[booch]

Hello everyone! I love drinking kombucha tea and I'm brewing it on my own at home. However, my fiance doesn't like it very much. One time, he was drinking beer and I sneaked some kombucha tea to it and he liked it. So now he's asking me to brew kombucha + beer. Anyone here have done that before? How did it go? Can you give me recipes? Thanks in advance!

[Stevie]

I saw an older blog post on mad fermentationist about this yesterday. Too weird.

Go check it out. If you don't read his stuff, you should.




http://www.themadfermentationist.com/search/label/Kombucha

[morticaixavier]

or check out some sour beers. they are similar micro-flora.

Do you brew beer now?

I'm actually thinking of trying something like this. I have a kombucha culture at home and I was thinking of splitting part of it off and introducing it to a beer wort to see what happens.

[HoosierBrew]

Kombucha culture is mostly lactobacillus, no ?  Or are there other bugs as well ?

[morticaixavier]

Kombucha culture is mostly lactobacillus, no ?  Or are there other bugs as well ?

lot's of other stuff, there is a couple yeasts, some lacto, some aceto. At least in the culture I started with. It has a lot to do with what you start with.

[dkfick]

Yes one of the main flavor components of kombucha is acetic acid (vinegar).  As for beers that might already have a fair amount of acetic acid... I would look towards Flanders Red styles.

[Jeff M]

Where does one acquire a kombacha culture from?

Jeff

[Stevie]

Where does one acquire a kombacha culture from?

Jeff

You can use a commercial bottle or buy a SCOBY (symbiotic colony of bacteria and yeast) online. Amazon has them. Real hippies share their SCOBY as they just keep getting larger and larger the more batches you make. They look like large disks that are part pizza dough, leather, and booger.

[Jeff M]

Where does one acquire a kombacha culture from?

Jeff

You can use a commercial bottle or buy a SCOBY (symbiotic colony of bacteria and yeast) online. Amazon has them. Real hippies share their SCOBY as they just keep getting larger and larger the more batches you make. They look like large disks that are part pizza dough, leather, and booger.

Thanks Steve.  Is it possible to "breed" a SCOBY from WLP or wyeast parts like a mad scientist?

[dkfick]

easiest way to find a culture that I've found is just simply to search on craigslist. Basically the thing keeps growing as you use it and you need to trim some off... so might as well either give it away or sell it... I wouldn't pay anyone > $5 for one..

[morticaixavier]

Where does one acquire a kombacha culture from?

Jeff

You can use a commercial bottle or buy a SCOBY (symbiotic colony of bacteria and yeast) online. Amazon has them. Real hippies share their SCOBY as they just keep getting larger and larger the more batches you make. They look like large disks that are part pizza dough, leather, and booger.

Thanks Steve.  Is it possible to "breed" a SCOBY from WLP or wyeast parts like a mad scientist?

as far as I know the yeast banks don't keep all the component biota but it really is pretty easy. I grabbed a growler of some live culture kombucha at the hippie market (I went to my co-op but I'm sure WholePaycheck has some as well). mix up about 1 quart of tea/sugar liquid. I used about 4 tablespoons of sugar in a quart of water and a bunch of black tea. Add the last pint or so of kombucha to the starter and let that go.

By adding that much kombucha you acidify the starter to help protect it from mold. I used RO water for mine for the same reason I use it for beer, namely my local water is crap.

When that gets done (kind of hard to tell but you will see a thin pellicle like formation eventually) you can step it up to a gallon or two.

I'm a beginner at this Kombucha thing having made one batch and bottled 9 bottles worth. My wife loves the stuff and we save the little pint sized growlers (if the half growlers are squeelers, what are the quarter sized ones? Squeakers?) I use them for beer on the go or for kombucha.

mine have not gotten sparkly yet though so perhaps my culture is short on the yeast part or I did something wrong.

[beerocd]

As long as the bottle has "gunk" on the bottom, you will be able to start a scoby.  You need to make "Southern" tea - like hurt you teeth sweet. That's what the scoby live off of.  Mort I think you just need more sugar to get your fizz going. Same as beer, bottle it before all sugar is used up and it will continue to percolate. Growing it out the bottle takes a while, once it gets to the full width of your container the batches go way faster. My first time I used too big of a first batch and it was almost a month before there was something noticeable going on.

[morticaixavier]

As long as the bottle has "gunk" on the bottom, you will be able to start a scoby.  You need to make "Southern" tea - like hurt you teeth sweet. That's what the scoby live off of.  Mort I think you just need more sugar to get your fizz going. Same as beer, bottle it before all sugar is used up and it will continue to percolate. Growing it out the bottle takes a while, once it gets to the full width of your container the batches go way faster. My first time I used too big of a first batch and it was almost a month before there was something noticeable going on.

Yeah, the refresh I gave if after bottling what I did bottle is already smelling good. I gave it more sugar, about a half a teaspoon in each bottle, not very scientific. didn't seem to help with the carbonation though. que sera. I have a keg of sparkly water and we are going to make some kombucha kocktails with juice and sparkly water.