Hello I have a question about the 3gal BIAB recipe kit’s. Yes I see The instructions say to use 5 to 5.5gal of water to mash with an after the mash you should end up with 4gal to boil down to 3 to 3.25gal for a total of 3gal going into the fermenter. But I have Heard from people’s review for these BIAB recipe kit’s that starting with 5 to 5.5gal is to much strike water to mash in with?
Try it… I do a full volume mash with my strike water… Sneezles61
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I agree that it may be too much for that volume. You can always add water to bring up volume before pitching your yeast. Personally I’d rather add than try to boil off excess. Try 4.5 gallons and see what happens. The more grains you have the more they absorb so that is part of the issue.
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Another option is to use a strike water calculator. That might help you get the right water volume for your grain. It’ll also help get the right strike water temp.
Consider that your grain is going to soak up about 1/2-1 qt per pound of grain and then you’ll have boil off…Doesn’t sound like it would be too much but I agree with @squeegeethree in that I’d rather have to top off then boil off while getting the timing of your hops additions corrected…
If you know your grain absorption rate and boil off rates you can make adjustments that way. But I don’t think those recommended starting points are far off. I would still likely use some tool to determine how much water and temp based upon your desired qt/lb ratio.
Yeast and trub loss… What you want to have left or what you want to start with… Big factor there… Sneezles61
