Ponderings on Separation

I was writing a letter to someone this morning and part of what I was writing about was the separation we feel between us when we have been estranged by hurt feelings, miscommunication, or some other form of pain. I wrote a phrase which struck me afterwords and so I'm trying to write a little more about it here.

"There is no separation. That which separates us is only illusion, and when we see it as real, only then does it have power over us."

This is a concept I know I picked up along the way in the teachings I have been studying and practicing. I hadn't ever spoken it this clearly before though. And I find it to be so true, that when we see these hurts, this pain as real, it is only then that it has the power to separate us. Because when we look within our selves. Look into our hearts, there is no separation between any of us. We are all part of the whole, of all that is. Of love. And what a beautiful thing to hold in our hearts. I want to keep that at the center of my being. I want that to be where I live from, that we are all one.

This plays into another realization abut separation I had recently. It is that agreement does not equal closeness, nor does disagreement equal separation. This strikes me as a most basic truth, and yet I am only recently uncovering the concepts I had put together in this area. It seems that long ago I cobbled together the idea that when there is disagreement, there is separation. And that's 'the way it is'. And what a lie. What an ingenious tool of the illusion to keep us separate. And what I have found recently is that in fact, when we are completely honest, and dedicated to speaking truth, even when uncomfortable, or contrary to the opinions and beliefs of the person sitting across from you, there is more real closeness than in agreement.

So don't believe the lie. And don't let the fear of separation stop you from standing in your truth, because by doing so you expose the truest parts of yourself. And what could be more vulnerable, and beautiful? And when you can do that together, though it may 'feel' uncomfortable in the moment, you are closer to one another than ever before.

Kombucha is Wonderful

I've been brewing Kombucha now for a little over a year and I really enjoy both brewing (and subsequently drinking) it. One of the by-products of brewing kombucha is the constant production of scobies (scoby stands for symbiotic culture of bacteria and yeasts) the live cultures that fuel the fermentation process. Recently I had amassed enough of them that I started seeking out people to give them away to. Most of them wanted or needed an explanation of the brewing process so I decided to write this post about how I do it. I'll also include a number of links to resources I've found over time.

To start off, here is a link to the site which I used to get started. He gives a very good and detailed description of the process which provided the basis for how I do it now. On this page the brewing instructions are a third of the way down.

Now I'll describe how I do it and what I use, then below I'll include some links to the resources I've found. I brew two gallon batches at a time. The first step is to boil two gallons of water. Once the water is boiled I add 2 1/4 cups of organic raw cane sugar and 8 decaf tea bags. I use the Taylor's of Harrogate Decaf Black available here. I like the decaf tea and you can't go wrong with Taylor's. It's available at most Whole Foods stores. Then you let that cool and place it, with a scoby, in a container in which it will ferment. Once you've brewed a batch you also want to include 1 cup per gallon of the finished, fermented, kombucha tea. If this is your very first batch you can use 1/2 cup per gallon of distilled, white vinegar. This will innoculate the mixture and keep it safe from mold.

I use a glass jar which I purchased at a restaurant supply store. It's this one which happens to be available at Amazon. I like the two gallon batches because with a 2-3 week brewing cycle I end up with a batch that lasts me. I keep the jars in a cupboard in our kitchen, where it won't get too cold, and it's not in any direct sunlight. The scobies don't like to get too hot. They're very sensitive.

Speaking of the brewing cycle, I do two fermentations. The first one, here in Boulder in winter is 2-2.5 weeks. During the summer months when the weather is warmer it's more like 1.5 weeks. You'll know you are done by a few measures. First and best is to taste it. I take the cover off, push the scobies down into the brew and stir it up a little. Typically there will be some bubbles and the smell will be mildly sour. I sip it with a straw, or dip a small glass in to taste it. If it's too sweet that means you need to let it go for a while longer. There's still too much sugar that hasn't been burned up by the fermentation process. You also don't want it to be too sour, simply because it won't taste good. You have to let a batch go for a long time before it's really too sour to drink.

I do a second fermentation which adds more effervescence and I add some flavour at this stage of the process. For the second ferment I remove the scoby from the big jar, placing it in a glass bowl. Then I stir the mixture to mix up the cultures which often have settled to the bottom of the jar. I flavour with lemon ginger tea and I use 4, 1/2 gallon Ball jars with 1/2 of a cup of the lemon ginger tea in the bottom of each. I pour the kombucha into each smaller jar and seal them with their standard screw top lids and then store them in the same cupboard I do the rest. I do this second ferment for between a week and two weeks depending on the climate and how bubbly I want it. You don't have to worry too much about it going sour at this point since once the scoby is out the fermenting slows down considerably. Once you're done with this second ferment you may find that some small scobies have grown in the jars. This is fine. I dispose of them as they're not really strong enough to grow into larger ones and fuel a batch.

Then you can drink your batch. I then further decant into G.T. Dave's bottles. I like them because of the size of the mouth and they have nice metal tops which are easy to wash and refill. Also, I drink about one 16oz bottle of this kombucha per day, so the size suits me. For larger bottles, the Santa Cruz Organic juice bottles are a handy size and I've found them easy to remove the labels from. These are great to bring to parties, etc. Once I've done this final decanting I keep it in the fridge.

You can skip the second ferment if you like the flavour and amount of bubble the first ferment produces. These days I try to rotate two batches so I don't run out in between. You can do this by starting a first ferment every time you finish one, so you've always got a batch going from ferment one to ferment two and so forth.

An aside. I've heard some people have concerns about a batch going bad and people getting sick. I've personally never experienced this, and from what I've read this only happens if you get mold on the scoby. Once in Oakland during a really warm spell we had fruit flies invade our kitchen and they laid some eggs in the top scoby. I threw out that batch and the scoby and continued on with no ill consequences. Also, as it is a fermented beverage, there is a slight amount of alcohol which is a by product of the fermentation. I'm a sober alcoholic, and I have no qualms about drinking the kombucha I brew. The degree to which it is intoxicating is so minimal that I estimate I would need to drink practically a whole batch to get a buzz, and it wouldn't be a very satisfying buzz at that.

If you give it a try, I hope you enjoy brewing as much as I have. And do let me know how it's going. I'm happy to provide any advice I can and certainly share in your successes.

RESOURCES
The site I linked to above, with the initial instructions I used to get started.
http://web.mac.com/willwinter/willwinter.mac.com/GOOD_STUFF.html

A great overview of Kombucha and the whole process.
http://www.seedsofhealth.co.uk/fermenting/index_kombucha.shtml

An alternate source for the brewing instructions with pictures from a cool site.
http://www.instructables.com/id/Kombucha-Brewing-Instructions/

An article about selecting different teas for brewing kombucha.
http://www.seedsofhealth.co.uk/fermenting/kombucha_teas.shtml

Site with good information and supplies you can order.
http://www.organic-kombucha.com/index.html