Homemade Kombucha Recipes

If you're going broke buying $5 bottles of kombucha to feed your fizzy tea habit, you may be curious if you can easily DIY and save big money. The short answer is yes. The longer answer is absolutely! Before you begin brewing your own beverages, read our Kombucha Primer. We'll tell you everything you need to have on hand, where to find a SCOBY, and the best temperatures for letting the probiotics do their work. These simple step-by-step instructions will make you an expert brewer and bottler in no time.

Kombucha is a probiotic-rich fermented tea beverage. It's fizzy, with a lightly sweet, tart flavor that is just irresistible. You can make this probiotic-rich gut-healthy drink you can make at home. Dollar for dollar, you'll save big by making your own if you drink the tea regularly. Once you start brewing your own, experiment with fun new flavors and types of tea to find your signature kombucha recipe.

Flavoring homemade kombucha tea is a fun way to add a twist to your daily dose of gut-healthy tea. The cherry-basil combination in this recipe isn't overpowering. The short window of brewing time with the tea and herb adds a delicate flavor. You can try any combination of juices and herbs if you're interested in making other varieties.

Pineapple adds a delicate hint of tropical sweetness to homemade kombucha. Making your own kombucha is a great way to save money and have a little creative culinary fund. Once you start brewing your own kombucha, offer your SCOBYs to friends and help them start their own kombucha brewery. Feel free to use this recipe as a canvas for trying other juices, too. Cranberry, apple, even blueberry juices would all make great kombucha flavors.

The apple-ginger combo of this fizzy kombucha is an exciting variation of the tea drink. Kombucha already has a faint apple flavor, so the additional apple juice enhances that existing apple cider flavor. Ginger gives the kombucha a warm, zingy kick.

SCOBY is an acronym that stands for symbiotic culture of bacteria and yeast. It's the "mother" that you use for every batch of kombucha you make, and it looks like a round, flat, opaque-beige piece of agar agar (like what was in those Petri dishes in chemistry class). You can order a SCOBY, or you can make your own. But you have to have one in order to brew kombucha. Whenever you brew a new batch, a new layer grows onto the SCOBY; it's easy to peel off, so you can use it to start another batch for yourself, or you can give away 'baby' SCOBYs to friends who want to get started.