My Kitchen Science Experiment

I started this new blog to post links and information about ways I am striving to have a healthy balance. A Healthy Balance in eating....I grew up eating Ho Hos, Ding Dongs, Fruit Loops, Lucky Charms, and jelly toast for breakfast. Not all of those at once no(!), but a high form of sugar was my daily breakfast intake. My diet was mainly all processed foods and I was a very picky eater which I am now getting revenge for in my own children. They prefer microwave popcorn to homemade popcorn, the kind popped on the stove with oil and REAL butter. Kraft Macaroni and Cheese over homemade. They think I'm a little over the top when it comes to eating healthy since they see me making and drinking what looks to them like green slime. Anything green to them is usually not eaten except for peas and maybe some broccoli if I am lucky.

I know it is a fairly common battle and I probably would not even be eating healthy myself if it were not for the fact that my health dictates it at this point in my life. I have struggled with migraines since I was an adolescent. Diet never became a plausible concern until my migraines increased in severity after the birth of my first son. I began researching the affects of diet on migraines and became easily convinced that there was an impact and a correlation. Now I also have High Blood Pressure added to the mix, a gift from genetics. So I strive to eat healthy, but I try not to be fanatical about it. I still like junk food A LOT and I want my food to taste good. I can hardly go to the movies without getting hot buttered and not-very-good-for-you-movie popcorn and I have joked to the boys that my tombstone should read "It's All About The Frosting" because that is my favorite recipe obsession. I ignore most of the health-food concerns like almonds being treated with chemicals so they are not good for you now because I feel being obsessed about everything that goes in my mouth is counter productive. So I pursue eating healthy, but I don't want it to rule me obsessively. Even though my boys think I'm a bit over the top, pain is my great motivator and they don't have that to influence them right now. In trying to come up with names for this blog, my oldest suggested "Almost Hippy"!

Today I wanted to share about my Kitchen Science Experiment called Kombucha. So in talking to a fellow mom that is into eating healthy, she introduced me to homemade chicken broth on our first meeting. I've made it a few times and it's delicious and not hard to make. Recently she introduced me (and coached me via lots of texting) on the whole process of brewing homemade Kombucha. I would buy Kombucha every once in a great while as a healthy treat, but never realized it was something I could create myself. I was so nervous that I would ruin my very first batch but I can happily say it turned out to be amazingly yummy!

So here is the process I went through. She gave me the scoby, yes that is what the starter is called and it does not look much better than it sounds. Here is how it looked:

Look like anything you would want to drink?! "SCOBY" is actually an acronym for "symbiotic culture of bacteria and yeast." That doesn't make it sound anymore appetizing, but I promise you it tastes really good.  Next, I collected all my needed supplies: a two-gallon glass jar with a wide-opening and two air-tight smaller glass containers to be used for the second fermentation (which is optional), a funnel, black and green tea, distilled water, sugar, and I used strawberries, raspberries, and lemon to flavor mine. 

Second fermentation and flavoring of the Kombucha:

The scoby bacteria and yeast eat most of the sugar in the tea, transforming the tea into a refreshingly fizzy, slightly sour fermented beverage that is relatively low in calories and sugar and loaded with probiotics which aid in healthy digestion and who couldn't use some of that? I only brewed this first batch seven days because I was nervous about it and when I gave it a good look after seven days I was concerned I had mold on my scoby! Gasp!! This is a newbie's worst fear! I texted a picture to my healthy friend,we both did our research on it right then and there and came to find out, it's a very common concern. I found lots of pictures to help me discern what mold looks like and felt sure after all our research that it was not indeed mold, there was no fuzz and it was under the scoby and not on top. If it doesn't gross you out, take a look:

Let's talk about that scoby — you can see what it looks like in the picture above. It's a little strange looking right? It floats, it's rubbery and a bit slippery, brown stringy bits hang from it, and it transforms sugary tea into something fizzy and sour. It's totally weird.  My boys could not believe I was going to use it for something I would actually ingest. They hated the smell of it and got a little grossed out when they would reach for their cereal as I had it brewing in the food pantry after hearing it is best to put it in a dark place. It peaked their curiosity, but did not tempt them to ever think they would want to participate in trying it out once it was in its finished form.

The longer you brew the kombucha, the less sweet it will be. I'm brewing my second batch now and I am waiting longer then seven days as I don't want mine to be overly sweet.  With the second fermentation I made two different flavors, one strawberry lemonade, and one raspberry lemonade.   The strawberry lemonade tasted much sweeter than the raspberry, maybe because I drank that batch first and the raspberry batch continued to ferment in the refrigerator? Not sure, I'm still a newbie at this, but I am hooked to keep it going. Many of my co-workers became fans and even told me they would pay me to brew them some!

My boys? Well, my youngest two tried it and actually liked it, they were surprised how sweet it was and it was fizzy like soda at first so they were surprisingly impressed! So even though they still think I'm "almost hippy", they understand why my kitchen science experiment was a worthwhile endeavor and they understand my motivation even if they don't share it.  So while I don't think I will ever be overly strict about eating and living healthy, I do strive to have a healthy balance in eating, cleaning, and the like. I'll be posting more healthy food "experiments", reviews and demo's on my new Norwex endeavor, and other things that involve living in a healthy balance. 

If you want to try your very own Kitchen Science Experiment, here is one of the main links I used:

http://livessimply.me/2014/04/09/homemade-berry-lemonade-kombucha

Thanks for reading my blog!

View my other blog: http://hopeagainsthoperomans.blogspot.com