Note: I read and enjoy every single comment. At the moment, though, the darn blog isn't letting me reply. My comments disappear into thin air, so any comments received will be answered by inserting them as q/a updates to this post. fixed!
I think I mentioned in one or more of my recent posts that I used to brew and drink water kefir, then stopped during a significant relapse back onto SAD (standard American diet) because water kefir only tastes good to me if I'm not eating a lot of sugar.
A week ago, I decided that since I've been back on whole foods for a while it would be nice to have water kefir available again. It seems to have a great effect on my gut, making me more lactose tolerant, and I enjoy making home-made sodas by adding fruit juice and bottling it.
Anyhow, my new water kefir grains came yesterday. Very exciting! I'm pretty sure they were somewhat starved; when I opened them, they looked a little dehydrated and there was an "off" smell I don't remember from the first time I ordered grains.
I gave them a good rinse and put them into feeding solution, expecting to refresh the liquid this afternoon. Last night, though, I noticed the liquid was already a very light color and I realized I may have put in too many grains for the amount of feeding solution I made. So, I fed them then and carefully measured the right amount of grains for the amount of solution.
This morning the grains look more plump and the solution is lightening but not yet exhausted. I want a mid-day feeding schedule, so I plan to feed them again in a few hours. They may or may not have consumed all the sugar by then but I'm only planning to drink a small amount so it doesn't matter.
Update: It's now mid-morning and I just did a routine jostling of the jar. I have tiny bubbles! That's a great sign that my water kefir grains are happy and are actively turning my feeding solution into water kefir.
One thing I learned the first time around is that you start with a small dose and work your way up to a glassful per day. Water kefir clearly makes it though the stomach and interacts with your gut flora. If you happen to have some nasty bugs, or SIBO, the kefir could actually make you ill if you drink a lot to begin with. Since I had a very unhappy gut a couple days ago I plan to be very careful.
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Update #2: I started a new brewing cycle at noon PDST as planned. I was very happy to see a few grains that were markedly bigger than any of them were when received. As suspected, they were dehydrated when they arrived.
I measured 2 tbsp of grains into 2 cups of feeding solution in late evening yesterday, and by noon today I had about 3 tbsp. In a full 24-hour cycle the ideal is for the grains to about double in volume.
I tasted the "kefir" from this batch. Because of the incomplete brewing cycle, it still had a sweetness to it and didn't yet have the signature kefir flavor; it was as if I was expecting to taste hard cider but tasted fresh cider instead. I will consider tomorrow's spoonful my first "dose" and take things very slowly as planned.
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I was disappointed when I bought supplies for brewing the water kefir. I found a lemon and organic raisins easily, but I didn't yet find a wheel of dehydrated, non-additive figs. Not only do the water kefir grains seem to like having a fig in the solution, I absolutely LOVE the fermented figs after they've been through 1 or 2 brewing cycles. So I need to try more outlets to find some. The fermented raisins are okay, but nothing like as good as those figs.
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Update, 4/14: I'm now making and drinking carbonated blueberry sodas as described in Brewing Water Kefir, part 2. The grains smell nice and fresh and they're doubling in volume each day. The fresh water kefir has a nice zing to it and the first soda, which I drank today, had great flavor and was nice and fizzy.
The good news is that I didn't have any strong reaction to drinking water kefir again despite my relapses last winter with wheat. Apparently my gut community was still pretty robust, because the kefir tastes great to me both fresh and carbonated and there was no churning or cramping from the initial doses of the kefir.
Forgive me if I gush about my new hobby, but you know how it is. The new toy gets all the praise.
It's less than 3 weeks since I began making my own yogurt, but by itself that should tell you there isn't a long learning curve. I've been asking myself why I waited so long to start making it, but the answer is that I could never tolerate it before. Since I started drinking water kefir, though, good things have happened and I now handle a dish of yogurt just fine every morning.
