Charizard Chipotle Pepper Porter

I never played Pokémon as a kid. Ever since I met my husband, I’ve teased him a bit for playing it when he was younger. Sometimes I like to him intentionally obnoxious questions just to annoy him:

“Hey babe, didn’t you play the Pokey Ball game when you were little?”

“Darling, what’s the name of that Dragon Ball game you and your nerdy friends used to like?”

My husband knows how much I adore him, so really, it’s kind of my duty to also keep his ego in check, right?

Well, recently my high horse came crashing down when the wildly anticipated Pokémon Go app debuted. The app utilizes AR (augmented reality) to allow the player to find virtual Pokémon monsters living in the real world.

Okay, just typing that out sounds nerdy.

I didn’t plan on playing Pokémon Go, but I’ll be honest, I do play my fair share of video games. I played more World of Warcraft in high school and college than I would care to admit. I still play Overwatch and regularly watch competitive online gaming (LCS, for those of you nerdy enough to still be reading this). I am a geek - but I am not that geeky.

At least, that’s what I told myself.

The morning it came out, I scrolled through my Facebook feed and saw nearly all of my friends playing it - young, old, male, female - all playing Pokémon Go. I saw parents catching Pokémon with their kids in the park, and I saw single friends catching Pokémon in pubs. I had to try it.

Well, now I’m hooked. Working at a homebrew shop, I’m always on the hunt for new and interesting recipes. Now I’m on the hunt for Pokémon too. So here it is, for those of you that need to combine the thrill of catching Pokémon with your love of home brewing beer, I give you:

Charizard Chipotle Pepper Porter

Extract w/ Grains – Makes 5 Gallons OG = 1.064 FG = 1.018 IBU = 53 SRM = 46 ABV = 6.0%

Ingredients: 3.3 lbs. Amber LME (Liquid Malt Extract) 3.3 lbs. Dark LME (Liquid Malt Extract) 1 lb. Amber DME (Dry Malt Extract) 1.25 lbs. Chocolate Malt 12 oz. Crystal 80L Malt 6 oz. Black Patent Malt 4 oz. Carapils Malt 2.0 oz. Mesquite Smoked Malt 2.0 oz. Mt. Hood Hops (Pellet) .5 oz. Chinook Hops (Pellet) 1 tsp. Irish Moss White Labs WLP002 (English Ale) Yeast .5 oz. Chopped, Dried Chipotle Peppers

Step by Step: 1. Bring 2.5 gallons of clean water to steeping temperature of 150-165 degrees. 2. Pour crushed grain into grain steeping bag. Steep for 20 minutes. After 20 minutes, remove grain bag without squeezing the bag. 3. Bring the wort to a gentle, rolling boil. Add all LME and DME. While continuing to stir, bring wort back up to a boil. 4. Once your wort has reached boiling temperature again, add 2 oz. Mt. Hood pellet hops. Stir well. 5. Boil 40 minutes. 6. Add .5 oz. Northern Brewer pellet hops. Stir well. 7. Boil 15 minutes. 8. Add 1 tsp. Irish Moss. 9. Boil 5 minutes. 10. Terminate boil. Cool wort to 70 degrees and add clean water to top up to 5 gallons. 11. Pitch yeast. Monitor fermentation. 12. During secondary fermentation, add .5 oz. of chopped, dried chipotle peppers in a sanitized muslin hop bag. Keep in secondary for 2-3 days, depending on the level of spice you would like in the brew. 13. Bottle and carbonate as usual. Enjoy (while searching for Pokémon in your backyard, preferably)!