Recipe Alert: A Step-by-Step Guide to Making Homemade Kombucha

The trendy probiotic drink is typically sold bottled, but you can save money and customise the flavours by making homemade kombucha yourself. Here's how.

By now, we all know the benefits of probiotics: balanced gut bacteria, a boosted immune system, and less bloat, for starters. And now that there's a huge focus in the news on digestive health, there's a resurgence of probiotic waters and juices. But if that £5-per-bottle kombucha habit is getting expensive, try this recipe from The Roasted Root to make homemade kombucha.

Below is everything you need to know, from the confusing terminology (like, erm WTF is SCOBY?) to each and every step in the brewing process. Once you have the base down, it's easy to experiment with flavour combos to find the mix-and-match you love best.  Enjoy...

How to Make Homemade Kombucha

Large pot

1 or 2-gallon glass jug/container

Stick-on or floating thermometer

Cheesecloth and rubber band

Glass, sealable bottles (such as flip cap bottles)

Ingredients

1 kombucha SCOBY (you can purchase online or grow your own by following steps below)

1 gallon spring water (don't use tap water because it likely has chlorine or fluoride in it)

10 black or green tea bags (whichever you prefer)

1 cup organic cane sugar

1 cup 100% fruit juice (optional, for flavouring)

Step 1: Brew the Tea

In a large pot, heat the gallon of spring water until boiling, then remove from heat and add the tea bags. Steep for 15 minutes and remove the bags. Add the sugar and stir well. (Whatever you do, don't skip this step, as the SCOBY grows and ferments from the sugar—more on this in step 2).

Step 2: Add the SCOBY

SCOBY, or Symbiotic Culture of Bacteria and Yeast, is the ingredient that transforms tea into kombucha through a sugar fermentation process (which you started in Step 1 when you added the sugar). After your tea is done steeping and has cooled to 75-80 degrees, transfer to a glass jug and add the SCOBY that's now grown. Place the thermometer in the jug, cover with cheesecloth and secure with a rubber band.

Step 3: Allow to Ferment

Place the jug in a dark, slightly warm environment (like a closet) and allow to brew for 7-10 days. The ideal temperature is between 75-80 degrees; any higher and you risk developing mould. (Below is what a healthy SCOBY looks like. If you begin to see mould similar to bread mould, throw the batch away and start again.) Your SCOBY will continue to grow in size—this is normal—but if it starts to become overgrown cut a few slices off to keep it healthy. After 7-10 days, your kombucha is complete—the longer you let it brew, the stronger the taste. 

Step 4: Remove the SCOBY

Now that your kombucha is done, slice the SCOBY off and place in a glass jug with enough kombucha to barely cover it, then cover the jug with cheesecloth. Let the SCOBY sit until you are ready to make another batch. If you like the taste as is, pour the kombucha into sealed glass bottles and place in the refrigerator until ready to drink. A batch typically lasts 3-5 days once the seal is broken.

NOTE: Steps 5-6 are optional, but often followed to develop more flavour within the kombucha. 

Step 5: Flavour the Kombucha

If you'd like to add more flavour to your kombucha, pour into a mixing bowl and add one cup of 100% fruit juice, or one cup fresh fruit and half-cup cane sugar. Stir, then divide into glass, sealable bottles. Place in the dark room where you grew your SCOBY and leave for three days. 

Step 6: Strain and Serve

After three days of fermentation, strain out any additional pieces of SCOBY that grew. Pour kombucha into sealed bottles and place in fridge until ready to drink. Be careful upon opening—the carbonation builds pressure in the bottles similar to shaken soda.

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Probiotics May Reduce The Risk of Common Cold

Daily consumption of a fermented milk drink with Lactobacillus casei strain Shirota could help the risk of upper respiratory tract infections (URTIs).

In Summary - What you need to know:

» A small study involving stressed office workers found that a daily probiotic drink containing milk fermented with the L. casei strain Shirota significantly reduced the risk of upper respiratory tract infections and the common cold.
» The probiotic drink seemed to help ward off colds by acting on both the immune system and the stress hormones – and say the researchers, the two are linked, which is why stress can make one more susceptible to colds.
» The researchers suggest that probiotics should be considered a useful approach to maintaining respiratory health.

Further Details of the Study:

The study reports that, after 12 weeks, the incidence of the URTIs in the probiotic group was more than half the rate observed in the control group.

Writing in the current issue of the European Journal of Nutrition the scientists noted that probiotic consumption was associated with improvements in both immunological parameters and stress markers in the healthy middle-aged office workers who took part in the study.

Improving Health, Saving Money

“The present study demonstrated the efficacy of probiotics in typical desk workers,” they wrote. “In general, such employees work under pressure and stress every day, which might be a risk factor for lowered immune defenses. Daily consumption of certain probiotics at higher doses may prevent disturbances in immune function resulting from stressful events in daily life.”
The cost savings could be significant,.with data from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention indicating that 22 million school days and 20 million workdays in adults are lost annually due to the common cold in the USA alone. In addition, the economic impact of colds in the US is estimated to be about $40 billion every year.

Keeping The Airways Clear

The Japanese researchers recruited 96 male office workers aged between 30 and 49 to participate in their randomised controlled trial. During winter, the men were randomly assigned to receive fermented milk with probiotics (L. casei strain Shirota at a daily dose of 100 billion viable cells) or a control milk for 12 weeks.

Results showed that the incidence of URTIs during the 12-week intervention period was 22% in the probiotic group, compared to 53% in the control group. In addition, the incidence of the common cold in the probiotic group was 18% versus 45% in the control group.

Men in the probiotic group also had a significantly higher URTI-free rate than men in the control group, said the Yakult scientists.

“The cumulative number of URTI episodes and cumulative days with URTI symptoms per person was lower in the [probiotic] group, and the duration per episode was shorter,” added the Scientists from the Yakult Central Institute

Mediating Immunity and Stress

The probiotics may work by modulating the immune system as well as a potential effect on the stress marker cortisol. The data indicated that, after six weeks of control milk consumption, the activity of NK cells decrease, while salivary levels of cortisol increased, but these changes did not occur in the probiotic group.
“NK cells play a very important role in the prevention of viral infections, including URTIs,” explained the scientists.
“Future studies should focus on nervous system-related actions of probiotics as well as their direct immune modulatory activities to obtain a better understanding of the precise mechanisms of preventing viral infections via probiotics,” they wrote.

Previous studies have shown that the same probiotic drink (known as Yakult) given to medical students during the run-up to nationwide medical school examinations, reduced stomach upsets due to stress among the students.

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