Recipes / Drinks

Kombucha — first fermentation

Sweetened black and green tea fermented into kombucha, following Alice Johnston’s recipe for Good Food.

Recipe author: Alice Johnston · Good Food

20 minutes prep + steeping and cooling time + 1–2 weeks fermentingMakes: 2 litres
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Kombucha — first fermentation · Serving suggestion
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Instructions

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  1. Brew the tea

    Pour the freshly boiled water into a saucepan. Add the tea and sugar, stir to dissolve the sugar and steep for 6–10 minutes.

  2. Cool and add the starter

    Remove the tea bags without squeezing, or strain out loose-leaf tea. Let the tea cool completely, then pour into a 2.5–3-litre glass jar. Add the SCOBY and starter liquid, leaving at least 5 cm of space at the top.

  3. Cover the jar

    Cover with a thin tea towel or muslin and secure with a rubber band. Label the jar with the date and contents.

  4. Leave to ferment

    Leave for 1–2 weeks at room temperature, away from radiators, the oven and direct sunlight. Air needs to circulate, so do not keep the jar in a closed cupboard.

  5. Check the flavour

    After the first week, check the pH first, following the BCCDC note below. Taste only when it is within 2.5–4.2. You can then check the flavour daily; longer fermentation makes the drink more acidic. If the pH is still above 4.2 after 7 days, discard the batch.

  6. Reserve starter and chill

    When the flavour is to your liking, pour into bottles. Keep the SCOBY and 100–200 ml kombucha to start the next batch. Refrigerate the finished drink; this recipe stops after the first fermentation.

Tips

Starter liquid acidifies the tea. Good Food advises discarding both the liquid and SCOBY if mould develops.

Additional BCCDC guidance: use a calibrated pH meter before tasting. Finished kombucha should have a pH of 2.5–4.2. If the pH is still above 4.2 after 7 days, discard the batch and restart with a fresh commercially supplied culture.

Contains caffeine and may contain alcohol. A home brew cannot be assumed to be alcohol-free.

Storage

Keep the finished drink refrigerated for up to 3 months.

How to serve

Serve chilled. This recipe does not include a second fermentation for carbonation.

Ingredients / history / science

Discover the ingredients and their stories

What goes into the jar? Where does the flavour come from? Open a topic and explore its sources.

About the ingredientsTea transformed by a living culture

Kombucha is made from sweetened tea and an active culture of bacteria and yeasts. Sugar feeds fermentation, while the starter liquid acidifies the tea. The jelly-like layer sometimes called a “mushroom” is not a mushroom. This recipe ends after the first fermentation, without further carbonation in a warm, sealed bottle.

History on a plateOrigins that remain uncertain

There is no firmly established date or single birthplace for kombucha. Smithsonian describes conflicting accounts of its origins, while the authors of a 2019 research paper refer to records from nineteenth-century Russia. The drink has a documented history, but there is no basis for naming one inventor.

A closer lookFrom sugar to organic acids

Yeasts turn some of the tea’s sugar into ethanol and carbon dioxide; bacteria then turn some of the ethanol into acetic acid. Bacteria also make the cellulose in the surface layer. Microorganisms live in the starter liquid too, so the visible SCOBY alone does not replace it.

Recipe sources

This recipe is based on the sources listed above.

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