Water Kefir Nutrition Facts?

[Theloose]

Anybody know or know how to find out the nutrition information for water kefir? Specifically the sugar content and the probiotic counts. Other stuff would be cool to know too.

I know a lot of the sugar is eaten up. It varies depending on how long you let it go. And the longer it goes, the higher the probiotic count. Google is SO not helpful on this one...

[newcastlemama]

Here is a little about Water kefir--mostly what strains of beneficial bacteria here are.
http://www.mothering.com/discussions...8&postcount=26

Because every brew is so different, I do not think you will find sugar content info. The only thing I have seen documented is alcohol counts.

This from http://www.healingcrow.com/ferfun/co...onspiracy.html about homemade milk kefir probiotic counts---Maybe water kefir has similar counts--

Furthermore, freshly made kefir can have an average microbial count as high as 10 billion cfu/ml. This includes a mixture of various bacteria and yeast strains. This means that a 500 ml glass of homemade kefir could contain as many as 5 trillion beneficial microorganisms or even more!

I think 500 ml is about 2 cups.

Jen

[Theloose]

Thanks for the links!

I'm sure water kefir is roughly similar to milk, but I'm really curious as to how it compares to probiotic supplements and the like. I want to assume thatit's better, but dd's holistic pediatrician seemed to brush it off as insignificant. She suggested a Jarrow supplement instead/in addition.

Also, who knows what the sugar is turned into as it gets eaten?

[newcastlemama]

I would guess that the water kefir way out performs the supplements. Supplements are helpful, but getting in the real food is where it is at

I mean there are 5 TRILLION (!!!) in 2 cups of milk kefir. You can't swallow that many pills!

Jen

[tanyalynn]

I thought I had looked through Dom's kefir site, and the bacteria counts for water kefir were lower than I expected. Let me look again and see if I can find the link--I wanted to replace our probiotic supplements with water kefir for the kids, but balancing the alcohol content and the amount they'd have to drink to get the bacteria count didn't seem feasible. Let me see what I can find.

ETA: I went and looked, and realized all I could find on his site was bacterial counts for milk kefir, and even that was lower than I expected, 5million cfu of lactobacilli per mL. I made the assumption that water kefir and milk kefir have equivalent bacteria counts, but I have no idea if this assumption is a good one. But 1 cup is about 240mL, so using these assumptions on bacteria counts (and I expect they can vary quite a bit from batch to batch, so I don't know how much store to put in these numbers), 1 cup has 1.2bil cfu's. But my Jarrow capsules have 3.4bil cfu's in each. I was bummed (then and now).

ETA2: Dom's site lists many types of bacteria (lactococci, leuconostocs... stuff I haven't heard of), so I just looked at the lactobacilli, since I think that's what our pills are. Yeah, I have lots of knowlege gaps to fill in.

[newcastlemama]

Originally Posted by TanyaLopez

But 1 cup is about 240mL, so using these assumptions on bacteria counts (and I expect they can vary quite a bit from batch to batch, so I don't know how much store to put in these numbers), 1 cup has 1.2bil cfu's. But my Jarrow capsules have 3.4bil cfu's in each. I was bummed (then and now).

ETA2: Dom's site lists many types of bacteria (lactococci, leuconostocs... stuff I haven't heard of), so I just looked at the lactobacilli, since I think that's what our pills are. Yeah, I have lots of knowlege gaps to fill in.

Everything I have read has shown long (24 hours or more) fermented dairy to way surpass pills in probiotic counts--
Acording to the healing crow site 2 cups of kefir can have about 5 TRIllion. The 24 hour yogurt I think was 3 billion for tablespoon.

http://www.healingcrow.com/ferfun/co...onspiracy.html

Well, if you were to eat a small bowl (500 ml) of 24 hour fermented homemade yogurt, you would receive 1.5 trillion beneficial bacteria - 100 times more bacteria than a 15 billion capsule.

The yogurt and kefir are in the trillions

Jen