Kumbacha starter

[Beernik]

I'm back from an 18 month brewing hiatus and I'm starting up with kumbacha. My wife likes it. Besides, our condo on the island is small I really don't have the space for brewing beer yet.

(Although, we just bought 1/4th of our condo building and I'm eyeballing the laundry room as fermentation space. I'm sure I can work something out with the other owner. We need to rewrite the condo association rules anyway.)

I just made a starter of:
1/2 gallon water
2/3 cup agave nectar
4 tea bags earl grey

When I get it cooled, I'll add a bottle of GT's raw kumbacha to get it going.

Edit: pitched the GT & added the pic.

 

[ericbw]

Off to a good start!

 

[Beernik]

Thanks.

I just checked it. It's got a couple goobers accumulating on the surface. I also ordered a gallon glass jar from Amazon so I transfer the SCOBY to it after this starter finishes.

 

[Beernik]

I stepped the starter up to a full gallon. About 1/3 gallon was carry over and 2/3 gallon of new black tea.

I drank 12oz the initial starter. It was really good, but still sweet. The scoby looked about 1/8" to 1/4" thick and about 6" diameter. It might have suffered some damage in the transfer, but I'm sure it will come back.

 

[ericbw]

Going forward, you can do about 2 cups of the last batch plus the rest fresh (3.5 quarts).

 

[Beernik]

I'm thinking I may just bottle my 2L swingtop and a 1L swingtop and carry over what is left. How much juice would I need to add to flavor it?

EDIT: My wife is telling me she wants lemon-ginger and blackberry-vanilla.

 

[ericbw]

I often put 1 oz of juice in a 12 oz bottle of booch. That ratio.

Lemon ginger could be a tea ( boil water, add chopped lemons and grated ginger, kill the heat). I would do 1/2 cup of sugar per gallon.

For blackberry vanilla, a tablespoon of vanilla extract plus a pile of fresh or frozen berries in the booch to steep a few days.

 

[Beernik]

Awesome. Thanks.

I'm starting to think of doing three 1L bottles instead of using the 2L

I just took a look at it. I'm assuming by the bubbles, it's not done.

 

[Beernik]

Here another angle.

 

[ericbw]

Looks like it's still fermenting.

 

[Beernik]

Thanks.

I'll let it go another week and see what it looks like.

 

[mendozer]

I thought you shouldn't use tea with oils (like EG) or is that old info now?

 

[Beernik]

I don't know. On an island, beggars can't be choosers. I couldn't find straight black tea. Earl Grey was as close as I could find in the grocery store.

I gave it a couple more weeks just to make sure it was done. This is what it looks like today.

I'm doing two 1L bottles with a cup of Knudsen's lemon ginger echninacea. The third 1L bottle, I'm doing with a cup of Knudsen's tart cherry.

The leftovers will go into the new batch.

About how many days at ~ 75F should I let it carb? 4ish?

 

[mendozer]

I haven't made in a year or two, but mine used to be quite a bit more bubble than that. Almost a full rim of bubbles around the jar

 

[Beernik]

That one was brewed on 07/02/17. This is the pic of the fermenter before bottling it tonight. The bubbles are from me picking it up and moving it to the table. The scoby itself has only been growing for a month.

I also looked up the antibacterial properties of bergamot oil. It's highly variable depending upon the bacterial strain and the oil. But the upshot I got of the study was that, at best, it inhibits 25% to 50% of the bacterial growth on an agar plate.

Since I've been growing this scoby with Earl Grey, either it's going to be a lower bacterial scoby than normal or it's going to be bergamot oil resistant.