So, like most homebrewers, I started out with a few 5 gallon batches. But then I had 2 cases of the stuff from each batch, and I don’t drink all that much anyway and I don’t have any friends (I mean, how could I if I’m on here for 16 hours everyday!) and (especially looking back in retrospect) it was pretty mediocre beer in those early years. So, I cut back to a 3-gallon batch size, and stayed there pretty much for most of my 12 years of homebrewing experience.
Then last year I decided it was still too much and cut it back to 2.5 gallons per batch. But now, I’m thinking, there’s about 7 or 8 different recipes I want to try, but I still have 2 batches in fermenters to be bottled, and another 6 cases of beer sitting in my basement collecting dust from the last 7 or 8 experiments. What the hell is wrong with me!?!?
I’m sure there’s others out there who feel the same way. Yes?!?
So now I’m thinking of cutting back to 1.25 gallon batches!! Yes, I know, that seems really small! But that way, I’ll get a good 12-pack of beer per batch, and brew day will be even shorter (maybe 3.5 hours!), and I’ll be able to brew pretty much as often as I want. I’m also at that point in my life where I want to brew the same recipes repeatedly until I get them right, so this will help with tweaking recipes, and it will also be a good batch size for running experiments, such as the “does high efficiency adversely affect flavor?” experiment. If I can knock a batch out in 3.5 hours, heck, I could do that in my sleep, almost quite literally – BIAB on the stovetop makes it so easy (which kind of looks like a pillowcase).
Anyway… Not sure why, but just thought I’d share. I really do think I’ll start with 1.25-gallon batches, effective immediately.