Anyone Make/Keg Kombucha?

[Mishraile]

So my wife wants me to start making Kombucha, and add a tap to my keezer to have it available for her and the kids.

Anyone else make Kombucha that knows about this? I have a few questions:

1. Can I use the same brewing equipment as I use with my beer brewing?
2. Can you keg Kombucha and serve it "on tap" like with beer? Or does it only work with bottling?
3. Is it super deliscious?!

I am sure I have more questions but that is all I can think of right now.

 

[hunter_le five]

1. You CAN use your beer equipment to make Kombucha. However, realize that there is the potential for bacterial cross-contamination into your beers, just like in sour-beer brewing. You may consider picking up an extra fermenter/autosiphon just for the Kombucha.

2. Yes, you can keg Kombucha. One of the local commercial kombucha brewers sells theirs in kegs to coffee shops and serves on tap at farmers markets. You may consider designating one of your kegs/taps/lines as "kombucha only" for the reasons mentioned earlier.

3. People seem to either love or hate the taste of kombucha. I love it. Do you like sour beers? It's basically the tea-equivalent of sour beer.

 

[stpug]

1. You CAN use your beer equipment to make Kombucha. However, realize that there is the potential for bacterial cross-contamination into your beers, just like in sour-beer brewing. You may consider picking up an extra fermenter/autosiphon just for the Kombucha.

2. Yes, you can keg Kombucha. One of the local commercial kombucha brewers sells theirs in kegs to coffee shops and serves on tap at farmers markets. You may consider designating one of your kegs/taps/lines as "kombucha only" for the reasons mentioned earlier.

3. People seem to either love or hate the taste of kombucha. I love it. Do you like sour beers? It's basically the tea-equivalent of sour beer.

Nailed it! Ditto

 

[jtratcliff]

I've made a few small batches. I wouldn't mix it with your beer gear.

It's essentially all the crap we're trying to keep out of our beer that is fermenting the sweet tea to make kombucha... Lacto, wild yeast, acetobacter, etc.

I wouldn't keg it, or put it on tap. Unless you already do sours and have a handle on avoiding cross contamination.

It's an acquired taste. Slightly tart/vinegary tea. Lightly carbed. I'm not a huge fan, but my wife and kids like it. I got a SCOBY from a friend and made a few 1 gal batches. Bottle primed with fruit juice for flavor and a bit of fizz. Blueberry and pineapple we're pretty good. Using green tea for the ferment and pineapple juice at bottling resulted in something very champagne like.

All in all, the process was fairly simple and the quality was good but once the novelty wore off, the consumption rate slowed down.

So my advice would be to go with a few 1 gallon test batches for a couple months to see how much will actually be consumed.

 

[ChefRex]

1. You CAN use your beer equipment to make Kombucha. However, realize that there is the potential for bacterial cross-contamination into your beers, just like in sour-beer brewing. You may consider picking up an extra fermenter/autosiphon just for the Kombucha.

2. Yes, you can keg Kombucha. One of the local commercial kombucha brewers sells theirs in kegs to coffee shops and serves on tap at farmers markets. You may consider designating one of your kegs/taps/lines as "kombucha only" for the reasons mentioned earlier.

3. People seem to either love or hate the taste of kombucha. I love it. Do you like sour beers? It's basically the tea-equivalent of sour beer.

This.

The only beer equipment I use is an auto-siphon and bottling wand but I do one gallon batches and bottle.
Don't buy a scoby, but a bottle of unflavored booch and start with that.

 

[jtratcliff]

I use is an auto-siphon and bottling wand

I don't even use that... I ladle it out of the 'buch jar with a sanitized ladle and fill the bottles using a funnel.

 

[Mishraile]

OKay,

FIRST OFF, thank you guys for your responses. This is why I love this forum. All sorts of weirdos here. Makes me feel welcome!

So asking for clarification if there IS any. One said you could keg it, but used a commercial example, which I am skeptical about as they might do something to it to make it "keggable", or maybe not. Is there anyone here that has actually kegged it? Others seems to say I should just bottle it. (I left bottling behind a while back and am not excited about getting back into it.)

I am willing to set aside a keg/tap/brewing equipment for it. It would be a lot nicer to have it on tap and do larger batches of it if we could, but yeah, I am not sure how fast we will go through it.

Thanks guys/gals

 

[jtratcliff]

I am not sure how fast we will go through it.

