Sundays Brew

[smitty8202]

Bavarian Hefeweizen

Recipe Type: All Grain
Yeast: Hefeweizen Ale WLP300
Yeast Starter: Nope
Additional Yeast or Yeast Starter: Nope
Batch Size (Gallons): 3
Original Gravity: 1.047
Final Gravity: 1.012
IBU: 21.3
Boiling Time (Minutes): 60
Color:
Primary Fermentation (# of Days & Temp): 10-14 days at 70 Degrees
Additional Fermentation: Kegged, chilled and Carb'd for one week
Secondary Fermentation (# of Days & Temp): None

2.8 LBS 2 Row
2.8 LBS White Wheat Malt
.4 LBS Rice Hulls
.30 oz Hallertauer (60 min)
1 oz Hallertauer (5 min)

Above is the recipe for the beer I plan on brewing Sunday as my first all grain beer. So my plan is to heat up 6.25 qts of water to 166 and mash in. Rest at 153 for 60 mins. No this is were I am unsure if I should do a batch sparge or not. I am thinking adding another 6.25 qts of water at the same temp for the second sparge. Pretty much repeat the process till I get my pre boil volume which I figure to be about 4.25-4.5 gallons.

Interested in what everyone thinks of this recipe as well as my process. I have a 10gal water cooler mash tun and a 10gal kettle. Looking forward to making this.

 

[bbrim]

I think the recipe is solid. You are at the upper end of IBUs for the style but that should be good. On thing I would say is that wheat brings some extra challenges and may not be ideal for a first all-grain batch. Rice hulls will take care of most of the difficulties (and I see that you are on top of this). The other issue is that it's hard to get maximum efficiency from wheat without running a tighter mill setting than barley requires. This isn't a problem so much as it is something to be aware of if your efficiency numbers are short of what you hope to achieve.
In sum, I think you look pretty well set. It is good to start with a simple recipe the first time through.
A side note, if you intend to brew lots of 3G batches you may want a smaller mash tun. That much head space will result in some heat loss.

 

[smitty8202]

A side note, if you intend to brew lots of 3G batches you may want a smaller mash tun. That much head space will result in some heat loss.

I was kind of thinking that myself too. I may throw a star san soaked towel in there to fill the head space and hopefully act as an insulator

 

[bbrim]

There is no need to worry about star San on the towel. Bacteria in the mash will not survive the boil.
I do you think your approach to the batch sparge sounds reasonable. I'm not the best resource on that though because I have always fly sparged.