Is all-grain really THAT much better than extract?

[Pataka]

I have just tasted my very first bottle of my very first all-grain brew, and it tastes completely, utterly, and amazingly good. It was a SMaSH Pale Ale made with NZ Cascade hops, regular pale ale malt, and US-05.

What puzzles me so much is that this brew was full of mistakes. I missed my target OG, and ended up with something too weak, I mashed too hot, I bottled too soon, then I lost too much CO2 from the bottles and had to re-prime.... and yet it still tastes WAY better than any extract brew I have ever made, hands down.

Can this insane improvement in taste be put down to the simple fact that I made an all-grain brew, and all grain just fundamentally produces far nicer beer that the typical extract kit, or is it perhaps something else?

 

[Sadu]

Congrats fellow Kiwi!

My first brew was pretty similar - NZ Cascade, us-05, pale malt base, though mine had some specialty grains thrown in. I was blown away at how good it tasted.

Other styles I struggle to have any success with, but I think the Cascade Pale Ale is just a really reliable combination that is hard to screw up.

Think about it.

You miss your OG, no worries, you got a nice session pale ale.
FG comes out too low, you get a dry easy drinker.
Mash too high, you get a bit more body and it tastes good.
Too much hops? No worries, call it an IPA.
Ferment too warm - you get a bit of wiggle room since the hops hide some mistakes.
Tastes good with high or low carbonation.

I don't know that all grain inherently tastes better than a well-brewed extract, but it is a fantastic way to make beer. I love being able to tinker with recipes, bit of this bit of that, really tailor what sort of brew comes out the other end. But that Cascade pale ale is a really great combo that is hard to beat.

 

[Pataka]

I brewed it over winter with my heat belt and temp controller, so the ferment stage was pretty well done at least. The ABV ended up sub 4%, and was probably playing in Tuatara Iti territory, which had me really worried about the lack of body versus the hops, but I actually prefer mine over theirs. The hops have a really nice citrus aroma, and the malt taste in the body is just where I like it. I'll be interested to try my US cascade version of the same recipe, which is about one week away from being bottle conditioned. That was my strategy for learning BIAB. Keep making the same beer until I am happy with it. Who knew I could have stopped at one!

 

[Sadu]

I was going to try the US Cascade like you to see the difference but never got around to it. Way I see it the NZ Cascade is pretty damn good, it's a few bucks cheaper, and I'm happy to support the local industry where there is a local version of something available.

Good for you doing SMaSH brews to figure out what you like. I'm doing my second 1 gallon SMaSH now, this one is Maris Otter/Simcoe/us-05 with the hops at 20/15/10/5/0/dry. If this comes out good I'll probably do it again with NZ Cascade.

 

[dmtaylor]

Can this insane improvement in taste be put down to the simple fact that I made an all-grain brew, and all grain just fundamentally produces far nicer beer that the typical extract kit,

Yes.

or is it perhaps something else?

No.

My 3 cents.

 

[agrazela]

IMO, grain can make better beer than extract. Kinda like the difference between canned fruit versus fresh fruit.

BUT, I also believe that there is some element of built-up skill and experience going on. Like a lot of folks I started with extract and moved to grain. By the time I did that I had learned so much and improved my processes so much (e.g., ferm temp control, starters, wort oxygenation, kegging) that it was pretty inevitable that the grain batches would be all-around better.

Even now on occasion I'll whip up an extract batch (or do a partial mash batch) and I can tell you they are far better than the extract batches I was making when I first started.

 

[Pappers_]

Can this insane improvement in taste be put down to the simple fact that I made an all-grain brew, and all grain just fundamentally produces far nicer beer that the typical extract kit, or is it perhaps something else?

This statement might work because of the "kit" addition, but it is objectively not true that the all-grain method produces superior beer to the extract or martial mash methods. Extract beers win gold medals at competitions - it is possible to make outstanding beers using extract.

 

[normonster]

Haha. It's been a long time since my first batch but I had a similar experience. Missed mash temp, tried to add heat, missed Pre boil gravity and volume, boiled over, transferred all the trub into my fermenters, fermented without temp control...and still ended up with a good pale ale. I never did try extract but I consider it sometimes when I'm scrubbing a mash tun.

 

[cvisinho]

I can always taste a difference. I used to brew extract years ago and hates a certain "taste" about it. Switching to all grain is way cleaner tasting with out that extract "taste"

I would never go back.

Even my buddy who is just starting to brew on occasion uses extract and the "taste" came back to haunt me when I tried one of his beers.

