Whirlfloc Problems?

So, I used whirlfloc for the first time and there is a ton of suspended material that has not sedimented out of in the bottles even after a month. The beer had plenty of other ingredients, orange peel, peppercorns, 4oz of hops but I have never had this much stuff left in suspension. I used one tablet for a 5 gallon batch and filtered the main crap out with strainers. Has anyone else had this happen?

Thanks!

I don't think this is a whirlfoc problem. Whirlfloc acts on proteins...if a lot of orange peel and peppercorns made it into your fermenter and then your bottles, whirlfloc won't help you.

Yea, Whirlfloc or irish moss will just sediment out yeast and proteins. If you used orange peal, did you boil it? You might be seeing pectin.

I sure did boil the orange peel. Pectin eh? Cool, how might I avoid this problem in the future?

Add peels in the secondary, pectins won't be extracted from peels that way.

BrewThruYou said:

I don't think this is a whirlfoc problem. Whirlfloc acts on proteins...if a lot of orange peel and peppercorns made it into your fermenter and then your bottles, whirlfloc won't help you.

Click to expand...

+1 on this perspective. I make a lot of wits. That means frequent late and flameout additions with same/similar ingredient additions. Even when I still bottled I did not have the problem you're describing.

That said, what time in the boil did you add the peel? Was it zest or dried peel?

On a separate note, what style was this beer? If a wit or other wheat (except for a Kristalweizen) whirlfloc would typically be deleted as an addition because you want the beer cloudy.

Yea, whenever you deal with fruit, you never want to boil it. Adding it at flameout is one option, also brining it up to like... 175 in a different small pot will sanitize it and you add all of that stuff into the primary once the other wort has cooled off. You want to bring it down in temp first.

So here is the recipe I used.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f71/ole-zion-church-saison-246288/

I added another half ounce or so after fermentation. I believe saisons are supposed to be clear, albeit, I think this is more of a non traditional saison. I feel like if I only add the orange peel into the fermenter I will lose some orange peel bitterness that would help balance out the more aromatic flavor from "steeping" it.

Thanks for the input!