It continues to get more tart as it sits.... At least the batches we made. Bottles that are few months old taste quite a bit different than ones just carbed for a week or so. Smaller SCOBYs start to form in the bottles, too (might be an issue for clogging a keg?)

So I'd still recommend a couple smaller test batches before diving in to kegging 5g at a time. That's a lot of 'buch.

Bottling a 1 gallon batch isn't too bad. I reuse old commercial kombucha screw top bottles. So that's only 8 bottles. Ladle it out of the kombucha jar into a funnel to fill the bottle, then screw on the lid. No nearly the same level of hassle as bottling 5 g in 12 oz bottles with crown caps.

 

[SatanPrinceOfDarkness]

I know you are looking more for advice on making it, which I don't have. However, I will needlessly chime in with my consumer experience. There seem to be pretty different flavor profiles to kombucha. I've never liked the kombucha sold in bottles at whole foods that tastes like vinegary arnold palmer raspberry hoo-ha.

The only one I have liked, is sold on tap in Philadelphia at a restaurant called Cedar Point. It's ginger-lime kombucha and it tastes like berliner weiss with more body. Basically it's the best non-alcoholic beer I've ever had, and the ladies all agree.

 

[SatanPrinceOfDarkness]

Also, if you can afford the equipment and the space, there's nothing wrong with having dedicated stuff for sour brewing.

 

[stpug]

It continues to get more tart as it sits.... At least the batches we made. Bottles that are few months old taste quite a bit different than ones just carbed for a week or so. Smaller SCOBYs start to form in the bottles, too (might be an issue for clogging a keg?)

So I'd still recommend a couple smaller test batches before diving in to kegging 5g at a time. That's a lot of 'buch.

Bottling a 1 gallon batch isn't too bad. I reuse old commercial kombucha screw top bottles. So that's only 8 bottles. Ladle it out of the kombucha jar into a funnel to fill the bottle, then screw on the lid. No nearly the same level of hassle as bottling 5 g in 12 oz bottles with crown caps.

Very good points made in this post.

As for kegging, if you filter your KT into the keg, avoid much oxygen pickup, and purge headspace of excess oxygen then no new scobies/pellicles should form.

As far as batch size goes, I also started with 1 gallon batches (about 5-6 16 oz bottles per batch) and found this to be a very easy to manage entry size. Bottling and starting the new batch takes maybe an hour. Low maintenance and time investment.

 

[aprichman]

I've got some kombucha going, although I've been neglecting it. I was going to use my beer equipment to siphon & bottle it, but then I got worried about cross contamination. I've been saving up Mexican 7UP and Coke bottles that I'm going to use for kombucha. I'll probably pick up a new siphon and bottling bucket as well. I started out with a pretty small SCOBY in a pint jar so I've been stepping it up. I went from 1 pint -> 2 quarts -> 4 quarts -> and my next batch will be 8 quarts.

 

[hunter_le five]

So asking for clarification if there IS any. One said you could keg it, but used a commercial example, which I am skeptical about as they might do something to it to make it "keggable", or maybe not. Is there anyone here that has actually kegged it? Others seems to say I should just bottle it. (I left bottling behind a while back and am not excited about getting back into it.)

I did cite a commercial example, but I know for a fact they do not pasteurize the kombucha or otherwise render the bugs/yeast inert. I used their stuff to make my scoby by dumping it into a fresh batch of sweet tea and letting it sit a couple weeks.

And I know there are members on this site who have successfully kegged kombucha, so hopefully some of them will chime in.

It continues to get more tart as it sits.... At least the batches we made. Bottles that are few months old taste quite a bit different than ones just carbed for a week or so. Smaller SCOBYs start to form in the bottles, too (might be an issue for clogging a keg?)

True, the longer the hooch sits at room temp, the more tart it will become, possibly to the point of becoming unpalatable. However, if you get it under pressure and into the kegerator (or otherwise chill it) right after kegging it should stabilize pretty well and prevent (or at least retard) new Scoby growth.

 

[Mishraile]

So
If I did keg it, it would be kept at about 38-40 degrees in my keezer and be on gas so if I am reading this right, kegging is a real possibility, if a more expensive one to bottling.

We have recently had these Kombucha "sodas" from our local store, and liked them. wondering if I can recreate something like that.

 

[aprichman]

If you've got a kegerator and holding your beers down around 32-33F it's going to take a long time for a new pellice to form.

*EDIT 38-40F would probably be fine. You could probably backsweeten in the keg to make the kombucha more "soda like" if you're holding it at low temps and under pressure.

