Scoby do (day 135)

I've stumbled onto culture, the bacterial kind.  I now know what a scoby is and I am worried about mine.  I hope I didn't kill it.  A scoby is a symbiotic combination of yeast and bacteria.  I have two types now:  one for making Kefir and one for making Kombucha tea.  Both were gifted by a kind soul in East Vancouver.  

After being sick I started drinking probiotics to replenish my gut with good bacteria.  But probiotic drinks are super expensive and knowing that all they are is fermented milk was bothering me.  What could be easier than multiplying bacteria?  I looked into making yogurt but the effort seemed to outweigh the returns.  Then I came across Kefir, a drink originally from Russia which kind of tastes like yogurt but with some yeast tones and effervescence.   An acquired taste to some maybe but I took to it right away.  It's quite good with chocolate.  Anyway, it too is expensive but unlike yogurt it is quite easy to make.  It requires room temperature and a typical kefir will take 24-36 hours to make.  The catch is that you need to know someone with the Kefir grains to start the process.  Thankfully the gift culture of craigslist yielded a kind person who not only gave me some grains but also showed me his method of making Kefir.  

As a bonus he also gave me a Kombucha tea mushroom (it's called a mushroom but it's not really a mushroom).   I'd never had Kombucha tea but I was thrilled to get the scoby after tasting his tea.  It's fresh tasting, a little bit like a cross between cider and beer.  It only has 1% alcohol. 

A big learning curve of an afternoon later, I have two things brewing:  Kefir and Kombucha tea.  The Kefir should be ready tomorrow night.  The tea, perhaps in two weeks if I didn't kill the scoby with the wrong PH or an invasion of another bacteria or mold. 

Who knew sickness could yield such treasures.

A song for this post.