Kombucha is a probiotic beverage made from fermented tea. We brew ours in a two-and-a-half-gallon oak barrel, and serve it daily at lunch. There are many variations for kombucha
brewing and flavoring! For an easy tutorial, check out this simple kombucha tutorial.
Continuous Brew Kombucha
At Round the Bend Farm, we’ve developed our own special method for continuous brew kombucha. Each week, we drain most of the fermented kombucha out of the brew barrel and pour it into jars. Then we flavor the jarred kombucha with tea, simple syrup, or fruit juice, and store it in the fridge to drink for the rest of the week. We add more fresh tea to the barrel and let it sit until we’re ready to repeat the process again a week later.
The following are some of our simple methods for making and flavoring continuous brew kombucha. Again, there’s a lot of different methods and recipes out there. This is just the one that works for us!
Continuous Brew Kombucha
The two-and-a-half-gallon continuous brew barrel makes two gallons of fresh kombucha every week. Do this recipe consistently once a week for best results.
Ingredients:
4 tbs black tea
1 ½ cups sugar
Water
Instructions:
Drain two gallons of fermented kombucha out of the barrel. Mix in any desired flavoring, cap, label, and refrigerate.
Heat one gallon of water to a boil. Pour over black tea and let steep for 10 minutes. Strain out the tea leaves and compost them. Add the sugar to the brewed tea and stir to dissolve. Mix with one gallon of cold water and test the temperature with your finger. It should be lukewarm. If it’s not, let it sit at room temperature to cool. When it is cool enough (below 110 F), pour it into the kombucha barrel.
Farm to Table Flavors
Friendly Maple Kombucha
This gives a lovely hint of rich maple goodness, while providing a variety of beneficial antioxidants that help our bodies fight off free-radical damage. It tastes great AND is better than other refined sugars.
Ingredients:
1 gallon kombucha
½ cup maple syrup
Instructions:
Mix and enjoy!
Fresh Apple Kombucha
The flavor of this kombucha will be sweet or sour depending on the variety of apple. This is a great fall use of storage apples. And apples are a great source of fiber, phytochemicals, and Vitamin C!
Ingredients:
1 gallon kombucha
2 cups fresh pressed apple juice
Instructions:
Mix and enjoy!
Sage Kombucha
Sage adds a deep, wholesome flavor that is unexpected but enjoyable. Plus, it’s a good source of Vitamin K (which can be good for our bones & our blood, also acting as an antioxidant in our bodies).
Ingredients:
1 gallon kombucha
1 cup sage simple syrup*
Instructions:
Mix and enjoy!
*Sage Simple Syrup
Makes: 1 liter
2 cups sugar
2 cups water
2 cups dried, powdered sage
Boil the water, take off the heat, and mix in the sugar until it is dissolved. Pour over the sage and let sit overnight in the refrigerator. Strain out the sage and use the syrup or store in refrigeration.
Fresh Turmeric Kombucha
With a mild, earthy turmeric flair, this kombucha contains polyphenols from the turmeric (i.e. curcuminoids), which are known to have antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, antibacterial, and anticancer properties.
Ingredients:
1 gallon kombucha
2 tbs fresh turmeric juice (about 1 ice cube frozen, or 1 oz liquid)
Instructions:
Mix and enjoy!
Blackberry Kombucha
This is a sweet and tangy kombucha with a beautiful purple color. Blackberries are a great source of Vitamin C, manganese and Vitamin K. In fact, blackberries rank as one of the top 10 highest antioxidant foods.
Ingredients:
1 gallon kombucha
1 cup blackberry juice*
Instructions:
Mix and enjoy!
*Use a steam juicer or mechanical juicer to extract all the juice from the pulp. Juice can be frozen in ice cube trays for later use.
Fresh Carrot Kombucha
This is a great way to use fresh, flavorful carrots, a great source of beta carotene, which our bodies convert to Vitamin A, promoting good vision, and also important for growth, development, and immune function.
You will need a mechanical juicer to make this juice. It does retain some amount of pulp, so the kombucha will become a little cloudy and will need to be shaken. However, it has a great flavor, and according to one person it was their “favorite kombucha flavor”. Wow!
Ingredients:
1 gallon kombucha
2 cups fresh carrot juice
Instructions:
Mix and enjoy!