 

[DPBISME]

Can this insane improvement in taste be put down to the simple fact that I made an all-grain brew, and all grain just fundamentally produces far nicer beer that the typical extract kit, or is it perhaps something else?

I duh-know but I can answer the Subject Line Question:

It depends, you cannot usually brew low gravity beers like "real" Saisons, Milds, Berliner Weisse, or usually take your existing recipes sub-4.0 ABV with out them coming out watery and weak....

At least that is my experience. I mean I could have added some adjuncts for additional body of flavor but I was ready to try all grain brewing and all my low gravity beers brewed in this way,,,, STILL TASTE LIKE BEER.

 

[Pataka]

That's a good point about extract vs kits. I haven't made brewed a kitless extract batch since I started usin temp control, so perhaps it's not quite fair on the medium to say it's as bad as I was implying. There's a couple of things that sealed it for me, however.

Up until my all grain batch, the best batch I had ever made was a black rock riwaka pale ale kit that I made on the turn from Autumn to winter when the ambient temps were just right without temp control. It tasted, I thought, amazing. Then I made a coopers dark ale kit using my temp controller, and it had a twang to its taste, so I read up and found a lot of people referring to the extract twang. I realised I needed to try all grain cheaply to compare, so I bought my brew bag.

It's just interesting that, with all the mistakes of the brewing process, I still made something superior to BOTH the two most recent extract brews. It just feels like a much 'cleaner' base, where you can find the different flavour elements much easier. My extract batches, even when tasty, just seem to have a blurred mix of flavour elements that you can't really single out any one of. My all grain batch reminds me much more of a bought product, on the other hand.

I do think I'll be sticking to all grain for a while now.

 

[Sadu]

I'm pretty sure the twang is (at least partially) something to do with the hop extract they use in those kits. Even that flash Black Rock kit says it uses hop extract - it's probably necessary so the hop flavour doesn't get wrecked when they turn the wort into extract. I read somewhere that Coopers use Pride of Ringwood hop extract for bittering in pretty much everything.

So by going to all grain, or extract with a proper boil, all of a sudden you are adding different hop varieties and you can now include late hop additions. Those late additions are where all the yummy taste comes from, especially so in a pale ale. Even in malt-focused beers like porters they normally have a 20 or 10 minute addition which I doubt you are getting in a pre-hopped kit. You just get the nasty bittering hops but not the nice flavour hops, and that's the twang that people talk about.

Just my 2c worth anyway.

 

[jerbrew]

Before I went all grain I did quite a few extract beers out of Brewing Classic Styles. Just went in to the LHBS with the book and pointed. The owner guided me around and explained things as he was helping me. It was a great way to learn and everything I brewed out of there was fantastic. I think extract can make very good beer if you put the effort into crafting beers that will work well in extract form. All grain on the other hand leaves you a lot of opportunity to screw up but I have found is very forgiving if you give your beer the level of attention it deserves. Just like with extract fermentation control, yeast handling, a solid recipe, and appropriate/good ingredients are vital to good beer no matter where you start.

 

[kh54s10]

Is all grain always better than extract? I would say no. I do some extracts in the winter when I don't want to brew outside. I have refined the way I do extracts and can't really tell much difference. In fact one of my extracts I would still rank in the top ten of the almost 100 brews I have done.

My extracts use some light DME early with the rest going in when the boil is done. I use freshly milled steeping grains for color and flavor.

I have never used a pre hopped extract. That, to me, is too much like mixing up a pitcher of Kool-Aid.

 

[BeerEngineer15]

I've had amazing extract brews and terrible all grain beers. The biggest thing that I see being the difference is the brewer's knowledge, skill base and procedures. Typically, an all grain brewer is more experienced/knowledgeable and their process is much better than a newer brewer. The newer brewers that will typically be starting out brewing extract, doesn't have these skills and that shows in the beer.

There is something to be said about some styles being very difficult to brew with extract but the majority of beers can be made very well with extract by a skilled brewer.

 

[dmtaylor]

After almost 10 years doing all-grain, I made an extract beer a couple years ago as part of a local homebrew club competition for extract-only. The resulting extract beer was good, but still tasted slightly of extract. I used all fresh ingredents and all the book-smarts knowledge gained over many years. Based on that, I did manage to win the gold out of like 8 entries or so, even among some all-extract all the time brewers. Some beers were way worse than others, but all tasted slightly of extract to my palate including my own. So... extract beers can be good? Sure. Still tastes like extract? Slightly. The answers are relative. Could we have made an inherently better beer with all-grain and with minimal effort? I think so.

