More about kefir, including kefir bread recipe.

Ok this is my third entry about kefir but I am getting a number of people wanting more info on the subject.  I’m also including a recipe I use to make kefir bread. (apologies to my friends on MSE as I’ve posted the picture on there too so they will be seeing it yet again lol)

Kefir is a living clump of bacteria and yeast (among other things) that live together happily in one white clump, commonly known as a kefir grain or grains.  It is thought that the grains were a gift from Mohammed to the people of the Caucasus mountains and they must not share them with others or the grains would lose their ‘magical healing powers’

Here is a list of bacterias/yeasts found in Kefir.  I have used the list from Doms (the kefir god) website. 

LACTOBACILLUS
L. casei – Homo-fermentative [responsible for 90% of lactate synthesis]
L. paracasei – Homo-fermentative
L. acidophilis – Homo-fermentative
L. hilgardi -Hetero-fermentative [responsible for 50% of lactate synthesis]
L. delbruechkii subsp. bulgaricus – Homo-fermentative
L. kefiranofaciens – Produce Kefiran, internaly within the matrix
L. kefyri – Synthesizes kefiran superficially [possibly controlls microflora]
L. desidiosus – Heterofermentative [ferments L-arabinose and gluconate]
L. brevis [Synthesizes polysaccharide]
L. cellobiosus
L. casei subsp. rhamnosus
L. casei subsp. alactosus
L. helveticus subsp. lactis
L. delbruekii subsp. lactis
L. lactis
L. fructivorans
L. parakefir
L. paracasei subsp. paracasei
L. plantarum

LACTOCOCCUS
Lc. lactis subsp. lactis [primarilly utilize lactose]
Lc. lactis subsp. biacetylactis
Lc. lactis subsp. creomoris

LEUCONOSTOC
Leuc. citrovorum
Leuc. cremoris
Leuc. mesenteroides subsp. mesenteroides
Leuc. mesenteroides subsp. dextrancicum
Leuc. mesenteroides subsp cremoris
Leuc. lactis

STREPTOCOCCUS
Strep. salivarius subsp. thermophilus [primarilly utilize lactose]
Strep. lactis
Strep. lactis subsp. diacetylactis [Synthesizes diacetyl]

ACETOBACTER
Acetobacter aceti [synthesize acetic acid from ethonol in the pressence of oxygen]
Acetobacter racens

YEASTS

KLUYVEROMYCES
Kluyv. lactis
Kluyv. marxianus subsp. marxianus
Kluyv. bulgaricus
Kluyv. fragilis

CANDIDA
Candida kefir
Candida pseudotropicalis

 As you can see, there’s quite a lot more in there than your usual probiotic! I have heard people with ‘yeast’ type problems such as thrush being worried about trying kefir.  From what I’ve read it can benefit these people because the yeasts in kefir will help bring back a good and healthy mix of yeasts in the body and balance out the system.

People who are intolerant of milk may also find it possible to drink kefir as the bacteria in the grains eat the lactose that is in the milk and turn it into a readily accepted and easily digested nourishing food for the gut.

Take a look at Doms page for everything you ever need to know about kefir……  http://users.sa.chariot.net.au/~dna/kefirpage.html#welcome

 Kefir bread recipe:
250g Freshly milled wheat(or the same amount of wholemeal flour if you don’t mill your own)
300g Strong white bread flour
1 tsp yeast
1 tsp sugar
1 small tsp salt
20ml butter or olive oil
200ml kefir milk
120ml water (I use potato water)

Here’s a couple of kefir loaves I made this week…

I’m back on the kefir…

 

Hooray I’m back on the kefir.  I managed to track down some grains so its cheers to good health again.  I promise not to let these grains die but I did have a lot going on in my life before and they got put on the back burner of my life I’m afraid.

Anyway, once they arrived I gave them a little while in milk, just to get accustomed to their new home.  I then rinsed them in water and left them for twenty four hours in plain water.  I rinsed them again and set them off to their new life in organic milk. 

The first few days always seem very slow as the grains acclimatise but after that they get on with the job of inoculating the milk for my breakfast. 

The taste is very creamy, but with a sparkling edge to it.  As I said before, its not my favourite drink but the taste isn’t so bad when you compare the benefits you can get from it.  Kefir has far many more different strains of good bacteria in it than standard probiotic drinks.  Plus it comes with the benefit of being free! 

