Stone Brewing Company’s Darth Porter clone

Darth Porter clone
(Stone Brewing Company)

(5 gallons/19 L, all-grain)
OG = 1.076   FG = 1.019
IBU = 63  SRM = 51  ABV = 7.3%

Ingredients
13 lb. 10 oz. (6.2 kg) Pilsner malt
12 oz. (0.34 kg) chocolate malt
8.0 oz. (0.23 kg) Caramunich® malt
8.0 oz. (0.23 kg) crystal malt (90 °L)
4.0 oz. (0.11 kg) black patent malt (or Carafa® malt)
13.5 AAU Perle hops (60 min.) (1.5 oz./43 g of 9% alpha acids)
6.5 AAU Hallertau hops (30 min.) (1.0 oz./28 g of 6.5% alpha acids)
0.5 oz. (15 g) Hallertau hops (15 min.)
Wyeast 2206 (Bavarian Lager yeast) or White Labs WLP820 (Octoberfest/Märzen Lager) yeast
1 cup corn sugar (for priming)

Step by Step
Mash at 154 °F (68 °C). Boil wort for 60 minutes. Ferment at ale temperatures, then rack to barrel and age six months to a year (or more). Pull samples from all of your barrels every few months and taste them.

Extract with grains option:
Omit Pilsner malt and add 3.25 lb. (1.5 kg) Briess Light dried malt extract and 5.75 lb. (2.6 kg) Weyermann Pilsner  liquid malt extract. Steep grains in 3 qts. (~3 L) of water at 154 °F (68 °C) for 45 minutes.

Rinse with 1.5 qts. (~1.5 L) of water at 170 °F (77 °C). Add water to make 3 gallons (11 L), add dried malt extract and bring to a boil. Boil for 60 minutes, stirring in liquid malt extract for final 15 minutes of boil.

Poor Man’s Barrel Option:
Don’t have the budget (or room) for a barrel? Try this “poor man’s” method of emulating some of the aspects of barrel aging. Conduct your primary fermentation in a bucket or ferment the beer with ale yeast, then rack it to a bucket — adding any “bugs” that may be called for. Buckets are more permeable to oxygen than barrels are, so let the beer
condition in the bucket for only about 3 months, then rack it to a carboy for the remaining conditioning time. Two weeks before racking, take 3.0 oz. (85 g) of oak cubes (French oak, medium toast) and soak them in wine. Use Chardonnay for the Temptation clone, Pinot Noir for La Roja, Cabernet Sauvignon for Darth Porter and Burgundy or Meritage for
Grand Cru and La Folie. Change wine every 3 days to lessen the intensity of the new oak. Add cubes when beer is racked to carboy.