Water Kefir, an probiotic drink
For the preparation of the Water Kefir avoid using metal elements, as they interfere with bacterial colonies. Always use glass, plastic or wooden elements and tools.
For 1 liter:
Ingredients:
- 3 large tablespoons Water Kefir grains
- 50g brown sugar
- 1/2 organic lemon
- 4 dried dates or other dried fruits
- 1liter mineral water
- A glass jar with glass or plastic cover
- A wooden spoon
- A cloth strainer or a cotton/gauze cloth
Put the Kefir grains in the glass jar.
Add lemon, sugar, dates and mineral water.
Mix everything, use the wooden spoon.
Close the jar with a plastic wrap, glass or plastic cover.
Put it in a dark place for 1-3 days.
After these days, open the jar, remove the dried fruits and lemon.
Using the cloth strainer, put (only) the water inside a glass bottle.
Now you have the Water Kefir! 🙂 It preserves in the fridge for 1-2 days.
Start the new preparation to have the Water Kefir every day. 🙂
To reuse the grains, you can lightly rinse them with the mineral water (do not use the tap water because it has chlorine and chlorine can kill some bacterial colonies).
To conserve the granules (if sometimes you do not want to make the Water Kefir straight after or if you are going to short vacation) cover them for few days with the mineral water with sugar. If it is going to be a longer period of time, you can also freeze them, but the therapeutic effect will not be the same because many bacterial colonies will die.
With the time the colony will grow, which will force us to make more liquid because otherwise, the drink would get too concentrated. The Surplus can also be given to other people or been taken to specialized shops, so they could pass them on, as it is difficult to get the gains.
You can mix the Water Kefir with juices without hesitation.
To know all the benefits of the Water Kefir:
https://www.culturesforhealth.com/learn/water-kefir/water-kefir-frequently-asked-questions-faq/
Collaboration with Casa Amella
I really want to learn to make water kefir at home, I’ve yet to try it and think its an important drink to have around the house for its probiotic benefits. Thank you for your recipe! Is there any way to make the kefir last longer than 1-2 days?
You are welcome Billy. I’m glad you plan on trying it ! We drink 500ml by person every day. Feeling goooodd ! 🙂
To clarify on this a bit the Kefir drink takes 1 to 3 days to ferment for consumption, but once you filter it you can have the drink in the fridge longer, like up to 5 days. The kefir culture (the white little grains that start this process) will live on indefinitely as long as they get water and sugar.
The tedious part is that you should not leave the fermentation developing for more than 3 days, after that the taste just gets too strong (at lest for us)
So we are using always two jars off sync fermenting. We prepare just enough in the first one to be able to finish drinking it by the time the second one gets ready…
Hope this helps 🙂