 

[Syncman]

Yes if you believe this guy. Interesting stuff.

http://counterbrew.blogspot.com/

 

[zacster]

When I switched to all grain even my bad batches were better than some of my good extract batches. There are a lot of factors that went with this though. I switched to kegging, I bought a large enough kettle to do full boil, I started to do yeast starters every time, I bought a fermentation fridge and controller, etc... Just a lot of things changed as I moved up. Every one of these things has made my beer that much better so I can't say that my partial boil extract brews wouldn't be improved by these same factors. I'm at the point now where every batch is a good batch, I haven't brewed a clunker in a number of years now. All of the above has added to a consistency that I could never achieve when doing extract with my shoestring methods.

 

[Beavdowg]

This is just my opinion but my answer to your question about extract vs. all-grain is yes. I feel that I can virtually always pick out an extract brew vs. an all-grain brew. Now, there are tons of variables that could be argued as to the beers I've tasted and I don't argue that. All I know is that it's pretty easy typically for me to tell the two apart. However, I can't help but agree that in the right hands someone could brew an extract beer that would be indiscernible. Having said that I will never go back to brewing extract again.

Cheers!

 

[Morrey]

This is just my opinion but my answer to your question about extract vs. all-grain is yes. I feel that I can virtually always pick out an extract brew vs. an all-grain brew. Now, there are tons of variables that could be argued as to the beers I've tasted and I don't argue that. All I know is that it's pretty easy typically for me to tell the two apart. However, I can't help but agree that in the right hands someone could brew an extract beer that would be indiscernible. Having said that I will never go back to brewing extract again.

Cheers!

From my BBQ judging days, some folks are insanely sensitive to various flavors and aromas, while others cannot detect them - period. I think this in part determines why folks are so opinionated about extract vs AG.

If you gave me an extract beer, I can detect a "boxed cake mix" twang a mile away. My wife, on the other hand, does not detect these same off flavors. In summary, I think it all depends on the person evaluating.

To me, I'd never do another extract, but to others it is the simple way to brew. You did a bang up job, missed the targets on several areas, but turned out an outstanding beer. It may have been "off" according to strict style standards, but so what...you made a GREAT beer!

 

[JimboVorlaufski]

if you gave me an extract beer, i can detect a "boxed cake mix" twang a mile away.

+1

 

[Bosh]

Basically the process of taking the water out of the wort to make extract inevitably changes the wort. No way to get around that. Not necessarily a bad change or even one people notice. The only difference I ever noticed was darker color and sweeter. Which is why I wouldn't use extract for a pale ale but would be fine with it in a sweeter beer.

But hopped extract, now that's just bad.

But people's palates are really really different. I find a lot of Engish ales completely undrinkable because the esters taste like a mouthful of rotten fruit to me. Esters that my friends don't even notice. Similarly I love beers that my friends say taste like burt soy sauce.

 

[brewcat]

Oh this thing again... I've converted my old extract recipes to all-grain and they taste the same. I really don't know if I could tell them apart if I wasn't the brewer. Maybe it isn't fair since I did mini mash/steeping grains along with full boils? I also used fresh extract. The thing I noticed was better color with all-grain. For me, kegging made more of a difference in taste.

 

[kh54s10]

I see several replies that state "When I switched to all grain my beers were better" That does not answer the question of all grain being better than extract. It just says their all grain was better than their extract brews. My extract brews are very good. I would say that I have more top brews by all grain than extract but I have also brewed 10 to 1 all grain over extract. As I stated before one of my favorites of all that I have done was an extract.

 

[Pataka]

You know what I'm SOOOOOO tempted to do.... (and I think I might just go ahead and do it now I've thought of it) is to repeat the exact same recipe as my first SMaSH pale ale, but make it with LME. Most of my extract brewing experience was either using pre-hopped kits, or LME that was probably less than ideal for the task. I'd like to try one now, using my current techniques and equipment.

 

[applescrap]

I've heard a lot of people that I respect say that extract can taste the same. The main rationale I have heard for using all grain, is better variety not just taste and quality. There are so many different malts and grains to choose from vs. limited extract flavors. I guess one can use specialty grains to enhance extract. I have never used extract other than hopped extract which is not very good in my experience. I would really like to make the basic Brewing 15 minute pale ale from extract. In general extract peaks my interest due to speed in brewing. However, even in bulk, extract is to expensive for my tastes. I think one of extracts best values is to make a beer much stronger. Rather than worrying about Mash efficiency you just dump some extract in. It is my understanding there is a twang with extract. I suspect over the course of five gallons that becomes more evident. Also I think the type of beer will make a big difference in how much you taste that twang. Regardless, I don't think there's any shame in using extract and I probably would if it wasn't so expensive. I mean you can make a beer in an hour, whats not to like?

