Ripening The Milk Kefir
1083 days agoI normally drink my Kefir straight up after I strain the Kefir. The reason is due to the fact that I lack the space in my house to store my Kefir for further ripening. I believe that if you ripen your Kefir for a day or two, the health benefits will even be better than just plain straight from the strainer Kefir. Even Dom (an expert on Kefir) recommends ripening the Kefir. Please take a look at his website which mentions more about storing and ripening of the Kefir.
Anyway, I have started a batch of Kefir which was then later ripen to compare the taste. I have no way to test for the nutritional value of the ripen Kefir and that of the unripen Kefir as I do not have the necessary equipment for that. Hey, I don’t live in a laboratory! However, what I can do is to compare the taste. And that is exactly what I did. I made myself a batch which I then ripen for 2 days and another batch which was freshly strained. Both batches were fermented for 24 hours first using the same milk (Farmhouse Fresh Milk).
The first thing I found is that the ripen Kefir is slightly more sour and has a more alcoholic taste to it. The sourness is not really that significant actually. In fact if this was not an experiment, I would probably not have noticed the difference. The reason could be that I ferment the both the batches for 24 hours in Singapore weather. Thus a large portion of the lactose in the original milk was already converted to lactic acid by the Kefir bacteria. That means that the ripening process produced very little sourness. However, the alcoholic taste was quite a jump from the freshly strained Kefir. Could that mean that the yeast during the ripening process is actually doing most of the work? I also found that 2-day ripened Kefir has a more profound “Kefir-y” smell. Unlike the freshly strained Kefir which has this slightly rotten egg smell, this ripened Kefir smells more “elegant” and cheesy. Again, not really that significant, but it is interesting nevertheless. I also never notice any increase in the complexity of the ripened Kefir which is surprising. As with all aged beverages, there should be at least some complexity created with the majority of the lactose and sugar gone. Perhaps it is because I only ripen it for 2 days.
I have read that some people ripen their milk Kefir for up to a week or even more. I am wondering what kind of alcohol booster will it produce. And for those who adds sugar to their milk when making Kefir (to encourage Kefir grain growth), how potent will the Kefir be? Anyway, if you are ripening your Kefir, please leave a comment here and tell us about your experiences.
hihi,
i usually ferment 1L of milk and about 12hrs later will strain and keep the kefir in the fridge.. we don’t usually finish the kefir within a day.. so a few days later, the whey will start to show up!
regarding taste, it can get very fizzy.. HB tasted slight alcoholic but i didn’t taste much of it.. maybe coz it’s refridgerated?
Yup, maybe because the yeast is sluggish and hence produce less alcohol? Anyway, more often than not, the kefir I made (24 hours fermentation) is quite a strong brew. I often feel a bit bubbly after drinking about 250-300ml of it. lol.
well i prefer my kefir fresh or a little bit aged. else too sour fro my liking, macham like set yogurt.
Ya, I prefer my kefir fresh too. But Dom recommends ripening the kefir under airlock for more health benefits.