Kombucha Green Tea

Kombucha Green Tea

3rd batch first started 29 September

Slightly modified

1 quart water, boiled

3/4 cup white granulated sugar
4 T organic green tea

3 quarts cold filtered water
½ cup kombucha from previous culture

1 kombucha SCOBY (Symbiotic Culture of Bacteria and Yeast) along with 2 very young baby scobys1 gallon wide-mouthed jar

Tea towel to cover the jar during fermentation (even an old t-shirt will work)

Rubber band that fits over the mouth of your jar

2 quart stainless steel pot

spoon (I have a very strong fiberglass spoon that I prefer for this)
funnel (for bottling)swing-top/grolsch style bottles (preferably green or brown tinted glass)

Bring 1 quart of water to a boil in your stainless steel pot. Turn off heat and allow water to stop boiling. Dissolve the sugar in the hot water. Add tea and steep for 15-20 minutes.Add remaining 3 quarts of cold water (or water mixed with potable ice made from filtered water) to the brewed tea.

Add at least ½ cup of the kombucha from the previous culture (or, if this is the first time you’re brewing, add any liquid that came with your scoby). Stir to combine.
Once liquid has come to room temperature, place tea into your one-gallon container. Place SCOBY on top (shiny side up).Place the cotton cloth over the jar and secure with rubber band. Store in a safe place at

room temperature.

05 October. Taste test.

I can most definitely tell I used more water, less sugar on this one. So far it's not quite as sweet but it's still very tasty. Not quite ready yet however. It needs maybe a day or two more.

The heating pad we have that is meant for heating seeds to germinate them has been keeping our

kombucha at a average temperature of about 77 degrees so we read the owners manual again and reset the temp to 73 degrees. Let's hope that works.

This batch has a lot more fizz to it! Oh and baby scobys are becoming a bit more defined. I think the time that we're leaving them alone while we're in Montreal is going to do them good.

We have this odd colored part sitting among our scobys. I don't know if this is just a thick part of a immature scoby or what.

Still it's not fuzzy, doesn't look exactly like mold so I guess we're still good.

10 October. Bottling

Today we arrived home late from visiting with family however it has been 12 days (I think anyways) since we started this batch. Using more water and less sugar most definitely makes a difference in fermenting time as it took longer for this batch to get that nice characteristic, sweet, apple cider like flavor to it.

Still, we knew we had to hurry and bottle these as pretty soon we will be traveling again.

This time we decided to go with some flavored and some not. We used apple, grape and lemon ginger. For the lemon we, unfortunately didn't have any fresh lemon so we tried adding just about a tbsp full of lemon juice. Not my first choice but we didn't have much to choose from.

Front two bottles on left are apple, small bottle on far right is green seedless grape, large bottle in back on left is lemon ginger and bottle in back on right is plain.

They will be going in the fridge on Wednesday morning.

Homemade Kombucha Tea Batch 091710

We started our next batch today.

1 quart water

5 bags of green tea

4 Organic Bigelow Green Tea

1 Southern Tsunami green tea

1 cup sugar

We then added 4 more quarts of cool filtered water.

I transfered the SCOBY and her baby back to the original container after cleaning my hands vigorously with vinegar. Once the tea was pretty cool I then poured the tea back in and the new batch has gone upstairs to the heating pad once again.

This next time we should be able to seperate the Mother and the Baby so we can produce faster, that's if I did everything right and didn't introduce any harmful bacteria.

We realized after the fact that we really reduced the sugar so first I am a tad bit worried that the SCOBY won't like it. If it does well though we should have a much drier Kombucha this time. Still that's okay by me as once I start getting enough SCOBYS and Kombucha I plan to experiment like crazy. Next experiment will most definitely be ginger.

Making Homemade Kefir

Okay so as you can tell we have gotten board with eating more raw & fermented foods.