 

[AaronLehman]

This is as an old threat, but let me pontificate to an empty room for the hell of it.

I think all grain tastes better, and I don't really agree with the notion that the reason it only seems that way is due to a better brewer, since ppl get around to all grain when they are experienced. Could be a factor, but my personal anecdote debunks that for me.

I was an extract brewer for a decade, and fairly quickly I put a lot of money and effort into controlling EVERY aspect of my beer to get a quality product. Some examples: I made yeast starters, oxygenated my wort with an oxygen tank and stone, used RO water and created my water profile (ensuring my extract didn't already have minerals added), boiled full volume with a quality brew kettle and propane burner, controlled fermentation temperature in a rigged up chest freezer, ensured my extract NEVER scorched at the bottom of the kettle, sanitized like a NAZI to the point that I annoyed fellow brewers with my analness, used a wort chiller, racked to a secondary, cold crashed, even tried cold filtering, aged my brew (up to 4 years), ensured that my extract was as new as possible, steeped specialty grains, and tried just about every goofy trick under the sun to get extract to taste better (e.g. tried adding at flame out to reduce caramelization, used priming sugar in the recipe to give a dryer finish and cover off flavors, dry hopping, trying exclusively DME since people often say it works better, etc.)

After doing all this, I noticed ONE theme: only my big beers came without the twang. Every single smaller beer I'd make came with that unmistakable, yet indescribable, home brew twang. That weird flavor (almost like wet cardboard and burnt sugar, but not exactly) would present itself to a varying degree in all the light to medium bodied beers I made. Only my imperial IPAs, imperial stouts, big strong ales and barley-wines, etc. would come out so flavorful that the twang was masked. The only problem with that is brewing a huge beer with extract is so dang expensive, and I don't like only making big beers.

When I switched to all grain, I could make small beers all day and never have that twang. Granted I make all grain with all the variables controlled mentioned above, so I'm not saying any amateur can hit all-grain home runs every time. But even when I make mistakes on my all grain, it comes out better. You can seriously sample the wort and notice that it's better. Typically extract wort has a slightly funny flavor, particularly when brewing a smaller beer (often a little astringent, burnt, just off) and I'd always just assume fermentation would take care of it, but it never would. All-grain wort tastes as wort should, smooth as silk and delicious. Try adding it to whiskey sometime, it's awesome.

All grain doesn't have to be an expensive transition either - BIAB is so cheap, and the money you save on ingredients will quickly offset any investments you have to make.

 

[fendersrule]

The benefits of all grain isn't so much the "taste" IMO. BTW, I cannot compare against 100% extract, as I was a partial masher for awhile that then went to all grain.

I can say that the taste difference from partial mashing to all grain was.....basically....nothing. I did not all of a sudden turn out better beers by just going to all grain. Some of my best beers thus far have actually been partial mashes, and that's by chance.

The benefits of all grain is 3 things. The first being an extremely huge advantage.

1) COST. Oh my god, have you realized how much extract costs per pound? It costs about $10 a lb, and you need MANY lbs to make a decent ABV beer. It actually makes "making beer" not that much cheaper than just buying beer. This is by far the biggest downfall with extract brewing.

2) VARIETY. If you are relying on extract for your flavor profiles, you will be limited. There's hundreds of grains out there. There's only a handful of extracts.

3) CONSISTENCY. Milling your own grain = known consistency every time and no surprises. Extract can differ based on shelf life, where it came from, how it was made, etc.

With all that said, my friend notices a "metallic" flavor from extract beers. I think there's something there, I just can't put my finger on it, and I don't think it's significant enough that it overtakes 1), 2), or 3) above.

 

[BrewnWKopperKat]

let me pontificate to an empty room

OK.

 

[brewbama]

Better? Nope

Different? Yep

 

[camonick]

1) COST. Oh my god, have you realized how much extract costs per pound? It costs about $10 a lb, and you need MANY lbs to make a decent ABV beer. It actually makes "making beer" not that much cheaper than just buying beer. This is by far the biggest downfall with extract brewing.

Where do you buy your extract? LME from most of the big online vendors costs $2.50-$3.00 per pound. DME is a little more, but a little less is usually needed. All grain is still a little cheaper though.

 

[odie]

extract = frozen pizza

grain = pizzaria

 

[kh54s10]

extract = frozen pizza

grain = pizzaria

I would say it is more like you are making a pizza at home.
Extract = using a premade crust and premade sauce.
All grain = making the crust from scratch and the sauce from scratch.

