does all grain beer taste better than extract? or is it just an experience thing?

I was reading 'Brewing Classic Styles' last night (got it for Christmas), and was comparing the recipes to the NB kits I've been making for the last 10 months, and had a bit of an 'a-ha' moment. Please call me out if I'm full of, as I am no expert! I was looking at the NB German Alt, that turned out quite well, but had that extract taste. I've noticed this taste even more pronounced in the two different browns I had brewed too, but not in any of the pale ales. I assumed since the hops are the star of the show in the pales, it masked the extract flavor. Anyway, I noticed that the browns and the alt all used dark extract, whereas every recipe in the book used a very light extract for the base, and much more steeping grain for color and flavor. I'm guessing that is the key to making nice, clean extract beers, but just my theory. I'd love to hear if anyone has an opinion on this...

BetterSense said:

For apartment dwellers and people who don't have big kettles (yet), extract begins to look more favorable.

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Or stove top partials, the five pound partial method I use, Deathbrewer's method, saves me a lot of time in equipment setup and take down versus AG. I can do it using only my five gallon kettle and a paint strainer bag. I sparge the grains in two gallons of water in a bucket for an additional ten minutes and done. Also, I fly sparge with my AG setup, so that adds more time.

Personally, I'm kind of happy to be doing a little bit of everything. It lets me choose the method I have the time and patience for on any given brew day.

Shooter said:

Utilizing late extract additions is also a real important tool, I think, to have in your arsenal if you are an extract brewer. One of the owners of my local shop is an extract brewer, her husband brews AG, and she makes some of the best danged beers I've ever tasted!

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This comment caught my eye . .. as this is true of MY LHBS, too. Of course, I glance over at your profile, and sure enough, we live in the same town. I assume you're talking Jade over at HopTech . .. and yes she does!

Given that I'm in Hayward, too, we should probably get together and do a brew one of these days!

mccullpl said:

I was reading 'Brewing Classic Styles' last night (got it for Christmas), and was comparing the recipes to the NB kits I've been making for the last 10 months, and had a bit of an 'a-ha' moment. Please call me out if I'm full of, as I am no expert! I was looking at the NB German Alt, that turned out quite well, but had that extract taste. I've noticed this taste even more pronounced in the two different browns I had brewed too, but not in any of the pale ales. I assumed since the hops are the star of the show in the pales, it masked the extract flavor. Anyway, I noticed that the browns and the alt all used dark extract, whereas every recipe in the book used a very light extract for the base, and much more steeping grain for color and flavor. I'm guessing that is the key to making nice, clean extract beers, but just my theory. I'd love to hear if anyone has an opinion on this...

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In general, I think most people develop extract recipes around light DME and/or LME and then get the colors and flavors from steeping grains. There are certain grains that require mashing. However, the recent availability of rye and munich extracts, along with wheat extract, does open up more possibilities. I would be more hesitant to brew with a darker liquid extract because I would be concerned about the turn over rate/freshness of the extract. Most shops of any size seem to turn out light LME at a good pace as it tends to be a base for a lot of recipes.

masterfool101 said:

This comment caught my eye . .. as this is true of MY LHBS, too. Of course, I glance over at your profile, and sure enough, we live in the same town. I assume you're talking Jade over at HopTech . .. and yes she does!

Given that I'm in Hayward, too, we should probably get together and do a brew one of these days!

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Yes, I'm talking about Jade and Roberto at HopTech.

I remember at last year's NCHF when Mike "Tasty" McDole was trying one of her beers and his comment was, "Jade, if I could make an extract batch like this I might not be doing all-grain as much!" She just knows the tricks and what needs to happen to make a good quality extract brew.

Always glad to see other Hayward brewers. Have you been to the meetings or belong to any of the local clubs? If you've ever gone to a Mad Zymurgists meetings we've undoubtedly already met...since I'm kind of required to go to them.

Shooter said:

Yes, I'm talking about Jade and Roberto at HopTech.
Always glad to see other Hayward brewers. Have you been to the meetings or belong to any of the local clubs? If you've ever gone to a Mad Zymurgists meetings we've undoubtedly already met...since I'm kind of required to go to them.