Both hubby and I tried a store brought brand of Kefir called Lifeworks


Here's the website for the brand.


http://www.lifeway.net/

Let me just say now that if this is how this tastes when it's store bought I cannot wait to make my own!

My husband and I are slowly becoming addicted to this stuff! While it does have a slightly sour taste to it it has a sugary taste that remains later on your palate. It reminds me of a really delicious piece of chocolate that hours later has you craving for more.

We plan on purchasing some grains here soon. I have found a company on Ebay that sells kefir grains. We actually bought our scoby Mother from them. So soon here I should be able to post pictures and all.

In the meanwhile I'll post the directions for making Kefir as well as several ways you can use this in everyday cooking.

These directions come from Seeds of Health.

http://www.seedsofhealth.co.uk/fermenting/kefir_howto.shtml
500ml glass jar like a kilner jar
About 1 tablespoon of kefir culture
Fresh milk
Put the kefir culture in the glass jar, then fill it with fresh milk about 2/3 or so full. Cover the jar with a cloth or put the lid on the jar. (If you use a lid don't fill the jar above two thirds or use a jar with a rubber gasket that will let any pressure escape.)

Let the contents stand at room temperature for approx. 24 hours depending on your taste. 48 hours will make a thicker, sourer kefir, 12 hours a thinner, sweeter kefir. The temperature will effect how quickly the culture works. So during the warm summer months the kefir will ferment faster.

When it's ready strain the kefir into a clean jar. While it's fermenting the kefir grains will float to the top of the milk along with any cream. It's a good idea to stir it gently with a wooden spoon to mix up the solids and liquids to make it easier to strain. Or use a wooden spoon or clean hands to scoop out the culture from the kefir (the culture is easy to feel and separate from the liquids). The kefir culture produces a jelly like polysaccharide substance that develops around the grains as they grow, making it look 'gloopy'. It has unique properties and it's own name 'kefiran'. As you scoop out the grains you may find them coated with a gel like substance. This is the kefiran. Giving the kefir a good stir will distribute the kefiran in the kefir and it contributes to the thickness of the finished kefir. (This seems to be pretty variable, some strains producing a lot and others not much.)

After straining, the grains are placed straight back into a clean jar without washing them first. Fresh milk is added to the grains to make the next batch.

A Note on Cleanliness
Make sure everything is very clean when handling kefir. It's a living culture, a complex system of bacteria and yeasts and you don't want risk contaminating it. Use freshly cleaned hands, clean jars and clean non metallic implements.

Here are some ways that I have found online to use Kefir. I will also be using the milk from this in bread and pancakes for my son. I've read that it makes extremely fluffy pancakes.
This is the website I got this from.
http://gnowfglins.com/2009/08/07/seven-yummy-ways-to-eat-kefir/


Kefir Cheese – This is much like yogurt cheese, where the whey has dripped out, leaving a thicker consistency that is spreadable like cream cheese. You can season it with herbed seasoning salt, herbs, or anything else you fancy, and then spread it on bread, biscuits, etc.
Probiotic Potato Salad – The secret to this probiotic potato salad is the kefir cheese used in the dressing. It is a tangy, delicious potato salad.
Salad Dressings – Use in place of yogurt in yogurt-based salad dressings. Experiment with adding it to other salad dressings.
Veggie Dip – Season up the kefir cheese (from the probiotic potato salad) and make a dip out of it. Just some homemade herbed seasoning salt is all it takes.
Ice Cream – I’ll be sharing a recipe for this soon! Kefir ice cream tastes much like frozen yogurt, with a little bit of a tang. It is so yummy! Edit: Here’s a recipe for Probiotic Chocolate Ice Cream, featuring – you guessed it – kefir!
Smoothies – Try my chocolate kefir smoothie or summer fruit smoothie.
Popsicles – Use the kefir smoothie (#6) mix to make popsicles (tip from Annette of Sustainable Eats). My friend Amy suggests using an ice cube tray and toothpicks if you don’t have an official popsicle tray.
NEW! Parfait – Make a kefir parfait, using kefir as you would yogurt and top it with soaked/dehydrated nuts and seeds, soaked/dehydrated oats, dried fruit, cinnamon, fresh fruit, and a drizzle of raw honey or maple syrup. Yumm for a snack, as a salad, or as breakfast!

