Question about T'ej

I'm making the T'ej recipe from Calagione's "Extreme Brewing" book, my first attempt at mead or its cousins. The recipe calls for shredded gesho, but the only gesho I could find is the whole sticks. The recipe calls for 9.6 oz. Since shredded roots would have much more surface area than the whole sticks, should I increase the amount I use? (I have a pound) Is there a reasonable way to shred the sticks or am I better off using them whole? And if I'm using whole sticks, should I boil them for 15 minutes like the recipe says or longer? Thanks!

Use a microplane or a cheese grater.

How about a vegetable peeler?

http://www.pitt.edu/~kloman/tej.html

I'd recommend reading this site. It tells you all about the different kinds of gesho, and how t'ej is made in Ethiopia

I've been reading that, but it doesn't give very specific amounts regarding the gesho. It does, however, state that most people prefer the stick (inchet) gesho to leaf/powder. At least I have that going for me. I can't find anything about the benefits of shredding, though...

Haven't read the links, but check this site out.