simpsons Medium Crystal
.5 lb. Simpsons Black Malt
.75 lb. Simpsons Chocolate

6 Gallon Boil:
9.15 lb. NB Pilsen Malt Syrup
1.0 lb. NB Munich Malt Syrup

East Kent Goldings Hop Pellets 1.65 oz. 60 min.
East Kent Goldings Hop Pellets .75 oz. 0 min.

White Labs WLP001 California Ale

Pitched when wort was 70 degrees, OG was 1.07, fermentation began about 20 hours later. Plan to ferment about two weeks or until gravity does not change. Going to rack to five gallon better bottle to condition for couple weeks and then bottle until carbed. Tasted the sample and it was great. Loved the hop profile with the residual sweetness. Can't wait to try this. Wish I did a ten gallon batch.
mfs

 

[motobrewer]

looks solid.

 

[Shooter]

I should be tapping into my robust porter, Jamil's recipe soon, if the sample I had was anything to go on, it is going to be GOOD!!

 

[msmylie]

Have you brewed it before?

 

[msmylie]

Update on the porter

Checked gravity on 2/28/2011 and fermented out to 1.020 or about 6.5%
Flavor is excellent and has a definite chocolate flavor from the choco malt.
Wondering if it is necessary to rack to secondary and age or if tastes good now just bottle and enjoy?
mfs

 

[Golddiggie]

Give it a few more days and check the SG again...

I wouldn't rack to secondary on this. Leave it on the yeast until you're ready to bottle it up... I would plan on letting it go ~3-4 weeks on the yeast though. Since you're at only 2-1/2 weeks from the start, I'd let it ride a bit longer.

How much sugar were you planning on priming it with? Did you record the temperature the wort was fermenting at (not the air temp, the wort temp)?? That will impact how much sugar to use for priming...

 

[msmylie]

I was planning on hitting it with just 5 ounces of corn sugar and then bottling. Should I take the temp of the wort prior to racking to bottling bucket? Air temp is 72 degrees. How long would this beer usually take to finish? Since the OG was 1.07 I thought it might need to ferment out about 3-4 weeks. I'm going to do another reading on friday to see if it has changed. If there is no change should I go ahead and bottle? Or will it benefit from more time on the lees?
mfs

 

[Golddiggie]

Air temp isn't what we're looking for... It's the temp the wort was at while fermenting... Can be X degree's above ambient... Such as the cream ale I have fermenting now is in a room that's about 63F, it's temperature is about 68F. So, I'll use the 66-68F temp to figure out how much sugar I'll need to prime with.

If the porter was in a room that had an air temp of 72F for the majority, then I would guesstimate that the wort fermented around 75-80F... Which means less CO2 was trapped in the wort as it fermented. Which means you need to prime with more sugar to get the same CO2 volumes as you wanted. That being said, I tend to carbonate porters and stouts in the lower half of their range.

You can use this site to figure it out on your own: http://hbd.org/cgi-bin/recipator/brew/widgets/bp.html I would say that you'll probably be looking at using about 4oz of sugar to prime. I wouldn't use more than that.

For a brew that had an OG of 1.070, I would go at least three weeks on the yeast... Four if you can... An extra week, or two, won't do any harm. If anything the brew will get better. Taste the hydrometer sample instead of tossing it... I would suggest doing another reading after Friday, around this time next week... If it's not getting ANY better, then plan to bottle when you have the chance/time. You don't HAVE to bottle right away.

 

[msmylie]

awesome advice, thanks for your help. the first sample tasted good, but did not have the depth of flavor i was looking for in this brew. maybe just needs more time.
mfs

 

[Golddiggie]

The more you brew, and taste things as they are getting closer, the more you learn on how to judge when things are ready. At least that's what I'm finding... With most ales (includes porters and stouts), they can easily go 2-4 weeks without issue. Since it sounds like you fermented a bit hot, I would give it time to see how things develop.

Off flavors, most of the time, age out (best when done on the yeast, in bulk). I would suspect that at about 4 weeks from start, it will taste really good... Just give it the time it needs, and learn... If nothing else, you'll have a better reference for the next brew you make.