Snow Day Porter (aka Fireside 2.0)

Frigid temperatures.  Blizzard conditions.  First day of the semester cancelled.  All non-essential employees told to stay home.  Kids' school cancelled.  Home for the day and snowbound.  Hmmm...what to do....what to do?

Lucky for me I had just picked up the ingredients to make a smoked porter.  With dry yeast to boot since I was not expecting to brew and so had not made a liquid yeast starter.  I've been wanting to brew this recipe for a while now - it is essentially the "Fireside Smoked Porter" I made a few years ago that turned out spectacularly.  I tweaked it slightly this time around - Chinook hops instead of Columbus (which was my original idea the first time except that back then I couldn't get any Chinook), more smoked malt, and just a touch more black malt (partly to darken it up a tad more, but mostly because doing so completed a numeric pattern in the grain weights...see recipe below...yes, I am that kind of guy).

Brew day went pretty well, except that my mash pH came out on the low side unexpectedly.  I use store bought spring water and have been using an old water report I got from the company as the basis for my salt additions.  It is possible the water has changed enough over the years to make a difference here.  I'll have to ask for a new report. I am not overly concerned about this, though my efficiency was a little lower than normal. I also ended up with 1 little more volume than I intended, leaving my OG a little lower than I was shooting for.

I have to admit that I wish I had brewed this beer a couple months ago - it would be nice to be drinking something like this during the current "arctic outbreak".

Snow Day Porter (Fireside 2.0)
brewed on 1/22/14

Recipe Specifications
Batch Size: 4 gal
Estimated Color: 30.2 SRM
Estimated IBU: 49.1
Brewhouse Efficiency: 70%
OG: 1.051
FG: 1.013
ABV: 5.1%

Grist
4 lbs Pale Malt -  50.8 %
2 lbs Smoked Malt (Weyermann) - 25.4 %
1 lbs Munich I (Weyermann) - 12.7 %
8.0 oz Chocolate Wheat (Weyermann) (415.0 SRM) - 6.3 %
4.0 oz Honey Malt  - 3.2 %
2.0 oz Black Malt (500.0 SRM) - 1.6 %

Hops
6 g Chinook [13.90 %]  - 60.0 min
14 g Chinook [13.90 %] - 30.0 min
14 g Willamette [4.80 %] - 15.0 min
14 g Willamette [4.80 %] - 1.0 min

Misc
0.5 oz oak cubes (medium toast, Hungarian) - in primary

Yeast
Safale American (Fermentis #US-05)

Mash Schedule
Single infusion, 152°F, batch sparge

Tabula Rasa (aka John) - Empirical Series 2011

"No man's knowledge here can go beyond his experience."

The original intent of my annual "Empirical" project was to brew a barley wine every year. However, I've since realized that, 1) I don't want to be limited to a single style for this series, and 2) the previous years' brews were, in fact, not actually barley wines. So, I've now decided that style plays little role in these beers and that the only "rules" are that they are big and that they are allowed to age for a year before drinking. Live and learn. The slate has been wiped clean.

The inspiration for this year's recipe was Deschute's Black Butte Porter. Now, the interesting thing here is that I have never had the privilege of tasting this particular beer, but by all accounts, it is wonderful. And as an avid listener of the Brewing Network, I had a good starting point for a recipe after the boys on CYBI brewed up a clone of this beer (podcast here; recipe here).

For my version, I increased the OG to 1.090 to help get me in the 9-10% ABV range and added some smoked malt for added complexity, especially in conjunction with a planned addition of oak. Also with these Empirical beers, I like to add 5-10% simple sugars to help increase the ABV as well as to help the yeast attenuate as much as possible. Given the nature of this project, I opted to experiment with a new-to-me sugar, sucanat - essentially, dried pure sugar cane juice. I expect this unrefined sugar to give the beer some rum notes, which I think will work well with the chocolate and smoked malts and the oak aging. I was unsure about the hop schedule, but since it seems to work for Deschute's, I figured I'd stick to it as close as possible - just increasing the additions to get me close to an estimated 70ish IBUs.

I ended up pitching three vials of yeast because I broke the growler of my intended starter and didn't have time to make up a new one. Fermentation took off quick and I had airlock activity for a good 7 days (the longest I can remember for any of my beers). I'll let it sit in primary for 4 weeks and then rack into a secondary carboy with some oak cubes for several weeks before bottling. I'll keep the bottles squirreled away until next winter.