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Never been to a meeting or joined a club. Have a few friends that brew . . . we get together a bunch. . .but nothing formal. PM me some of the details for those "Mad Zymurgists", and maybe I'll look into it! Sounds like my kind of crowd!

masterfool101 said:

Never been to a meeting or joined a club. Have a few friends that brew . . . we get together a bunch. . .but nothing formal. PM me some of the details for those "Mad Zymurgists", and maybe I'll look into it! Sounds like my kind of crowd!

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I'll shoot you some details. Jade and Roberto are both members BTW.

I've personally found that my extract brews were more hit or miss than my all-grain brews. I've been AG-only (except for starters and gravity corrections) since the middle of last year, and the quality of my beers has gone way, way up.

With extract (especially liquid), you're at the mercy of the turnover in your LHBS when it comes to freshness, but I don't think that's the whole story. I tend to think of extract/partial-mash brews as "quickies," and as a result I likely don't pay the complete attention to temps, times, etc. that I would with an AG brew.

Now that I think about it, my perception has been that with all-grain you either get it all right or it all can go way wrong, but of course that's only partially true, and hardly moreso than with extract. AG just has more "moving parts," and as such there's more to go wrong.

I may have to make another extract/steep batch one of these days and try extra-hard to hit all the marks. I betcha I'll be surprised.

-Rich

I was a BIAB brewer from the get-go (I skipped extract), but I will say that when I moved to a full AG system last year it forced me to pay more attention to my processes. I'd concur about it being more about the brewer than the ingredients. I just don't think you have many brewers with little experience doing all grain and so it skews the results.

I'd also like to add that for me, there was a difference. The flavors in the malt of all grain are much more distinct and the flavors seem to be ready much quicker. I'd have to let extract beers sit a lot longer for the flavor to reach its potential.

One of the biggest differences for me was the actual kit formulation. I popped my cherry on a Rye Pale Ale kit where the OG was 1.042. Back then I didn't know what a weak and thin beer that can produce to a novice. I was a bit disappointed. Personally, unless you market the beer as a "light" beer, it shouldn't be anywhere under 1.050. Even then I like to add ingredients to get the body up if it's not a wheat beer.

Lastly, I will say that there's more areas to mess up in all grain, i.e. volume amounts. But once you get three or 4 brews under your belt, it becomes second nature.

BreezyBrew said:

One of the biggest differences for me was the actual kit formulation. I popped my cherry on a Rye Pale Ale kit where the OG was 1.042. Back then I didn't know what a weak and thin beer that can produce to a novice. I was a bit disappointed. Personally, unless you market the beer as a "light" beer, it shouldn't be anywhere under 1.050. Even then I like to add ingredients to get the body up if it's not a wheat beer.

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Just because a beer is under 1.050 OG doesn't mean it's a thin "light" beer. There are plenty of expamples of full flavor beers that can have OGs in the 1.030s even. Dry Stout, Scotch Ale (60/- or 70/-), Mild Ale, and Ordinary Bitter just to name a few. I will say though that I would expect a Rye Pale Ale to have an OG closer to 1.050 than 1.042. I can see how that would be a little thin and weak for that style.

And in response to the thread title, having started with extract and going to all grain, I would say all grain is definitely better. It just produces an overall higher quality beer, and you have more control over your finished product.

First, based on what I've read (I've never brewed AG myself, so feel free to take what follows for what you believe it's worth), the process is more important, and dwarfs whatever difference one gets from ingredient quality, assuming one is starting with a quality extract. Are your sanitization practices good? Are you able to control your fermentation temperature? Did you properly oxidize the wort pre-fermentation? Inadvertently oxidize post-fermentation? Are you getting a good, rolling boil to drive off DMS? How quickly did you chill the wort to pitching temperature? Did you pitch the right amount of healthy yeast?

I'd think any of the above factors can drive the quality of the finished product to a much greater extent than differences in ingredients.

Assuming that one has a good process, one will make good beer either way. If one has a process that could use substantial improvement, one is going to produce sub-par beer either way too.

With a good process, I think it comes down to a personal choice, as opposed to one or the other being objectively 'better'.

