I talked earlier about how awesome Kombucha Tea was, and it’s really easy to make for yourself too. Here’s how:
First, you have to get your hands on a baby (also known as a Scoby, also known as a Kombucha mushroom).
Next, choose your tea – I’ve used all kinds: green tea, black tea, pu’erh (this one is my fav!), rooibos, jasmine, you name it. As long as there aren’t any oils (like in Earl Grey) then you’re good to go.
Next up, make your tea: boil four litres of water in a big pot. When it boils throw in 1 cup of sugar and then around 6-8 bags of your chosen tea. Let this boil away for about 15mins.
Next take out the tea bags and pour the whole shebang into a big container of some kind: glass is great, as is crockery, but stay away from plastic and metal as these won’t work at all.
Next, let your tea cool off all day/all night until it’s room temperature. This is VERY IMPORTANT or else you’ll kill your culture and the whole thing won’t work.
Once the tea is cooled, slide in your Kombucha baby along with a 1/4 cup or so of the liquid it came with, cover your container with a tea towel, secure the towel with an elastic so it doesn’t fall in and wait around for 2-3 weeks or so. Put your container in a secure spot where it won’t get direct sun and won’t get bonked, but that’s still warm so that the fermentation can do it’s groovy thing.
After a couple of weeks test it out – is it as fizzy as you want? Does it taste good? Great! Done! Voila Kombucha.
You can bottle it, and you can even add stuff to it like lemon juice, ginger, raspberries, whatever strikes you, just make sure that you add it after you’ve bottled your tea otherwise you’ll kill your culture.
Your baby will have grown a new baby, so you can save it or give it away, or feed it to your chickens (ours love them!), whatever you want. Each culture can be used about 6-7 times I’ve been told.
Super easy! Give it a go and have fun experimenting! And if you have any questions you can always send me a signal and I’d be happy to help you along…