Some things I've leaned and realized:
1. Water managment - Critical when doing 1 gallon brews. It's tough to hit 1 gallon going into the bucket exactly and if you don't, well there goes your gravity. So 1.5 qt / gallon for protein rest (131 deg F) and mash (boiling) each seems about right and hits the temperature every time. Sparge water (165 deg F) is whatever is needed on top of protein rest and mash to get to 1.5 gallons (24 cups) plus 2 cups water per lb of grain (roughly).
2. Hops - Limit the 60 min addition. Got a lot of bitterness (astringent notes) with the early IPAs. Not sure if it's the different water, my early troubles with temperature control (likely) when I was trying to use the stove to raise the temperature during the mash, or the yeast (never used the California V strain before), but the recent IPAs, with the lower 60 min additions, have been tasting much better.
3. Thirteen batches completed to date and another coming before the end of the week. This is approaching the total number of beers that I made prior to starting this whole experiment when I was making about 4 batches per year. I really feel that this has been helpful and will give me some good base recipes / jumping off points to make better beer in the future. Gallon brewing is nice, quick, and I've had a wide variety of beers to drink. Also it's been an enjoyable, weekly break from work, worries, etc.
4. Follow up to #3 - I'm looking forward to tweaking some of these recipes. So far I think that the Citra IPA and the Wheat wine could both be really good with some minor changes...
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