What is kombucha?

What is kom­bucha? Just a drink, or …?

Safe­ty pre­cau­tions

Per­form this ex­per­i­ment only un­der adult su­per­vi­sion.

Equip­ment

• 3 tbsp black tea;
• 100 g sug­ar;
• 4 tbsp ap­ple cider vine­gar;
• 1 L boil­ing wa­ter;
• large glass jar;
• gauze;
• rub­ber band.

Step-by-step in­struc­tions

Pour 3 tbsp black tea and 100g sug­ar into a glass bowl. Add a liter of boil­ing wa­ter. Stir and wait for the mix­ture to cool. Trans­fer to a wide-neck glass con­tain­er and add 4 tbsp ap­ple cider vine­gar. Cov­er the con­tain­er with gauze and store it in a warm, dark place for 3 weeks. Dur­ing this time, you will be able to ob­serve how a thin film of tea fun­gus forms on the so­lu­tion's sur­face, which grad­u­al­ly thick­ens and turns into a ful­ly-fledged SCO­BY!

Process de­scrip­tion

A SCO­BY (Sym­bi­ot­ic Cul­ture Of Bac­te­ria and Yeast) is a sym­bi­ot­ic or­gan­ism con­sist­ing of two com­po­nents: bac­te­ria and yeast, as the name sug­gests. The yeast fer­ments sug­ar to form al­co­hol and car­bon diox­ide, and acetic acid bac­te­ria ox­i­dize the al­co­hol and con­vert it into or­gan­ic acids. They grad­u­al­ly cre­ate a com­plex sys­tem that forms a thin film on the liq­uid's sur­face. As the bac­te­ria and yeast mul­ti­ply, the film thick­ens and ac­quires a char­ac­ter­is­tic jel­ly­fish-like shape. This gives it its name: Medu­somyces gi­se­vii. But not all bac­te­ria and yeast will form SCO­BY – some­times this process just re­sults in mold. Wash the glass con­tain­er thor­ough­ly with bak­ing soda and rinse with boil­ing wa­ter to pre­vent this. But if at first you don’t suc­ceed, don’t wor­ry! You can buy a ready-made cul­ture and add it to the tea so­lu­tion. Over time, the same or­gan­ism will grow out of it. Your labors will re­sult in a fra­grant, pleas­ant­ly sour drink rich in or­gan­ic acids, an­tiox­i­dants, and pro­bi­otics – kom­bucha!