Once a brewer has established a good or at least decent process, I think which is better depends on the brewer, how appealing brewing 'from scratch' is to him or her, just in and of itself, and with regard to the additional flexibility in ingredient choices -- balanced against the additional time and equipment it takes.

Well, I started with Extracts, largely LMEs but I very rarely if ever simply used the extract kit as sold. I always added hops or some kind of specialty steep because from the get-go I wanted my beers to be somewhat original. (That lead to quite a few horrible mistakes while I was learning...)

I think All-Grain gives you an opportunity to better understand subtle processes and points in making your beer and consistently producing a specific characteristic or flavor. With AG you start to learn what happens when you add an extra half pound of crystal. Anyone can throw together a bunch of grains in different measures and come up with beer. With time and experience you begin to understand what those grains are doing specifically to the final product.

So ya, I guess I kind of agree it's a DIY thing. But it's also a sense of pride, knowing that you've made a decent and reproducible beer from scratch and you even understood why it turned out as it did. I suppose it's a bit like algebra or chemistry (ya, I went there...) Some people are happy just knowing the formula. They can do the problem and get the right answer but they have no idea why the math works out. Other folks actually understand the MATH. They understand the fundamental crap that goes underneath and therefore they have a much broader base and ultimately can do more complicated and useful problems because they aren't merely tied to the formulae and minor variations.

IMHO AG is NOT better than extract. With AG you have a larger pallet in which to "paint" with. With AG you are in control of what grains go into the mash and how the mash is performed (Same for BIAB). With Extract you are hiring someone else to do that for you. In using extract you compromise: having fewer grain options, you spend less time to brewing, spend no money on mashing equipment however you do spend more money on the product vs AG.

I like AG brewing when I have the time to do it. I still extract brew and will BIAB too. Its all good.

I started out doing extract and had no experience whatsoever with AG brewing. The extract beers I was making were pretty damn good... Or so I thought.

Over the winter I got into AG doing BIAB and I was amazed at how much better my beers were turning out. I was even converting recipes I used for extract brewing to AG and the difference was pretty significant which kind of surprised me. I was of the opinion that there was no way that AG could be THAT much better than the quality beers I was making doing extract. Well, I was wrong...

Anyways, I won't be going back to extract brewing. BIAB gives me the flexibility and quality of AG and the convenience of extract brewing (although it does add about an hour or so to my brew day compared to when I was extract brewing). So to me, AG is a no brainer...

I've made some good beers AE,but partial mash BIAB is a bit better so far as being cleaner tasting with a bit better definition. On the other hand,there have been some process improvements since I was AE brewing. With a tweak or two from the new process,I think my AE beers would be better.

I'll start with this... I have had, made and judged some exceptional extract beers. There is a cat. 23 going to finals at the NHC this year that is all extract and outfvckingstanding beer. No, not mine, a friend's who is a whizz at extract brewing. I made some great beers using extract once I learned a few tricks; late extract adds, little to no LME, don't be afraid of simple sugars if you want a dry beer, mash a li'l base malt if you can, etc. But I made just as many, if not more beers where I could definitely taste the extract twang. I've also come across quite a few beers like that while judging. Obvious twang, likely from older LME and or boiling the extract too long. For me, extract was hit or miss, even when the process was quality.

As an AG brewer, I'll be the first to say that I've made some pretty gross beers but in general the quality is much better. At this point, unless my recipe is flawed or I arf something up royally, my home brews are amazing. I attribute most of the improvement to better equipment and most of all better ingredients; i.e. not using stale or maillarded up extracts. But also to the process; an AG brewer needs to pay attention to things like water chem., temperatures and procedures that don't come into play with LME/DME beers. Lastly, and this is generally speaking, AG brewers tend to have more experience, and thus are more likely to produce quality beers time in and time out.

Moral: You can make great beer using both (all three?) methods. That said, AG will bring out your entire potential as a brewer and that's something that extract simply cannot do.

NordeastBrewer77 said:

I'll start with this... I have had, made and judged some exceptional extract beers. There is a cat. 23 going to finals at the NHC this year that is all extract and outfvckingstanding beer. No, not mine, a friend's who is a whizz at extract brewing. I made some great beers using extract once I learned a few tricks; late extract adds, little to no LME, don't be afraid of simple sugars if you want a dry beer, mash a li'l base malt if you can, etc. But I made just as many, if not more beers where I could definitely taste the extract twang. I've also come across quite a few beers like that while judging. Obvious twang, likely from older LME and or boiling the extract too long. For me, extract was hit or miss, even when the process was quality.