I cant stress enough how much these little grains seem to clear out the colon.  They always seem to make me go to the toilet and they leave me with a ‘drained out’ feeling…. as though I’m completely empty. I feel lighter if you understand what I mean.  Constipation has never been a problem for me but if it was, I would see kefir as a completely natural way to relieve it.

I also use kefir milk on my face as a face mask and in the bath as its very softening.  Also it can be used in places where you would normally use yoghurt, such as in baking.  I love kefir milk in my bread as it seems to help the yeast do its job and I get lovely high fluffy loaves.  

Kefir milk ready for straining, you can just see the kefir grains bobbing about on top.

 Once you have your grains, you have a life times  supply of kefir.  Just look after it and store one of the baby grains in the freezer in case of emergency.  As your kefir continues to grow and separate, give the babies to friends and before you know it everyone has a healthy gut!  If all goes well with my new grains, then I shall have spare baby grains in a week or two.  If anyone is interested in giving it a go then just send me a stamped addressed envelope (SAE) and I’ll pop some out for you… just leave a comment on here and I’ll get back to you.

An alternative to costly probiotics?

I was reading an article in the Mail on Sunday and it talked about how beneficial those little yoghurt drinks are.  The bacteria in the drink set about colonizing the gut and as they grow fast, they soon start taking over the bad bacteria to bring harmony to your gut… simple eh?

The article suggests that in the future, probiotics could be used to combat diseases such as colon cancer and diabetes.  They also worked out that probiotic drinks cost around £10 per week for a family of four.  So at £520 a year, its not exactly a cheap option. 

 Now I have always thought that using a healthy approach in our diet would help keep us safe from a lot of the diseases out there so for a few years I’ve been drinking a product called kefir.  Kefir is a living cluster of good bacteria.  It contains billions more beneficial bacteria than the probiotic drinks and far more different strains so we have more chance of getting all the health benefits available from these sorts of drinks.

Once kefir starts to colonize your gut with friendly bacteria, it then starts helping to digest the food you eat, turning it into a substance much easier for your body to cope with and expel.    It is claimed that kefir is like a mini vacuum cleaner for your gut.  Getting rid of all the bad bacteria and even ‘grabbing’ debris and bad bacteria whilst travelling through your colon on the way out of your system.

If you look around the web you will find hundreds of websites telling you of the health benefits related to kefir drinking.  I studied it in detail before taking the plunge and actually drinking it.  I stay clear of the websites that are trying to sell products from kefir.  There seems to be a lot of studies through university’s that rate the benefits of kefir as real and genuine so its definitely worth taking a bit of time to read up on it….

Kefir isn’t pretty to look at.  Think of it as a little spongy cauliflower.  Its very white and a whole one fits on a teaspoon.  Its a living organism and the most amazing thing is that it has babies!  Every so often you will see the shape of the kefir grains starting to change until one morning when you strain it out… and you will find a tiny little kefir grain ready to grow and start its own little colony!  You can keep the baby grains with the mother until its big enough to give to a friend so they can enjoy the benefits too.  You can also freeze some grains in case catastrophe strikes and you lose your grains.

on to the taste… hmmm its like a slightly sparkly thin yoghurt.  Its not lumpy or anything, just smooth.   I’m not overly excited by the taste so I add a bit of strawberry crush to mine.  I’ve also added a mashed up banana and this combination kept me full to way past lunchtime…. worth thinking about if you are on a diet?

So now you are thinking ok where do I buy kefir?  Don’t buy it… it should be given away!  Ask on your local freecycle.  That’s where I originally got mine from.  Once you have your grains its simply a case of popping them into a glass of milk and leaving them overnight.  I repeat this process the next day and so on.  I strain the grains into the new glass and pop the ‘inoculated milk’ into the fridge for an hour to chill, then drink it down. 

I find that as a breakfast drink, when added to fruit it is very filling.  But the main thing I noticed with drinking kefir on a daily basis is its colon cleansing ability!  Within an hour of drinking kefir I would be on the toilet, maybe this is something worth considering if you have constipation problems?

 I was a fool and killed my kefir at Christmas. I put it in a little bag with some milk in and then threw the bag away whilst doing the post Christmas clean.  Writing about it again has reminded me to get some more so its off over to freecycle I go…

By the way if anyone is interested in reading comments about kefir making, I started a long thread on moneysavingexpert.com.  The thread is here http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=181557&highlight=kefir  I posted under the username of Leonie in those days 🙂