In response from a question my father asked…

I was talking to my father last night and he asked what was kefir. So here is my mini tutorial of my water kefir (milk will come tomorrow).

 Here are all my supplies minus a lid for my jar.

 First I almost fill up my jar with spring water (if you were on well water you can use that, city water has chlorine in it and that can be hard on the grains).

 I add 6 tablespoons of Rapadura (or Sucanat which is what this is) to my water. Rapadura is a natural sugar with the molasses still attached. You can also use white sugar.

 I put the lid on the jar and shake it till sugar is dissolved.

 This shows you the dissolved sugar water (left), vs the water kefir after about 3 days (right). Notice the grains in the bottom of the water kefir.

 Next I take a funnel and put it into my bottle with a strainer on top and pour my kefir through.

 This is the water kefir “grains”. They are a probiotic blend of organisms that are in agreement with each other. I can’t remember exactly what it is, but they make the drink better for you then just sugar water. They eat the sugar in the water and that is why it changes color.

 Then I pour the grains into the sugar water…

 and cover with a coffee filter with a rubber band. I store this on a shelf for 3 days till I do it again.

 Going back to the 3 day kefir in the bottle, I add fruit to the mixture. Our favorites are pineapple (shown) or lemon. Anything really will work though.

 Seal the bottle and let rest for another 3 days. See the difference the second 3 days makes to the color. If you leave this too long though it can become slightly alcoholic.

And this is the finished product after 3 days. I had chilled this bottle and so it isn’t as fizzy as it normally is. The fizz is naturally occuring. I have heard of some people getting it without using a bottle and just using a mason jar. However the bottle is probably best for this purpose. You can also drink kefir after you remove the grains. We don’t do that but you can do it.

That is all for now. Tomorrow I will talk about Milk kefir and how it is different.
Jennifer