kombucha -what kind of sugar do you use?

[Vaquitita]

all the kombucha recipes i see call for white sugar, why is that? would using unrefined sugar add alot more minerals to the end product? i made my first batch with organic white sugar. but i have a second batch brewing and i went with tj's 'raw turbinado sugar' which is unrefined, thinking it would be better. or have i ruined it?

rebekah

[cobluegirl]

I think, if I remember correctly, that reasoning is that the scoby eats up the sugar...so there isn't any left..so you wouldn't get the minerals even if you used rapadura etc....I am not sure though..I use the cane sugar...it is cheaper and I can't afford to use the rapadura for that. especially if there is no extra benefit from it.

[AnnC]

Sally Fallon said in the book that white sugar and black tea together with the mushroom create the kind of beneficial acid (forget the name) that makes kombucha so good for you. She said white sugar was specifically called for in this one recipe alone!

Ann

[Vaquitita]

but kombucha has been around for a long time. did people hundreds of years ago in china make kombucha with white sugar? it doesn't seem likely...

well, i was just reading the problem solving section here:
http://www.kombuchatea.co.uk/kombuch...ha-culture.asp
and it looks like the only problem with unrefined sugar is simply the strong flavor it adds to the tea.

rats! you're not supposed to use earl grey, which is what i've been using. between the wrong tea, the (possibly) wrong sugar, and the 100+ heat wave we had over the weekend (and our power went out!) i think i'm going to toss this batch and start over.

[Threefold]

I use Red Rose Tea and white sugar, organic, just because that is what I has when I started, but when that's gone, I'll just be using the cheap stuff.

[cobluegirl]

Originally Posted by Vaquitita

but kombucha has been around for a long time. did people hundreds of years ago in china make kombucha with white sugar? it doesn't seem likely...

well, i was just reading the problem solving section here:
http://www.kombuchatea.co.uk/kombuch...ha-culture.asp
and it looks like the only problem with unrefined sugar is simply the strong flavor it adds to the tea.

rats! you're not supposed to use earl grey, which is what i've been using. between the wrong tea, the (possibly) wrong sugar, and the 100+ heat wave we had over the weekend (and our power went out!) i think i'm going to toss this batch and start over.

taste your tea...if it taste fine I would say it is good...KTea is really not a picky thing..I have done it with different amounts of sugar and different teas...not had a bad batch...some I didn't like as well and some that didn't grow a very good scoby..but none bad. Green tea is good..grows a really nice scoby...I usually mix black tea with something else.