Please! give me some advice about obtaining kombucha

[BelovedBird]

I have a friend who really wants a mushroom. She was told that it would cost 1000 shekel locally (that's 200$). Any advice on where to get them online?

TIA!

[xenabyte]

GAH...that's outrageous. I'm sure there has GOT to be someone with 'babies' to spare. Mmm, I'm not sure about customs, and shipment time to Israel (assuming your friend is in that general area too), but it can't cost that much even if someone shipped to you overseas.

I will try to find the website where you can put in your country, state, etc, and do a search for who has 'extra' to send out, usually just for the cost of shipping!

I will have a 'baby' scoby in a few days...but there has got to be someone closer than Colorado for sending to you both!

[xenabyte]

http://www.kombu.de/suche2.htm

Go to this site, and scroll down. There are many countries listed and some links to potential 'exchange' sites. Try here for her country and let me know if you still have no luck.

If we get desperate, you could PM me her mailing address and I can look into shipping and if it's not totally outrageous, I would send her a baby mushroom.

[BelovedBird]

Heather, thank you so much for answering.
Israel is not on that site. Which is probably why people pay this guy so much!

I emailed the guy from thehappyherbalist.com and he said he can ship to Israel and the best thing to get for shipment is "semi dry" starter. I am not the one who knows a whole lot about kombucha, but what does "semi dry" mean? Would mailing a baby not work because it would get ruined in the week- 2?

[xenabyte]

I'm not 100% sure about 'semi dry' starter. It is probably some of the culture, with a small amount of moisture still in it, to make it activate faster, kinda like a 'yeast cake' rather than dry yeast, as used in baking.

I did grow an entire mushroom from just Kombucha tea that had culture in it. So I'm sure it will work fine, just take a few days longer.

(I made a batch of Kombucha with a 'scoby' mushroom and then bottled the tea. After tasing the vinegary taste, I tossed the Scoby... Then I felt guilty, and made fresh black tea, added more sugar to improve the taste for me, and poured a bottle and a half (beer bottle size) of the Kombucha tea into it to innoculate it with the culture again. I let it 'brew' for 7 days and a new healthy Scoby grew....and it's been making babies ever since!) /whew!

So I'm sure some 'semi dry' culture would be a safe and effective way to ship it. I'm just not sure of the details....gee, now I need to go search for ways to 'semi dry' the culture to ship!!

I'm just glad your friend can get one for WAY cheaper! Maybe she could then register and become a 'source' in Israel for others!

[littlebeagle]

What is kombucha for? Is it supposed to be a special kind of mushroom? Or does it treat something? I'd love to learn more about it, considering it seems to be a hot commodity by the sounds of the messages posted here!!

[Lexymama]

Does anyone know if the yeast in Kombucha is counterproductive for people with candida problems?

[xenabyte]

Little Beagle, look at this other thread for a info sheet I did about Kombucha

http://www.mothering.com/discussions...d.php?t=201488

Lexy,

Kombucha yeasts actually help get rid of Candidia yeasts in the body. Refer to the mini info sheet at above thread (it's on page one currently of this forum)

[Lexymama]

Thank you!!

[lao80]

Do they sell the tea so I could make my own culture?

[xenabyte]

Lindsey,

You can buy pre made Kombucha Tea, ready to drink, in many health food stores. I have not tried making up a gallon of sweet tea, and pouring a couple of those store bought bottles into it, and letting it brew for a week to see what happens. (Ie, growing a baby 'scoby' mushroom).

This might be a good experiment!

When I did it, I used two of my bottles of Kombucha I'd brewed from a Scoby/tea mix. I hadn't even set the bottles in the refrigerator, (but had tossed the Scoby) when I decided to see if I could regrow a 'SCOBY'. So my Kombucha tea was really fresh and the cultures were obviously quite active, to be able to grow a new mushroom without ANY SCOBY or SCOBY bits in my new 'ferment jar'....

I would hope the store bought Kombucha tea would be 'active' enough to do the same....if it didn't work, I'd be suspicious of things like, pasturization of the Kombucha after they 'bottle' it...or perhaps it's just tea with some apple cider vinegar flavor added. This would be an easy way to get your own SCOBY culture started for home brewing, if it worked!

Somebody do this! Or I will try it when I can get to the health food store for store bought stuff..

[yitlan]

I've heard of others doing this with success. It just takes longer than having the starter AND scoby at the beginning.

[lao80]

I'll try it out when I get a chance.

[BelovedBird]

Thank you everyone! She ended up getting one locally (in our neighborhood!) for free. I saw it today, really interesting.

Just wanted to update.

And for all the nourishing traditions folks she made a yummy soufle today from the cookbook. We had a nice "tribal" time sharing the child care and housework for 2 hours, at her place.