treehouse said:
Agreed. AG might even be easier IF you have the space and the equipment. A PM is a compromise and like all compromises, PMs have their drawbacks. That being said, I do get near to 70% efficiencies using PMs. The big disadvantages of PMs that I can think of are:
Don't get full boil volumes and then you have hop utilization issues, hot break issues, etc. etc., etc...
Difficult to hit and hold target mash temperatures
Can be wasteful due to inefficient sparge
Cloudy worts because of no filtration through a grain bed (don't forget the Irish Moss!)
Difficult to reproduce recipes due to variations in mashes
More expensive costs per bottle
I'm sure there are others. But I can make a PM beer that will stand up to any AG brew and frequently even are better (IMHO). There are still other parameters in making good beer other than going AG. Good yeast, good temperatures, good hops, good recipes, good sanitation...etc. etc. Just doing an AG homebrew won't guarantee you great beer. But it sure do help...
treehouse, i tend to disagree with you across the board. first off, partial mashing and full boils are compatable (if you have a big enough kettle), but even partial boils are not an issue if you compensate for the different hop utilization levels. Most all PM kits take this into account, so that concern is negated off the bat.
If you are AG'ing with anything other than insulated coolers, I think temperature control is exactly the same with a PM. I used to mash on the stove for PM's, and keeping temperature constant was as simple are pulling the grain bag out and cranking the gas.
I always got very good efficiency by 'ladel sparging' through the grain bag in a colander. Alyways got good enough #'s, and regardless you will be adding extract after the sparge so there is noithing to worry about if your efficiency is lower than a good AG setup. That's the beautiful check of doing partials, the extract is always there as a fallback. Also, if you sparge it carefully there is little concern w/ clarity (again, you are adding extract which tends to add cloudiness itself, so this is no concern again).
Regarding them being difficult to reporduce due to the 'variation in mashes' wouldn't this be inherently MORE of a factor in AG batches, hence making PM's more easy to reproduce?
Lastly, PM's usually fal right between extract and AG as far as cost goes. It's only logical.
I tend to agree with you last paragraph, it is totally possible to make a great PM beer (though that claim tends to contradict you previous points!). There is much more to it than simple process, and there have been bad to amazing PM's and AG's made.
Hope it doesn't come across as an attack, I just couldn't disagree more with the mentioned points.