Let's Brew - 1882 Strangman H Porter

Another Strangman beer today. And another mystery. So many questions and so few answers. As so often when bathing in the pool of history.

Here we have a beer which actually is called Porter. Though what does the prefix “H” stand for? Could it be “heading”.

Heading being the high gravity, fermenting wort added at racking time as a sort of Kräusen. Two problems with that theory: the gravity isn’t high enough and there’s far too much of it. The 132 barrels would have been enough for 7 or 8 batches of their Beer. So about two weeks’ worth. But it wouldn’t last that long. And it was pitched in tuns the normal way.

My guess is that it’s one of the other elements of Irish Porter and Stout” aged beer. At least, that’s what the high hopping rate implies to me.

The grist is similar to Single Stout, having around 5% black malt. Of which around 20% was added to the copper rather than the mash tun. Which probably resulted in a beer darker than the 27 SRM in the recipe below.

Just a single type of hops, which I assume, based on the grower’s name of Noakes, were English. 

1882 Strangman H Porter
pale malt	15.25 lb	94.57%
black malt	0.875 lb	5.43%
Fuggles 90 mins	2.25 oz
Fuggles 60 mins	2.25 oz
Fuggles 30 mins	2.25 oz
Fuggles dry hops	0.75 oz
OG	1068.5
FG	1016
ABV	6.95
Apparent attenuation	76.64%
IBU	69
SRM	27
Mash at	153º F
Sparge at	165º F
Boil time	90 minutes
pitching temp	58.5º F
Yeast	WLP004 Irish Stout