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Care to expand of the little to no LME part? I'm just getting into brewing and I'm going with extracts to start. My first two kits have been DME only, but it wasn't on purpose, just ended up that way. What is it (apart from the LME being old) that would be reason to avoid it?

It very well may be psychological, but there seems to be something better, more smooth and flavorful, about my AG (and even PM) over steeping grains/extract brews. My PMs are typically still pretty large mashes with as little extract as possible, preferably dry. I also really enjoy the mashing process.

But obviously people are making great extract-only brews, so its all good.

NordeastBrewer77 said:

I made some great beers using extract once I learned a few tricks; late extract adds, little to no LME, don't be afraid of simple sugars if you want a dry beer, mash a li'l base malt if you can

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AH HA!!!!

<jumps off couch and manically points finger at computer screen>

You just said "MASH"! So you're saying that the best way to brew extract is to not brew all extract. Gotcha!

(But seriously, I have no dog in this... some of the best brews I've done have been extract. My BIAB brews have ranged from awesome to undrinkable mistakes. Extract is a LOT easier to achieve a baseline of consistency with. It's more forgiving.)

Ultimately, it's all beer...

evrose said:

AH HA!!!!

<jumps off couch and manically points finger at computer screen>

You just said "MASH"! So you're saying that the best way to brew extract is to not brew all extract. Gotcha!

(But seriously, I have no dog in this... some of the best brews I've done have been extract. My BIAB brews have ranged from awesome to undrinkable mistakes. Extract is a LOT easier to achieve a baseline of consistency with. It's more forgiving.)

Ultimately, it's all beer...

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Ha ha ha!! Nice! Yeah, one of the "tricks" is to throw in a little base malt into your steep and make sure you steep in the 150ºs. Even w/o that, just following some of the other good rules like late or flameout extract adds, not using LME unless you know it's fresh fresh, not scorching your extract when you add it, etc. will make for a good extract beer.

I know it's a little OT, but, what's better for fermenting beer? Glass carboy or food-grade plastic buckets?

(Ducking and running!)



Cheers!

Mozart said:

I know it's a little OT, but, what's better for fermenting beer? Glass carboy or food-grade plastic buckets?

(Ducking and running!)



Cheers!

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Do it in your bathtub, nothing more to buy that way.

KepowOb said:

Care to expand of the little to no LME part? I'm just getting into brewing and I'm going with extracts to start. My first two kits have been DME only, but it wasn't on purpose, just ended up that way. What is it (apart from the LME being old) that would be reason to avoid it?

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The old part for sure. Also, it's a lot easier to scorch, and IME it seems to degrade faster in the beer. I'm not saying don't use it, you need to since Munich, rye and Maris Otter extracts only come in LME form. Just make sure your source has fresh stuff and that it's always handled properly; i.e. stored in the fridge and added late (or after flameout). I've made great beers with LME, all LME in fact, but if misused (or stale stuff is used) it's the extract that'll give you that twang.

When you guys talk about 'fresh' for LME/DME, what sort of time are you talking? Is it reasonable to assume that extract kits from the LHBS is fairly fresh?

Lastly, if the LHBS will allow you to mill the grains in store, how long is it 'fresh' for? Should you brew the same or next day, or would it hold for a week or more if sealed/refrigerated/etc?

For context, I'm a total newbie, and am still on my 1st batch (2nd batch brewing tonight), and I want to learn as much as possible!

Kozzer said:

Lastly, if the LHBS will allow you to mill the grains in store, how long is it 'fresh' for? Should you brew the same or next day, or would it hold for a week or more if sealed/refrigerated/etc?

For context, I'm a total newbie, and am still on my 1st batch (2nd batch brewing tonight), and I want to learn as much as possible!

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Milled grains can stay fresh for quite some time so long as they're stored in an airtight container.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f36/how-long-do-milled-grains-stay-fresh-194087/

Kozzer said:

When you guys talk about 'fresh' for LME/DME, what sort of time are you talking? Is it reasonable to assume that extract kits from the LHBS is fairly fresh?