Tabula Rasa - Empirical Series 2011
Brewed on 2/23/11

Recipe Specifications
Batch Size: 3.75 gal
Boil Size: 5.00 gal
Estimated Color: 29.2 SRM
Estimated IBU: 65.6 IBU
Brewhouse Efficiency: 74.00 %
Boil Time: 60 Minutes
OG: 1.090
FG: 1.020
ABV: 9.3%

Grist
7 lbs Pale Malt (2 Row) UK - 60.87 %
1 lbs Wheat Malt, Pale - 8.70 %
8.0 oz Chocolate Malt (450L) - 4.35 %
8.0 oz Crystal malt (50-60L) - 4.35 %
8.0 oz Smoked Malt - 4.35 %
1 lbs Extra Light DME 8.70 %
1 lbs Sucanat - 8.70 %

Hops
0.75 oz Galena [13.00 %] (60 min)
0.50 oz Cascade [5.50 %] (30 min)
0.50 oz Mt. Hood [6.00 %] (5 min)

Misc
0.75 oz Oak Cubes, Hungarian, Medium Toast (Secondary 4-8 weeks)

Yeast
Dry English Ale (White Labs #WLP007)

Mash Schedule
Single Infusion
60 min 152°F

3/18/11 - racked to 3 gallon carboy for bulk aging; added oak cubes; SG = 1.020

Fireside Porter

I've long been a fan of smokey flavors - BBQ and hickory-smoked bacon of course, but also a nice Islay single malt scotch, lapsang souchong tea, and Bramberg rauchbier. Amazingly, I hadn't tasted any smoked porters until recently, but once I sampled Clipper City's Smoke on the Water and Alaskan Brewing Company's Smoked Porter, I knew this style was going on my short list to brew. Looking to brew something rich, flavorful, and smooth, I did some research and came up with this recipe. I actually wanted Chinook hops, thinking a nice piney flavor/aroma would complement the smoke nicely. Unfortunately, my LHBS was out of Chinook so I decided to give Columbus a try. I've never used this hop and hope it works out OK.

Brew day went without a hitch. I am getting used to my new set-up - all-grain, small batch, split boil - and am quite happy with the results so far. As for the grist I decided to go with approximately 20% Weyermann's beechwood-smoked malt - I want the smoke character to have a real presence, but not dominate like in a rauchbier. I've become a fan of honey malt in lieu of crystal malt - I find it less intense. I also like to add some wheat to my brews for increased head retention and overall body and since my LHBS carries chocolate wheat, I decided to kill two birds with one stone, getting my wheat and my roasted grain in one. I threw in a dash of black patent so the beer had a bit of acridity to it. I wasn't looking for anything special from the yeast, so I went with the clean-fermenting dry US-05.

After listening to the BN podcast with Shea Comfort on using oak, I decided to add some oak cubes to the primary, which Shea suggested can add mouthfeel, but little oak flavor to the finished beer. Not sure what kind of effect this will actually have - or if I will be able to detect it - but I figured it was worth a try.

I'm thinking this will need some time to condition in the bottles, so I'm looking at mid-March before it will be ready.

Fireside Smoked Porter
Brewed on 1/12/11

Recipe Specifications
Batch Size: 3.50 gal
Boil Size: 5.00 gal
Estimated Color: 29.3 SRM
Estimated IBU: 46.7 IBU
Brewhouse Efficiency: 72.00 %
Boil Time: 70 Minutes
OG: 1.060
FG: 1.014
ABV: 6.00%

Grist
4 lbs 8.0 oz Pale Malt - 57.62 %
1 lbs 8.0 oz Smoked Malt (Weyermann) - 19.21 %
1 lbs Munich I - 12.80 %
8.0 oz Chocolate Wheat - 6.40 %
4.0 oz Honey Malt - 3.20 %
1.0 oz Black Malt - 0.77 %

Hops
0.18 oz Columbus (Tomahawk) [14.50 %] (60 min)
0.5 oz Columbus (Tomahawk) [14.50 %] (30 min)
0.5 oz Williamette [4.80 %] (15 min)
0.5 oz Williamette [4.80 %] (1 min)

Misc
0.5 oz Oak Cubes, Hungarian, Med Toast (Primary)

Yeast
SafAle (Fermentis US-05)

Mash Schedule
Single Infusion, 152°F, Batch Sparge