New homebrewer considering a smoked porter

Use smoked malts.

Here is an example - http://www.northernbrewer.com/documentation/beerkits/PeatSmokedPorter.pdf

Can you use LME? Don't see why not. Here is one specifically with LME - http://hopville.com/recipe/1303107/other-smoked-beer-recipes/cherry-wood-smoked-ale

 

Your answer may lie in partial mash with smoked malt. There are at least three commonly used types on the market: peated malt, rauchmalt, and cherrywood. I've only used the cherrywood, in a partial mash, to make a smoked schwarzbier. That beer had 1 pound of Briess smoked cherry wood malt in a 3 gallon batch (with 3.3 lbs liq. munich extract, .5 # light dme, and a touch of carafa for color).

The different type I mentioned above vary in intensity, supposedly. My read on this is that intensity of peated > cherrywood > rauchmalt. It also varies depending on how fresh the malt is. Smoke fades in stored malts, apparently, and also in beer. Of course, people's preferences vary too. My example was as smokey as I wanted it, but two competition judges wanted more smoke. You'll probably want to check out more recipes gauge what high, middle, and low amounts of smoke may look like.

 

Peated malt is high in phenolics. I do not like it at all in beer, and I love rauchbier.