Kombucha Tea

 

I considered giving this post the title "Gross Things on my Counter, Part 1," since kombucha is only one of the things on my counter that could be considered gross to the uninitiated.  Once I started to travel down the live fermented food path it wasn't long before I realized my kitchen counters were beginning to take on a laboratory vibe and sometimes there is a ... special odor.

The photo above is of the kombucha scoby that my sister in law gave me for Christmas this year.  It's a slimy mushroom like thing created by a symbiotic colony of yeast and bacteria which is grown in a sweet beverage, like tea or fruit juice.  The perfect gift - she knows me so well!  The scoby came with a quart jar, a tea bag, and instructions for brewing the tea and letting it stand at room temperature for a week or so while it converts the sugars and changes the tea to kombucha.  

After my first batch I decided to make it by the gallon since it takes so long to brew a batch that I wanted more than one quart at a time.  I'm supposed to put a cloth or paper towel over the jar so it can still breath, but dust doesn't get it in.  Don't ask my why I think it's funny to dress my kombucha like Rosie the Riveter so it matches my recipe box, because I have no idea, I just do.  Isn't it cute?

Once the kombucha tastes like it's done, I put it in jars with a little bit of home made jam.  So far I've used peach jam and a few dried cranberries, and more recently pear jam.  If the cap of the jar is air tight the little bit of sugar in the jam reactivates the yeast and bacteria, which release gas and makes the kombucha fizzy.  I brew some more tea and put the scoby and some of the finished kombucha in it and let it make another batch. That's how I end up with a jar of brown liquid with a gross slime patty floating in it on my counter. 

The kombucha tastes tangy, like a vinegar or lemon drink.  Since most of the sugar has been eaten by the kombucha organisms, it has less calories than sweet tea or soda, and less caffeine.  It's tart and fizzy and is good over ice.  It's a good substitute for soda, but for some reason people enjoy it more if you don't show them the scoby first or let them see you pour it from an olive oil bottle!