AMERICAN PORTER – Sweet and Full-Bodied

[Uriel homebrewer]

https://www.brewersfriend.com/homebrew/recipe/view/1577505/american-porter

I’m planning to brew this beer next week and I’d like to get some advice or feedback on my approach. I prepared the recipe as a traditional American Porter, but added oats for extra body and head retention. I was originally planning to use 300g of oats, but I cut it down by 50g because I don’t want to end up chewing my beer haha.


I’m trying to replicate a beer I remember having a long time ago — sweet, full-bodied, and creamy (drinkable rather than overly chewy).

 

[Bigbre04]

https://www.brewersfriend.com/homebrew/recipe/view/1577505/american-porter

I’m planning to brew this beer next week and I’d like to get some advice or feedback on my approach. I prepared the recipe as a traditional American Porter, but added oats for extra body and head retention. I was originally planning to use 300g of oats, but I cut it down by 50g because I don’t want to end up chewing my beer haha.


I’m trying to replicate a beer I remember having a long time ago — sweet, full-bodied, and creamy (drinkable rather than overly chewy).

that is a very interesting recipe.

The biggest thing is to shoot for a higher mash temp. instead of 147-149f maybe shoot for 152f.

This is an oatmeal porter that i did a while ago.
https://www.brewersfriend.com/homebrew/recipe/embed/1501840

This is a coconut porter:
https://www.brewersfriend.com/homebrew/recipe/embed/1454166

Stout for reference
https://www.brewersfriend.com/homebrew/recipe/embed/1437455

 

[Bigbre04]

I would reduce the vienna malt and up the pils.

the vienna is welcome though just in smaller %s.

i would also add some dark crystal for the sweet toffee flavors.

I would reduce the overall chocolate and sub in some Debittered black malt for color and the crystal and chocolate work together.

In my mind, a porter is like a drier, sweet, lighter stout. I would go with the 151 mash temp as your max. you could probably get what you want at 149-150.

i would also shoot for a higher SRM. >28SRM seems to be good.

 

[Minbari]

Looks pretty good.

Not sure 6% of 340L will get it dark enough, for me. Personally would add some 500L in there too

 

[Dave Y]

I prepared the recipe as a traditional American Porter, but added oats for extra body and head retention.

From what era?
“traditional American Porter” has evolved over time. We had a tough time emulating Porter in colonial times without adjuncts. Then once we sorted the chaps across the pond, until prohibition, we had an era of both good and bad developments where ethical brewers produced a higher ABV, darker ale and less ethical ones added all manner of yucky stuff to darken up cheap swill. Then there was a divergence of porter with ale yeast and lager yeast - Yeungling is, I believe, a good example of the latter. This is representative of the immigration of Germans to the US, along with their methods and techniques. So you still have the expressions available as an ale with brown malt - I think Fullers comes to mind, the less ‘brown malt’ expressions with largely 2 row and some crystal, and black patent for color, and the lager expressions which came later.

If you’re going for a no adjunct American Porter, I’m with @Bigbre04 on the vienna, crystal, debittered black malt, etc.
where chocolate malt is added, I like an even split of chocolate and pale chocolate malt. The combination works well together.

I like where this is going. I still have an east coast porter on tap - Nitro actually.

 

[Megary]

My opinion —->. Not sure what makes your recipe an “ American” Porter, other than the gravity. Not seeing any American malts, hops or yeast. Alas. And while oats can be a nice addition, they aren’t going to give you a boost in head retention. Don’t believe it.

Compared to an English Porter I would expect an American version to be a bit bolder in roast, less chewy, less sweet, more dry, with a more pronounced hops presence and with less yeast esters. Basically, more stout like, if that makes any sense.

One of the best American Porters around is Great Lakes Edmund Fitzgerald. Here’s a great place to start.
https://www.greatlakesbrewing.com/edmund-fitzgerald/

Good luck!

