My Foray into Kombucha Brewing

One of the Ironworks Gym owners (Dickie) is a big Kombucha drinker, and after a few tastes, I became hooked on it too. I decided one day to start brewing my own and here we are several months later, with another batch on the counter and a bottle ready to drink in the fridge.

And along comes Dickie and asks me to write about my experiences with Kombucha and brewing my own... and that's how this blog post came to be.

I tried making Kombucha for the first time after buying several very overpriced bottles from the store. Wasn’t exactly rocket science from what I could figure. Take some tea, some sugar, a little bit of an old bottle of Kombucha and *poof* some magic happens and you have this wonderful elixir that helps with digestion and tastes good. After a few failed attempts at getting a good batch that tasted like the wonderful concoctions the store sold me instead of straight up vinegar, I decided to ask for a little help.

Enter Dickie with his simple advice:

1. Get a glass jug with a spigot
2. Use more sugar than you think
3. Put it in a warm, dark place to ferment
4. Taste it often

Let me back up. I gave Kombucha a try because, like most people, I wanted to see what the hype was about. I read all the stuff about how it’s good for your gut, but never from a lifter… it was always some skinny guy that looked like he was afraid of the gym. I wanted to see if it actually did anything for me. And then I finally got a few bottles on sale. There were all sorts of flavors, but I found the less exotic sounding bottles tasted better… and made me feel better. By better, I mean the stomach issues most heavy lifters get with a diet heavy in protein. After a few weeks of drinking 4-6 ounces per day, I noticed a lot of foods didn't give me the same problems (Why do you eat food that gives you problems? Because I like it. That's why!) and that there was a difference in what I craved. The downside? It's super expensive (a cheap bottle was $2 for 2 servings) and I was spending a lot of money for something I can make at home. And for $10, I could make enough to last 2-3 weeks.

Since I'm not a doctor or a scientist, I can only give you my experience.

Back to the failed attempts. I did several things wrong, that you can easily avoid. I didn’t use enough sugar. I fermented it in the fridge. I didn’t clean my SCOBY. I used only flavored tea bags.

Since then, I’ve learned to do a few things to make the batch better. 

The vessel and the giant SCOBY with a fresh batch

1. ½ Gallon of filtered water
2. 2 cups of sugar
3. 4 tea bags, no more than 1 flavored (be careful with flavors as they get strong, quickly)
4. Keep ½ cup of the previous batch in the jar
5. Clean your SCOBY with warm water every few batches
6. Create a SCOBY vault to keep in case something goes wrong

I’m no expert, but with a few extra minutes of research and a freshly cleaned starter SCOBY, I started making fresh batches every few weeks and have learned to tweak them to taste just like I like them.

Here’s my process for making my own Kombucha:

• Boil the water, sugar, and tea until the sugar is fully dissolved.
• Allow the tea to cool to room temperature. It takes a few hours.
• Clean your vessel with hot soapy water, being sure to get all soap residue out.
• Every 2-3 batches I will clean the vessel again.
• Add 2-3 tablespoons of white vinegar and swirl around the vessel and then dump out.
• After the tea is cooled, pour it into the vessel and add approximately 4 ounces of unpasteurized kombucha from a bottle or the last batch. The acid in the previous batch will help ward off the bad things we don’t want.
• Add your Scoby if you have one. If you have one, it ferments faster, if not, you can order one or just go get a non-pasteurized bottle of Kombucha from the store.
• Cover the mouth of the vessel with a coffee filter or paper towel.
• Place in a warm, dark area.
• Check it every 2-3 days for taste.

What I use to store my batches for drinking

My personal favorite is made with 3 bags of green tea and 1 bag of lemongrass tea. I’ve also tried using cinnamon tea, orange tea, and mint. Be sure to taste the tea often as it doesn’t take long to go from sweet, digestion helping tea, to vinegar. And no matter what you’ve read, vinegar is not something that tastes good as a drink. If you want to add in some additional flavor after you're finished the brew, you can add some fresh berries, melon, etc.

One of the biggest things I had to get over was the yeast growth. After the first batch and the first cleaning, the yeast growth subsides. It is perfectly natural to have some yeast growth and if you are grossed out by the idea of drinking a strand of yeast, you can always run your Kombucha through a filter before placing it in a bottle for storage. One thing you have to be very careful of: MOLD.  Mold is not ok in any stage. If you see mold (and you know what mold looks like), get rid of the batch and start over.

If you're interested, here are a few good resources to help you get on your way:

The Kitchn

Cultures for Health

Food Renegade - I personally don't do the double fermentation, but if you want fizzy, this is the way you have to go.