Summer Kombucha

This summer, I began my Kombucha tending process at home in D.C.  Kombucha is a fermented tea-based beverage with (proven and unproven) health benefits.  It has a vinegary taste and is good for digestion and general health because it contains probiotics.  The culture is called a SCOBY (Symbiotic Culture of Bacteria and Yeast).  You brew strong, very sweet tea and then add the SCOBY to let it ferment.  The sugar is eaten off during the fermentation process, and the vinegary taste develops.

It's an interesting process that takes a lot of tweaking. In June, I got my SCOBY, or mushroom, or Mother of Vinegar, from a lady in the egg line at the Takoma Park Farmer's Market.  The first few batches did not work, probably due to the fact that I damaged the growing cultures while trying to transport them between my parents' houses.  Kombucha doesn't like car movement.

I tried brewing it in the kitchen, and some mold got in there.  I learned online that mold spores from other food items can travel and latch onto the Kombucha, so the kitchen isn't the best place.  When I brewed it downstairs in the shadows of the basement, I got the best results:

I know it looks gross, but this is a healthy culture.  The thickness of it was what I was lacking beforehand - they were papery thin and see-through.  I still believe that these tasted a little too sweet, but they were good in general.  Now I'm brewing in Berkeley!  More on that later.