 

[Dave Y]

One of the best American Porters around is Great Lakes Edmund Fitzgerald. Here’s a great place to start.
https://www.greatlakesbrewing.com/edmund-fitzgerald/

Huzzah!

 

[Craigerrr]

From what era?
“traditional American Porter” has evolved over time. We had a tough time emulating Porter in colonial times without adjuncts. Then once we sorted the chaps across the pond, until prohibition, we had an era of both good and bad developments where ethical brewers produced a higher ABV, darker ale and less ethical ones added all manner of yucky stuff to darken up cheap swill. Then there was a divergence of porter with ale yeast and lager yeast - Yeungling is, I believe, a good example of the latter. This is representative of the immigration of Germans to the US, along with their methods and techniques. So you still have the expressions available as an ale with brown malt - I think Fullers comes to mind, the less ‘brown malt’ expressions with largely 2 row and some crystal, and black patent for color, and the lager expressions which came later.

If you’re going for a no adjunct American Porter, I’m with @Bigbre04 on the vienna, crystal, debittered black malt, etc.
where chocolate malt is added, I like an even split of chocolate and pale chocolate malt. The combination works well together.

I like where this is going. I still have an east coast porter on tap - Nitro actually.

I was trying to remember why I wrote down "East Coast Porter", you mentioned this on the last zoom!
What is this, this "East Coast Porter" that you are referring to my good man?

 

[Craigerrr]

I would also recommend some dehusked carafa usually a high lovibond malt. I have brown (coffee) malt in my porter. Mind you mine is a coffee porter, so if you could rake that with a grain of salt. The flavor form the brown suits Porter though. Someone else mentioned Crystal, I agree, but it probably should be limited if you are in the 5%ABV range, just my opinion. Flaked oats are good at the 14/15%you have in there, you don't want chewy, but you do want some body, you aren't brewing a dark lager. Roasted Barley, just a smidgen, I have 2.7% in my 6% coffee porter.

 

[dmtaylor]

Ditch the sauer malt, that doesn't belong in a dark beer. Trust me on this.

Oats don't do what you think they do. Swap the oats for rye malt and a handful of rice hulls. You'll thank me later.

Good luck.

 

[Craigerrr]

As many opinions as there brewers, and nobody is wrong!

 

[Bigbre04]

Ditch the sauer malt, that doesn't belong in a dark beer. Trust me on this.

Oats don't do what you think they do. Swap the oats for rye malt and a handful of rice hulls. You'll thank me later.

Good luck.

@Uriel homebrewer
the sauer malt is just for ph adjustment and is perfectly fine instead of adding acid. PH wise you really want to be between 5.3 and 5.4 mash ph. i use phosphoric acid, but acidulated malt is perfectly acceptable and very german of you.

I add ricehulls to all of my beers, they just help my stupid system achieve glory lol.

I wouldnt worry about country of origin for malts, i use mostly canadian malt in my "Merican" beers, but you really should look at getting your hands on some cascade/columbus/CTZ/Centennial/etc. you want a slightly dank hop

I generally shoot for most of my bitterness at 60 mins and then layer in some flavor hops with the lower AA hops like cascade/centennial at 15 mins.

total IBUs for a 6-6.5% abv porter should be slightly higher then your recipe calls out. maybe 28-35.

If you want it Sweeter, you need to reduce your yeast attenuation and adjust your recipe accordingly. Shoot for a warmer mash in temp. For me, i prefer my porters to be well attenuated with a crystal sweetness vs a stout sweetness. I would run this beer at 149(same temp i run for all of my beers, for stupid brewhouse reasons)

I would do:
2r/Pils ~70-75%
vienna/munich 1 or 2 ~5%
C120 ~5-6%
light choc ~ 2%
Black patent/debittered black/midnight wheat however much you need to get to 28SRM(midnight wheat is my first choice of them)
Dextrin malt can help with head retention dont use more then 4% and take it from the overall basemalt %. Not really needed, but it is a staple in commercial brewing.