Lastly, if the LHBS will allow you to mill the grains in store, how long is it 'fresh' for? Should you brew the same or next day, or would it hold for a week or more if sealed/refrigerated/etc?

For context, I'm a total newbie, and am still on my 1st batch (2nd batch brewing tonight), and I want to learn as much as possible!

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If they are a busy shop, they're probably going through their bulk supply relatively quickly.

Once grains are crushed, I try to use them within a couple of weeks.

Mozart said:

Milled grains can stay fresh for quite some time so long as they're stored in an airtight container.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f36/how-long-do-milled-grains-stay-fresh-194087/

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Yes, airtight would be better, mine tend to stay in the paper bag they were milled into.

Kozzer said:

When you guys talk about 'fresh' for LME/DME, what sort of time are you talking? Is it reasonable to assume that extract kits from the LHBS is fairly fresh?

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Depends on their turnover. A good shop will tell you how long their stuff's been in stock for.

Lastly, if the LHBS will allow you to mill the grains in store, how long is it 'fresh' for? Should you brew the same or next day, or would it hold for a week or more if sealed/refrigerated/etc?

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If they're not refrigerated, use it as soon as you can. Remember, there are commercial breweries that buy milled grains by the pallet and sit on them for weeks at a time. If you can, fridge 'em. If not, I say you're good inside a couple few weeks for sure.

Couple weeks sounds great! I may try a BIAB after I get through the kits I already own. My main thing is that I don't have room for more equipment, so extracts are good for that. But BIAB seems to be a decent compromise.

e: such quick responses! thanks, guys!

BIAB is awesome. No extra stuff to buy if you don't want to. I still BIAB all my smaller batches unless they're crazy high gravity, no need to break out all the equipment for 6 or 7 lbs of grain.

Being a retiree,PB/PM BIAB has been great for me. The only extra thing I had to buy was a nylon paint strainer bag. Unfortunately,it's 18" x 32",like for a taller narrower kettle then mine. When I order on the 1st,I'm getting the 24" x 24" nylon bag,hopefully in fine or medium mesh. My current one is course mesh. Not sure if fine might restrict flow though in the kettle?...
Anyway,I mash 5-6lbs of grain,on average,in 2 gallons of water,sparging with 1.5G to get 3.5 gallons boil volume in my 5 gallon kettle.

I've noticed that since I started brewing I am much more critical of commercial brews. I'm not fooling myself into thinking that I brew world class beers, but being completely honest, I'm more satisfied with my humble brews than I am with what is available on the market.

What I'm getting at is, experiment with advanced techniques if you want, but don't be afraid of saying that the simple stuff is quite good. Sometimes a well cooked hamburger is more satisfying than beef wellington with a black truffle and red wine reduction.

The above only applies if you are brewing for your own enjoyment. Otherwise, you gotta appeal to the masses.

p

brettamuss said:

How long does all grain take from start to pinching the yeast? From what i understand its takes a lot longer than extract? How much longer?

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Good question. It certainly does take longer... but by how much can vary of course depending on your equipment, the recipe, etc. I've only brewed 4 AG batches so far, but here's some general time lines (and I'm going off the top of my head here so these are just guestimations):

1) Get out the grain mill, a table to attach it to, some containers, measuring scale, etc, measure the grain, mill it, brush out the mill, put the stuff away that I took out. Approximately 1 hour.

2) Measure and heat strike water (which could be done while some of the above is going on, but so far I've kept it separate). Including getting out the kettle, various utensils/tools, burner, etc. Time here will significantly depend on your burner and quantity of strike water. With my equipment approx 30 mins.

3) Mash in and start measuring and heating sparge water. About an hour.

4) Conduct the sparge, about 15-20 mins.

5) Boil the wort, approx 1 hour

6) Chill it to pitching temp, (time depends on your chilling method). For me about 15 minutes.

7) Get the beer into the fermenter, aerate it and pitch. 10 mins?

8) Take it to its resting place and hook up a blow off tube. 5 mins.

