Irish Moss - Can You Use To Much?

[Dave77]

Being a newbie, keep in mind that I'm an idiot. LOL

I bought a 25g baggie of Irish Moss at the HB store, and thought I needed the whole bag for a brew, so I dumped it in. I subsequently read the recipe instructions which said to only put in 1 tsp. Oops. About 5x more than called for. Will this screw things up, or just really clear out the proteins? LOL

Thanks in advance...

 

[hotbeer]

Can You Use To Much?

I'd think so. I used way to much whirlfloc one time and had way too much fluffy stuff in the kettle that left little clean beer for the FV. And straining that stuff out was worse than trying to strain out the hop matter.

But if you can get over it and just put everything in the FV, it'll eventually all go to the bottom. Though I try for clean wort into the FV and sometimes achieve that, I still can't see that it makes a difference whether the wort is clean or not prior to fermentation.

On the flip side of that question, do you even need to use it or can you use too little? I think you need some. Once I forgot to use whirlfloc and my beers all seemed to to have excessive chill haze after bottling and being cooled for serving. That took many days to clear. But that might just be coincidence.

 

[user 338926]

It will not negatively affect things in my experience. It's relatively inert flavor wise. But, it will make the yeast cake a bit of a mess if you are expecting to save it to use for another batch.

I have a giant bag of it, but I don't even use it in my brews any more. I use Kick and Whirlflock (interchangeably). Does the same thing, less mess, and less chunks of crap in the fermenter.

 

[Dave77]

Another question on Irish Moss - I throw it in my hop spider. Should I throw it directly in the wort instead? Does it matter? I'm doing BIAB.

 

[seatazzz]

Either way works, but you might get better utilization from it by throwing it straight into the wort. Although, per what was said above, using it in the spider will keep it out of the yeast cake. I use whirlfloc myself, and just toss the tablet into the wort. Sometimes from across the brewery, if I want some target practice.

 

[DuncB]

I only use half a whirlfloc in a 25 litre batch. Seems to work. Am I under dosing?

 

[user 338926]

I only use half a whirlfloc in a 25 litre batch. Seems to work. Am I under dosing?

I say if you're happy with it, that's great. I think they recommend one tablet for every 20l/5 gallon. But it's your beer. If less works, wonderful. I'm pretty sure they didn't use any 100 years ago and they made beer just fine.

(Edit) per Hoppy2bmerry below, you are both correct, they recommend one tablet per 10 gallons, not five.

I got crossed up on these. I use both Whirlflock or Kick tablets interchangeably. Whirlflock is 10 gallons per tablet but Kick is 5 gallons.

 

[Hoppy2bmerry]

I only use half a whirlfloc in a 25 litre batch. Seems to work. Am I under dosing?

That is the correct amount for 5-ish gallons from what I’ve read. I use Irish moss.

 

[seatazzz]

The bonus of using either whirlfloc or irish moss, is they are both pretty cheap. I bought a pound of whirlfloc tablets from amazon in 2021 for about $27; at current usage, I might need more in 2025. Still at least 100 tabs in there.

 

[DuncB]

The bonus of using either whirlfloc or irish moss, is they are both pretty cheap. I bought a pound of whirlfloc tablets from amazon in 2021 for about $27; at current usage, I might need more in 2025. Still at least 100 tabs in there.

Yes I got a lot of them cheap too.
I do keep them in a sealed container with some drying sachets in the fridge to slow down deterioration.