Porter

As I said in my 2015 Brewing Goals post, I was going to focus on a few styles (saison, hoppy beers, sours) and I have done almost exclusively that so far this year.  As much as I love re-brewing the same beers with little tweaks and making them better/honing in on them, every so often you need to switch things up.

I decided I wanted to brew a porter for a couple of reasons.  1) A stout/porter/dark beer is a nice change of pace from saisons/hoppy/sours.  2) Some of my favorite beers that I've had (and some I haven't had, but desperately want) are porters ie: Funky Buddha Last Snow, Angry Chair German Chocolate Cake, Hill Farmstead Everett.  3) Porter is a great style to serve as a base for different treatments (Last Snow has coffee, coconut, white chocolate, German Chocolate Cake has cacao nibs, coconut and vanilla) and if you've read a little of my blog, you'll notice I love splitting a batch 3 ways to get different beers.  

Now, I've read countless arguments about porter vs stout and it seems like nobody knows what differentiates the two styles.  Personally, I don't really care about putting this beer into a style category as I don't aim to enter this in competitions.  Initially I was shooting for a lower ABV, sweeter, lighter (brown to dark brown) beer with little roast character (which is what pops into my head when someone describes a porter).  In researching recipes, I think I actually drifted away from that in an effort to get something like Hill Farmstead's Everett.  I think the beer I ended up with will be a little roastier (maybe too much roasted malt?), but should end up with a higher finishing gravity to add some sweetness and hopefully a little bit of syrupy-ness, which I actually like.  Either way, I think this beer will get tweaked a few times because I'd love to have a good porter in my back pocket.

Porter

3 gallons
74% Efficiency
60 minute boil

5.5 lb 2 Row
0.75 lb Chocolate Malt
0.75 lb C60
0.75 lb Roast Barley

0.25 oz Chinook (60 min)
0.5 oz Chinook (15 min)

Wyeast 1318 @64F.  Mashed at 154F.

OG 1.066 | FG 1.022 | ABV 6.0% | IBU 33

Ca 237 | Mg 2 | Na 87 | Cl 219 | SO4 253 | HCO3 269

3/21/15: Brewday.  OG 1.063 (Ended up with > 3 gal).  Seriously dark.  Mash pH high (5.6), added lactic to lower.

3/22/15: Cooled overnight to pitching temp, added decanted 1L starter.  Fermentation was visible within hours.

3/24/15: Down to 1.026.

4/8/15: Racked 1 gallon onto 12 oz of frozen raspberries.  Racked 1 gallon onto 49 g toasted unsweetened coconut.

4/14/15: Bottled the 2 variants and the plain batch.