A friend mentioned this site to me recently. I’m curious to know who here uses extracts often in their beers? It also makes me wonder how many commercial breweries are doing this to go above and beyond what they can get from malt, hops, and perhaps raw additives.
I believe Drew has used some of those. It was a brand he recommended on a recent podcast. Hey, aren’t you listening? 
I have used many of them with great success in experimental beers and fruit beers. Their extracts are very high quality and most come across as quite “real” as opposed to chemical tasting. Beware though as they are quite potent and you do not need much at all for a 5 gallon batch (as in no more than 1 oz for some of these). I try to purchase the “natural” labeled flavorings when making my selections.
Drew might be the “friend” he’s talking about
Not sure how I forgot about the podcast…I am now! Driving around for work all day has it’s perks! Really enjoying it so far. I think it’s a great middle ground between VERY LONG podcasts that are just people chatting about beer and the very short ones out there. Keep it up!
*As an aside (and I know this thread isn’t about providing you and Drew feedback), it seems you guys had a great time out at Faction :o
Almost too good a time! We had been to the distillery next door before Faction, but fortunately I didn’t drink there.
I have not used extracts partly because every commercial beer I have tried that adds extract or “flavor” comes off as perfumy.
Have you had Rogue’s Hazelnut Brown?
No I haven’t. I take it that its a good one? I imagine a nut extract might be OK to my taste.Its usually the fruit extracts I find offensive: grapefruit, strawberry etc.
There are good and bad extracts for just about any flavor. Don’t judge them all by the bad ones.
I’m not so sure its totally about the quality of the extract as its about my preference for beer flavored beer. When a beer has a flavor I generally like it to be subtle and complimentary. For instance I just put an entire grapefruit, skin and all, through a juicer and added it to the fermenter of a cascade and centennial dominant IPA along with some fresh Rosemary. (Yes,I’ll tell anyone who tries it that it contains grapefruit [emoji3] )I am expecting those additions to add noticeable but not overpowering aroma and flavor contributions. IME the beers I have had that add “flavors” other than the natural whole ingredients tend to be too much. For my personal taste, maybe others don’t find grapefruit sculpin for instance to be ruined or close to it by the perfume like aroma.
I understand your “beer flavored beer” statement…I’m the same way. But your comment seemed to address extract quality, which is why I headed in that direction. It sounds like it’s more a case of you ( and I) just don’t like “unbeerlike” flavors.