I would like to try AG, never have done it yet. I guess what bothers me on here is how it seems that if you brew extract, your brewing out of the box. If you buy a pre-made kit, well then sure, you can't really call it your own. But you can still come up with your own recipes and use extract, I've made plenty, I do partials and I use extract because I don't have the equipment or time to do all grain right now. I don't see how using DME or LME instead of mashing 12 pounds of 2 row, would technically classify this as "not my own." If your making tomato sauce, do you grow all of the ingredients or do you buy them from the store? What does it matter. If you enjoy what you are doing, then it's not "wasting time."