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| Let's Eat! |
Because ancestral eating means eating whole foods without fear of animal fats including dairy, I don't make reduced-fat yogurt. In fact, I enhance my whole milk with heavy cream. Fats have been wrongly accused of causing heart disease when research now shows the opposite--low fat diets increase your chance of suffering heart disease. If you want to read more about that, here's a link to a relevant article. However, if you want to make reduced-fat yogurt then just buy reduced-fat milk.
Here are my first reactions to making yogurt:
- I can't believe how easy it is!
- I love having control of how much/little fat is in the yogurt
- I love having control of how much I make each time rather than having to buy containers that are too large/small
- I love the flavor--the plain yogurt isn't sweet but it definitely tastes like a dairy product unlike the commercial ones that taste like sweeteners, thickeners and stabilizers
- I love the texture. I'm already successfully producing a nice thick yogurt that mixes easily with fruit and is smooth on the tongue either plain or mixed
- I like the fact that my home-made has a full complement of live, active cultures and has no appreciable shelf life as I make it every 3 days
And that's just the beginning. In case you're curious, I'll detail a few facts:
- I bought a yogurt maker. Living in a 5th wheel RV, temperatures are comfortable but quite variable. In winter, it gets cool overnight and in summer it's quite warm despite 2 air conditioners and a ceiling fan. I bought one that allows me to use my own container of preferred size. Many people are able to make yogurt without a yogurt maker, though, and advice is easy to find online.
- I buy organic whole milk and heavy cream (the cream also goes in my coffee.) I purposely tried mixtures of different strengths--milk plus a little cream, half/half and mostly cream. My strong favorite is 1.5 cups of whole milk and 1/2 cup of cream. It sets up beautifully but still has a milky taste.
- Few supplies are needed other than the yogurt maker. I use a stainless steel bowl for heating the milk/cream, a silicone spatula to stir, my full-purpose glass measuring cup, an instant-read thermometer and 2 2-cup ceramic mugs-with-handles that are nice for handling the warm liquid and yogurt. The only things I purchased for the yogurt project were the 2 2-cup mugs and a package of culture starter.
- To make the yogurt, you heat the milk/cream to 185 degrees, then cool to 110. You then add the starter culture (I used the one I bought for the first batch only) or 1 tbsp live-culture yogurt per cup of liquid. I reserve 2 tbsp of yogurt from each batch to start the next.
- My yogurt is ready in about 5 hours; I cool it briefly then cover and put it in the fridge. Right now I'm using about 2/3 cup per day.
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| New Batch |
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| Sample for Next Batch |
Instead of staring in bewilderment at the supermarket's yogurt display, looking in vain for full-fat yogurt without additives, I now open the fridge and take out my creamy fresh yogurt and all I have to do is decide which fruit sounds good today.
Resources: The most complete information I've found about making yogurt at home is at makeyourownyogurt and I recommend you check it out.
The best things about my recipe are that I'm using home-made, full-fat yogurt and there are no sweeteners used.
If you aren't making yogurt, then look for plain unsweetened yogurt with no- or few additives as they basically make yogurt taste like something else. My favorite part of my home-made is that it still tastes like a dairy product. I can and will eat it plain, but only to keep losing weight. Once I reach my desired weight I plan to eat it this way every day.
I start with a ripe banana. Mash half of it coarsely with a fork and sprinkle with cinnamon. Add your yogurt. I use about 2/3 cup of yogurt; you should start with your preferred portion and, if it's much more or less than 2/3 cup you may want to adjust the fruit quantities from what I describe.
Once the mashed banana and cinnamon are stirred into the yogurt, slice the other half of the banana and add a handful of either sliced or whole grapes in your desired quantity. Gently mix with your spoon and EAT! The mashed banana sweetens the yogurt but not so much that the other fruit tastes sour.
To enhance the flavors, I add a few raw pecan or walnut halves for contrast.
Variations can include replacing the grapes with any of these: kiwi, sweet apple, pineapple (preferably fresh), berries.
