Healthy Probiotic Soda You Must Try: Water Kefir

Looking for a fizzy healthy soda alternative packed with probiotics? Let me show you how to make water kefir or kefir. It's easier than you think and way better for your gut than anything in a can. Water kefir is a naturally fermented lightly fizzy drink made by feeding sugar water to special probiotic rich grains. These grains aren't actually grains, they're just living cultures of bacteria and yeast that work together to transform simple ingredients into a gut loving soda alternative. And we're talking about bacterial counts in the billions, which is very beneficial for your gut and immune system. We're also talking about a large variety of probiotic strains. Anywhere from 20 to 40 different strains, for example, could be in your cup of water kefir compared to yogurt, for example, which on the high end might have 12 strains. What you'll need. You're going to need water kefir grains. You can get them on Amazon. I'll link the ones that I use below. Water and sugar and a glass jar. Best water to use. Water kefir grains are actually fairly tolerant, but ideally you want water with minerals and not all the contaminants. Filtered water is great, especially if you have a water filter that leaves the minerals in like I do. Spring and mineral water are also great, but more costly. Well water is good. You can even use regular tap water and contrary to popular belief, your kefir grains will probably survive the chlorine and even chloramine, but do yourself a favor and let your water sit out for 24 hours or boil for 20 minutes to at least get rid of most of the chlorine. That won't get rid of the chloramine, however. I would avoid distilled and reverse osmosis water unless you want to add some minerals back in. Best sugars for water kefir. Our grains need minerals to thrive. So here's what works. You can use plain old white table sugar, but since it lacks the minerals, use that 50% and then add another 50% of a more mineral rich sugar. Or you can just use a mineral rich sugar like these. I use raw cane sugar and it works great. It's fine to add something like molasses to your plain sugar as well. Just know that too much of a good thing can be a bad thing. It's super mineral rich, so don't overwhelm your kefir grains. I would avoid honey for the most part because of its antimicrobial properties and don't use artificial sweeteners. They're not going to give your grains the food that they need. Ratio. How many grains to use. As a general rule, use one tablespoon of kefir grains and one tablespoon of sugar per one cup of water. You may need to adjust any part of this given your fermenting conditions. Here is my water kefir. I have a massive amount of grains. So here's a great example of how you can stray away from ideal conditions and still get a good beverage. For this four cup container, I technically only need four tablespoons, aka a fourth cup of kefir grains. But this is just what I happen to have in here. I have like, I don't know, over a cup. So maybe not ideal, but it works. I'm just probably going to get a really fast ferment and if I'm not careful, this is going to get really hungry and it's going to get more sour more quickly. But I'll probably eventually take some grains out, maybe use a bigger container or split it into two containers. You can see all these little bubbles rising up. That's a good sign of active kefir. All right, so here's my process. A fourth cup of sugar, filtered water, then I just stir and wait for the sugar to dissolve. Then you would just add your kefir grains and top this all the way off with water. I have some kefir that's ready, however, so I'm going to pop a little sprouting lid on it that I use to strain the liquid out. I'm going to put my water kefir in this bottle so that I can drink it later. All right, and now I have my grains right here, so I'm just going to add in my new sugar water along with more filtered water. Make sure you don't use hot water because that will kill your microbes. Then I take a paper towel. This is literally the last one on the roll that I have in my house. You could use a coffee filter or another light towel. Cover, put your lid back on, and then I like to rip this off so I can see what's going on. Water kefir does like to breathe a little bit, unlike some other ferments. And now this just sits on the counter for 24 to 48 hours. You'll know it's ready when you move it around and you see all kinds of bubbles shooting up. Taste this now. It'll just taste like sugar water. And then you can compare in 48 hours. Taste it again. You're going to notice that it has a little bit more of a sour taste, but in a good way. Ferment even longer for more sourness. But just be careful because you don't want your grains to run out of food. Making fizzy soda. Now, if you want to make super fizzy sodas, you do what's called a second ferment. I did that here, which I already started to drink. But basically, once your kefir is done, you're going to take some of it with your little strainer and pour it in. Use a funnel, obviously. Pour it in. You'll fill up your bottle, let's say, to here with your water kefir and then fill the rest up with some sort of juice. I used organic blueberry juice. Watch out for any additives. You don't want those to mess up your ferment. And then you just leave this bottle, plopped, on the counter for 24 to 48 hours. A flip top bottle like this is great because at this point for the second ferment, you don't want your kefir to breathe. You want all of the carbonation to build up in your jar. For that reason, make sure every 24 hours you burp your jar by just taking the lid off so you release some of the gases so you don't get an explosion. So then after you're done fermenting the second ferment, when you're happy with the bubbles and the flavor, just throw it in the fridge and drink as desired. The good thing about the second ferment too, or fermenting in general, is your microbes are eating the sugar. So the longer you ferment, the more they're reducing the sugar content. Go too far and then you get alcohol. And by the way, if you're starting with dry grains that you've gotten in the mail from Amazon, let's say, there are variations of this. But basically, you just need to rehydrate them. So pour some water in a jar over your grains and let them sit there for a few hours until they start to plump up and look like my grains. A fourth cup of sugar, filtered water. Then I just stir and wait for the sugar to dissolve. Then you would just add your kefir grains and top this all the way off with water. Cover like I did and allow to ferment for 24 to 48 hours. It might be that nothing happens because your grains are still waking up. So then strain and repeat the process for a few cycles until you start noticing that you're getting lots of bubbles. If you aren't getting anything, you might need some more minerals. So put in a pinch of molasses or throw in a medjool date or some other dried fruit. And that can help give your kefir grains what they need to get going. Now you know enough about water kefir to get started. There's a lot more. So check out my frequently asked questions video for more on the subject. And I'm going to drink this probably just as is. It's so good cold from the fridge. Or I like to squeeze some lemon in it and just have a nice refreshing probiotic lemonade. Say that five times fast. Water kefir, like I said, is full of probiotics. It's dairy free, which is great for a lot of people. And it's lower in sugar than your traditional soda. I'd like to hear about all the drinks you make with your water kefir. Remember to eat real food. I'll see you next time.