Optionally
oats would take from the total basemalt(have to add ricehulls over 10% IMO)
Roasted barley ~1% (low % really rounds out the combo of crystal/dark malts without being overly bitter)
Brown malt/extra spec malt(i like this because it is like roasted barley combined with dark crystal)
Spec x gives a very specific flavor that i love at around 4% i would reduce the dark crystal(could also go with a lighter crystal for flavor layering) and do about 50/50 with spec x.


Hope this helps!

 

[dmtaylor]

@Uriel homebrewer
PH wise you really want to be between 5.3 and 5.4 mash ph.

True, but at what temperature? The correct answer will surprise you: at MASH temperature. The correct pH at room temperature is 5.5 to 5.6. Fall down some rabbit holes:

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/threads/will-it-mash-at-ph-5-00.667992/page-2#post-8653242

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/thread...-brewers-do-not-mash-at-5-2-to-5-6-ph.671764/

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/thread...-at-5-2-to-5-6-ph.671764/page-12#post-8803629

Also... dark malts and crystal malts are acidic. It is likely that with 3% crystal and 6% roasted malt, the pH will hit perfectly right around 5.5 with zero acid addition necessary.

 

[Dave Y]

I was trying to remember why I wrote down "East Coast Porter", you mentioned this on the last zoom!
What is this, this "East Coast Porter" that you are referring to my good man?

https://www.bjcp.org/style/2015/20/american-porter-and-stout
&
https://www.bjcp.org/style/2021/27/27A/historical-beer-pre-prohibition-porter/

"History
Commercially brewed in Philadelphia during the revolutionary period as an adaptation of English beer. Evolved later as German immigrants applied lager brewing methods during the second half of the 1800s. Prohibition ended most porter brewing in the US, except in a few regional Northeast and Mid-Atlantic states where it was most popular.

Characteristic Ingredients​

Two row or six row malt. Low percentages of dark malts including black, chocolate, and brown malt (roasted barley is not typically used). Adjuncts are acceptable, including corn, brewers licorice, molasses, and porterine. More historical versions will have up to twenty percent adjuncts. Lager or ale yeast. Historical or traditional American bittering hops, American or German finishing hops."

Note that you have a wide range to deal with here, going from the colonial era to the mid-late 1800’s which covers a lot. Skewing towards the colonial era, you would see a high amount of adjuncts such as corn, & molasses, but not so much porterine which would be more prevalent in later expressions. Not only were we in our relative brewing infancy, what we didn’t know about brewing was far more than what we did.

As we leave the colonial era, and add the Germans to the mix, we start to see less adjuncts, a more clean profile and lager yeast but still a bigger porter, than the English cousin. The malts would be more consistent than in the colonial era, where you would see ‘brown’ malt that was inconsistently kilned.
Maybe even a little smokey characteristic to it, but I would think it would be subtle- a guess.

In terms of Porter, I think of them as English, Colonial era, East Coast ; both of the latter would qualify as 27a pre-prohibition porter, and (modern) American.
I suppose English Porter carries a wide range as well due to the ever lowering ABV as a result of taxes, but for that I shoot for a 5-5.5%ABV.

HTH!

 

[Bigbre04]

@dmtaylor
sure thing, but i have never had a mash at those temps???

for my "normal" beers(golden lagers, ipas, kolsch, etc.) i add at least 35ml of 75% phos. to hit 5.2-5.3

for my black lager, stouts, porters, etc i still have to add 15-20ml of 75% phos to hit 5.35-5.45

acidulated is just a different means to the same end. as long as he is using the calculator to approximate his target ph it doesnt matter how it gets in there!

 

[Sandy Feet]

I like flaked oats in a Porter, but I go a pound for 5 gallons.
Not American, but I like using Otter/C120/Munich/Chocolate 350/Flaked Oats/ and maybe a little wheat.
Single infusion @ 154F. The Munich will give a little sweet @ around 1 3/4 lb for 5 gallons.