Kombucha 101
Everything You Need To Know About ‘Booch
We love our kombucha kin. And that includes the ones that are just curious about these bottles that, recently, seem to multiply like a SCOBY. For the ones that don’t know what that is, and even for the ones that do, sit tight because you’re all about to be kombucha virtuosos.
How It Started
It’s nearly impossible to pin down where kombucha started, but the most common consensus was that it started at least 200 years ago, in most likely, Northeast China. Which, would make sense, because while it may not look like it, kombucha is actually a tea.
This tea starts super simply, with only four ingredients – tea, sugar, bacteria, yeast. Technically, it’s only three ingredients because the last two come together in one being called a SCOBY - an acronym for Symbiotic Culture Of Bacteria and Yeast. This SCOBY truly is a being because it’s living, “symbiotic” meaning that the bacteria and yeast live together in a mutually beneficial cycle and community. You might hear this SCOBY referred to as a mushroom because of its billowing, but pancake-like appearance, similar to a mushroom. Kombucha can sometimes be called “mushroom tea” as well.
The Life of A SCOBY
The composition of which bacteria and yeasts are in a SCOBY can vary pretty wildly, and measurements are just as hard to pin down, which is why seeing particular bacteria and their amounts listed on a kombucha label all gives you a likely tip-off that synthetic probiotics were most likely added, and not brewed (i.e., “Contains 2 billion live cultures...”). What makes figuring out what the colony is made of even harder is that SCOBYs are a self-perpetuating culture. This is where things get really cool. SCOBYs actually replicate themselves through the very process of making kombucha.
All living things need to eat, and a SCOBY’s favorite food is tea and sugar (really, it’s ours too). In putting the SCOBY into a mixture of tea and sugar, the SCOBY begins to eat up the sugar in fermentation, and form another of itself. The original SCOBY is the “mother” culture, and further grown SCOBYs are the “baby”. All of our kombucha you see actually started by a surprisingly few number of SCOBYs.
The SCOBY is left to do its job anywhere from as little as a week, all the way up to a month, depending on when the brewer thinks its just right. The fermentation of all the sugars release a few types of organic acids, the bacteria and yeast multiply, and the whole process results in a release of carbon dioxide. This is how your kombucha becomes so fizzy without anything added. Shaking or jarring the bottle makes the gases more volatile, and causes the uncontrollable foamy volcano every regular kombucha drinker has experienced at least once upon unscrewing the cap.
The sediment at the bottom that you see is actually naturally occuring yeast particles. Don’t be scared. That’s actually where the really healthy stuff lays. It means what you’re getting likely is raw kombucha, or at the very least, real kombucha where a SCOBY was definitely used. We understand the instinct to shake something with stuff on the bottom, but we recommend you gently swirl the bottle, or just cradle the bottom, slowly turn it upside down, let the sediment distribute, then slowly turn it right side up again. Shaking the bottle makes the CO2 in your bottle go crazy, and when you pop the cap, you’ll end up with more of it all over you than in your mouth. You might even see a small SCOBY right in your drink too. It’s what makes kombucha kombucha, and is just a concentrated form of it. You’re also welcome to eat this, most seasoned booch drinkers actually do like eating the SCOBY.
Along with CO2, this fermentation also releases a ton of B vitamins, amino acids, Vitamin C, and probiotic bacteria into the liquid. If a glob of bacteria freaks you out, think about the fact that these little guys literally work 24/7 to keep you healthy.
Alcohol and Kombucha
We’re often asked if kombucha contains alcohol. For untouched, traditionally brewed kombucha, the answer is yes. But the brewing of kombucha is actually regulated, in part, by the government.
To be sold on grocery store shelves, the alcohol content has to be at 0.5% or below, or else it must be treated as an alcoholic beverage available to only those 21 and up. There are multiple ways to remove alcohol, and one of the most common is pasteurization. While adding heat to the brew can indeed remove most of the alcohols, heat also kills off a lot of the good bacteria you’re buying kombucha for, anyway. You can also alter the methods in which the kombucha is brewed, but this, of course, deviates from tradition.
