March 3, 2019
Kombucha Recipe
The moments of patience and care involved in fermenting things make the taste something akin to eating vegetables from your own garden. I think Kombucha is a relatively simple process, but the storage and cleanliness elements might make it seem mysterious and elusive to some. The scoby is also a unique organism that can make some people squeamish. My view is that it's a positive experience for people to see the process that undergirds what has, in a relatively short amount of time, come from a DIY practice mostly participated in within private spaces, to a fixture in corner stores and delis throughout the US. This coming to know the gushy and imperfect bits which carbonate and enrich this beverage can change perspectives of the machinery behind the underway standardization of the global, processed product.
There are many flavors of kombucha; many ways to do it right. I'll provide my standby, basic recipe, which is good for a beginner. Possible modifications are many - all involve some form of caffeine and some form of sweetener. My favorite alternatives include green tea (or jasmine), and honey. However honey is a little bit harder for the organisms to digest, and green tea produces less caffeine, so they can require special steps and modifications.
Acquiring a scoby is the first step. Ask around - making kombucha is a somewhat niche activity, so the availability of them will vary widely depending on your social circles. If you can't find one by word of mouth, online markets like OfferUp and Craigslist usually have people selling them for around $10. It might seem to some like a gamble, to trust a stranger with providing the starter. In my experience, people growing kombucha also share other kinds of connection to community-building practices. Also, if you happen to live in the San Diego area and want a scoby, all you have to do is ask.
Another way of ensuring you are getting a good scoby from the beginning is to consider its health. The health of the scoby is something that can be seen and felt. They age, so the newer ones often form at the top of the jar and are a rubbery white. Brown film is normal for scobies at all levels of development - more mature scobies will often have a filmy brown hue. If scobies are old they are usually more kidney-like and shriveled. When they get to this state, it may be time to compost it and give the younger ones in the jar more space to breath. There is a pretty clear difference between the normal filmic layers of healthy kombucha, and kombucha which has been affected by mold. Checking your kombucha regularly will help you get to know it's healthy state, so you would be able to detect if anything unusual starts growing (unlikely if you make sure to be clean when interacting with your kombucha (more on that soon).
For one batch:
*Hang on! What is a batch??? --> A batch might mean any number of sizes, and this is a very flexible recipe. A lot depends on the maturity and health of your scoby, what quality of tea you are using, etc. As for the size of the batch, it depends on the size of the jar.. Varied sizes are OK! I recommend a rounded edge, half gallon Mason jar or larger, which you can often get at garden and hardware stores, Ikea or like cookware stories, and co-ops. Notice that I don't really have exact measurements. Jars are different sizes, and the tea/water/sugar proportions do not need to be exact. The main point is to make sure the tea is strong and very sweet, which can easily be judged by taste and the darkness of the tea.
| Large glass jar |
| Coffee filter or cheesecloth |
| Rubber band |
| Paper towels or napkins |
| Non-plastic bowl |
| Clean towel for drying the sanitized jar |
| 1 scoby with some starter liquid |
| 8-12 black tea bags |
| 1/2 cup sugar or more |
| Enough water to fill the jar |
| 1) Boil enough water to fill the jar |
| 2) When water is boiling, add tea bags and turn off the heat |
| 3) Let the tea bags steep for 3-5 minutes, make sure the tea is very dark/strong, then take the tea bags out |
| 4) Mix sugar into the fresh, hot tea. Start with 1/2 cup, add more to taste. Tea should be very sweet, probably more sweet than you would otherwise drink on its own. Stir the sugar into the tea for about 1 minute, making sure it gets dissolved |
| 5) Let the tea cool to room temperature for a few hours. You may put a lid on the pot if you have fruit flies, etc., although no lid is also fine and makes it go faster |
| 6) When the tea is at room temperature, we will prepare to transfer everything together: Thoroughly wash your hands with soap and thoroughly rinse them. When you are doing the transferring, it is imperative that you keep your hands and surfaces clean. This does not mean wiping the surfaces with cleaning sprays, etc. that might mix chemicals into the air and your kombucha. Keeping things fresh with a clean cloth and washed hands + hot water is my recommended way to go |
| 7) To sanitize the jar: Boil a few cups of water in a kettle or on the stove. Get out your glass jar, pour a small amount of hot water in the jar to sanitize it, move the liquid inside the jar around with some hot mits on, make sure the hot water has touched around the insides and mouth of the jar to get it clean and ready. Put the jar on a clean cloth to dry and/or dry it immediately with paper towels and put on a clean cloth. |
| 8) Now we will transfer everything into the jar: |
| 9) Make sure the jar and the tea you've brewed are at *room temperature* and not hot when you are ready to transfer things |
| 10) Start with clean hands, take the kombucha scoby out of your container and transfer it to the larger jar, then dump the starter liquid with it |
| 11) Now, add the tea you've brewed till you fill up the jar almost all the way to the top, but leave some room knowing you will eventually be pouring some out |
| 12) Once everything is transferred, get some paper towels or napkins wet and wipe around the surface of the jar and especially the mouth of the jar, making sure they are clean. Dry off the mouth of the jar as well |
| 13) Take a coffee filter or cheesecloth and put it on the jar, secure tight with a rubber band |
| 14) Now, find a clean cupboard to put it in - preferably not somewhere that fresh fruit or vegetables go too, an isolated cupboard is best |
| 15) The kombucha will need around 2 weeks till it has carbonated, then pour some out and enjoy! I recommend adding ice otherwise it will be room temperature.. |
| 16) Replenish the tea when it's getting low/as necessary |
| 17) Finally, make sure to change the coffee filter periodically, and after every time you pour yourself more kombucha, wipe the mouth of the jar to make sure no kombucha has gotten on the outside of the jar |
I hope you enjoy! Feel free to email me if you have questions about how to make this recipe and I will do my best to respond.
References
Katz, S. E. (2016). Wild fermentation: The Flavor, Nutrition, and Craft of Live-Culture Foods. Chelsea Green Publishing.