water kefir beer?

[Guy.C.]

Has anyone ever tried adding kefir grains to their wort? I just tried it on a very small batch(1 qt). I won't add any hops until the grains have done their work. Just wondering...
Guy

[shanek17]

thats really interesting, I am a fellow home brewer, meaning alcohol. But I now make veggie ferments and liquids such as water kefir. Kefir is a scoby rite, so thats a mixture of bacteria and yeast, and normally beer is only yeast, atleast that is my understanding. So If your substituting beer yeast for a scoby kefir water then Im thinkin it will be more sour, depending on how long you let it ferment.. or are you just adding kefir for minerals and other reasons ?

[Guy.C.]

No I put the grains in wort (it is awfull) I'll keep thinking and may give it another shot or two. After all I made a bad batch of beer from time to time also
Guy
The grains seemed to love wort by the way.

[Guy.C.]

I think for my next attempt I'll mix finished kefir with wort(complete with the hops) stay tuned to anyone that's interested.Any suggestions from you guys will be appreciated also
Guy

[shanek17]

No I put the grains in wort (it is awfull) I'll keep thinking and may give it another shot or two. After all I made a bad batch of beer from time to time also
Guy
The grains seemed to love wort by the way.

lol, the wort tasted awful before you boiled it ? I wonder how thats going to taste when fully fermented? So you must have added the grains after you did your boil rite, because the heat would destroy them. This is an interesting experiment your doing maybe you could elaborate more on how your doing it? Did you add only the kefir grains to fulfill the fermentation? or did you add yeast too it too?

I listen to alot of james spencer on basic brewing radio and him and others will talk about these delicious sour beers. I believe they use lactic acid from bacteria that we use for kefir. So you may be on to something here. I have also heard of people using their kefir grains to start their food fermentation, instead of waiting for whatever bacteria exist on the food itself.

[Guy.C.]

What I tried was boiling up a hop free wort and using the kefir grains instead of yeast.After a few days I strained out the grains and added a hop tea.I think I'll just add the hops to the wort next time.I'm still pondering tho.
Guy

[shanek17]

What I tried was boiling up a hop free wort and using the kefir grains instead of yeast.After a few days I strained out the grains and added a hop tea.I think I'll just add the hops to the wort next time.I'm still pondering tho.
Guy

you made a hop free wort, so there was essentially no bitterness, then you added kefir grains which would have eaten the sugar and turned it sour. I wouldnt imagine that would taste amazing after a full fermentation. lol . But at the same time there are sour beers out there that I have heard are very good, but the professional beer brewer would also know how to balance the beer out properly and keep it from being too sour. Also If were using kefir grains I dont think its going to be a high alcoholic drink, atleast not very much, since kefir make alot of lactic acid and acetic acid there shouldnt be very much alcohol in it.


I have been thinking about making some experimental beer type ferments and I got to thinking how you used your kefir grains. I have a ton of kefir grains now and I think I will try the same as you did but instead of adding hops I will try some green tea for bittering, I have heard of other brewers using this as a substitute for hops. I dont think I will like it fully sour so I will have to taste it periodically and strain the grains when it gets to a balanced sourness.

Also Im wondering did you have to add alot of kefir grains to your 1quart experiment? I plan on doing a batch of 4 liters or roughly 1 gallon, and Im not sure how much kefir grains to put in there. Im thinking atleast 1 cup maybe 2 or 3 cups. I just dont want a stuck fermentation!

[Guy.C.]

I used about 3 tablespoons of grains in 1 quart of wort ,the green tea is a good idea

[zuki]

Hi. I'm making water kefir beer for the first time. I've never made beer before. But I've been making water kefir for a while. I'm following the instructions here: http://www.traditionaltx.us/KefirBeer.pdf

Have any of you made water kefir beer? Do you know how long I'm supposed to let it go on the first ferment, with the grains? I have the airlock on, and the instructions say to let it keep going until the airlock stops bubbling/burping. It's still going, and it's been 9 days. Is that correct? Should I let it keep going?

thanks!

[newbie]

Hi zuki, I'm about to start using the same recipe. How did your brew turn out?