 

[Mishraile]

So I keep it at 38-40 degrees so that it can double as a fermentor for lagers, in the very rare times I have lagered. I honestly could lower the temp easily...

SWMBO is getting VERY excited about this and has approved the purchase of a perlick tap for this so she can have her Kombucha.

She is looking for an enjoyable source of good pro-biotics for her and the kids who have issues with that. I just want a perlick tap to upgrade my current cheapo and reassign it to 'Bucha duty.

 

[stpug]

...She is looking for an enjoyable source of good pro-biotics for her and the kids...

I think the jury is still out on that topic, BUT it's a tasty drink and *probably* better for you than soda pop. I certainly enjoy it

 

[aprichman]

I think the jury is still out on that topic, BUT it's a tasty drink and *probably* better for you than soda pop. I certainly enjoy it

There's a load of probiotics in kombucha.

 

[hunter_le five]

There's a load of probiotics in kombucha.

Sure, there's a lot of bacteria and yeast in booch. Nobody disputes that.

But does it actually DO anything beneficial for you? Unclear.

 

[aprichman]

Sure, there's a lot of bacteria and yeast in booch. Nobody disputes that.

But does it actually DO anything beneficial for you? Unclear.

There have been numerous studies that have been published and peer reviewed that suggest it's beneficial. These studies have been published in journals like Food Chemistry and BES by respected scientists. There is overwhelming evidence that kombucha has potential health benefits.

 

[hunter_le five]

There have been numerous studies that have been published and peer reviewed that suggest it's beneficial. These studies have been published in journals like Food Chemistry and BES by respected scientists. There is overwhelming evidence that kombucha has potential health benefits.

There's also studies that suggest that humans receive no practical benefits from "probiotic" bacterias.

I'm not saying you're wrong; just that the science is inconclusive at this point.

 

[aprichman]

There's also studies that suggest that humans receive no practical benefits from "probiotic" bacterias.

I'm not saying you're wrong; just that the science is inconclusive at this point.

I'm talking about studies that look specifically at kombucha and have clearly identified mechanisms that are considered beneficial to human health, many of which have nothing to do with probiotics.

However, the bacterial flora in the human body has a huge impact on our health. Just look at what is going on with FMT. The science isn't inconclusive about this. Having a healthy bacterial flora is very important.

 

[hunter_le five]

I'm talking about studies that look specifically at kombucha and have clearly identified mechanisms that are considered beneficial to human health, many of which have nothing to do with probiotics.

I'm specifically addressing the point about the probiotics. Because that was the original point you brought up. Now you're just being confusing.

Here:

I think the jury is still out on that topic, BUT it's a tasty drink and *probably* better for you than soda pop. I certainly enjoy it

There's a load of probiotics in kombucha.

Sure, kombucha certainly has other, more firmly established health benefits. For example, those that come from the actual tea. Tea has loads of benefits. But you can get those from regular tea, without fermentation. Likewise the vinegar-like aspects of the fermented booch probably come with certain benefits. But I wasn't addressing any of those.

However, the bacterial flora in the human body has a huge impact on our health. Just look at what is going on with FMT. The science isn't inconclusive about this. Having a healthy bacterial flora is very important.

I've already granted you that some studies suggest benefits to probiotic bacteria. However, as previously mentioned, there are contradictory studies as well. Yes, healthy gut bacteria is vital to digestion, but does ingesting MORE bacteria really do anything that your body's natural processes don't already take care of? THAT is the question. I'll see if I can find some links for you later when I have a moment.

 

[hunter_le five]

European Food Safety Authority says claims regarding immune system and digestive health lack sound scientific basis...
The food industry's probiotics sector, worth £200m a year in the UK, was called in to question today by a new European ruling that its health claims are unsupported by sound science....
The EFSA had already published five opinions on claims relating to probiotics, all negative, although a spokeswoman said EFSA scientists "avoid using the term probiotics", since it has no proper scientific meaning....
http://www.theguardian.com/society/2010/oct/19/efsa-rules-probiotic-health-claims-unproven

A 2012 research review published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) found that probiotics reduced the risk of antibiotic-associated diarrhea by 42 percent—but many of the studies had flaws, so these findings should be interpreted with caution. A 2013 Cochrane review of 23 trials also concluded that probiotics may be effective for preventing antibiotic-related diarrhea. However, the largest and best-designed study to date, published in the Lancet in 2013, found that probiotics were no better than a placebo in preventing diarrhea in older people taking antibiotics.