They could taste about the same but you know exactly what went into the all grain.

 

[balrog]

And making your own sausage.

 

[davidabcd]

No.

 

[Carolina_Matt]

I started brewing in January last year, and I brewed 20 batches of extract. Last December my wife asked if I brew all-grain or extract, and I told her extract. Christmas morning I opened up my present, and it was 3 all-grain kits. Oops!

I bought a Wilser bag and a grain mill and brewed the kits BIAB. I instantly noticed a better quality beer than any of my previous batches. I don't have the most refined taste buds, but the beer tasted 'fresher', for lack of a better term.

I had previously bought kits from Northern, Ritebrew and Atlantic Brew Supply, but the all-grain kits were a notch above. I started buying bulk grain and hops, and now I'm spending a lot less money for (what I consider to be) better quality beer.

It adds some time to my brew day due to the mash, but I'm more than happy with BIAB over extract.

 

[kh54s10]

As I said a little over 3 years ago. I can make extracts that are equally as good as my all grain. I guess some can tell the difference, I can't. My second brew was extract and I would still rank that one in my top ten.

About 8 extract, 4 partial mash and 96 all grain brews.

YMMV

 

[fendersrule]

Where do you buy your extract? LME from most of the big online vendors costs $2.50-$3.00 per pound. DME is a little more, but a little less is usually needed. All grain is still a little cheaper though.

I bought/buy my LME and DME locally. It's $10 a lb. I am however aware that you can buy extract in bulk online and it would be cheaper. But even still, all grain is still significantly cheaper, especially if your local HBS offers a "virtual bag" which is half price off grains (which are already cheap).

All grain at first isn't cheaper since you need additional equipment, but in the long run all grain easily pays for itself.

I used LME for awhile, then I switched to DME because I found it's easier to use, carry, and mix in.

Buying locally, making a 10 Gallon double batch of 6% ale requires 14 pounds of extract. At $10 a pound, that's $140. That's stupid.

All grain, without a virtual bag discount for the same thing for a 6% ale requires roughly 24 lbs of grain. At $1.32 per pound, that's $31.68. With my virtual bag discount, It's roughly half that, around $20 or so.

$140 vs $20.....

Let's say you choose to get DME online for cheaper. Looks like Amazon has 3LB of DME for $15. Using those prices, 5 bags of DME is $75.

$75 vs $20....still not close.

This is why I consider COST to be the #1 reason to leave extract.

 

[RM-MN]

I started brewing in January last year, and I brewed 20 batches of extract. Last December my wife asked if I brew all-grain or extract, and I told her extract. Christmas morning I opened up my present, and it was 3 all-grain kits. Oops!

I bought a Wilser bag and a grain mill and brewed the kits BIAB. I instantly noticed a better quality beer than any of my previous batches. I don't have the most refined taste buds, but the beer tasted 'fresher', for lack of a better term.

I had previously bought kits from Northern, Ritebrew and Atlantic Brew Supply, but the all-grain kits were a notch above. I started buying bulk grain and hops, and now I'm spending a lot less money for (what I consider to be) better quality beer.

It adds some time to my brew day due to the mash, but I'm more than happy with BIAB over extract.

Use iodine to tell when your conversion is over. You probably don't need an hour long mash and you also don't necessarily need a full hour boil. I've cut both of those to 30 minutes each and find that to be sufficient. That pretty much equals the time I used to spend on an extract batch.

 

[fendersrule]

Not necessarily true though. People have had varying degrees of success w/ longer mash times and even mash-out with BIAB.

Some notice 2% better efficiency, some notice 10% better efficiency incorporating a mash out, or extending mash times from 60 to 75 or even 90 minutes.

FWIW, my BIAB efficiency is 71% on the dot, each and every time, for 5.5-7% ales. That is with 60 minutes mash time, and crushed grain to .027" and no mash out. I also am a squeezer---the reason I squeeze is really for boil volume. If I don't squeeze then I lose 1/2 gallon on my finished product which is too much.

Plenty of people are getting 80% efficiency from BIAB, or even more. Some of them are getting much more because they are circulating the mash (which I don't plan to do...more equipment and more stuff). At some point, I'm going to try a 60 vs 90 minute mash, and I'm going to try a mash-out and compare refract numbers. Chasing down a couple percentage points of efficiency is not worth it, but if you can get 10% efficiency improvements (and be consistent), then it's probably a win-win.

This is a very interesting thread. Take a look:

https://www.biabrewer.info/viewtopic.php?f=51&t=1669