We refused to deviate from tradition, or kill off the best parts, but we want your whole family to be able to enjoy what we’ve made. So we’re extremely proud to say that we are one of the very few companies in the US that have figured out a way to remove the alcohol without heat, while still brewing with traditional methods. We use what’s called a spinning cone, which spins at high speeds and uses a low temperature vacuum distillation to remove 99.9% of the alcohol. That’s right, our juice actually clocks in at about .1% alcohol. It only then needs to be kept cold so that it doesn’t ferment anymore, and you have the lowest-alcohol kombucha on the market. We’re that serious about what we do.
The Sugar Question
To answer this, let’s get back to our friend, the SCOBY. The sugar that the brew starts out with is actually there for the SCOBY, not you. Most of it is eaten up and fermented by the time the kombucha is ready to go. If your drink is flavored, the juices, fruits, herbs, and flowers were added in a second fermentation, which eats up even more of the original sugars, and some of the sugars in the fruit and juices too.
By the time the bottle gets in your hands, the lot of any sugars you’ll drink are from the juices and fruits that make what you’re drinking so irresistibly tasty. That is, unless more sugars are added to try and make it more appealing, and hide that tang at the end that we think is the best part. Some brewers try to hide the tastes of fermentation because some people don’t like it. Kombucha’s taste can be altered by any number of things you put in it, but it always has a faint apple cider vinegar vibe to it, and a similar sweet tang at the end. The fizz to it gives a bit of an added tang, and keeps that taste around for longer. Adding in things like spices or fruits can mix with that ending tang, and make a whole odd symphony of flavors. Some people say it’s an acquired taste, some people love it from day one, and some never come around.
When we say “no added sugars”, that means the natural juices and flavors of brewing speak for themselves, and the taste of traditional fermentation isn’t masked. Any sugars you see on the label are, and a small amount of sugars from the first fermentation. It’s impossible to have a sugar-free kombucha, juice or not, because without a SCOBY, it’s not kombucha, and if you have a SCOBY, it needs to eat and survive to do its job.
If you’re part of the crowd that hates the ferment-y taste, that’s ok, we still like you. But we have a cool pro tip. Remember, sugars ferment. The more sugar that’s there, the more it’ll ferment, and the more prevalent that taste will be. If you want to like kombucha because of the benefits, try flavors that don’t have fruits in the title, or on the ingredient label. You’re looking for super low sugars, flowers, roots, and/or herbs. The less sugar the SCOBY has access to, the less it can ferment, and the less you’ll taste it. This is why people love our Hibiscus Ginger so much - a flower and an herb leads to a dry taste, rather than a tangy one.
What’s In It For You?
We get it. This stuff might be interesting and all, but why would somebody grab a bacteria-infested tea that could explode if you opened it, and try to drink it?
Think about this: In it, you make a new best friend that works tirelessly to eat up all the sugar you try to stay away from all day, and turn it all into a health food. This stuff is teeming with probiotics, which are huge players in not only healthy digestion, but have effects on your immunity, and even mental health. The more research that’s done about your gut’s bacterial environment, called your “microbiome”, the more they find it deeply affects your entire body.
That could be enough right there, but it’s also a bottle full antioxidants, vitamins, and amino acids, all while being low in sugar and caffeine. It’s one of the lowest sugar drinks on the shelf (as long as a ton of sugars aren’t added later) that still has a punch of unique taste. Where else do you still get to enjoy flavors you really can’t find anywhere else, with no guilt?
In grabbing a bottle of kombucha, you’ve decided to take part in a 200+ year old tradition, and step foot into a fanatical cult following full of people that care about their health, and are educated about what’s going into their bodies. Think of it as your own symbiotic culture.
If none of that appeals to you, you at least get to hang out here with us. And we think we’re pretty cool, too.