Hello everyone who is interested. I am new here, but the subject was interesting so I decided to experiment.
I have brewed two small batches of English Pale Ale, one AG and one DME assuming the same efficiencies. The recipe I made it up to be simple and easy to make. For the AG I have used British Two Row as base then British Crystal at 50-60L, a little CaraVienne, and Flaked Wheat for head retention. For the DME I used Munttons extra light DME as base and British Crystal and CaraVienne.
Mash: The AG was mashed using simple infussion for an hour, mashed out and boiled. The DME was done in a regular manner plus steeped adjuncts as mentioned above.
The recipe was written assuming the same effeciency for both formulations. After the boil and chilling I have measured the original gravities. There, I have seen the first differance between the batches. My AG batch had an OG of 1.054 and the DME batch 1.051, even though on paper the gravities should have been exactly the same. So my mash extracted more sugars then the DME had in it.
Fermentation: I have used S-04 birtish ale yeast. This was the fastest fermentation I have ever seen.
In 3 days the DME batch was complitely fermented. The final gravity was 1.012, which gave an ABV of 5.1%.
In AG version of the beer fermentation held 2 more days. The final gravity reading was 1.01. This gave me an ABV of 5.6% or so.
This is very interesting because the yeast could eat more sugars extracted by AG brew then in the DME, a differance of 8%. The AG batch is more nutricious to the yeast.
While all that is interesting it is not as important as how does it taste, and smell. So here is what I have done. I had a few friends over for dinner. So without telling anything about the process by which the beers were made I asked them to taste them and tell me what they think.
Head: The head in the AG was much fluffier and long lasting even leaving nice lace on the glass. The DME had a nice head two but the bubbles were a little bigger and did not last as long.
Color: The colors were very close, the DME was just a tad darker but I mean a little bit. The differance was in clarity. The AG was much clearer. (note I did not use Irish Moss for the DME batch because I forgot so this may be the cause)
Nose: The AG smelled maltier while the DME smelled more yeast like with a malt finish. This is where people can choose what they like better.
AG - malt, grape, toffee, hop DME - grape, little malt and other fruit, hop
Taste: The AG was rich and malty with a nice hop bitterness and dry finish. Very ballanced.
The DME batch was not as malty and the bitterness was similar to the AG, no dry finish and a little butter-scotch. All in all the AG brought forth the taste of the malt much better.
Which one did they choose to drink? All people asked liked the AG better without question they would drink the AG if they had a choice.
Conclusion: Making AG beer is more time consuming, but you can get a richer flavor, clarity and smell from it. If you have the time, try it. You may be surprised at what you can accomplish, but it requires precission and attention. If you are not precission oriented nor do you have the time to be so then stay with extracts, the beer made with them can be very good and better then most of what you can find at the store.
Happy Brewing everyone and I hope this helps.