...certain probiotic strains boost measures of immune response—but whether this translates into any clinical benefits is uncertain. Studies have been inconsistent...

...Bottom line: Probiotics are a promising field of research and may one day be used to treat or help prevent many disorders. But there’s not enough solid evidence to recommend their widespread use. Vague claims that probiotics "support good digestive health" are meaningless. Larger, longer and better studies are needed to test specific strains for specific conditions and to determine the proper doses and regimens.
http://www.berkeleywellness.com/supplements/other-supplements/article/probiotics-pros-and-cons

...benefits have not been conclusively demonstrated, and not all probiotics have the same effects.
... strong scientific evidence to support specific uses of probiotics for most health conditions is lacking. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has not approved any probiotics for preventing or treating any health problem.
https://nccih.nih.gov/health/probiotics/introduction.htm

Although there exists some evidence of the safety and efficacy of probiotics for treatment of disease, many of the clinical trials have lacked methodological quality, particularly with regard to protocol design...
Although probiotic research has been conducted for the past 28 years, variability in study design, type of probiotic, dose, and duration of treatment have yielded contradictory results....
http://cid.oxfordjournals.org/content/46/Supplement_2/S101.full#ref-14

Again, my point is not that probiotics (specifically in Kombucha) have no health benefits. My point is that there are those in the scientific community who feel that the purported benefits of probiotics in general remain to be proven.

 

[stpug]

^^Very good.

And for every link/source that hunter_la5 provided, there is a source/link that disputes the claim.

My gut feeling is that probiotics (in general) are a definite benefit to people/animals. I also believe that kombucha provides probiotics (i.e. beneficial microbes useful by/to the body). Edit: But, I would never tell someone that my kombucha is any more beneficial for their health than say a Dannon Yogurt from the grocery store.

 

[aprichman]

Again, my point is not that probiotics (specifically in Kombucha) have no health benefits. My point is that there are those in the scientific community who feel that the purported benefits of probiotics in general remain to be proven.

I don't have the time to go through all of your links at this moment, but I would like to point out that the 1st link to the ESFA statement is 5 years old. Today, the ESFA does allow probiotic manufacturers to make specific health claims on the label. They still don't allow broad claims such as, "probiotics will make you healthier" because that could be a misleading statement. For instance, if you have cancer or the flu probiotics aren't going to magically heal you or make you healthier.

I would also like to point out that the Lancet study relied on people taking probiotics while taking antibiotics. It should be of little surprise that no significant difference was found between the probiotic and placebo treatment groups in this study.

 

[riptoldnutonKT]

So my wife wants me to start making Kombucha, and add a tap to my keezer to have it available for her and the kids.

Anyone else make Kombucha that knows about this? I have a few questions:

1. Can I use the same brewing equipment as I use with my beer brewing?
2. Can you keg Kombucha and serve it "on tap" like with beer? Or does it only work with bottling?
3. Is it super deliscious?!

I am sure I have more questions but that is all I can think of right now.

I've been making kombucha for about 4 years now. I started small, now i'm brewing with a 5 and 6 1/2 gallon big mouth bubbler at home that I bottle. I'm also brewing with a 31 gallon speidel fermenter at a local brewery that is transferred to 5 gal kegs and put on tap there.
I bought all new equipment for kombucha use only.
Whether it is bottled and naturally carbonates or kegged and forced carbonated, it's delicious

 

[Mishraile]

I've been making kombucha for about 4 years now. I started small, now i'm brewing with a 5 and 6 1/2 gallon big mouth bubbler at home that I bottle. I'm also brewing with a 31 gallon speidel fermenter at a local brewery that is transferred to 5 gal kegs and put on tap there.
I bought all new equipment for kombucha use only.
Whether it is bottled and naturally carbonates or kegged and forced carbonated, it's delicious

Well this is encouraging, I am still humming and hawing over this, and SWMBO has come up with new ideas as well, including Raw Ginger Ale, with little to no sugar added, which sounds tempting too.

 

[Sand Dude]

I realize this post is super old, but I came across it while looking for a specific kombucha question (mixing old and new kombucha in a keg) and wanted to chime in.

I second the kegging approach; I've been doing it for years with no issues. I also just dump it in (not auto siphon) and have yet to have it be a taste issue.

Building on what others have said: I have a keg and carboy dedicated to just kombucha. I keep the SCOBY in the latter.

My wife loves kombucha, so this system has paid for itself many times over.