Feedback on smoked porter

[eddie_burns]

Hi All - I'm looking for some feedback on this smoked porter recipe. Never built a porter recipe before so I'm a little unsure, especially because the smoked aspect of this one may be unconventional. I want a strong smoked effect, but I also wanted some subtle peated flavor. So in order to keep the peat under control while maintaining a strong overall smoked effect I also added some standard smoked malt in addition to peat smoked malt. Is that crazy?

Any other feedback is also welcome

6 lb Dry Malt Extract - Pale 53.1%
3 lb Beachwood Smoked Malt 26.5%
0.5 lb Black Malt 4.4%
0.5 lb Caramel / Crystal 40L 4.4%
0.5 lb Caramel / Crystal 80L 4.4%
0.5 lb Chocolate 4.4%
0.3 lb Peated Malt 2.7%

3 oz Northern Brewer Pellet Boil 60 min
1 oz East Kent Goldings Pellet Boil 30 min

5 Gallons
OG: 1.063
FG: 1.021
ABV: 5.53

 

[KegOutlet]

Hey Eddie, we just brewed a Smoked Porter (the recipe is very similar to the one you are looking at doing) and used 3.2 lbs of smoked malt as well. We did not use any Peated Malt thought.

The end result was excellent, and very smokey! I kind of wish that I only used about 2-2.5 lbs of smoked malt after tasting it, because it was a little too smokey for my taste... but it is still very good!

You may want to consider toning back the smoked malt a little if you want to be able to get your nose on that Peated Malt a little more. But be careful with the amount of Peated you use too, it can be overwhelming and ruin beers if too much is used!

Either way, I think this will be a great tasting beer!

Cheers!

 

[Ozarks Mountain Brewery]

well all I can say is the hops is through the roof, I'm guessing its to balance the strong flavor

 

[Foster82]

If you want to experiment you could smoke your own grains. I did this for a stout and it worked great. I got a few pieces of charcoal going in my grill then added small green maple branch pieces on top of the charcoal. I then took 1 pound of rolled oats and spread them in a shallow pan and placed in the grill. I then try to maintain the temp as close to 150 for an hour, adding more maple as needed to keep the smoke coming. I also stirred the oaks about every 15 mins. The process worked great, just had to make sure I keep the heat out from under the pan.

Overall the oats really soaked up the smoke and left a great smoke flavor in the beer.

Also I did the smoking about 3 days prior to brew day. Just a little to much to tackle all at once.

 

[Nosybear]

Way hoppy for the style but who knows, it might work.... I've found that smoke and bitterness aren't good friends. Concerning the grain bill, you're using Crystal 40 and Crystal 80, seems like you could just use a pound of Crystal 60 for mostly the same effect. I'd go a little bolder there and use Crystal 20 for caramel sweetness and Crystal 120 for some dark fruit flavors. I prefer a dry porter and would make the yeast selection appropriately. Porters should be dry, drinkable and malt-forward. Your recipe should work - it will be bitter and phenolic from the high hops and smoke but if that's what you're shooting for, go for it. And do let us know how it comes out!

 

[chessking]

I can't believe I'm the first to say this, but I wouldn't use peated malt in my beer if you put a gun to my head. Cats and dogs would be living together. Its nasty, and not appropriate for beer. Save it for making Scotch. The beech smoke malt is fine, but all you need is enough to notice over the flavor of the beer. Strong flavored beer like a Porter can handle more smoke, where a mild flavored beer can easily be over powered by too much smoke. I found 3lbs is about right for a 5 gal Robust Porter.
Also for an extract batch you may want to do a partial mash to convert some of the starches in the smoke malt. Otherwise you may have some starch haze in the final beer.

 

[Nosybear]

I'd trust Chessking with this - the man makes some awesome rauchbiers!

 

[eddie_burns]

So I went ahead and did the brew. Holy crap - it came out awesome.

The only changes I made were courtesy of Nosybear: swapped out the crystal 40 and 80 for 20 and 120. I left in the peat-smoked malt and all those hops. I do like the peated flavor, but with everything going on in this brew you can hardly tell it's there. Just a subtle earthiness from the peat. Don't be scared.

The hop additions put this brew at about 50 IBUs, but it doesn't taste like it. You can tell there's some hoppiness there, but it's far from dominant. It's just a nice addition to all the rich malty and smokiness.

It came out a bit heavier than I expected - almost more what I would consider a stout, but I'm not complaining. The really nice thing is it packs a huge flavor punch and comes across as a really big beer, but it's actually around 5.5% ABV, so you can have a few at once.

Overall, it's got some rich, complex malty character, plenty of warm smokiness, and complimentary hops. There's a lot going on, but it all stays pretty balanced without any one aspect dominating. Sorry if it sounds like I'm tooting my own horn here, but this is one of my favorites out of all the brews I've done.