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jenmidge

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About jenmidge

  • Birthday September 4

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    UK
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    the great outdoors

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  1. I have my first scoby hotel. Do I need to top it up with fresh sweet tea occasionally and if so, how often? I've read conflicting advice on different websites. Also, I made it with white K tea, will this contain enough tannins for long term storage or should I top up with black tea? It's kept in the back of a cupboard rather than fridge. My last batch had good fizz after first and second ferment but after sitting in the fridge for a week, seems to have gone flat. Has anyone else experienced this? I'm using flip top old K bottles which seem airtight.
  2. i wonder if the brewing temperature affects fizz. I started using a heat belt around my cb jar on the weekend and have noticed lots of bubbles around the top of my scoby for the first time. From my last batch, only the bottles flavored with fruit tea developed fizz.
  3. Thankyou. the link was very helpful. It is definitely mould but I now know the probable cause. I'm a bit frugal with my central heating and the brewing environment is therefore colder than recommended. I thought this would just result in longer fermentation time until I read the info on the link. thanks again.
  4. I have spots of light green mould on the baby scoby on top of my 2.5L jar. Do I have to throw baby scoby, adult scoby and Kombucha all away? I have moved the jar away from my cb jar in case the mould somehow transfers.
  5. How NOT to brew Kombucha I bottled my second brew yesterday. I made a new lot of sweet tea with 4.5 litres water, 16 white tea bags (because I forget to buy more green tea) and 2 cups of sugar. I drained my 6.5 litre cb jar apart from 1 cup and topped up with the new tea. I didn't strain the tea when I poured it into my cb vessel and there were some strange little black bits which settled on top of my scoby. I fished out the top scoby with black bits and rinsed it under a tap then dumped it in a plastic tub, deciding not to use. I then decided to add more tea to the vessel so made another 1.5 litres of tea with 8 tea bags and 1 cup of sugar. It was at that point that I checked on-line for tea recipe and realized I could simply top up my new brew with filtered water as there was already enough tea and sugar. Topped it up to 6 litres and went to bed thinking I'd just wasted a lot of expensive tea bags then remembered I had a 2.5 litre jar which I'd bought with my first Scobies and not used, so Jumped out of bed, rinsed jar with vinegar, poured in tea and 1 cup of ginger Kombucha from my first brew, topped up to 2 litres with water then added my dumped scoby. Checked this morning and it's not died yet. On a positive note, my second brew has good fizz already Oh and I didn't label my bottles so can't tell between the ginger lime and plain ginger.
  6. Aye, I realise now that I was too impatient to bottle. I'm curious to know if Kombucha still has the same caffeine content as the original tea. I gave up my daily latte last friday to commit to another W30 and considered myself to be caffeine free but perhaps not??
  7. I tried my home brew today. Not much fizz and sweeter than the commercial stuff but still refreshing and very drinkable. I tried my passion fruit and it tasted like a lager shandy which is fine with me.
  8. I'm not getting notifications of new posts either, hopefully this will be resolved soon. I decided to bottle before going away after all. I am brewing about 6 litres in a cb vessel with two large scobies. My bottled batch has a very slight fizz and the taste is definitely drinkable so not bad for a first attempt I guess. I've wrapped my cb vessel in natural sheep wool insulation (it looks warm and cosy) for the second brew which now has the two original scobies plus the baby which is thickening up nicely. One improvement on the commercial stuff is the smell!! Mine doesn't have the parmesan cheese aroma of Love Kombucha which is a definite plus.
  9. My kombucha is still not ready for bottling. Once it is ready, how quickly will it turn too vinegary to use? I'm going away this weekend and wont be home to test it for two days. Right now, it is still tastes slightly like sweet tea and is barely fizzy. The only commercial kombucha I've tried is made from green tea (Love kombucha) and I've been waiting for my home brew to taste similar, but maybe it wont??? I've made mine from 2/3 white tea and 1/3 green. Today is day 15. It has been cold here and the temperature strip has consistently read 68 deg. A bit colder than recommended I know.
  10. Many thanks for you helpful response jmcbn I live in the cold and wet North West and I'm not using a heat tray. I'll follow your advice and leave my brew alone until the weekend, then taste again.
  11. My scobies finally arrived in the post last week. I am using two large scobies with a 1.5 gallon cb container. Today is day four. The recipe that came with my scobies recommended tasting daily from day 3. I tried it this morning and it tasted like sweet tea mixed with vinegar. Is this normal? Store bought booch doesn't taste like vinegar at all. It looks okay, there is a film covering the top of the brew which I assume is a baby scoby (?). Also, when I come to bottling from my CB and adding more tea, do I leave the two original scobies and the new film in or remove one or both original scobies and just leave the filmy substance?
  12. Thanks for the info. I like the sound of my first Scoby baby. I've taken on board all advice and went shopping for a bigger brewing vessel after work tonight. I ended up buying a 1.5 gallon CB jar. I hope my Scoby wont feel too overwhelmed as he is being delivered with a much smaller jar. (why he is male, I've no idea.). I just need him/it to arrive now so I can start brewing. I've read that I can't wash out the brewing jar with detergent so I've rinsed it out with vinegar and water. What about my bottles? I think I've probably already washed them out with detergent, does this matter?
  13. I ordered my starter kit from Happy Kombucha. We have a T K Maxx in town so I'll check it out. I've just had a quick look on Amazon and they have some lovely jars. Thanks for the tips. Hey Casey, it's so great that I get to share my new obsession with you
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