Kom·bu·cha (kŏm′bo͞o′chä′) n. ‘A lightly sparkling beverage made by fermenting black or green tea and sugar with a culture of various bacteria and yeasts.’
I recently discovered Kombucha. I didn’t really want to ‘discover it’. The name sounded horrible and when I tried it (I make a point of trying everything once) it tasted pretty horrible. I thought it was another fad that, if I simply put my head down long enough, it might pass by without me having to embrace it. That was not to be.
I decided to do Dry July i.e. not drink any alcohol for July. This was a good and bad decision – I’ll tell you about it sometime but for now let’s focus on the Kombucha. I was in a health food shop one evening in July trying to be excited about the poke bowl I was about to eat and looking to see if there was anything interesting I could drink given I wasn’t drinking alcohol. There was some super fresh orange juice that looked fabulous for 6am but didn’t really appeal after 6pm. There was some sort of organic ginger ale which was so organic it seemed to have pieces of ginger floating in it. That didn’t really appeal either. There was a bottle of Kombucha – to be fair it was primarily the marketing that did it – the bottle looked interesting with a funky label and the watermelon and mint flavour sounded a lot better than hard core ginger. So, based on it being the best option out of a pretty unattractive set of options, I decided to give Kombucha another go.
When I popped the Kombucha bottle and poured it into a wine glass I had a sense that I was settling into my evening with a drink in hand. I sat down to my poke and glass of Kombucha and felt better about the day/ life (funny what a drink in a wine glass can do).
Let’s be honest Kombucha is not really a like for like replacement for a glass of wine but, over the course of July, I had quite a few glasses of Kombucha and started to really enjoy it. In fact I have even drunk it a few times since then by choice. Since July I have also discovered that Kombucha is full of antioxidants and has all these amazing health benefits. Apparently it aids in digestion, helps maintain a healthy liver and has benefits for the cardiovascular system. I’m not sure about the real benefits of the watermelon and mint version but just by reducing my alcohol intake it has had some health benefits for me.
What are you doing for your Friday evening? Settling in for a few glasses of Kombucha??
Originally published at elwinelliot.com