To Protein Rest or Not To Protein Rest

Hello all,
I'm brewing an Ocktoberfest/Marzen today and I was wondering whether I should do a protein rest or not. The recipe is found here: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f59/worlds-best-oktoberfest-123493/

It calls for a double decoction, but I can't do decoction because of my inferior equipment. Here's the grain bill:
5.00 lb Vienna Malt (3.5 SRM) Grain 47.62 %
3.00 lb Munich Malt (5.5 SRM) Grain 28.57 %
2.50 lb Pilsner (2 Row) Ger (2.0 SRM) Grain 23.81 %

Should I protein rest at 125 first then up to mash temp?
Advice is appreciated!
Thanks!

With those malts, no.

What is your "inferior" equipment?

Maybe "inferior" wasn't the right word. I just have a 8 gal pot and I use a BIAB system with just 2 paint filter bags. Not the most sophisticated setup, but it works.

No reason to do protien rest, just let in convert and brew on!

No need to - malted grains now are better then 100 years ago, so protein rest adds little. I tend to do it thinking I get a few points better efficiency out of doing it, still debating if its worth it for the added time in the brew day.

If you are doing BIAB you don't need to do a protein rest. But you should do a mash out.

Edit-didn't read all of op message.

OK! Good to know! Thanks everyone!

German Pilsner malt may benefit from the protein rest but it makes up such a small percentage of your grist.

The benefit would be to break down the high molecular weight proteins (which are responsible for forming chill haze when combining with polyphenols) into medium molecular weight proteins which increase head formation and retention.

Although most German breweries have abandoned decoction schedules most still implement upward multi step infusion mashes that include a protein rest.

-After much observation and understanding protein degradation through malting and mashing I'm starting to believe that the "clumpy" head that is left behind on my traditional german grist lagers is from an over-abundance of high molecular weight proteins; I'm going to start giving a short protein rest a try when I get my HERMS setup and see if I can't get that huge fluffy lager head that fades into nice lacing vs. clump floaties. (No, I'm not talking about floaty clumpies that you get from using too many kettle finings, either.)



Adam

I've stopped using pale malt, and always use pilsner malt and always use a protein rest (I brew mostly lagers, and now just use pils for the occasional ale I do). I typically have VERY nice heads on all of my beers - except on my O'fests of late. This could be either from doing these as a 10 gal. batch as opposed to my normal 5 gal batch, or, I'm suspicious that when I have a lot of Munich/Vienna in the grain bill that perhaps a p-rest is not a good idea.

So, I'm testing this out this fall. First I brewed up two identical 5 gal. batches of a Pils/Vienna O'fest like normal but used a different yeast in each. Then I did two Pils/Munich beers (Munich I vs II, and different hops, same yeast). For the Pils/Munich beers I changed up my mash routine. I kept the malts separate. I mashed in with the pils like normal at 122 F and the after 20 min. when I turned the heat on, I added the Munich (I or II) and proceeded on with the mash. I'm very curious to see if the delayed Munich mashing gives me better head. It is not the best experimental design, but it should give me some clues.