Grain into the water or water onto the grain? I have heard and read both ways. Thanks for the help! 
Either way works fine. It pretty much depends on your techniques and system. I do grain into water because I’ve found it works better for me. Pick a method, try it, and see how it works.
This will be a matter of opinion here but:
Grain into water for me.
I’m a big proponent of grain into water. If you put your water into your MLT first, it gives you the chance to preheat your MLT and gives you the opportunity to make corrections to the temp if you erred - i.e. if the temp is way above your strike, you can either wait or add ice, and if its below, you can remove some of the water and reheat it. I always heat my water to about 3-5df over my strike since that seems to be what my MLT drops the temp immediately.
You can still ‘fix’ things when the grain is in there, but its messier and now you are running against the clock.
I do grain into water because it’s what Denny does 
Acually I do 1/2 water, 1/2 grain, the rest of the water and the rest of the grain. Works well for me…no dough balls.
I too am a grain into water proponant. I got terrible dough balls (tee hee) when I did it the other way for my first couple of batchs. but that was probably because i was working with a 5 gallon bucket as mash tun. but the preheating of the mash tun is also usefull
+1 to the above. Grain in to water. No dough balls here! ;D
I’ve done it both ways with success. I prefer grain into water because I get less dough balls and I can adjust my water prior to adding grain if need be.
I do water into grain because I’m pretty gangsta.
I do grain into water because I direct fire my mash tun.
Another good point that I forgot to mention.
I put roughly 1/3 of my strike water in as a foundation, then add all the grain then add the remaining water. Reasons . . .
When doing high gravity mashes that require the full volume of the mash tun, it lets the grain settle lower in the tun when doughing in, First time I added all the water then the grain I had grain falling out the top of the tun till it soaked enough water to settle.
My water inlet into my tun enters the top of the tun through a copper “T” which has two 10" copper pipes with a total of a dozen drain holes. It spreads the remaining 2/3 of the strike water evenly across the top of the grain while the 4 motorized stirring propellers eliminate any dough ball formation. It worked so well the first time I did it, I do it that way for all my mashes now. The only variable is contending with the tun’s thermal mass when the ambient temperature changes considerably, but Promash can compensate the numbers pretty well . .
Now that you’ve heard arguments for both ways, it seems that it really depends upon your particular brewery and the type of beer you are making. How are you mashing and how big is the beer?
+1. That’s how I do it and for the very same reasons
If you’re doing infusion mashing in a cooler this is a really good argument for grain into water. It can be pretty tough to hit your temps until the temperature of the cooler is stabilized up near your mash temp.
Me too. I get the water to the correct temp and dump all the grain in and stir.
To be honest I’ve always thougth that grain into water would be better because it would prevent doughballs, and the temperature checking sounds like a good idea. But I mash in a cooler and heat water in a pot next to it, so I always end up putting the grain into the mash tun while waiting for water to heat because I’m impatient. I have had some times where I had to do a mass panic temp correction with mashed grains.
I don’t think the type if beer has any bearing on it. It’s pretty much about what your system likes.
I have done both. I used to do grain into water but then I got lazy.
I preheat my cooler with hot water from the sink, while heating my mash water. I drain off the preheating water and use it for washing stuff later. Then I dump in all the grain and start adding my mash water. I pour the water in with a 1 gallon pitcher. I add most of the water by pouring from fairly high up along each side and then down the middle which forces the water down into the grain. Then I stir, working down from the surface to avoid dough balls. Once it’s all mixed in I take temp readings and adjust with the remaining mash water to hit the correct temp.
This takes about the same amount of time but I don’t have to hold a bucket and stir at the same time (see lazy comment above).
It works for me.
Paul
I’ve done both without any problems.
I used to do water into grain until fairly recently when I switched from using a cooler to a pot. A mix of being able to add heat to the tun and kind of the whole hot water/plastic BPA thing. Now I do grains into water and I dont see much of a difference.
Two tips I wish I knew before I started all grain was to heat the mash tun first(if using water into grains method) and make sure the grains are room temperature. Its amazing how much that can affect the temp and playing catch up in a cooler is not fun.