Pliers Porter English Porter

ALL-GRAIN

Batch size: 5 gallons (19 liters) Brewhouse efficiency: 72% OG: 1.053 FG: 1.013 IBUS: 28 ABV: 5.3%

MALT/GRAIN BILL

8 lb (3.6 kg) Maris Otter 1 lb (454 g) chocolate rye 1 lb (454 g) British Crystal 45 1 lb (454 g) brown malt OR 12 oz (340 g) brown malt and 4 oz (113 g) Cherry-smoked malt

HOPS SCHEDULE 2 oz (57 g) East Kent Goldings [5% AA] at 30 minutes

YEAST Wyeast 1318 (London Ale III) DIRECTIONS

Mill the grains and mix with 3.4 gallons (13 l) of 163°F (73°C) strike water to reach a mash temperature of 152°F (67°C). Hold this temperature for 60 minutes. Vorlauf until your runnings are clear, then run off into the kettle. Sparge the grains with 3.8 gallons (14.4 l) and top up as necessary to obtain 6 gallons (23 l) of wort. Boil for 60 minutes, following the hops schedule.

After the boil, chill the wort to slightly below fermentation temperature, 63°F (17°C). Aerate the wort with pure oxygen or filtered air and pitch the yeast.

Ferment at 63°F (17°C) for 48 hours, then increase the temperature by about 1°F (0.5°C) per day until you reach 70°F (21°C), and hold there until two days after fermentation completes. At that point, crash the beer to 35°F (2°C), then bottle or keg the beer and carbonate to approximately 2 volumes.

TIPS FOR SUCCESS There’s nothing wrong with the straight brown malt version of this recipe, but adding that touch of smoked malt really ramps up the complexity! One thing you definitely want to avoid here is diacetyl—diacetyl plus smoke plus toffee plus bread can make the beer seem slick and oily. Start cool, increase temperatures throughout fermentation, and give it time to clean up at the end.

If temperature control isn’t an option for you, consider giving this beer a shot with a more-neutral yeast such as WLP 001 (American Ale) yeast or Wyeast 2565 (Kolsch) yeast.