Homemade Kombucha Tea

Homemade Kombucha

This I have actually borrowed from the blog "BURP".
You can find the blog itself about making Kombucha here:
http://www.eatatburp.com/2010_08_01_archive.html

3 quarts filtered water1 cup white granulated sugar
4 T loose plain green or black tea
½ cup kombucha from previous culture1 kombucha SCOBY (Symbiotic Culture of Bacteria and Yeast)
1 gallon wide-mouthed jarTea towel to cover the jar during fermentation (even an old t-shirt will work)Rubber band that fits over the mouth of your jar2 quart stainless steel potwooden spoon
funnel (for bottling)swing-top/grolsch style bottles (preferably green or brown tinted glass)

Bring 1 quart of water to a boil in your stainless steel pot. Dissolve the sugar in the boiling water. When the water boils, remove from heat. Add tea and steep for 15-20 minutes.
Add remaining 2 quarts of cold water (or water mixed with potable ice made from filtered water) to the brewed tea, along with at least ½ cup of the kombucha from the previous culture (or, if this is the first time you’re brewing, add any liquid that came with your scoby). Stir to combine.

Once liquid has come to room temperature, place tea into your one-gallon container. Place SCOBY on top (shiny side up).Place the cotton cloth over the jar and secure with rubber band. Store in a safe place at room temperature.
Kombucha will take an average of 7-10 days to brew, though you can allow your batch to ferment longer if you would like the brew to be less sweet. The longer it ferments, the dryer and stronger the acidic taste will become.Remove the SCOBYs (Once you’ve brewed your first batch, you should have two SCOBY – the mother and a newly formed baby). If you’re storing the SCOBY for future use, keep it in a similar large glass jar, and pour in enough of your freshly made Kombucha to cover it.

Using a funnel, pour finished kombucha tea into swing-top bottles, filling up into the neck of the jar. Seal and keep at room temperature for 4-5 days (this aging will improve the flavor). Then store in refrigerator to extend its shelf-life.
Flavorings like fruit, herbs, brewed herbal teas and other additions can be added during the bottling stage (but not before – or they could compromise the health of your SCOBY). Please note that fruit (or any type of sugar) will feed the active cultures and increase the effervescence of the beverage during the resting period. If you have weak Kombucha after the brewing period, let rest longer during the bottling period.


Now I will be updating this as we go along in the process of making Kombucha. We started this on Tuesday (07Sept) at around 7pm or so after we finished our dinner.***************************************************************************
09September10Last night we took a look at our kombucha that is currently being kept in a remote closet. My son insisted the he wanted to see the "mother" so I tried moving it slightly. It did shake the jar slightly so I'm hoping that that didn't bother it much. This morning I found the mother on the bottom of the jar however after a bit of research I found that this does happen from time to time so we'll see if we actually have kombucha 7 days from now.
Lots of squiglers present in water.09 September 10, SCOBY on bottom.

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11September 2010

First and foremost we added a heating pad to it that controls the temp so our kombucha gets no hotter than 80 degrees.

You can purchase these off of Amazon for pretty cheap.

Seems like our scoby is pretty happy as she has noticeably gotten bigger in the past few days.

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17 September 2010

Time to bottle! We have a nice sweet yet tangy

Kombucha starting! Our

SCOBY has developed a very thin soft baby, but it's still a baby!

We have two almost full 1 quart bottles filled with simple, plain Kombucha and then half a bottle of Kombucha flavored with 2 Scuppernong Grapes. Total brewing time for this batch, 10 full days. First 3 days it was kept at a temperature of about 70 degrees. We then got the heating pad that kept our Kombucha at about 79 degrees or so.