Making your own Kombucha

Once a long time ago, I was making my own kefir. A co-worker had given me some of her kefir. I liked the taste, and it was really low maintenance. It was however, a little hard to do by myself, I had to drink Kefir every 3 days or so, and well it reproduced very quickly! So I dropped it, and now that I don’t drink cow milk, I don’t really think I can do it again (but I might be wrong). In any case, it’s still only me, and that’s a lot of Kefir for one girl!

But, something else I found really good, and good for your health: Kombucha. Except Kombucha costs about 4,10$ at my local natural food store. That’s a lot of money. Then I heard of other friends who actually made Kombucha at home! So I thought I should give it a try. I looked online on how to purchase a Kombucha mother (also called Scoby). But everything I found, they cost like 25$+shipping. I thought ugh no way I am spending that much (and you know, if it gets moldy or if fruit flies go on it… what will happen?). So I looked online again and found you could start your own Kombucha mother from a regular store-bought bottle! 4,10$ to start my own Kombucha? Yes we have a deal!

Before going into what tutorial I used, what are the benefits of Kombucha? Well from what I read on the bottles, it has probiotics, which are awesome bacteria for your guts (and other places where you might need good bacteria). It also has yeast inside. It should help with digestion, and intestinal health. Probiotics also help keep away yeast infections! As a vegan it’s a good way to get those probiotics too. Of course as with any natural products, there are some precautions to take, among others, have clean hands and clean utensils. To be sure if you want to try it at home, I recommend you look online at what the very little research has shown! Also I encourage you to splurge and buy a bottle and try it first, to see if you like it or have any allergy.

With that said, I followed these instructions, and after one week, I had Kombucha!!!

I took some pictures along the way.

First step align all ingredients (Green Tea, Sugar, Jars for the tea, cheesecloth to put over the jar)

Two bad things can happen to Kombucha mothers: fruit flies or fungus! So it is important to have clean conditions when you brew the tea, and to cover your culture to limit contamination (Kombucha cultures produce gaz, do not close the jar!). I used cheesecloth folded in 4, hoping that would prevent fruit flies from coming in. But I saw a youtube video advising to use an old T-shirt to keep fruit flies away. Up to now, I haven’t had any problems!

First you brew some sweet tea (the original website was quite useless for measurement, so I winged everything. I think I put like 3-4 tablespoon sugar.Then you add the bottled Kombucha (once the tea has cooled down)

Then you wait for a week and check out if it’s ready. I got a glass straw for that purpose since I don’t have straws.

Here are pictures of the Kombucha mushroom (which is not a mushroom, this only how most people describe it). I’m sorry they’re blurry, I’ll try to take better ones next time! 

So I’ll report back in a week to tell you if the production is still going. 

Until next time! 

Sophie