When you say 'it' I'm assuming you're talking about multiple decoction procedure. Something I've yet to try. My next brew requires three decoction steps, increasing in temperature (144F/20m,152F/60m, 168F/10m). Everything I've ever read says to stay at or below 165 to prevent drawing tannins from the husks. However, the final step is 168F and the sparging calls for 170F water, which makes me a little nervous. That's bangin' up against the end-stops for mash temperature on most malts, based on my 'research and experience'. Bittering from tannins is not a nice experience. I let one all-grain mash get too hot and haven't made that mistake again. That was in my early all-grain learning curve on a brew that I normally do with partial mashing and decided to try my hand with all-grain. I drank it, but the quality wasn't nearly what I expected, and I learned my first lesson about 'off flavors'. I knew what I did wrong, though, and did the same recipe in all-grain again, and pretty much matched the quality of my partial mash version. It was hard to tell the difference, meaning, all the trouble for the all-grain version really didn't do anything for quality that I could detect versus extract brewing, except prove that my skills are improving. The total mash time on this batch is nearly 2 hours, though, and that concerns me, along with the high sparging temperature. That's a long time to have grain husks in a mash. This is really just a foray into a more complicated all-grain brew to test my skills and see if I'm ready for and can benefit from more sophisticated equipment, as well as my first try with a Maris Otter adjunct. If it flops or turns into pig swill, then, I guess I practice more before I get fancier gadgets. I have to justify the expense of better brewing equipment to myself before I'll invest in it. Having better equipment doesn't mean I know how to fully use what I have yet. I'm taking my time and learning as I go.
Above all, I can't think of anything more fun than learning about beer tasting. I'd say I've grown my tastes for different styles considerably doing this, and certainly have become more open-minded about bitterness while learning different hops. I never realized there was so much range and type of bitterness but depending on the hop and the other things it imparts to the beer, it can make the bitterness not only tolerable, but an integral part of the overall flavor. My days of saying "I don't like bitter beer" appear to be behind me. Learning the different contributions and flavors is the fun part at the moment. Perhaps when I 'master' that, I'll get more sophisticated equipment and expand my horizons even more.