9) Clean up. More stuff to clean up - the mash tun, likely a few more utensils, dispense with the spent grain. And all the normal stuff has to be cleaned too (as you would with extract). 1 hour or more.

What's that total, about 5 or 5+1/2 hours?

That's seems about right for me, 5-6 hours for an AG brew day. By the end of the day I'm tired, which is usually compounded by the fact that I've had a few beers throughout the day. And the worst part of brew day is the clean up which is unfortunately at the end. Certainly some time can be shaved off that... for example I could be heating strike water while I'm milling, but I don't yet do that. I could be cleaning the mash-tun while the wort is cooking, but I don't yet do that (God I'm an procrastinator at times). So it's probably possible to do the same recipe in just over 4 hours. Some recipes take longer - you might need to mash longer, or boil worth longer, etc.

Also, these guys that have tiered stands set up probably shave off some time as well as effort in lifting.

With extract you skip the milling and mashing altogether. You also don't need to boil nearly as long - perhaps in some cases not at all. If you were efficient you could probably brew 2 batches of extract in about as much time as it takes to do one AG.

But it's fun...

Rhumbline said:

I've noticed that since I started brewing I am much more critical of commercial brews. I'm not fooling myself into thinking that I brew world class beers, but being completely honest, I'm more satisfied with my humble brews than I am with what is available on the market.

What I'm getting at is, experiment with advanced techniques if you want, but don't be afraid of saying that the simple stuff is quite good. Sometimes a well cooked hamburger is more satisfying than beef wellington with a black truffle and red wine reduction.

The above only applies if you are brewing for your own enjoyment. Otherwise, you gotta appeal to the masses.

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I too have noticed that I actually enjoy my homebrews more than some of my favorite craft beers. Bell's Oberon was one of my favorite beers before I started homebrewing. I have since found an awesome Oberon clone in this forum and I'm amazed at how much more flavor my clone has! A couple of weeks ago I got some Oberon on draft and it just didn't compare to my clone.

There's also a small brewery that opened up in the town I live in. When it first opened I was all over it and the brews were outstanding. But I can't hardly drink their beers anymore since I've started doing AG homebrewing. And I have friends who also tell me that my beers kick the local brewery's ass.

Sorry I'm bumping an old thread, 3 days ago I made my first BIAB brew after a year of prehopped extracts, and I see that almost everyone in this thread mentions a partial mash using extracts and no one mentioned a comparison between AG and prehopped goop.

My thoughts after my first AG:

-the moment we added our base malts (some 7kg pale ale malt) the kettle started to smell exactly like the dme I was using when brewing with kits. This soon changed when we added the specialty grains and hops. The resulting wort smelled a lot fresher than a prehopped kit, and overall more like something that will turn out to be beer (I always found the goop smell kinda off-putting). The airlock fusels smell a lot clearer. I can smell mostly the hops and the fermentation kicked in smoother.

Another thought is that with AG you can have a more controlled experience. With beer kits we could hardly reach the recommended pitching temperature even by waiting 15 hours or so, where we would pitch our yeast to 26°C instead of recommended 18-23°C mark, just so we can avoid any infection. But we where risking off flavours that way. After boiling we had our wort to 19°C for yeast pitching in no time. Not to mention that if you have the time to do AG, that's actually the way of making true beer from start to finish anyway, if someone comes across this thread, try to go all grain

Congratulations on your first all grain batch, it's a bit of magic. Let us know how it turns out.

JohnSand said:

Congratulations on your first all grain batch, it's a bit of magic. Let us know how it turns out.

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Thanks I appreciate it! It really was my most awesome experience since I started brewing, I was waiting to go all grain for a very long time. I'll surely give an update!

BoomerHarley said:

I've been doing all grain for a couple of years and yes I think it does. Case in point, I bought an extract irish red ale kit recently just to keep the pipeline flowing. It tastes like an extract ale (with that weird off flavor I have only ever gotten from extracts).

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I have been in all grain for quite a few years and feel the same way, the extract that I did just this off flavor to it that I didnt like and pushed to all grain faster, which was the best choice IMHO

I haven't drunk an extract brew in many years, but I feel like I can taste the grain more clearly in an AG brew, especially a clean beer like a pilsener.