Bottling Kombucha

An ancient beverage thought to date back to the Qin Dynasty in 250 BC, Kombucha has only recently tipped here in the U.S. Perhaps that's because it was a well guarded Chinese health secret, but more likely it's because it's weird and slimy.

Making it at home is much more rewarding and infinitely more cost effective than buying it. And like many homemade products, it's also usually much worse.

Until now. For fifteen bucks I bought a bottle capper and caps at a local brewery supply shop, poured the brew into beer bottles, and capped them off. The capping alone won't stop fermentation, so I stuck them in the fridge, except for one, which I left out for a few more days. That one was as fizzy as a Coke.

To avoid confusion, I labeled each of the bottles, which formerly housed my roommate's Amstel Light, with a piece of masking tape marked "kombucha." I wouldn't want him to get healthy instead of drunk.