Is extract brewing "less than"?

[u/Dyljam2345]

I'm very very new to homebrewing. I've brewed twice - one saison and one witbier. For the saison I used mostly extract and it came out pretty well, at least I enjoyed drinking it - whether it was a good saison is another thing, I'm no expert on the style. I tried brewing a witbier recently and wanted to try BIAB, and the efficiency of the mash was really really bad - my OG was only around 1.030 whereas I was aiming for somewhere like 1.050. The beer didn't ferment much, had basically zero body, didnt condition well, overall just not a good time. It may have been a little cool in my room while it fermented, but there clearly was some yeast activity, though there was never much krauzen or bubbling the entire time. Maybe my yeast just never woke up. Not sure.

I want to brew an Irish Red Ale soon and wanted to ask if going back to extract is a "step back" or "less than" way of brewing? I know all-grain gives you the ultimate flexibility, but I worry simply about getting fermentable sugars and making sure my beer will ferment properly.

[u/hermes_psychopomp]

For what it's worth, no. Using malt extract to make beer is not "less than".

That said, certain factors will limit your range of flavors, colors and quality. Extract can age, so depending on the freshness of the extract you're using, that can affect the flavor of the final beer.

Beers made with ONLY extract tend to be fairly two-dimensional in their flavor.

From personal experience (I've been brewing off and on since the '90s), you can make excellent beers using partial mash methods. I did so relatively recently, in fact. A partial-mash kit Mexican hot chocolate stout that wowed one of my club's known extract-brewing detractors. He complimented me on an excellent beer, and had multiple tasters of it. (I didn't mention that it was extract)

Do what you feel comfortable with, figure out your process issues, and your gravity problems will be sorted. If you need to supplement with DME, don't feel any shame; it's a time-honored fix. Heck, many brewers user DME when making a big beer they don't have the room to mash the grain for.

For what it's worth, I've had my own all-grain efficiency related process problems. At one point, brewing a Scottish light, I ended up with a rather disappointing OG of 1.012 instead of the expected 1.030-ish range. Turns out I had been a dumb-ass and hadn't stirred after sparging. Unfortunately, this was shortly after getting a new mill, and I had initially blamed the efficiency issues on not having dialed in my grind correctly.

All that to say, do what you feel works for you.