Just Curious.....Extract brews....

[Zambi]

Since most here don't do 'extract' brews, what if we focus on shorter brew days when brewing 'all-grain'? Let's find out.

For those of you that only brew 'all-grain', what do you do when you need a shorter brew day?

Not so much shorter, but easier ..
I often mash longer and during that time I do other things that need doing.
I "no chill" overnight, so no "waiting" there

 

[Megary]

Since most here don't do 'extract' brews, what if we focus on shorter brew days when brewing 'all-grain'? Let's find out.

For those of you that only brew 'all-grain', what do you do when you need a shorter brew day?

I moved to 30-minute boils from 60 with no ill effect, adjusting hops accordingly. Put a half hour in my pocket.

 

[J A]

I moved to 30-minute boils from 60 with no ill effect, adjusting hops accordingly. Put a half hour in my pocket.

I've done that with some beers, as well. The only disadvantage is that I don't have as much time to re-organize the system for chilling and get the fermenter(s) ready. It gets a little hectic.
I've also tried to shorten mash times and sparge speed but I just don't get the best efficiency when I do that.

 

[Brew Cat]

well some beer styles just require a longer day
that said I have done a Quick Pale Ale I knock out if I'm low on product and short on time. Basically shorten the mash by 15min and doing a 30 minutes boil. Do it all in a single pot BIAB then coolpool your whirlpool addition. No chill cool the rest of the way. pitch next morning or later in the day. Easily knock off an hr and clean up is a breeze with single vessel BIAB

 

[Dave Y]

For those of you that only brew 'all-grain', what do you do when you need a shorter brew day?

Embrace the suck.

 

[Sandy Feet]

I don't brew as much as y'all do. When I do, it is for fun, so I don't really take short cuts. A 70-minute mash gives me time to enjoy a beer, and I don't mind waiting 60 minutes on a boil. If I didn't like brew day, I wouldn't get up at 5am to do it.

 

[dmtaylor]

Since most here don't do 'extract' brews, what if we focus on shorter brew days when brewing 'all-grain'? Let's find out.

For those of you that only brew 'all-grain', what do you do when you need a shorter brew day?

I brew smaller batches, usually about 2 gallons, so I'm always done within 3 to 3.5 hours. Last night I actually brewed 5 gallons for the first time in forever, and it took me just 4.5 hours from crush to pitch. Indeed, started at 5:15pm and was pitching just after 9:30pm... and I had a stuck runoff! Added a quarter pound of rice hulls within 10 minutes of discovery and was good to go after that. Other things to keep the brew day short: having the recipe and water calculations 100% finalized and printed ahead of time, having water already measured and ready to heat up, mashing for less than an hour (last night was 50 minutes), nailing the mash temperature and pH, heating up the first runnings towards the boil while the latter half or second runnings is still coming out. Boil for just one hour, or a bit less if you dare. I could have saved a bit of time last night by having the grains weighed and crushed the day before, although it took about that long to heat up the strike water anyway on my slow system so it probably didn't matter all that much. If I had a faster heating system (I do not, and don't care to), obviously I'd want to have the grains all crushed and ready to rock ahead of time to save time on brew day.

Additional off-topic detail for anyone curious: This morning when I got up at 6:00am, just ~8 hours after pitching, the fermentation is already going blip-blip-blip in the airlock. I had pitched 7/8 pack of Windsor in 5 gallons -- I was only going to pitch 1/2 pack which certainly would have been plenty but I overshot on accident, oh well. Knowing Windsor, I expect fermentation will be complete no later than 2pm tomorrow (always less than 48 hours with Windsor). And this is fermenting in the low 60s F. If I'm wrong, I'll update this again later with the actual approximate completion time (well I'd have my Tilt in there but the battery died, dang it!).

 

[BarbarianBrewer]

If I didn't like brew day, I wouldn't get up at 5am to do it.

Well said @Sandy Feet! That sentiment is why I don't rush the brew day. If I don't have the time, I just brew another day. I have, on occasion, "brewed" Flash Brewing kits from More Beer. It's been a while since I brewed extract but, I would put the Flash Brewing kits in the same category; good but not as good as all-grain.

 

[J A]

If I didn't like brew day, I wouldn't get up at 5am to do it.

That's what I ought to do...at least get a start by a reasonable time in the morning.
If I'm doing a single brew or small batch, it doesn't take too long and I can get a start by early afternoon and be done in plenty of time to make dinner. Since I often do split batches or multiple brews or mashes on a single brew day, by the time I get everything figured out and have a strategy for transferring wort, splitting boils, organizing different hop additions, etc...it can be a late start and a long day.
Yesterday I did a split batch to fill kegs with 2 different styles and followed up with a sugar wort using the late sparge from the mash for flavor. All told I have 20-plus gallons in fermenters and I was at it from around noon until about 7 in the evening.

 

[HighVoltageMan!]

I brewed this pale ale with my son to show him simple extract can be. I wasn’t expecting a very good beer, but it turned out really good. So good, in fact, I entered it into a competition. It wasn’t the freshest by the time it was judged, but it still scored a 38.

I was pretty surprised by the beer, I preferred it over a lot of commercial beers, plus it was so fast and easy to make. So yeah, you can make decent beer with extract.

One last thought, DME is often better quality than LME unless you know for sure the LME is super fresh. DME has a longer shelf life. The other thought is to use all RO or distilled water. I added 1/4 teaspoon of 85% phosphoric acid to adjust the pitch pH to 5.1.

https://www.brewersfriend.com/homebrew/recipe/view/1593393/nicholas-pale-ale

 

[Megary]

I brewed this pale ale with my son to show him simple extract can be. I wasn’t expecting a very good beer, but it turned out really good. So good, in fact, I entered it into a competition. It wasn’t the freshest by the time it was judged, but it still scored a 38.

I was pretty surprised by the beer, I preferred it over a lot of commercial beers, plus it was so fast and easy to make. So yeah, you can make decent beer with extract.

One last thought, DME is often better quality than LME unless you know for sure the LME is super fresh. DME has a longer shelf life. The other thought is to use all RO or distilled water. I added 1/4 teaspoon of 85% phosphoric acid to adjust the pitch pH to 5.1.

https://www.brewersfriend.com/homebrew/recipe/view/1593393/nicholas-pale-ale

Well…sure…throw that much Citra and Mosaic at it, how could you go wrong?!

 

[Steve Ruch]

FYI: 2021 AHA homebrewer of the year won with an extract beer.

 

[J A]

brewed this pale ale with my son to show him simple extract can be. I wasn’t expecting a very good beer, but it turned out really good. So good, in fact, I entered it into a competition. It wasn’t the freshest by the time it was judged, but it still scored a 38.

FYI: 2021 AHA homebrewer of the year won with an extract beer.

As I've said, there are a lot of great reasons to prefer all-grain brewing but knee-jerk rejection of extract as a viable method is just narrow-mindedness.
It's very true DME is almost always far more consistent and superior to LME, not to mention somewhat more economical, in most cases.

 

[NorthCoastBrewer]

FYI: 2021 AHA homebrewer of the year won with an extract beer.

“Canoe-Chuk Lager”: category 1B: American Lager (Zymurgy Sept 2021, p 44).

 

[HighVoltageMan!]

FYI: 2021 AHA homebrewer of the year won with an extract beer.

He won a gold the American Lager category. I got second to him with a all grain American Lager, so I guess I got my @ss kicked by an extract beer.

I final redeemed myself by winning HBOTY in 2025 with the same beer (all grain). Point being, extract can make really good beer.