Two Newborns

I attended a Christmas party and found out that my friend C. was a long-time kombucha brewer. I had no idea! And yet I should have suspected... She introduced me to another friend of hers who is an experienced kombucha brewer, as well. We discussed at length brewing procedures, sanitation, and ideas for flavors. I questioned him about how to kee p the ‘bucha clean and he suggested putting a paper towel over the top with a rubber band, versus leaving the metal lid of the jar slightly askew, as I had been doing. Kombucha needs air in order to flourish so capping the jar completely would be a bad idea and would suffocate it. The paper towel allows you to keep unwanted intruders, such as fruit flies and larger contaminants, at bay. He also told me to handle my SCOBY with gloves and sanitize all instruments. It seemed as though I was going to have to take my brewing to a whole new level. 

I invited C. to come see Ramirez a few days later and she commented that he was quite large. Too large, in fact. Apparently, if you let the mother reproduce too many times, the SCOBY will become too thick and the center of it will begin to die off, which isn’t optimal. She asked if she could “poke” him to see what he felt like to see if he felt health. Admittedly, I hadn’t yet touched Ramirez. She proceeded to wash her hands in the sink and then stuck her hand into the jar and pulled Ramirez into several pieces. I felt like my little friend had just exposed his inner soft parts to someone he didn’t know. Was he ashamed? Probably not. Was I once again paranoid about mold? You betcha! C. pronounced Ramirez healthy and withdrew her hand from his home. He now looked like he was floating in 2 separate pieces. C. said that he was going to need to be separated.  So I put him back on his shelf and after pronouncing him mold-free after a few more days, I acquired an old one-gallon pickle jar and cleaned it out with boiling water. That morning, I had gone to the store and chosen a box of organic green tea and another box of blueberry tea bags. I’ve heard some bad things about adding tea leaves with fruit oils making kombucha grow mold, so I made sure these were oil free. They were made with just the leaves and stems, plus some flavors from other berries.  I thoroughly washed my hands and pulled out a plate. Everything else was rinsed clean and I boiled up a pot of water. I used 8 cups of water and added 4 green tea bags and 2 blueberry plus 1 cup of sugar. I let is cool and poured it in the jar. I then added a cup of Ramirez’s brew and then carefully pulled Ramirez out of his jar with two spoons. He was quite a bit thicker than I’d expected, and rather heavy. I tugged a bit with the spoons and found that Ramirez was a bit harder to separate from his/her daughter than I’d expected. It was a bit like tearing skin from raw chicken (although I haven’t handled raw chicken in 10 years). I pulled off the first layer and placed it into the jar with my blueberry green mixture and named him Santos.

I was also surprised to find that Ramirez had a second daughter. This one, however, was a bit brown and not the nice white colors of the outer layers. I could see what C. meant about not allowing it to get too thick. I wasn’t sure what to do with this one, so I got out a glass spaghetti jar and made that his home. Unfortunately, the jar was smaller than the half-gallon jar Ramirez had been living in, so this new Scoby wasn’t going to fit. Therefore, I got out a steak knife and began sawing away. I cut up a few chunks and fit him to the spaghetti jar. I tossed him in and named him Gonzalez. Welcome to the world, Gonzalez and Santos. Your sagas are yet to unfold!