Home Brewed Beer: The Smoked Porter, Part 2

Welcome to the second installment of our beer brewing experiment. If you missed the first part, you can view it here.


We left off with adding the second round of hops to your bubbling beer. Now, we get to rapidly cool it down.


During one of the long stints of waiting for the beer to boil, throw two large bags of ice into a big tub and then add some water. You're going to place the pot of beer in this. Don't worry - it floats.

Stir around with the thermometer while you wait for it to cool to 150 degrees F.

Once your beer comes to the correct temperature, pour 2 gallons of water into your 5 gallon bucket. Be sure to sanitize the bucket first.

Slowly pour in the beer from the pot. Ideally, you should run this through a mesh strainer. We may have forgotten about that, but we used a wire mesh splatter screen. It mostly worked.

Be thankful that we didn't show you the sludge that was left in the bottom from the hops. Eww.


Now use the hydrometer to measure your originating gravity. You use the originating gravity number to calculate your alcohol by volume percentage. Your instructions will tell you what range you want to be in. Add water very slowly if your number isn't in the right spot.

Once you get your chemistry right, pop the lid on and give it a good shake. We're serious, shake vigorously.

Next step, open up the lid again and sprinkle the yeast over the top.

Seal it up again and place it in a 65-75 degree area for a week.


Stay tuned for the rest of the process. We will demonstrate the transfer and bottling process.