For us, there’s nothing quite like a good Porter; we can recognize one almost by its aroma alone. These dark, often full-bodied beers have something of an attitude thanks to their caramel and chocolate tones.
And it’s a beer with a good story.
The origins of the ale trace back to the 1700s, when it was a favorite beer of the porters who worked the London shipyards. Popular legend has it that brewers and bartenders got tired of tapping separate kegs for each of the current three styles: “beer,” “ale” and “twopenny” (a beverage of specious origins most famous for being cheap). Brewers combined them into one brew that became popular with London laborers. Others claim the Porter style emerged as a result of brewers combining different mash runs from the same malt. For whatever reason, burly deliverymen balanced wooden kegs on their shoulders and rapped on pub doors, announcing themselves with a shout of “Porter!”
Porter evolved as malting processes evolved, and the beer went from being a smoky brown ale to a darker, more roasty style of beer, ranging from brown to deep black in color due to its chocolate and smoked brown malts. Breweries aged the beer in immense vats that might tower over 20 feet high and contain thousands of barrels’ worth. It was the first mass-market beer style of the Industrial Revolution.
In the U.S., the porter style nearly vanished in the years following Prohibition as light-bodied lagers dominated the market, until they were revived by homebrewers and small craft beer makers in the early ’70s, including Anchor Brewing Company — the first American craft brewery to brew a Porter post-Prohibition. Other craft breweries followed Anchor’s lead, including Lazy Boy Brewing in Everett and the Harmon Brewing Company in Tacoma. And it was these two Porters that deserve some credit for P-51 Porter, Wingman Brewers’ robust beer that soars every January during the Tacoma brewery’s Porterpalooza celebration.
“I fell in love with Porter after drinking the Lazy Boy Porter and Harmon’s Puget Pound Porter,” says Ken Thoburn, head brewer and co-owner of Wingman Brewers. “I thought Lazy Boy’s Porter was amazing. One night I ordered a pint of Puget Sound Porter, and ended up buying a pitcher of it for the table.
I was drinking craft beer, but these two beers inspired me to homebrew, and my first recipe was a Porter. It wasn’t very good, and being a perfectionist, Derrick Moyer and I worked and worked at it. I dove into books on the style. Bruce Kiewell at The Beer Essentials gave us pointers, too.”
After four batches, Thoburn and Moyer had what they thought was a damn good Porter. They poured it at a friend’s birthday party.
“We called the Porter ‘Nalty’s Tall Order Porter’ since our friend is a tall dude,” explains Thoburn. “The beer went over so well with our friends that it remains the only recipe we’ve never changed since Wingman started, except we changed the name. We now make P-51 Porter for our taproom, local sale, can sales, Coconut Porter and Peanut Butter Cup Porter. They are all the same base recipe made with Washington-grown barley and Moxie valley hops.”
Thoburn thanks his lucky stars he created his P-51 recipe — essentially an Imperial Porter —during his homebrewing years.
“It uses an absurd amount of specialty malts — malts that taste like caramel, chocolate, coffee, biscuit and such. It goes against conventional wisdom to brew a beer with so many specialty malts but when we made the recipe, we didn’t know any better and turns out it works.”
Thoburn and his crew will offer creative variations on their flagship P-51 Porter during Porterpalooza Saturday, Jan. 9: Coconut, Peanut Butter Cup, Avocado, Sriracha, Vanilla Cinnamon, Nutella, Pistachio, Tiramisu, Irish Coffee, Blueberry, Habanero, Brett and possibly more derivatives. The celebration not only allows Wingman to exhibit their Porter polish, but also select winners for a possible spot in the regular rotation. Porterpalooza gave birth to their staples Coconut Porter and the Peanut Butter Cup Porter. Most of the Porter flavors on this year’s roster are making their Tacoma debut.
Perhaps the hardest kind of Porter to obtain nowadays is one that mirrors the original. The wooden vessels employed 200 years ago harbored a variety of microorganisms in their crevices, including the wild yeast called Brettanomyces (literally, “British yeast”). Wingman Brewers will pour a Brett Porter Saturday, and the rich, chocolaty flavor should mellow out the acidity and earthy flavors that can spiral out of control in some American wild ales.
Avocado Porter? Tiramisu Porter? Has Thoburn gone mad?
Well, kind of. He’s gone mad scientist. He studied molecular gastronomy to create a few of his Porter derivatives. Molecular gastronomy is a branch of food science that utilizes the principles of chemistry, physics and biology to develop delicious food and beverages that can be presented in new and interesting ways — solid cocktails, fruit jelly caviar or avocado beer.
“We separated the fatty oils in the avocados using temperature variations and made emulsions that were water soluble,” says Thoburn. “We stayed away from alcohol-based extracts. We played with water-based emulsions to preserve the integrity of ingredients. We used the same process with cream cheese in our Carrot Cake Ale. It might not look pretty, but you can smell and taste the cream cheese as well as the carrots and spices.”
Porterpalooza will cost the same as last year — $5 cover secures a commemorative Porterpalooza 10-ounce glass and a first pour; all other pours ring in at $4 each.
Porter is something you take for granted, like a comfy easy chair or a well-worn sweater. Saturday at Wingman, you won’t see a comfy chair, but rather a packed house of eager drinkers and Thoburn donning a mad smile stroking his chin in thought of his next Porter.
PORTERPALOOZA 2016, 2-11 p.m., Saturday, Jan. 9, Wingman Brewers, 509 ½ Puyallup Ave., Tacoma, $5 cover, 253.256.5240
