Building the Recipe

Much of the research I've been able to find on the history of porter and stout styles in Ireland, as shown in previous entries, has been in industry journals or homebrewing blogs and websites. When settling on a particular style to brew for this project, however, there were certain constants in both the academic and industry scholarship on the history of modern beer styles in Ireland and the UK.

To review, the beer now known as "porter" was first recorded as a distinctive style of beer in 1721 brewed by commercial brewers and pub owners in London, England. The style was carried over to Ireland in the late 18th century, where it began to be brewed by Arthur Guinness at his brewery at St. James's Gate, Dublin. Beamish & Crawford founded their brewery dedicated to porter styles in 1759 in Cork City. Guinness would become the largest brewer of beer in the British Isles, dominating the market for beer in Ireland and Britain throughout the 19th and early 20th centuries when tastes shifted to lighter ales and lager beer styles. Porter brewing begins to fall out of fashion in the UK at the onset of WWI due to restrictions on raw materials necessary for the brewing process and all but completely dies out by WWII due to continued restrictions and shift in public demand to lighter styles. However, Irish and American brewers both continue to brew porters and stouts throughout this period. Guinness finally ceases to brew porter in 1974 and shifts only to its stout styles. The Beamish & Crawford brewery produced their porter until 1960 and stout until its acquisition and ultimate closure by Heineken in 2009.

There seems to be a consensus among the scholarship I have read that the base of porter grists (grain builds) consists of pale-malt barley. I have also read in almost all of the sources I have used for this project that Irish porter and stout brewers such as Guinness used the Black Patent Malt as for both color and for a smoky flavoring in the beer following the invention and patenting of the drum roaster in 1817. This patent black malt was used in combination with brown malt, which was used to varying degrees by both English and Irish brewers in porter recipes for its flavoring and coloring. Brown malted barley in the 18th and 19th centuries was comprised a large percentage of the grain bills of porter brewed in Ireland and the UK. Historically, it is believed brown malt was kiln-fired in smaller batches than what modern brewers typically produce, leaving enzymes in the grain intact which allowed conversion to fermentable sugars in the wort. However, modern brown malt is produced in the drum-roasting process and contains no enzymes. Because few sources are available to describe the exact process of how brown malt was produced in order to leave the enzymes in the grain intact and still get the dark brown color and texture, it is used in conjunction with pale malt to ensure conversion of the fermentable sugars. This recipe, I believe, should emulate a similar account of what the Guinness brewery used shortly after the introduction of black patent in the 1820s.

Hops are not native to Ireland and were likely brought over to Ireland with the same brewers who brought the brewing equipment and porter. Thus, the bulk of the hops used in this recipe are known as Fuggles, a traditional English hop with an earthy, less-refined flavor spectrum than some of the more noble hop varieties such as East Kent Golding. Northdown Hop will also be used for aroma, to help balance the bitter and sweet flavor spectrum, and to be in keeping with the historical brewing tradition of using what resources were available.

The yeast used in this recipe is actually an English strain from a brewery in Essex. I am using this yeast for several reasons. For one, the local homebrew store was completely out of Irish ale yeast. That aside, however, I am attempting to emulate in this recipe a recipe closer to the period when porter was still essentially an English brew style that was in the process of being appropriated and experimented with by Irish brewers. Moreover, Essex yeast is characteristically most similar to Irish ale yeast of the English yeast strains.

Thus, the recipe I am using takes all of these into consideration and uses a mixture of all three varieties of malted barley: pale, brown, and black patent with Fuggles hops and Essex ale yeast.

Turn of the Century Irish Porter (Robust Porter)

Makes 3.5 US Gallons

Grist

6.3 lb Malting Company of Ireland Pale Malt
.7 lb UK Brown Malt
7 oz UK Black Patent Malt

Hops
1. 5 oz Fuggles
~ .8 oz Northdown

Yeast
White Labs WLP022 Essex Ale Yeast

Original Gravity (O.G.): 1.057
Final Gravity (F.G.): 1.018
Expected ABV: 5.15%
Expected IBU: 42.59