What would a homestead be without something fermenting on the kitchen counter or, in my case, on top of my fireplace mantle?!
I discovered the world of fermentation about a year ago after listening to a podcast where the speaker spoke about something called “milk kefir.” They said it was fermented milk and incredibly beneficial to our gut microbiome. Smoothies were extra delightful when kefir was used in place of traditional milk. My mind was boggled. I had never heard of fermented milk (it sounded kind of odd,) but I wanted to try some immediately!
Fermented foods help support a healthy gut by providing food to the good bacteria in our gut while supplying our gut with bacteria in the fermented product. Our gut is exposed to a plethora of toxins and is continuously doing its best to keep us safe. How can it keep us safe though if it is overrun with bad bacteria? Bad bacteria flourish and thrive when we take antibiotics or feed ourselves junk. When we begin to have gut problems, our body begins to deteriorate and exhibit symptoms that a doctor will be happy to mask with some funky pharmaceutical without even asking what your diet is like. Pills here, pills there, pills everywhere! How many ailments could be resolved if we took a step back and evaluated the health of our gut? Quite a few, I would guess.
I began diving into the world of milk kefir on YouTube and was a little daunted at how it worked: you started with “grains” that you had to feed fresh milk to every day. The grains, either bought online or given by a friend, fed on the lactose in the milk and broke it down while proliferating beneficial bacteria. I would have a living thing living in my kitchen—how exciting!
My kefir grains came from an online source: culturesforhealth.com and I had a wonderful experience with them. The grains arrived on time and I got them up and running as soon as I got my package! The package comes with instructions on how to “wake up” and “feed” the grains.
You start by emptying the pack of grains into 1 cup of pasteurized milk. You don’t want to start with raw milk because the good bacteria in the raw milk will compete with the grains for food. Pasteurized milk, on the other hand, has no good bacteria because it was all killed in the pasteurization process, so it makes for a good food to wake up the grains, lol. Eventually, you will want to switch to raw milk if you can!
After the 1 cup of milk begins to thicken up, you strain it keeping the grains in a strainer and putting them back into the glass jar, and add 1 1/2 cups of milk to the grains. Wait for the milk to thicken then add another 1/2 cup of milk. Repeat the process until you’re up to 4 cups of kefir! The full process is outlined on my website here How To Make Milk Kefier .
My current batches of milk kefir are sitting happily on the mantle of my fireplace. I am awakening some new grains and refreshing some older ones. My farmhouse is a little cooler than my old house in the city so the fermentation process takes a bit longer. The neat thing about milk kefir is that it continuously and indefinitely makes kefir as long as you have milk! Mix it in smoothies or eat it has yogurt—yum.
Cheers to good gut health!