Reddit reviews Bormioli Rocco Square Swing Bottle 33.75 Ounce

You need to acquire a kombucha scoby first. You can buy it online or grow one from a bottle. For me, what I did was get a bottle of original GT (the silver and blue bottle, it's unflavored. You must use original/unflavored) and pour everything out into a quart-sized jar. When purchasing, look for a bottle with the most amount of yeast strands inside. They are on the bottom of the bottle. The bigger the clump of strands, the better it is for brewing kombucha. Some people say you cannot brew kombucha with a regular bottle of GT since they changed the formulation a few years ago, but I did in Februrary. I like to think it's because I grabbed the one with the biggest/most yeast strands LOL. When growing the scoby, you can use a smaller cup than a quart-sized jar, but be mindful that the scoby will grow on the top so if you use a small cup, the scoby will be small. I kept it on the counter, covered with a tightly-woven cloth and rubber band for until it grew about 1/4" thick. Here's a video in case anyone is more visual

You will need a 1 gallon jar (or two gallon, but standard is 1 gallon), tea, and sugar. I use only plain green tea (no flavors since flavored might induce mold) and white sugar. Some people highly recommend organic sugar. RecipeMake sure the tea is COMPLETELY cool before adding it into the jar. If it is hot, it may kill your scoby. All tea + sugar that touches the scoby must be room temperature.

Keep the kombucha covered with a tightly-woven cloth (no lid) with rubber band and in the dark preferably away from chemicals. It takes about 10-15 days or longer to brew usually, but it can be as short as 5 days or as long as 3 weeks. It all depends on how strong the scoby is. If you want to taste it, get a straw and put it in to take a sip underneath the scoby. Don't be alarmed if the scoby falls down if you do this (it acts like a barrier) because it will either rise up again OR form a new scoby on top. If the brew tastes too sweet, it needs to ferment longer. If it tastes very watery, don't fret, it sometimes goes through a weird VERY watery stage during fermentation....it simply needs to ferment more.

The reason why I recommend a 2 gallon jar is if you intend to brew seriously (more than 6 months) as you brew, the scoby will get thicker and thicker. Each new batch will also lead to a formation of a new scoby on top. After a lot of research, I decided that it wouldn't be good for me to touch the scobies in fear of contamination so I leave all the scobies inside of the jar. As you can imagine, it takes up a sizable amount of room after a while (1/4 of my 1-gallon jar is scobies!). I do need to repot at least 1 in a scoby hotel in case anything happens, but that's just a backup if my kombucha gets moldy (very rare due to acidity levels).

I bought an auto-siphon for bottling. I highly recommend it. It keeps everything much more sanitary when bottling and is easy. For my first batch, I tried to pour the kombucha in my 1-gallon jar into a bottle using a funnel. It was a REAL pain. Would never do it again. Here's a link to the auto-siphon and a video so you can see how amazing it is. Autosiphon However.... if you want to save money and buy the exact SAME thing for slightly cheaper ($16.95 currently with free shipping), buy it here. You want to get the Size: Mini 3/8", No Clamp, and "Add 5." The Add 5 is 5 feet of tubing so when you get it, I recommend cutting it in half to be 2-2.5 feet of tubing.

For the 2nd fermentation to create carbonation, which isn't necessary but some prefer it, I buy swing-top bottles. I bought mines at TJ Maxx for about $2 each (1 Liter since that's all they had). It might seem difficult to open if you don't know how to, but once you know how, it's super easy.

Sorry if this seems a bit out of order, but I hope I explained a lot. Kombucha Kamp is a great resource and I do believe in not refrigerating scobies. If you take a break from brewing, just add some fresh tea + sugar (same ratio as making kombucha) and let it sit, checking up on it every so often to make sure it doesn't evaporate. I've done it personally for about 2 months and my kombucha was fine (took about 5 days longer to brew, but its fine). I wouldn't refrigerate the scoby because I heard it can grow mold if you do. By the way, mold is fuzzy, green, or black. If you have any concerns about it being moldy, please look at pictures online of kombucha scobies before throwing a batch out. When I first started, the early formations of scoby (blotchy on the surface) made me think it was molded, but it wasn't :)

You may get a dud batch or two taste-wise. If this happens, just remove about 50-75% of the liquid and put new tea+sugar water. Practice makes perfect, yet sometimes humidity/temperature levels can cause a dud (strong sulfur taste... thankfully it was just one batch).

I hope this helps! There are so many resources online and once you get it started, it's as easy as just refilling the 1 gallon (or 2 gallon) jar with more tea+sugar water and waiting for it to ferment.

---**edited to replace cheesecloth with tightly-woven cloth. Personally, I use a tea towel. A cheesecloth may have holes big enough to allow fruit flies to come in. Also added that all tea (tea+ sugar) that will be contact with the kombucha scoby must be cooled down to room temperature or it may kill the scoby.

The style of bottle is commonly called "Swing Top". The bottles in the picture look like the ones sold by Ikea though I personally prefer the brand called "Bormioli Rocco" as they're constructed quite a bit better.

(Note: they're very expensive on Amazon, I usually buy them elsewhere, but I linked to Amazon since it's a good example).

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