Making Kombucha!

We have been brewing up many a batch of Kombucha at the TripKnight headquarters.  We love it!  The brewing process is simple: brewed and cooled black or green tea, sugar, apple cider vinegar or starter from a previous Kombucha batch and one SCOBY, which is short for Symbiotic Culture of Bacteria and Yeast.  The scoby eats the sugar in the tea and produces a probiotic, carbonated, ph balancing drink that we find DELICIOUS!  Kombucha tea was all the rage in 2010.  It was on tap at Whole Foods and the individual bottles were flying off the shelves.  The F.D.A found that the amount of alcohol present in each batch due to fermentation was unpredictable and sometimes as high as 3%.  Kombucha was banned for sale and cleared off the shelves.  It is now back but met with some dispute as to the actual health benefits or possible detriments.
Kombucha has been brewed and enjoyed for over 2000 years.  It has only recently entered the American culture and been presented for scrutiny to the Food and Drug Administration.
Some Healing properties of Kombucha may include (from Kombucha Kamp):
- healthy bacteria
- balancing internal PH
- detoxifying the liver
- increasing the metabolism
- improving digestion
- rebuilding connective tissue
- cancer prevention
- reducing blood pressure
- relieving headaches
- improving eye sight
- aiding healthy cell regeneration
- reducing gray hair
Mostly it is probiotic and contains amino acids, both of which help with digestion and 'for life' bodily functions.  We are having lots of fun brewing and creating Kombucha!
Stay tuned for some new SCOBY recipes we've been playing around with (SCOBY smoothie anyone?)