How to flavour your homemade Kombucha

One of the many benefits of brewing your own kombucha is the myriad of amazing flavours you can produce! The only limit is your imagination! There are so many flavour variations! Apart from adding flavour, second fermenting your kombucha adds a fabulous fizz! The key point to remember if you want really fizzy kombucha is to bottle your kombucha when it’s still a bit on the sweet side and leave it for a few days up to a week or so for the fizz to develop. Remember to gently open your bottles daily to release excess gas. Adding really sweet fruit can create maximum fizz in a short space of time, especially in the summer when temperatures are warmer! Exploding bottles are a real hazard and a shower of sticky kombucha all over your ceiling is not fun!! You have been warned!

So here are some ideas for flavouring your kombucha!

1. Using one or two flavoured teabags in the first fermentation. Green tea with jasmine, green tea with mint and spicy chai tea all work well but only 1 tea bag per 2 litre batch of kombucha. Earl grey and many fruit and herbal teabags contain antibacterial essential oils which can damage the scoby!
2. Flavoured tea bags can be used after the kombucha is bottled, in which case any can be used since the scoby remains in the fermentation vessel. Some good choices are mint, earl grey, spicy chai, camomile or any fruit or herb tea. One teabag per bottle is enough.
3. Roots like ginger and fresh turmeric can be juiced, sliced or finely zested.
4. Spices like cinnamon, star anise, cardamom, cloves, black pepper, pink peppercorns, work well but a little goes a long way!
5. Citrus fruits lemon, lime and pink grapefruit add a fabulous zing but only the juice or the fruit, not the zest which tastes bitter.
6. Summer berries, strawberries, raspberries, blackberries, blueberries, fresh or frozen work extremely well, for best flavour chop or mash them into small pieces.
7. Stone fruits in season, cherries, peaches, plums and nectarines make delicious kombucha, finely chopped or juiced for maximum flavour and fizz.
8. Tropical fruits mango, pineapple and watermelon create fabulously fizzy kombucha so remember to regularly burp your bottles to release excess gas!
9. Fresh herbs, mint, lemon balm, chamomile, lemon verbena, rosemary, lavender, rose petals all add a delicate flavour for a most delicious summer flavour.
10. Cordials and flavoured syrups also work well.

If you want to learn more about fermented drinks, check my 3-hours course where you will  learn all about their benefits, other ways of use and you will take home a Scooby to brew it at home.  Details here
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